Which Bible, Which Version?
Before we begin examining specifically the “occult” connections of Westcott and Hort (W & H), it is only fair and proper for us to understand some of the key terms involved in such a discussion.
Now, if Westcott and Hort had been involved in getting chiropractic treatments or using herbs, I would not have the least problem with that. I find nowhere in the Holy Scriptures where that violates God’s laws. In fact, in Psalms and elsewhere, herbs are specifically commended for the use of man.
Even though this part of our examination of the lives of W & H will continue into the next chapter, we will not get into a full-blown treatment of the occult, or what is generally referred to as the New Age movement. We will assume that our readers already have some understanding of terms.
To delve in depth on the myriad aspects of the occult is beyond our scope for this study. Nevertheless, I would like to get some idea of how many of you in this live audience are somewhat familiar with what some of these things are that are generally labeled as the occult.
You may be familiar either by your reading about them or perhaps by personal experiences with some of these things. I myself have had some personal experiences and I will give you some details shortly. But with the following questions, allow me to survey my audience.
How familiar are you with the New Age/occult/psychic phenomena? So, by show of hands, can I see how many of you are familiar with these particular terms? Let us start out with just the occult in general. I would guess that most of you have some kind of idea what that means.
Now specifically, how about psychokinesis? Does anybody know what that is? Could you define it? I see only a few of you.
How about mental telepathy. Everybody knows what that means. How about clairvoyance? And clairaudience?
How about levitation? I remember reading years ago, and perhaps you also have heard of some yoga master who could supposedly levitate. Allegedly, his body simply rose into the air a foot or two.
Then there is telekinesis. Can you describe what that means? It means the ability to perform some kind of physical action at a distance.
Of course, we have all heard of channeling, have we not? We hear that word a lot in the past few decades. We will talk about that a little later. And what about spirit guides? Spirit guides are usually an essential part of channeling.
Then there are some terms that go back many decades such as ESP (Extra-Sensory Perception). And astral projection, which is similar to what is now called remote viewing.
How about seances… which often involves people known as “trance mediums.” Supposedly, the medium goes into a trance and is able to contact the souls or spirits of the dead.
There is also divination in a multitude of forms. And there is distant healing.
How about meditation? And reincarnation? To clarify, reincarnation is not where you come back as a frog. That is called transmigration. Reincarnation is where you allegedly come back as another person in the next life.
Incidentally, some years ago we did a six-part study examining the biblical truths about reincarnation, near death experiences (NDEs) and out of body experiences (OBEs). Here is a link to that album called The Wheel of Reincarnation. It includes four hours of audio lectures and a two-hour DVD.
Of course, in any discussion of New Age phenomena, we should not fail to mention witchcraft, along with sorcery, the casting of spells, and downright satanism.
For now, just one more. Necromancy? Are you familiar with what that term means?
Well, I could go on and extend that list probably for another ten minutes because it is such an enormous subject. But I think most of you are familiar enough with these things that you will understand some of my experiences of what people call the occult. And others might just use the term “psychic phenomena.”
That is such a broad label. Some people say that psychic phenomena and the occult are interchangeable labels. I disagree. They are close but not exactly the same because the word occult does not necessarily mean something negative.
The word occult simply means “hidden” or “obscured from view or perception” In a lunar eclipse the moon is occulted from our view. Nonetheless, the most common usage of the word is in reference to knowledge allegedly gained by means beyond normal human abilities; i.e., with supernatural (good or evil) aid.
In any case, the experience I want to tell you about is really not my personal abilities, but rather my personal experience of knowing the abilities of a friend of mine.
I have never shared this with you before, but for many years I have known this man who has many of these abilities which are generally called psychic abilities. This man is utterly amazing. He has this uncanny ability to read people’s minds sometimes.
He is a clairvoyant. Upon just meeting a person, he can tell a person things that happened to them in their past. And this is not charlatan tricks like you have seen exposed on TV, where these guys have a little radio receiver in their ear, and they have an assistant planted in the audience.
You have seen that type of thing exposed by some of these so-called healers or “magicians.” But anyhow, this friend of mine is able to tell things about a person when just meeting them for the first time. No fraud involved. Wholly legitimate!
I can personally attest that he has also been right on the money in predicting some future events that would happen either to an individual person or to what we would term in the broad sense geophysical or geopolitical events. I have never known him to be wrong.
Speaking of being wrong, we know that the Bible says that if someone, claiming to speak under a divine unction, anointing, or gift, makes a prediction and it does not come to pass, he only needs to be wrong once. Thereafter, he should be classified as a false prophet, is that not correct? Well, my friend has never been wrong yet and he has been making predictions for a very long time.
Now, in addition to all that, he is apparently able to heal people by just touching them. But we have all seen lots of televangelist healers doing that, haven’t we?
But what about this? My friend has been seen—get this—he has been seen to levitate! I cannot personally vouch for that, I did not personally witness that, but reliable individuals have reported to me that they have actually seen him levitate.
As you know, I live in the Great Smoky Mountain Range of Western North Carolina. We are blessed to have some very beautiful, green and misty mountains there. I do not know what it is about the mountains, whether it is some sort of special energy field up on the tops of the mountains, but my friend likes to go up on the mountain.
I do not know if he just communes with God there or what, but he likes to go up by himself, and sometimes he will take a few friends with him. And I know that he has done that because I have heard that he has done the following.
He has induced some of these friends to go into a trance up on the mountain. When he put them in a trance, they all saw a vision. I do not know if he pt them in a trance by hypnosis or what, but I believe that is actually true because of the testimony of those who had the first-hand knowledge and experience.
But anyhow, that is a little bit about my acquaintance with these sorts of matters. I have had some actual personal experiences, too; but I do not intend to share those publicly, at least not at this time.
Now, let me ask you in this audience a question. If I were to take a poll, an opinion survey of a cross-section of Bible-believing Christians…Not a poll of you people here because this audience is too small for a reliable sampling.
But let us pretend that I went into a church on a Sunday morning, into any one of thousands of Bible-believing Christian churches in this land, a large church, and I would tell them about my experience, or rather, not my experiences, but my friendship with the man who has all these abilities.
Then after giving that testimony, if I would ask these hundreds of people in the Bible-believing church this question: Do you think that I should associate with this person, or should I stay away from him because he is into some woo-woo stuff, some New Agey, and occult-type stuff?
So, I want to ask you folks here, what do you think that church audience would say? How many of you think they would say, Stay away from that person? Yeah. I get mostly heads nodding in agreement here. And I agree.
I think the average, Bible-believing Christian audience would overwhelmingly say, Stay away from that man! I do not care if he has been your friend for sixty years or whatever, you should stay away from him.
Now, why would they say that? Would they say that because that man has quite a bit of power that could be misused for criminal activities or he could use those powers to achieve a very high level political career?
I think most of them would answer this way: That I should stay away from that guy because those activities that you are describing, James, all those powers and abilities that your friend has, all that is part and parcel of the occult, and the Bible says to stay away from that stuff.
I think that is what they would say that is the reason I need to stay away from that person. Would those believers consider my friend to be a sorcerer or something like that? Well, yes, I think so. Many or most of those people would say, that guy is a sorcerer, or a wizard, or an evil magician, or what have you.
But at that moment I would tell that typical church audience… “Oh, there is one other thing I want to tell you about my friend. It is something that he told me years ago. I must confess that it has had such an impact on me, it has gone way down into the very heart of me, and I have never forgotten the words that he said.
“And what he said was this, ‘greater works than these shall ye do.’ ” Who am I talking about? Yes, I am talking about Jesus, the Christ. The man with all those “psychic” abilities is the one whom we profess to be our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.
Think about it. Let’s review the list. Could not Christ read minds? When he was confronted with the Pharisees, the Scriptures tell us He knew their thoughts. (Matthew 12:25; Luke 6:8) There are two witnesses.
Did He not heal the centurion’s servant at a distance? (Luke 7:2ff) Did He not heal at a distance the Canaanite/Syrophoenician woman’s daughter? (Matthew 15: 22-28; Mark 7:26-30)
Did not Jesus tell the woman at the well about her past, that she had had five husbands, and that the one she is living with now is not her husband? (John 4)
Did He not tell the apostle Peter his future when He told Peter how he was going to die? (John 21:18, 19) That was a prediction of the future for an individual. And of course, there were the great geopolitical events which He prophesied in Luke 21 and Matthew 24: wars and rumors of wars and all that.
Did not Jesus levitate when He walked on water? Did He not take Peter and James and John, His small group of friends, up on a high mountain (probably Mt. Hermon), where He induced them into a trance, and they saw a vision of the transfigured Christ with Moses and Elias? (Matthew 17:1-9; Mark 9:2-9)
The point is this. Just because some Christian believer, or some Christian minister, or podcaster or televangelist, or some book from a Christian bookstore tells you that something is occult and forbidden in the Bible, does not make it so.
Be like the Bereans, and check these things out for yourself (Acts 17:10, 11), and see if the Bible indeed condemns what they or the book is telling you is condemned.
How many of you take herbs? I see that almost everyone’s hand here in this room went up. I had both hands up because I take a lot of them. Well, let me tell you something. Apparently, we are all New Agers. Thus, we are warned by “experts” who assert: “Do you take herbs? Then you are a New Age cultist.” Did you know that?
Now, I know you listeners will deny that you are into the occult and New Age stuff simply because you take herbs, but I have a book at home. I am serious; this is true. It was written by a couple of Christians, and according to these Christians, you are into the New Age deception if you take herbs.
This book also condemns certain genuinely pagan, heathen, and “New Age” practices, but along with them, they condemn herbs, chiropractic, reflexology, and other alternative health modalities.
Listen, friends, just because some New Age adherents use herbs, or might practice chiropractic, or they might use iridology or reflexology, that does not make these things evil and New Age or occult.
This book which condemns those things was not written by a couple of fanatic idiots. Both these people hold doctorate degrees.
One thing I have tried very hard to do when our children were growing up was to instill in them the need to, and the ability to think critically. In other words, do not simply accept something as true because it is in print. Or worse yet, because you saw it on TV, or now in 2026, because you saw it online somewhere, or on a podcast, or on your social media feed—God forbid!
One of the most important aspects in critical thinking is to learn something about the author and where he is coming from. Does he have an axe to grind? Does the author stand to benefit financially or otherwise by promoting a certain viewpoint?
In the case of this book, which was condemning herbs, chiropractic, reflexology, homeopathy, and iridology, etc., it condemned all those things as New Age and occult practices, and the authors assert that Christians should never be involved in such “forbidden” things.
Now, let us utilize that first vital question in our critical thinking process here. In fact, the authors are a husband and wife team. I said they both had doctorate degrees. Well, in fact, they are medical doctors.
Aha! You now understand why they might take that point of view. Perhaps they want to slam alternative health practices because they have a financial vested interest in keeping people on drugs. Now I hasten to add so that you understand, I am not putting down and condemning all medical doctors. Not at all. We need them. And I thank God for the good ones that are out there.
But again, the point is that the terms New Age and occult are such broad brushes that we need to be discerning about what is and what is not to be categorized as occult, New Age, etc. The Bible’s commandments, statutes, and judgments are our standard for discerning good and evil.
Many years ago I gave a two-part lecture about the Wizard of Oz. As I “decoded” it, I showed that it fits the Israel message to a “T,” or shall we say it fits the Israel message like ruby red slippers 😊. Yes, we know that in the book, they were silver slippers. Biblically, silver is associated with redemption.
The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (full title of the book) is, in fact, the story of true Israel in disguise, in allegory form. It is about the descendants of the “lost” tribes of Israel found in Christianized Europe.
After I sent out that pair of lectures to our tape ministry at that time (decades ago), a few people got upset, and demanded: Take me off your mailing list, because that is occult. Perhaps they were convinced that the presence of a rainbow in it (when Judy Garland sings, “Somewhere Over the Rainbow”) made it occult in their eyes.
Plus, there are witches in the movie. I suppose that made them feel like this movie or this story thereby qualified as being occult. After all, the word “wizard” is right there in the title. And therefore Christians should stay away from it, they would contend.
But as I pointed out then, and numerous times over the decades: I do not care if 100% of so-called New Agers have a little rainbow trinket dangling from their rearview mirror. That does not make the sign of the rainbow occult or New Age.
In truth, that symbol was given to our great-great...grandpa Noah as a sign of a covenant from God. It was the sign of a divine covenant promise. And we should not be afraid to use it. We should embrace it!
I have also noted that when those who are devoted to the dark side use the rainbow on their flags, banners and bumper stickers, it almost always (I have never seen an exception) consists of only six colors (biblically, six being the number of man, of imperfection and incompletion), while the typical and true rainbow has the seven colors: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet (seven being the number associated with perfection and completion).
Before we go further, readers should know that I am fully aware of author L. Frank Baum’s likely intended hidden (occult 😎) message in The Wonderful Wizard of Oz when he first published the book in 1900; namely, that the story was all about our money system. And that decoding is wholly apt as well.
Well, this section is getting long, so we will pause here. But this is necessary background information for some readers as we begin to explore the “past times” of the key players in the history of English Bible versions.
(To be continued.)
~END~
