Do Demons Exist According to Judaism? (Ft Rabbi Pinchas Taylor)

today's topic is demons we're going to look at it through a historical lens we're going to look through it from a jewish lens all the way from biblical times up to the modern era and kind of get like a crash course explanation in how jews had viewed demons kind of obscure topic but a fun one nonetheless i'm sure it'll be fun for for everyone the biblical text the talmudic sages and all throughout rabbinic tradition there are innumerable references to malevolent powers that are identified as demons now these demons or evil spirits are non-human influences which can manipulate people in an assortment of ways the prevalence of the topic of demons was summed up by rabbi manasseh in israel a 17th century sage who said that the opinion of all jewish authorities is that the biblical references to spirits are to be taken literally many talmudic statements uh can be interpreted uh allegorically however demons cannot the sheer number of talmudic references to these sources demonstrates that we are dealing with some sort of actual phenomena that's the marthrius in in shabbos now the babylonians were famous for their magic back way back when and their demonology similar to egypt and the time of moses which was also steeped in magic now it's difficult for us today to sort of fully grasp what you know belief in demons meant to the ancients because these forces for them played a very active role in their life but today in the modern era and civilized society it seems that most people would like reject this that the average person today is not really concerned with demons we're kind of like beyond that however it's something interesting to note that the baylor department of sociology was given a three-year grant from the john and templeton foundation to conduct a nationally representative survey you know a multi-year survey of religious values practices and behaviors and in their research they found that 67 percent of the american people believe in demons or demonic possession now the percentage goes up as as as the age group that they're focusing in on gets younger the amount of people believing in demons is much more but nonetheless the idea is that 67 of the people that were surveyed over the course of three years believed in demons so again that doesn't mean that there are demons or that there's not demons that just says that as a society we can't just write it off and say yeah nobody believes in that anymore it's not a part of you know our our daily life anymore it really is and for most people in society it would seem that it's not but according to this particular study 67 percent actually believe in demons now let's talk about some demon terminology in in a torah context there are several terms that are used in jewish literature to describe these forces right and they're all sort of like colloquially lumped together under the term demons so the term that's most frequent to describe demons is a magic or the mazikin which literally means a damage or damager destroyer another common term is a shade or plural shading which is uh which carries a association just with demons and the last term that's commonly used is a ruach or a ruachra an evil spirit which has also a broader spectrum not just talking about demons but there are certain things that are said to have like a bad presence or a bad spirit about it which will which we'll get into a little bit later so besides for the general terminology there are specific names of demons and demon classes classes of demons in jewish literature as well there's one famous demon named ashmedai and he uh rashi the biblical commentator uh says about a verse in isaiah excuse me in the in the book of shmuel he says the word that's used over there for a plague is is a reference to the demon ash madai he said that this particular demon was expelled from heaven after rebelling against god and the talmud deems this character as the king of the demons the the the ruler of all demons so ash medai seems to have a sort of um be like the generic name for the king of the demons in the same way that pharaoh paro is the generic name for whoever is the leader of egypt is like the the general name of the leader of the demon it's like a title which is actually interesting because the word ashmidai and the word paro have the same gematria they have the same numeric value in in jewish numerology now the talmud also tells a an interesting story the gemaran gittin about king solomon malek who asked this king of the demons where to find the shamir worm in order to uh which was used in the construction of the temple later what happens is ash madai takes the image of like he makes himself look like and he actually kicks a day uh 40 days distance away ash madai is now sitting on the throne posing as as king solomon is a 40 days journey away and he's telling everybody i'm the king i'm the king and no one's believing him they think he's a crazy person finally he gets back to jerusalem and he he identifies himself to the sanhedrin and they go about uh expelling ashman but the the idea is uh this this character is plays a role in in talmudic stories then there's another demon character named azazel azazel is mentioned in the torah it's connected with the holiday of yum kippur the day of atonement aaron the the high priest casts lots over two goats one is for azazel which is presented alive before god and then it's released into the wilderness some of the commentaries say that azazel is the name of the place that the goat is driven to and the talmud teaches that the sacrifice to azazel atones for immorality which is promoted by fallen angels that azazel is named after the ramban quotes rabbi eliezer godzill who connects azazel this character this demon with supernatural demons an evil spirit that is identified with another uh evil spirit sameel the the angel of death so azazel is connected with sutton samayal it's uh they're kind of like one of the same things the great tempter azazel the this particular demon is also mentioned uh as a demon in the in the dead as a demon in the dead sea scrolls um as well as in the apocrypha literature the supplemental biblical texts then there's another famous presence or famous demon malevolent energy the major talks about ketev mariri which means literally bitter destruction it's a kind of dangerous spirit that's discussed that's referenced to in partial zazino in moses farewell address in the parish of hazino and this force kate of prevails especially from the 17th of thomas until the 9th of of during the period in jewish and jewish during the during the jewish jewish year that mourns the destruction of the of the holy temple it says that uh this negative energy um has ramifications in jewish law this sort of negative presence that that's present during that time has has uh ramifications in jewish law in that it uh there's a potential danger during that time so in other words actually rules that a person should not uh walk by themselves or do certain other dangerous activities during those times during that three-week period then there is another demon identified as a female demon she is known in hebrew as lilith and in english as lilith she appears in in the bible text in the book of isaiah the book of isaiah and some some commentaries on the verse where where it speaks about her they talk about her as the mother of all demons she is the queen of the demons and she also is described that way in the zohar as well now lulu has mentioned as well in the dead sea scrolls the talmud which makes several references to lilith describes her as a demon with a human face and with wings and particularly long hair she's known as sort of like a seductress that goes around and and uh bothers men especially and also is goes after children then another famous uh demon character samael which we mentioned a little bit earlier this is the agent of death the malacha mavis as was known in hebrew the the agent of deathly uh some say that this agent was created on the first day of creation with the creation of darkness other authorities would like to say that this particular entity was not created until after alderman adaman and adam and eve committed their sin interest interestingly the zohar describes the the snake in the garden of eden as being synonymous with both the evil inclination and the angel of death so sort of like a physical embodiment of this spiritual entity there's there are many other demonic names uh mentioned throughout the talmud and throughout jewish literature we're not going to go through all of them but just know that they they happen to have a fairly wide presence now one thing that's interesting is there is that there is a very large uh quantitatively there's a there's a lot of references to demons in the babylonians homeless there aren't hardly any in the jerusalem talmud in tamir shalom and one of the reasons for that rabbi avraham yitzchak explains that the reason for that is because the sanctity the holiness of eretz israel of israel prevented any negativity from from coming into it so it wasn't something that was particularly bothersome to them so they didn't really write so much about it let's talk about the creation of demon where do they come from what's their we'll get to what's their purpose so let's talk about their creation so the creation of demons is described in various ways uh there's one statement that says the mazikin that they were created on the eve of the first shabbos the eve of the first sabbath that's that's what it says in parque office the ethics of our fathers elsewhere it says that they are sort of the offspring they are sort of like this uh negative spiritual offspring that came about from adam and eve after they separated uh following their sin following the sin of adam and eve and they were expelled from the garden of eden there was a there was a period of time where they were separated from each other it says in other places that demons are a result of that jewish jewish tradition teaches as well that when new york when noah was gathering all the animals onto the ark and seven of the kosher animals two of the non-kosher animals rashi mentions very clearly that there was also two demons that were taken to sort of i guess prolong their existence keep their exist keep them in existence another another place where we see demons in the in the biblical text is that during the tower of bubble the tower of babel there were three factions three different groups with three different motivations as to why to build this tower so one of the factions that wanted to go to war with god it says that their punishments was they were transformed into demons that's one of the things that that took place in some context in some texts of jewish mysticism becoming a demon is also the destined punishment for some of the wicked that could be like your you know your punishment anyway so how do they look what's a demon look like um so again just for fyi whenever we give a description of spiritual matters we all we always have to remember that these are anthropomorphic associations in the same way that when we open up a copy of the torah we open up the bible and it describes god as taking us out with a you know a strong hand and an outstretched arm or god spoke these words or he uh heard the cries of the people that god does not have ears does not have a mouth does not have arms these are you know sort of borrowed terms in order that we can relate to it in the same way when the when the talmud and our collective jewish literature is explaining you know demons or anything spiritual the the terms that are being used are not meant to be taken in the most literal of sense they they basically are certain physical descriptions that are uh you know that are related over jewish literature to sort of emblematically shape some sort of aspect of truth about the nature of demons so first of all the talmud says that the sheer quantity of demons outnumbers that of humans it's considered actually a blessing that we aren't able to see them because we wouldn't be able to stand uh seeing so many of these creatures demons are sort of like they're described as having sort of an intermediate or intermediary level between angels and and human beings they're described that the shade are described that in three ways they are like angels and in three ways they are like people so they are said to have wings and fly from one end of the earth to the other and they know the future that's like the angels and they also eat drink and die and reproduce that just as humans do um although in in normal circumstances they are invisible the talmud actually offers a certain diagnostic ritual as a means of sort of detecting them so demons can also have the appearance of a human being as well we mentioned the story of king solomon that is also an option as well rashi actually distinguishes between the appearances of each genre of demons in various places now their effects various sources in jewish tradition say that the power of demons sort of shifts between you know different hours of the day different weeks different uh days of the year times of the year the talmud says that evil spirits are or more of a threat in the evening they sort of prefer the the night hours or or whatnot also demons are said to avoid groups so it's like buddy system you know if you're if you're working in buddy's system then you have no uh no need to fear for the demons now this is a this this next uh section that we're going to talk about is is something really really strange and really interesting as well okay we're going to talk about demonic sightings in jewish law how how there are certain certain roles or certain situations where the proposal of of an interaction with a demon is presented and how jewish law would sort of treat that very interesting take a look so in jewish law the concept of a demon comes up actually quite quite a few times there's examples uh uh right after right off the bat that were meant to avoid things certain things because of because of a bad spirit or bad presence again the the context isn't you know demons like goblins with horns and pitchforks it's like a negative presence for example you know you take your negovos or in the morning you have your the basin that you wash your hands with so it says that the the water that you wash you know into that into the basin it shouldn't be disposed of an area where people are walking you know dispose of it in a place that's and no one's gonna be around um there are other things that were said that we shouldn't uh we shouldn't eat and things that are uh that were stored under a bed certain things that are like garlic or whatnot that was left peeled overnight so it says that you shouldn't have them because of ruach so again as far as the practical implications to modern day consult your local rabbi but the idea is certainly is certainly there then there's an there's actually an open discussion about the permissibility of conjuring demons meaning is it logically permissible to conjure demons like to sort of you know gather them together or use them for your own purposes or or what not so the tour quotes the opinion um that involvement with demons is forbidden because it's like sorcery but the rush another medieval sage he permits it he says that you would technically be allowed to to conjure them again parenthetically people today are not of the spiritual character to be involved in these practices in fact rabbi yosef karo the author of the shohana warns that one who involves themselves and demons will not get away unscathed so if you had any thoughts of conjuring demons tonight hold off on that urge and uh and just don't do it all right graviosocaro says that you're not going to get out unscathed unscathed so then there's an interesting discussion in jewish law as to whether it's permitted to ask a demon for help in finding lost object okay additionally there's an even more there are also more peculiar topics addressed in several jewish legal texts such as the marital status of someone who who meets a demon so someone meets a demon and they're married like what's their what's their jewish legal status as far as is it considered adultery or or not or there this is actually something that is is discussed a further somewhat related topic also centers around a bill of divorce a get when you uh that's it's the jewish bill of divorce uh uh that that is given so traditionally this is something that is initiated uh by the husband so the mishna teaches that if let's say you hear some voice calling out from a pit there's a pit or like a well and you hear a voice calling out it says you know please write a bill of divorce to my wife and and give it to her so what's uh what jewish law teaches the talmud says that um you know we listen to him we write the we write the bill of divorce however it makes a uh clarification that we listen to him as long as we can determine that it's not the voice of a demon posing as the husband in order to divorce the wife so it's kind of interesting kind of uh off the beaten path but nonetheless present in in jewish literature so with these few examples we can gain some insight of just how permeated demonic presence is within the talmudic and the jewish legal writings let's talk a little bit about what the jewish mystics say so the ram khal writes that all the non-legal sections of the talmud contain ideas that are too esoteric to be presented to the general public who would surely misunderstand them the sages encapsulated these ideas into cryptic statements passing on their innermost meaning to exceptional disciples who would be able to decipher them appropriately meaning in the same way that that someone could read the biblical text and make a misunderstanding of what their what they are seeing if they don't have an oral tradition around it you know if somebody just reads the bible an english translation of the bible they can misinterpret what is actually being said what being what is being commanded we have an oral tradition that accompanies our biblical text in this in a similar way with the non-legal stories that are recorded in the talmud the the sages sort of um encrypted these very uh very spiritual esoteric ideas into these stories so again when the talmud mentions these stories of demons we can't take the actual encounters and the the exact scenarios that are being described as completely literal okay they're they contain very esoteric concepts and meaning so he clarifies the role of demons uh using sort of a sort of mystical terminology why why are there demons explain this to ramachan it's an interesting thing to to sort of keep in mind explains that god can be said to be the single sustainer the original source the primary operating force in creation and at the same time there are tools that god has set up to sort of interface with creation meaning in order to go from infinite god oneness of god to a physical world of action there are sort of a gradation of steps a devolution and tools that are used that god uh can influ can uh interface with the world in in order to make his will come out manifest in a physical way so in other words you have god his infinite in his infinite will and he's he wishes to confer it over to the creation so in order for that will to manifest itself in a physical way there are stops along the way sort of tools that that translate that will and sort of coarsen it into a a palatable way that the world can can reflect so god created a chain of command of sorts to you know sort of course in his influence from lofty spiritual to lowly physical angels are one means of this interface the stars and constellations are said to be part of that interface and demons as well are a a tool in that in that interface so uh demons cannot be experienced with the five senses so they might thought to be spiritual yet they do interface with the material world so they have sort of like a connection with with the physical so they're not really quite spiritual they're not really quite physical they're the interface in between now the kabbalists and the hasidic masters draw parallel between the concept of demonic activity in the world at large and the working of the demons within all over jewish tradition we are taught that what happens within us is reflective of what happens in the world at large and vice versa what happens in the world at large is also reflected in us in other words you're a small world after all right so whatever's taking place in the world in the big world takes place in the inner world so the kabbalists actually make this comparison this parallel and they write that man produces mankind produces the demons from within via their thought their speech and their actions the jewish demons are described as our negative inclinations toward things that are permissible to us for example a person has like an animalistic drive towards a kosher hamburger but it's like a gluttonous drive and the quote-unquote non-jewish demons would be a drive to something that is not permitted to us a a desire a strong desire for a cheeseburger for example now again the the the jewish demons uh and the and the gentile demons are just about the quality of the of what the desire is within the person so in the same way we're saying that when a person will uh cultivate their desire and act upon it not only are they sort of uh letting their evil inclination win within themself but they're also causing that within the world at large there's sort of like a you know a negativity that is brought to the world but the other side of that coin is that when a person brings some positivity and and overcomes their inclination within themselves they do the same thing in the world at large the outside world and the forces that play a role in the world at large are largely dependent on us we we have a very shared role in in what takes place now i want to make a just a small sort of you know digress for for a moment and talk about uh the rambam so in in many circles there are people that say that the rambam was sort of like an exception to the rule in academic circles it's generally accepted that the rambam uh the famed and evil sage maimonides denied the existence of demons that's what that's what people say a large segment of the of the jewish population also says that as well the rambam nowhere explicitly denies the existence of demons it's sort of implied through many places in his writings rabbi yosef ergus a 17th century italian rabbi and kabbalist wrote that the rambam deemed belief in demons to be nonsense and stupidity okay so there were certain sages that understood the rambam to be rejecting demons based on the way that he was describing them in his throughout his writings so the gra the gun of vilna he actually in his commentary on the shulhanar takes the rambam to task about his stance on demons he says that when describing the rambam's look at magic and demons and the way that the rambam sort of brushes them off the guru comments that the rambam was actually um led astray in this area because of his study of philosophy that he got was you know consumed with philosophy and in this area with be it magic or demons or or these types of things that he was sort of led astray in this in these things now the gura encourages that the that the jewish people follow the talmud which teaches that amulets are efficacious and that demons exist their album again does not simply reject all of the talmudic references you know we mentioned before there's a lot of talmudic reference to demons throughout them just doesn't say well you know those don't exist he simply he seems to classify the tales about them as parables or as deep illusions that they're hinting at something else that they're not talking about these you know sort of like evil spirits evil forces the meeri who is another great medieval sage also tends to expound on these occurrences uh in a similar way however the conclusion that the rambam didn't believe in demons may not be so simple other rabbinic sages said that the ram surely did believe in demons a very large number of urbanic sages right with assurance that the rambam certainly believed in the existence of demons there's an early 20th century scholar head of the yeshiva ortera and stannislav which is over in europe claims that demons were simply not found where the rambam lived and calls it utter nonsense to say that the the rambam uh didn't believe that demons ever existed he said that they just weren't prevalent in that time in that place but to say that the rambam never believed that demons never existed he said is is preposterous uh the khatsuka rabbi rabbi mendel writes that in the earlier in the earlier generations demons existed however the rambam as a towering legal authority was actually able to change material reality through his jewish legal pronouncements we know that in in jewish tradition in jewish law paiseka of when they make a decree so the reality conforms to to that reality in other words the person comes to thereof or pasek with a chicken and you want to know is it kosher is it not kosher like the way that it was shafted is it was it done properly not properly so when thereof based on his understanding of tara makes the sack and says kosher the material reality of that thing is that it is kosher in other words we think sometimes people like to ask well what if the love is wrong or what the plastic is wrong you know saying that it was kosher he's not wrong because once he says kosher material reality conforms that it is now it is kosher obviously he's doing if he's doing it you know as a god-fearing individual who knows a lot of torah knows how to apply it so his sock actually changes the material reality so the katsukarabi said about their album that the rambam wasn't saying that demons never existed and whatnot but when he was saying when when he wrote in such a way that implied that demons didn't exist what he was actually doing was making a sack that demons should no longer exist and he was sort of like eradicating the demons from the world and when he made this decree it was sort of agreed upon on earth that there would be no more demons so that's how that's how uh the katskarabi uh explains the rambam's position which seems to again be dismissive of demons the min the the rebbe of munkach so he actually has a very interesting look at what the rambam was doing in his approach to demons says that the there's a in the talmud in the gemara it says that demons only affect only or can only bother someone who is bothered by them maybe if you're not trouble with them you don't but if you don't bother with them they won't bother you okay so being that the rambam was living in an area he lived in egypt in medieval times where belief in demons was very prevalent there was actually a grave danger to those people why because they believed in them so again the talmud says that demons will only trouble someone who is troubled by them they'll only bother someone who's bothered by them so if the if they don't if you kind of write them off you know you kind of disregard them they'll disregard you right so the the salazar says that what was the rambam doing the ramadan is living in medieval egypt where everyone's believing in demons and magic and sorcery and whatever so he says he implies demons don't exist around them says you know demons don't exist in order that the people stop believing in them and then they won't be affected by them it's sort of like a way to protect the people that's what says so again it seems that there's more to the story than meets the eye and we can't just dismiss the rambam is being a a non-believer in in demons now what about demons nowadays that's the question everyone wants to know when they're walking back to your home are you going to be attacked by the demons so the even in even in the times of the qu'anim they write that in their day evil spirits were not as numerous as they were in talmudic times one of the things that that we have to know is that spiritually we are undergoing sort of a devolution of sorts devolution meaning that the earlier generations most connected with the creation of adam and eve you know created by god's hand or the generation connected with the giving of the torah the the pinnacle of spiritual experience every generation that goes by is one generation further removed from that level of perfection so every generation that goes by every period that goes by is a less spiritual time we are more sort of calloused to our our spiritual abilities what we can perceive and whatnot and being that that's the case our achievements on the on the side of good are are become more limited for example prophecy leaves the jewish people when we are no longer deserving of it when we're not spiritually capable of achieving prophecy and so forth so the idea uh is that that hashem what he does is he keeps everything both in the good forces and the negative forces parallel in the world so meaning when we have positive spiritual abilities and capabilities that everyone's able to tap into and see so we also are given challenges in negativity that are also prevalent and powerful that that parallel the same intensity of the side of good so meaning when there's prophecy and there's all sorts of positive spiritual energies that we can tap into there's also things like a very strong drive title worship we notice that you know throughout the torah literature throughout the the greater biblical literature the jewish people are constantly being led astray into idol worship you think what were they so stupid you know they they weren't but it's just that if again if you are if you're granted the ability if you're granted the power on the good side to have things like prophecy and and temple and uh tabernacle and seek open godliness and sacrifices and and and be granted that ability on the side of good in order to keep our free will um balanced hashem gives us also the drive for the negative is also much stronger as well so when we are when our abilities on the positive end are also limited the the our abilities uh what we're susceptible to on the negative end are also lessened so one of the things that is taught is that when prophecy ended also the drive for idolatry ended as well you know they kind of came simultaneously so again we had this great positive thing taken away from us but also our susceptibility to the negative was taken away from us as well and the same thing applies with demons so being that spiritually we have become much more coarsened than previous generations again the name wrote that demons were less effective in their days than they were in the in the talmudic times because they were already one era more removed so how much more so in our days that our susceptibility to demons because we're so coarse and on the positive of course we're so cursing spiritually in the positive light that our susceptibility to the you know any bad things that could come from demons is also weakened it's practically non-existent okay there are rabbinic scholars that differ as to whether or not demons or evil spirits exists nowadays or have any effect on us nowadays and it has it really has to do with you know being that we are spiritually feeble on the positive end we are also granted that we're not susceptible to the uh negative influences that that that can be present as well so let's talk about some interesting practical more contemporary views so rapsada kakayan of leblin who was a great 19th century talmudist who later became a hasidic master he he personifies psychic these psychic forces that aid a person's life in the positive as like angels and things that uh either thoughts or illusions that hinder a person as demons so again if a person wants to grasp a sense of what it's like to having sort of an angel helping you or a demon hurting you it it can be likened to when we have uh you know positive thoughts and and and and and good aspirations and good drive towards the positive that's like an a it's like being helped by an angel and uh negative thoughts or you know illusions or whatnot that's that hinder us and hinder our progress is similar to um having a demon up against you now one another interesting contemporary more contemporary source of aaron celavech he explains that these invisible malevolent demons that are discussed in talmudic times are actually referring to germs germs and bacteria he says that this was the language that was available to the jewish sages to describe those thousands of harmful influences that surround a person at all times meaning they didn't have the in the lexicon of the talmudic sages to describe what was actually taking place so they described it as like sort of demonic energy the things that will harm you and they're all around us and and whatnot so germs and microscopic bacteria again were not part of their language they didn't have the the sages couldn't say that there's these microscopic bacteria that are out to get you so reverend television because contemporary uh jewish sage tells us that these these things may have been referenced to like germs and bacteria and that was just the way that the language that that the sages had to to sort of describe it you know if you if you look at these what bacteria looks like under a microscope it probably looks like this like hairy creature or whatnot the sages were using the the terminologies that they that they had um that they had access to so that that's that's his opinion that's that's sort of his view additionally that he writes that these invisible destructive forces um are descriptions of mental illness as well hallucinations or other like explanation demonstrating the brilliant insight of the sages that they were sort of you know on this track they recognize these the presence of these things in the world long before they were uh discovered with our tools that we have today the rebaim really uh seemed to not uh get too into demons they were they didn't uh demons were certainly not a focus in uh in daily life or certain certainly not something that we should be overly fearful of or whatnot uh i believe it was the minhasa lazer that says that the balchemtev um sort of banished demons from civilized areas as well so and that's already a few generations back so now i mean there's really nothing to worry about because our spirituality of the average person from the time of the belgian is uh is is lacking tremendously and so our susceptibility to negative influence uh correspondingly is is that there as well so um there's a very there's a very interesting uh insight from ravi yitzhak uh hutner the rasheeva of heim berlin he gives an interesting perspective uh of the rambam on demons which which helps bring sort of philosophical clarity to the entire concept he writes he writes like this check this out all that exists in the world has an analog in man and the opposite is also true everything that exists in man finds an analog in the world we have parallel we discussed this earlier now in the mind of man we possess the power of imagination right because that's the power of imagination which when man can sketch a reality that in fact does not exist in the world right use your imagination right we can make a whole world in our head that doesn't really exist so it is a reality only by the power of imagination the reality that's taking place in your imagination is only a reality by power of your imagination so since the kind of power exists in man it certainly has a creaturely analog in the world the creatures whom we call demons are sort of like the imagination of the world the way that imagination plays itself out in in the world at large in other words demons are sort of a reality non-reality according to putner he says the proof that the proof looks something like this when we speak about something as being a figment of your imagination what do we mean the thing is not real that's a figment of your imagination it has no reality however to the researcher in human psychology at the moment of his examination of the inner workings of the mind is imagination reality yes so in other words there is a concept of imagination imagination is something that that we have that there's there is a tangible concept called imagination yet the very being of what is in the container of the imagination is fantasy it's not real so is imagination real well yes there is a concept of imagination and to the one imagining the imagination he is really imagining an imagination so imagination does exist but imagination doesn't exist what you're imagining doesn't exist it's not a wacky concept but it's a fascinating way to describe also sort of the discrepancy or the seeming discrepancy that the rambam has with the non-existence of demons right so the whether they exist or they they don't exist the the idea is is sort of in the way that imagination exists and doesn't exist but again and being that within us we have this power of imagination we have this faculty so the parallel in the world would be this concept of demons which are a reality non-reality as well so again just as a person has an imagination so does nature so does the world just as man's imagination is real to him or her nature's imagination is ostensibly real to it so it's an interesting approach now there seems to be a somewhat related approach even among some contemporary researchers now although modern academia as a whole rejects the present the presence of demons or other supernatural phenomena there are some scientists who acknowledge certain quasi-spiritual premises that may be instructive in our understanding of demons one such person is a man by the name of dean raiden he's a leading researcher and extra sensory perception a senior scientist at the inter the excuse me at the institute of noetic studies and an adjunct faculty member at the department of psychology at sonoma state university so raiden dean raiden he views demons as a projection of the unconscious explains that there's some sort there's some kind of inter-subjective reality that we create between ourselves and others by sharing thoughts and feelings meaning that our thoughts sort of have are able to make a tangible reality in the world so in other words he's sort of of the idea of what we were talking about from the jewish mystics that everything that happens within us happens in the world at large and every time we cultivate within ourselves uh like you know our negative urges that the negativity in the world also ensues and when we when we cultivate our positive inclination the positive in the world increases as well so he's he explains it that our thoughts actually can have a tangible reality and effect in the world he says our intentions to some degree can affect the world around us more than other people think one might sort of create a shared mental space which can appear as it were for lack of a better term as an angel or as a demon so when he when he this this uh this professor actually so he's he was discussing ghosts and hauntings and demons he rules out the id he rules out the idea that these are exclusively psychological in nature and suggests that there is some tangibility to the claims as well he proposes that these entities came from many years of people paying close attention to a given space meaning when this happens so so you have a a building that they they say is haunted so he says that when they say it's haunted or there's demons there or what not he's saying that it's not just psychological that these demons exist there or that this presence exists there meaning that because so many people have experienced such negativity there or place such negativity with their thoughts in this place that the material reality actually conforms to the thoughts and it's given some sort of presence in that in that place again so when people are thinking negatively or or looking at something as a negative energy or negative force he says when this happens it actually changes the energy of the place and when somebody new comes along in the vicinity perhaps that person perhaps the per it will resonate in a different person uh in the same way with the intentions that went back to that initial person he calls he calls the the idea place memory that if a person has negative associations about a place and a lot of people a lot of negative stuff happened in a place and people are thinking negatively about a place he says that there's a concept called place memory that the you know the tangible space of that area actually carries with it a certain negative energy you ever ever ever uh use the term like uh i'm getting bad vibes right in in a similar way that there's more to what we experience than you know might meet the eye to begin with um again dr rayden he's he's he speculates that in that on an informational level the material reality of this place actually changes in some way that sort of it sort of stores the information which can later be picked up on by another bystander you know i just get bad vibes here well it's because you know according to him this place maybe maybe had some negative uh you know influence there in the past people thought that about it bad stuff happened there whatever the case may be as a scientist uh dr raiden prefers this kind of sort of quasi-physical explanation as opposed to a spiritual one but he does not rule out the possible spiritual alternative but refers to it as something like a collective unconscious or he calls it large esp at any rate all these conclusions aren't in perfect sync with traditional torah perspective of demons it's curiously interesting that even in secular study um they're they are unlocking certain peripheral ideas i want to conclude with this one idea i think the main thing to to take out of any talk or any discussion of demonic presence or negative energy is that we always have a correlating and corresponding positive energy as well that when we look around at events in the world and we see negativity we always have to know on the other side of the coin by by the way that hashem creates the world is that there is always a positive force that we may not we may not be seeing viewing whatever but it is very much presence it is it is it is there also within ourselves if we feel that we have challenges if we feel that we have thoughts that are hindering us if we feel that we have disadvantages on the other side of the coin hashem has equally granted us talents abilities motivations good characteristics as well to have that balance so any time a person in themself feels negativity or has negativity or the people that they're interacting with at their job or in their workplace in their neighborhood i should say they feel a certain like negativity over there there is one clear way to eradicate any negative influence it's through infusing that negative influence with positivity when we add in positivity negativity goes away when we add in our light darkness dissipates so if a person once again feels within yourself or feel within the world around you negativity drop a nuclear bomb of torah and mitzvahs upon it and we'll see how much it lights up your life thank you very much click subscribe to see more exclusive content for the most sought after jewish speakers teachers and thinkers

Channel: Jewish Learning Institute

Views: 74,669

Keywords: jli, Jewish Learning Institute

Id: JEcxdwSe4To

Length: 52min 29sec (3149 seconds)

Published: Thu Feb 11 2021