The difference between a witch and a witch-doctor

Thanks for posting Jim. I just read a book review written by David Tuesday Adamo of the book Divining the Woman of Endor: African Culture, Postcolonial Hermeneutics, and the Politics of Biblical Translation by J. Kabamba Kiboko_._ Kiboko makes similar conclusions as Priest does, at least as far as 1 Sam 28 and the woman of Endor is concerned. Adamo says this book is a must read when it comes to decolonizing Bible translations. https://www.bookreviews.org/bookdetail.asp?TitleId=11642 

Comparing the insights of Priest and Kiboko was useful to me. I appreciate Priest's bravery in taking the argument to the challenge of translating Exodus 22:18, which seems to put the ideologically aware translator between a rock and a hard place. Even through Priest clearly signals the danger of translating Ex 22:18 as a Category two, a clearly malevolent spiritual-material actor, choosing a category one translation, a shaman or diviner, does not relieve the translator of ideological danger given the challenge of colonial denigrations of all shamanic activitiy as described by Kiboko (and also by Priest even though Priest uses different language). 

On the other hand, if one reads Kiboko's work on 1 Sam 28 which leads a translator away from the colonial habit of demonizing shamans and applies that logic too quickly to Exodus 22:18 without considering the harmful aspects of witchcraft accusations which Priest raises, a decolonizing reading might choose "a malevolent witch" or Category Two. Notwithstanding Priest's claim about what the Hebrew originally meant, Priest argues such a translation does not lead to good pastoral practice. It invites witchcraft suspicions, accusations and even potential vigilante behavior. 

What strategies can translators employ with a text like Exodus 22:18 which urges captial punishment?! How does a translator warn contemporary readers of the dangers of a text that is being misued in more than one "harmful" direction - either to denigrate African shamanic practice as so evil to merit capital punishment, or to exacerbate witchcraft suspicions, accusations, and vigilante capital punishment applied disproportionally to vulnerable people on the other?

Hi Nathan, Thanks for some good reflections. It seems like you are finding: the devil if you do, and the devil if you don't!

Unfortunately Kiboko's book is a little expensive ... 

You raise some very good questions in your final paragraph. I am not sure if Priest considered all those questions at sufficient depth, or not. Exodus 22:18 is a 'frightening' verse! To answer your questions would require further research, it seems to me ...

Taking the Luo language (Western Kenya), we don't have a word for 'witch', as such. If you say 'jajuok', which would seem to be 'witch', the term refers specifically to a night runner. In a sense (thinking on  my feet), the reason for this is because EVERYONE is a witch. That is - we all can, and do, 'juok' each other. (Any displeasure I feel at your prosperity has had me already 'bewitch' you.) We can add, that to my understanding, juok was once more 'neutral' than it is now - 'power', rather than implicitly 'evil power'. 

Rightly, Priest identifies a 'problem', that African pastors act as 'witchdoctors', i.e. they try to help people with issues of having been bewitched. If one wants to help people, and bewitchment is the way they perceive their predicament, then it's very hard not to come across as a 'witchdoctor'. Even should one vocally deny that one is against 'a witch', one is still likely to be perceived as being such. 

So, my on-the-hoof suggestion to translate Ex. 22:18 is 'witch-promoter'. That is, someone who goes out of their way (as did Saul re. the witch of Endor?) to draw on witchcraft beliefs when the context would seem not to require such. That is, I am distinguishing being 'passively' against witchcraft, from being 'actively' against witchcraft. Passively (in much of Africa), one has to be. Actively, as a Christian, one shouldn't be. 

This issue is a major reason, speaking personally, why I am reluctant to engage closely with pastoral issues in African contexts. That is, if one applies Western counselling principles, then if not the dead, one will find witches blamed for people's predicaments. If one simply 'denies', one is the fool. If one 'responds', one is the witchdoctor. Hence, I guess, the necessary emphasis on 'preaching the word,' i.e. declaring Jesus, over and above more 'pastoral' approaches. To follow Priest's suggestion, in this sense, implies that pastoral counselling could deserve the death penalty.

Here's a response to me from the author of the article concerned:

Jim,

Thanks for passing along this email comment and reference. I just ordered Kiboko’s book, which I’d not seen before. Feel free to pass along my comments below to whoever might have actually read my original article.

These are complex matters, and I’m not in a position time-wise to give a great deal of time to back and forth discussion. But I’ll give a brief set of clarifying comments and hope that is sufficient for now. At some future point a fuller discussion and exploration would be great.

In my view the woman at Endor should never have been labeled a “witch” – but rather a diviner or medium. Nonetheless, a careful and full reading of the biblical text signals that among the people of God such a diviner/medium was not to be making a living recruiting clients. So, there is a sort of judgment in the texts themselves, not simply in what colonialists sometimes illegitimately read into the texts. That is, there are quite a few passages (such as Deut 18:9-14 or Leviticus 20:27) insisting that traditional shamanic/mediumistic practitioners were not to be present in Israel (“not to be found among you”) recruiting clients, but should be “cut off from my people,” and even “put to death.”

And while even these passages resist simple translation, with virtually any translation using indigenous words contestable in terms of how exact a fit they are, they often do identify categories somewhat similar to traditional diviners/healers in many African societies. And while such translated passages have certainly led Christians to insist that Christians should not be clients of such diviners/mediums (and be disciplined if they are – as with the CCAP in Malawi), I’m not aware that these translations have contributed to such diviners being killed in large numbers, as with accused “witches.”  So yes, churches have generally understood Scripture to disapprove of such mediums/diviners. The full consequences of this are difficult to assess.

For example, if we follow the view of anthropologist Michael Brown in his little classic “the dark side of the shaman,” anytime you have shamans/diviners whose central diagnostic category for authoritatively explaining affliction is to attribute it to some nearby relative, colleague or neighbor who is said to really be a secret and evil witch, then you have a magico-religious practitioner who, in the name of healing/helping, actually sows suspicion, accusation and death [negative social capital]. Pastors can also do the same thing, and thus can have a “dark” side to their ministry.

Among the Sukuma of Tanzania, for example, thousands of diviners convince roughly half of their clients that their misfortunes are due to some nearby relative, neighbor, or colleague that secretly hates them and is trying to kill them. Among the Aguaruna of Peru, shamans assert nearly 100% of the time, that some nearby relative, neighbor, or colleage secretly hates them and is trying to kill them, and is the reason for their misfortune. These are not neutral diagnoses. 

To merge the ideas of anthropologist Richard Shweder with those of theologian Rene Girard: “Any diagnostic system that illegitimately accuses (scapegoats) innocent people is doing the work of the great Accuser Satan.” Of course, in my view, when pastors do this they are not doing it with genuine continuity with the Christian faith. But when diviners do this, they are doing what in many societies [not all] has been a core attribute of diviners. As purveyors of negative social capital, it is possible on purely secular grounds, to view such “healers” with deep ambivalence.

In any case, if one follows my analysis and suggestions in translating the Exodus passage, this does not introduce anything new that is not already in other texts.

But if one translates the Exodus passage using words for secret killer – it provides the sole biblical ideological underpinning for witch accusation practices horrific for the accused (widows, orphans, elderly, poor). That is, I argue on substantive grounds this is a bad translation, and on consequential grounds, that the error is serious.

Having said that, I’m naturally delighted to see further engagement of the issues by others, including substantive discussion and debate.

Robert Priest

Professor of Anthropology, Taylor University

To add some more comment: I have heard some very harsh criticism, if not condemnation, of African pastors, for their involvement in witch accusation. That cuts a little for Christians, who see ourselves as offering a way out of the witch-accusation thing! ... Of course one should consider the counter-factual: what would the situation be were there no Christianity in Africa, for example? I think that question is much more enlightening to those who are well informed (although of course the question remains theoretical.) It would be 'horror'. ... Perhaps an example to look at, though not that people understand its situation well particularly because of the extreme unsettlement, is that of Somalia. 

In perhaps an 'evolutionary' view, then, countries like Nigeria, have much less and much less effective witchcraft accusation going on than if the Gospel were not so widespread there. Perhaps the rate of killings through witchcraft is only 10% of what it would have been had there been no churches, for example. While that 10% remains horrific, we should make appropriate and not inappropriate comparisons for purpose of evaluation. 

The bible I think clearly communicates that God is the one who determines human fortune. Pastors who teach from the bible 'must' get that in due course. Not, though, of course, in the way that 'we' in the West would prefer them to. (Westerners are not God after all.) 

I am sure this issue is key for bible translators. I don't have comments on further pertinent translation examples. Except to say - in the West, the difference between 'God' and 'witchcraft' tends to be assumed to be fairly clear. I don't think it is necessarily at all in much of Africa. To take the example of the Luo people. The Acholi in Uganda translate 'God' as Jok, whereas the closely related word juok is in Kenyan-Luo commonly translated into English as witchcraft. This points, I think, to a related underlying issue, that although it is wonderful to have bibles translated, formal theological thinking is not being guided using African languages, but typically by Westerners, and certainly through use of European languages. Real 'African' isses thus come to be skirted over. Theologising in Africa 'should' happen using African languages. There's a challenge to theological educators.

First let me highlight a resource related to the issue of Exodus 22:18 and witchcraft.

Adu-Gyamfi, Yaw. “‘Thou Shalt Not Suffer a Witch to Live’ (Exod 22:18) and Contemporary Akan Christian Belief and Practice: A Translational and Hermeneutical Problem.” Old Testament Essays 29, no. 1 (2016): 11–32.

Old testament essays is  open source you can find this article online here. I think this is a good article which does a lot of linguistic work across translations Hebrew, LXX, Vulgate, KJV, and Akan translations.