What do you think of tarot readings and psychic mediums?

[T1mom]

What do you think of Tarot card readings and similar?

I went to a 'psychic medium' yesterday who was highly recommended by close people I know.

I'm not sure if they were tarot cards or another type of cards. I picked 8 cards, she talked through them. They had relevance to my life but I am skeptical and think that any card could have been twisted to fit my life. She asked a lot of leading questions and I feel like I filled a lot of gaps for her.

My DH saw her separately and thought she was brilliant and bought every word she said. Thought she knew a lot about his life and past and believes every word she said about his future.

What do you think? I'm intrigued because so many friends have totally bought into it.

Yep they are demonic .
Would avoid at all cost

They are either deluded or charlatans.

Yep I’ve seen psychic mediums do this, use the cards as a theatrical prop. Cards when used properly help a person work through a situation they are in as a jumping off point for discussion

Absolutely!

my neighbour was doubly bereaved in the worst circumstances. She told me about this psychic who was “amazing” He was awful completely off base and I could only conclude that he had been taking this poor family for a ride for years based on information they had accidentally given him via cold reading

Yes it would come under witchcraft.

I am genuinely interested. I gather from other chats we have had here that you are a Christian. So how does believing that tie up with Exodus 22:18? Also Lev 20:27.

What changed in the various churches that this verse was no longer applied ? I mean that in terms of preaching.

Hey there!

For the benefit of other readers:

Exodus 22:18 "You shall not permit a sorceress to live." This cross-references with Leviticus 19:31 "You must not turn to mediums or spiritists; do not seek them out, or you will be defiled by them. I am the LORD your God."

Leviticus 20:17 "A man or a woman who is a medium or a necromancer shall surely be put to death. They shall be stoned with stones; their blood shall be upon them"

Practising the occult, something God hates, goes against God's exclusive right to reveal the truth and guide his people (Israel at that time). If people went against this law then they were essentially rebelling against God and cutting off their relationship with Him, plus it can lead to idolatry, another thing God abhors. This was the Law at the time and to go against it was to go against God's covenantal rule, and to damage the community. It's no good if people are following other 'voices' and not following the teaching and laws given, it results in chaos and harm.

What changed in the various churches that this verse was no longer applied ? I mean that in terms of preaching.

Well, the person of Jesus Christ came! These laws were specific to the nation of ancient Israel. Jesus has fulfilled the Law (Matthew 5:17) and he bore the penalties of all sin on the Cross (Colossions 2:14.) We are now under the New Covenant which means the Church wields spiritual, not civil, discipline. So no putting people to death because they dabbled with a Ouija board. However the Church very strongly warns against occult practices.

Galations 5:19-20 warns against it "Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God."

Revelation 21:8 is pretty clear "But as for the cowardly, the faithless, the detestable, as for murderers, the sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars, their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death."

Today we prefer people confess this sin, repent (turn) from it and are forgiven. Why couldn't they be forgiven then? Because they were under a different covenant and Law.

Quote " We are now under the New Covenant which means the Church wields spiritual, not civil, discipline. So no putting people to death because they dabbled with a Ouija board. However the Church very strongly warns against occult practices."

New Covenant. But that was from Jesus I thought. While the witches were still being executed in the west in the 1700s. So they were being executed under Christianity.

This is what I meant. Because many of the OT Mosaic laws are still enforced by various Christian Churches. Then at some point, the executing of witches stopped just a few hundred years ago ( But persecution still in other places).

So what changed between the 1700s and today ?

Read James Randi's work, they are manipulative cold readers. Cold reading is a learned skill and very disconcerting so I can see why people believe it but some of these people are very harmful.

OP, you’ve answered your own question. She asked leading questions. You fed her information.

You have a worryingly gullible DH. Tell him to delete friendly emails from Nigerian princes who want to borrow his bank account for their millions.

This person didn’t even need to cold read — she asked questions, and the OP gave her information!

Yes with Jesus came the New Covenant. Unfortunately people were very superstitious in the middle ages and made a link between natural disasters and deaths and the practice of sorcery. They were innocent people who were wrongly executed just because people were ignorant and made them into scapegoats. Now we know it's an El Nino and not Bob down the road who cast a spell on our failed bean crop, or it's a virus causing the death of our children and not some old lady who lives on her own with a cat.

The Reformation came in the mid 1700s and this brought enlightenment and scientific advancement so that crop failures and ill health were better understood, and the idea of pacts with the Devil were viewed with skepticism. Mercifully the Witchcraft Acts fell by the wayside but serve as a terrible reminder the damage ignorance can do.

I've yet to study Church history though, am hoping that will fill in a lot of blanks and answer questions I have about how we got from a small band of believers in the time of Christ to where we are today with myriad denominations, so apologies if I can't answer in any great detail!

You got there via excellent early PR and evangelising (Paul was a particular powerhouse) and later on via the Christianisation of the Roman Empire.

Otherwise Jesus would be forgotten as just another of the many Second Temple self-proclaimed messiahs of that time, who came to an unusually bad end after a brief preaching career.

I want to believe but I don't actually see how it's possible to communicate with the dead. I went to a medium last year and, like the OP, she was highly recommended. But she was clutching at straws the whole time & using the classic psychic lines like "I can only go by what the spirits are telling me". In the end she didn't even charge me! So I'm even more sceptical now. It's just not possible imo

Yup. So they used to kill people for being witches. Based on biblical laws. And if we go to 1597, King James 6th ( I am Scottish so he was number 6 ta very much (insert smiley)), published his book on demonology. And executing witches became quite the thing.

Free copy can be downloaded safely here:

Daemonologie. by King of England James I | Project Gutenberg

Yes. The same King James of Bible fame.

My interest though is not the witches, but this whole "not a real Christian" thing. Because if the Bible orders witches to be executed, as they were under the Christian Church, then is someone still a real Christian if they now don't ?

See what I mean ? It's about the picking and choosing of what OT Mosaic laws are kept under the new covenant, and what are ditched.

And no, I am not advocating that Christians execute witches.

The future does not exist and anyone who tries to tell you otherwise is telling lies. All fortune telling is bogus. At best it is an extrapolation of patterns and skillful insights of a personality to make predictions.

I have no problem with people believing whatever beliefs or world view they want to, but I'm less keen on other people making money out of those beliefs or using those beliefs to control people.

My interest though is not the witches, but this whole "not a real Christian" thing. Because if the Bible orders witches to be executed, as they were under the Christian Church, then is someone still a real Christian if they now don't ?

You are looking at the ancient laws given to Israel in Leviticus, though. The Mosaic law of executing people for witchcraft did not apply once Christ made his sacrifice. None of those laws apply. Otherwise we'd still not be allowed to do a whole myriad of things including dietary laws and so on. So it's not a Christian thing AT ALL and never was, but was a practice that was associated with ancient Israel (and not the Gentiles). If the Christian church at that time was recommending execution for Witchcraft (I believe it was) then it was wrong in its actions. As I said I haven't studied church history yet. Anyone now practising witchcraft is urged to repent and turn completely from it.

See what I mean ? It's about the picking and choosing of what OT Mosaic laws are kept under the new covenant, and what are ditched.

No it's not. The Council of Jerusalem in Acts 15 shows what the process was and what rules were decided upon for the incoming Gentiles to follow. Christ set us free from the burden of slavery to the Law. I'd urge you to read some Bible commentaries which do go into a lot of detail on these types of questions.

But it was the various churches that were executing witches. From Mosaic law. That is, the religious people killed the witches. Then they went to Church. and said "job done".

Using the same bible.

So you are saying the Christians who done that were not real Christians ?

This is why I find it interesting.

Acts 15 says nothing about Mosaic law not applying. Apart from foreskins.

They were not acting as Christians should. They weren't even executing people who actually practised witchcraft, but innocent people! So they were in effect the criminals!

OK I am done here because we just keep going round in circles with you trying to poke holes in everything.

Fair enough. My interest is "what is a real Christian". And with 50k + denominations these days, it seems the Christians can't agree.

It is entirely possible to be an objective, rational thinker and still believe that mediumship deserves genuine consideration. I am well-aware of the scams and psychological tricks like cold reading that exist, but I don't think they account for every single phenomenon. I take issue with the assumption that believing in a reality beyond our current understanding equates to naivety or a lack of intelligence. Sceptics and believers alike are entitled to their viewpoints, and a mutual respect for differing perspectives should be the baseline of any intelligent conversation, rather than dismissiveness

Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, of course. The issue with belief in the paranormal is that every single example that is properly investigated has turned out either to have a rational explanation or to be fraudulent. That doesn’t mean a genuine example might not turn up tomorrow, but until such time, scepticism is the only logical approach.

@Dahlia1234

Just to add what CurlewKate says, as an Engineer, I would like to see some data from the paranormal side as to what this unknown energy is. What are it's Si units, where does it fit on the electromagnetic spectrum ? Even a rough estimate.

But if it is in the theoretical physics side I am lost. Even then though, have any theories been put forward on that front ? I have not seen any, and I am sure that would be headline news.

@Dahlia1234 I am all for people believing whatever they like and I don't think that it makes them less intelligent. Some of the greatest theologians have been religious.

However, "telling" the future (which is what tarot readings and "psychic mediums" claim they can do) has to be guesswork. The future quite simply does not exist, so anyone claiming to predict it has to be making stuff up.

Adore it all. 🧙 For me it’s not a hobby it’s something that’s always been in me and grew. Tarots, cards, all of it, I just love it. My husband thinks I’m bat shit crazy 🤪.