Should Christians Read Books About Demons and the Occult?

Question 08102

The question of whether Christians should read occult books needs one distinction made before anything useful can be said. There is an enormous difference between a Christian book about the occult and an actual manual of occult practice, and a great deal of confusion disappears once we separate the two.

Nobody sensible thinks a pastor is in danger for reading a careful evangelical study of spiritual warfare. The harder question concerns primary sources, the material written by practitioners for practitioners, and there my answer is considerably more restrictive than many would expect from someone who reads as widely as I do.

What Happened at Ephesus

Luke gives us one of the most striking scenes in Acts. After the failed exorcism by the sons of Sceva, fear fell on the city and the name of Jesus was extolled. Then this: “And a number of those who had practised magic arts brought their books together and burned them in the sight of all. And they counted the value of them and found it came to fifty thousand pieces of silver” (Acts 19:19).

That was an enormous sum, roughly fifty thousand days of a labourer’s wages. These new believers could have sold the material and given the proceeds to the poor, which would have looked far more responsible. They burned it instead, publicly, and Luke clearly approves.

The word Luke uses for their practices is perierga, meaning curious or meddlesome arts. The books were working manuals: spells, formulae, incantations. Whatever else this passage teaches, it does not suggest that converted practitioners kept their occult books on the shelf for reference. The bonfire was the point.

Innocent as to What Is Evil

Paul gives the governing principle in Romans: “I want you to be wise as to what is good and innocent as to what is evil.” That sentence deserves more attention than it gets, because it cuts against a deep instinct in thoughtful people, which is that understanding something thoroughly is always an advantage.

Paul says no. There are things a Christian is better off not knowing in detail. He says something similar to the Ephesians about the works of darkness, that it is shameful even to speak of the things they do in secret. Detailed knowledge of evil is not a spiritual asset, and the appetite for it is worth examining. We would find it odd if a Christian took an intense interest in the mechanics of fraud or the technique of cruelty. The instinct that finds occult books intriguing is not really different.

That is my chief hesitation about occult books written from the inside. It is not that the ink is dangerous. It is that curiosity is the ordinary route into these things, and reading such material feeds precisely the appetite that ought to be starved.

Does Anyone Need to Read Occult Books?

Some will point out that missionaries, apologists and pastors sometimes need to understand what they are dealing with. That is fair, and I would not lay down an absolute prohibition where Scripture has not.

But I would ask a couple of things of anyone who thinks they need to go to primary sources. Is there a competent Christian treatment that would tell you what you need to know without the exposure? And are you honest with yourself about whether this is duty or fascination? In my experience the second question does most of the work, and it is the one people least want to answer out loud.

I would also say that the need is far rarer than people assume. In many years of ministry I have never once found that a working knowledge of occult books would have helped me pastor someone. What helped was Scripture, patience and the gospel. People who come out of that world do not need me to be an expert in what they left. They need me to know Jesus and to be unshockable, and neither of those is acquired from a library. For related concerns see my answer on whether demons can enter through occult practices.

Why Curiosity Is the Real Issue

Almost every account I have heard of someone becoming entangled in occult practice begins the same way. Not with rebellion, not with a deliberate turning against God, but with interest. Someone was curious. They read something. They wanted to know whether there was anything in it.

Eve was curious too, and the serpent’s approach in Eden was not an offer of evil but an offer of knowledge. You will be like God, knowing good and evil. That is the oldest sales pitch there is, and occult books make exactly the same offer in modern packaging: hidden knowledge, available to those willing to look.

I do not think curiosity is a sin. It is a good thing that has been aimed badly, and the answer is not to become an incurious Christian but to aim the appetite properly. There is more genuine mystery in the doctrine of the Trinity than in every grimoire ever written, and rather more reward in pursuing it.

The Line Between Study and Practice

Deuteronomy 18 forbids divination, fortune telling, omens, sorcery, charms, mediums, necromancers and the consulting of the dead. The prohibition is on practice, and it is absolute. Nothing there forbids knowing that such things exist, which is just as well, since the passage itself describes them.

So the biblical line is not drawn at knowledge but at participation. The trouble with occult books written by practitioners is that they are not written to inform. They are written to induct. A grimoire is not a description of a ritual; it is an instruction to perform one, and reading it as though it were a neutral historical document mistakes what kind of text it is. Occult books of that sort are closer to a recipe than to a report, and nobody reads a recipe without at some level imagining the meal.

That distinction also answers the question about fiction. A novel in which a character practises magic is a different thing from a manual telling the reader how to do so. I would not treat the two as equivalent, though I would still watch the effect on a young reader who is drawn to that world more than to the story. Parents know the difference when they see it.

What to Do If You Own Such Material

If you were involved in these things before conversion and still have the material, I would follow Ephesus. Get rid of it. Not because paper carries a demon, but because keeping it is keeping a door on the latch, and because the act of destroying it is a clean and definite break.

I would not sell it on. Those converts at Ephesus could have recovered a fortune and chose not to, and their instinct was right. A large financial loss, cheerfully accepted, in front of witnesses. Passing occult books to somebody else is not a solution; it is a transfer.

And do it with someone else present if the material has any hold on you at all. There is more on this in my answer on what to do if you have been involved in the occult.

Without Superstition

Let me guard the other flank. Books are not haunted. A believer who has read something they should not have read is not thereby compromised, and no spirit has acquired a claim on them through the printed page. The Spirit who lives in you is greater than anything printed.

So if you have read such things out of curiosity, deal with it as you would any other matter of conscience. Confess it, put the material out of the house, and get on with following Jesus. Do not spiral into fear, because fear is one of the few things the enemy can still do to a Christian, and he is very good at it. A frightened Christian is a useless Christian, and he knows that better than we do.

So, now what?

Have a look at what is actually on your shelves and on your reading device, and be honest about why it is there. Some of it will be perfectly fine. Some of it you have kept out of a sentimental attachment to a version of yourself that Jesus has already dealt with. Occult books in particular have a way of surviving several house moves without anyone quite deciding to keep them.

Then feed the appetite that matters. A Christian who is genuinely absorbed in Scripture rarely develops a hunger for occult books, and the surest protection against a fascination with darkness has always been a greater fascination with the One who is light.

What have you been curious about lately, and where is that curiosity actually taking you? It is a question worth asking before the answer becomes obvious in hindsight.

I want you to be wise as to what is good and innocent as to what is evil.

Romans 16:19 (ESV)