And there is nothing wrong with Libraries having books that are about witchcraft. Everything from Shakespeare to the Grimm Brothers to the Wizard of Oz to Harry Potter has involved witches.
I used to think knowledge was not bad in general. But after dedicating my life to Christ, and drawing closer to Him, I realize that there are many things of this world are sinful and people do not seem to care that they are sinful. Again, would you want a whole entire library book section on inappropriate behavior with animals for your kids to read? How about a book section on serial killers with graphic depictions of their episodes? What about a book section on the abuse of children? What sins do you draw the line at?
You said:
So reading the Wizard of Oz is committing sorcery in you heart? Nonsense.
Witchcraft and the Wizard of Oz:
Witches and Satanists Use the Media to Recruit
. . .by David Benoit
"Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools." (Romans 1:22)
Witches and Satanists use the media to recruit. This is an entry in the The U.S. Chaplain 's Manual from the Church of Satan on ethics, recruiting, and relationships. They were questioned concerning how the Church of Satan recruits new members. They responded with the following:
"The church does not proselytize but welcomes inquiries from honest potential Satanists who hear about the church from the various books about it, the mass media, or word-of-mouth. "1
This is also from the U.S. Chaplain ' s Manual. This entry is from the American Council of Witches, and they were asked the same question. It was answered thusly:
"Witches do not proselytize, but welcome inquiries from those who hear about the craft by either word-of-mouth or the media."2
For two totally different organizations and two totally different entries, they surely have some definite similarities. If two totally separate and different people wrote these two documents, without one another's knowledge, they must have been led by the same spirit. So, in essence, they say they do not proselytize, but they both have one thing in common. They both have their religion propagated by the media.
THREE WAYS THAT THE MEDIA HELPS WITCHCRAFT
By giving a distorted view of witchcraft. They make a witch look like a wicked, ugly old hag, so that when an attractive woman claims witchcraft as her religion, people become more curious and let their guard down.
They introduce good witches to combat the bad, ugly witches. This gives an image that some witches can be trusted as allies for good. You notice that good magic always wins over bad magic. This leads a person to believe that it is okay to practice witchcraft, if it is for good. If I were to ask you, "Are all witches bad?"-what would you say?
You may think back to Bewitched and Samantha -she wasn't a bad witch, was she? Then you might think of Sabrina, the teenage witch from the Archie comic books. But probably one of the strongest images may have come from The Wizard of Oz. Anyone who saw the beautiful witch of the north would not have one thing bad to say about her.
Just to prove my point, let's talk about The Wizard of Oz. Is this family classic just a family classic, or could it be classic witchcraft?
First, you notice that all the witches in the movie are actually directional. For example, the house landed on the wicked witch of the east. Dorothy was hounded by the wicked witch of the west. Then she was helped by the good witch of the north. Logic would have us believe that if the wicked witches were from the east and west, then the good witches would be from the north and south. Yet, you are never introduced to the "good witch" from the south. Not once in the movie does the "good witch" from the south appear. Why?
The answer may lie near the end of the movie. Do you remember how the good witch of the north helped Dorothy get home? Dorothy was discouraged because she found that the Wizard of Oz was really a fake, and all hope of her returning home was gone. Then the witch of the north told Dorothy that she had the power latent inside her to go home all the time. According to satanic teaching, it says, "Say unto thine own heart, ' l am mine own redeemer. ' '' Would we dare think that sweet, little Dorothy may have learned that everyone has a latent power to perform good magic? Could she have subtly been the fourth witch? The "good witch" of the south? Do you remember the first question that was asked of Dorothy by the good witch of the north? "Are you a good witch, or are you a bad witch?" Dorothy said, "I'm not a witch at all. Witches are ugly." The Munchkins laughed, and Glynda, the good witch of the north, said, "Oh, no, only evil witches are ugly. I am a good witch." See, she was beautiful. Do you know what that image evokes? It gives a false security that if a witch is attractive, he or she can be trusted as good and not evil. Could she, Dorothy, have subtly been the fourth witch? You know where her house came from-the south. Keep in mind that good witches are from the south and were beautiful. I would say that Judy Garland, or Dorothy, was very attractive. Was she possibly the witch of the south ?
Witches do believe in directional spirits which we will talk about a little later in the section on The Magic Circle.
Remember in the beginning of the movie, Dorothy runs away from home to save Toto, and finds herself seeking spiritual guidance from a professor and a crystal ball. He looked into the crystal point. A very important point is that Dorothy sought occult guidance before she ever went on her journey to Oz. Now we know the professor was a fake at that point, but he said that this crystal ball came from Isis and was used by the Egyptians. Again, Isis was a goddess worshipped in Egypt. How convenient it was that Dorothy would just so happen to stumble upon a person who claimed to have the spirit of divination.
Dorothy finds herself seeking occult guidance throughout the whole movie. Who could ever think one bad thought about the sweet, innocent girl who would sing, "Somewhere Over the Rainbow," before the rainbow was used as a symbol for the New Age movement? By the way, for some of you who do not know what the rainbow means in the New Age movement, it means basically the arch or bridge that leads from the natural to the supernatural. Without a doubt, Dorothy crossed the bridge in The Wizard of Oz. The sad thing about it is that Judy Garland, who played Dorothy, died of suicide. Miss Garland may have found the rainbow, but she never found the light of the world.
Let me prove my point of how the media promotes witchcraft. Right now some of you are angry that I would bring up The Wizard of Oz while talking about real witchcraft. Some of you are thinking that I am, excuse the _expression, "witch hunting." Right now, some of you would like to debate me on all the good wholesomeness of this movie. All I can say is that witches are right-the media can be their best source of recruitment. The media has craftily changed your biblical perspective of witchcraft. Not one time is witchcraft mentioned in a good context in the Bible. Philosophically you might say that witches are not all bad. But biblically they are always bad. As a matter of fact, in Exodus 22:18, the Bible says that "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live."
SYMBOLISM BEHIND THE WIZARD OF OZ
1. They followed the yellow brick road. Yellow is often used as a color to refer to gold. There is only one place I have ever heard about golden streets- that is Heaven. (Remember, her house did spiral northward.)
2. This golden road led Dorothy and her friends to the Emerald City, where the all-powerful and all-knowing wizard lived. Omnipotence and omniscience are two attributes that belong only to God. They found that the all-powerful and all-knowing wizard was a fake. He was just a man that people had elevated to become a supreme being. In a world filled with agnostics who are confused about the existence of God, could this be a reference to God? See, God is all-knowing, all-powerful, and yet many would have us to believe God does not exist; that He is just an elevated person that we created to be a supreme being.
3. The final thing to consider is the pure dose of humanism as the end result. After finding out that the wizard was a man, they found out that they had all the power inside themselves. The Tin Man really did have a heart; the Cowardly Lion really was not a coward; the Scarecrow had the ability to think the whole time; and Dorothy had the ability within herself to go home any time.
Humanism teaches that there is no God, and that we all have the power within ourselves to succeed. There may be those who say I am making too much out of The Wizard of Oz. Witches are just make-believe. Before you make that statement, maybe you might want to read about how witches are gearing up to change your mind:
"But in Wiccan circles, Cabot is considered a high priestess of the religion and a leader. In 1986, she and other witches formed the Witches League for Public Awareness, a non-profit, tax-deductible organization dedicated to correcting misinformation about their religion. They publish a newsletter and pamphlets, like law memorandum that outlines the 1985 U. S. District Court decision that ruled witchcraft is a legitimate religion. The most recent newsletter discusses an Air Force ruling that approved religious holidays for witches and a U.S. District Court case in which a federal judge ruled against the Salvation Army because it fired a woman who practiced witchcraft." (3)
To illustrate how witchcraft is viewed from God's perspective, not media perspective, we must look at Nineveh. You remember Nineveh. It was the city Jonah went to. It was the city that God cared so much about that he sent Jonah, special third-day delivery, via whale. This city was so big, it took three days to walk around it. The walls were one hundred feet high and broad enough to drive a chariot on. It had more than twelve hundred towers that people could adorn. Yet, it was a wicked city. Jonah 3:4 says, "And Jonah began to enter into the city a day's journey, and he cried, and said, Yet forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown. " These words convicted the whole city and they all repented.
Then one hundred and fifty years after one of the greatest revivals in history. God sent another prophet whose name was Nahum, to Nineveh. Even though Nahum means "the comforter," his message was anything but comforting. It was a message of doom. Yet the people would not repent. Why? The answer is found in Nahum 3:4: "Because of the multitude of the whoredoms of the well-favoured harlot, the mistress of witchcrafts, that selleth nations through her whoredoms, and families through her witchcrafts." This verse tells us that witchcraft destroys nations as well as homes.
THREE DANGEROUS SIMILARITIES BETWEEN NINEVEH THEN AND OUR WORLD NOW
Witchcraft became not only accepted, but well-favored. My nephew, some time ago, was cutting out some pictures in his class. The teacher then handed out some pictures of witches and told the students to cut out these witches. My nephew looked at his teacher and said, "I can't cut out pictures of witches; I don't believe in witches." The teacher told him he didn't understand-these were good witches. Talk about lacking in discernment.
There are many Christian people who would be ready to defend The Wizard of Oz. If it were just an entertaining movie and not an indoctrinating movie, why are Christians so mad when I suggest it to be bad? It all depends on what you use as your plumb line. If you use the Bible, you will probably have no trouble with making the right decision. But if you use philosophical ideas, you will be headed in the wrong direction.
The Bible says it sells nations-that means it is marketable. Today, everything on the market has something to do with witchcraft. Witchcraft today is a very marketable commodity. In fact, it is so bad that I have a lot of parents say to me, "Everything I've got for my children is bad, bad, bad. What can my children play with?" Understand that before the Antichrist sets up his kingdom, he's going to have to set up an Antichrist society. Everything you hear today is dealing with magic-it's like magic, it works like magic, magic this, magic that. Witchcraft is very marketable.
Finally, the Bible says that Nineveh's families were sold into witchcraft. Did you know that witchcraft is family oriented? That's right, witchcraft today is rated "G." Top family movies, like Witch Mountain, Escape to Witch Mountain, and Return to Witch Mountain, by Disney are all family oriented.
The Care Bear Movie had a witch in it, as did The Little Mermaid. (Again, don't say they were bad witches unless you believe there are such things as good witches.) These are just a few of the hundreds of "G" rated movies that do not have vulgarity and nudity, but are loaded with witchcraft. Did you know that the Billy Graham film , The Prodigal, was rated PG by the Motion Picture Industry of America? Do you know why? Because the Motion Picture Industry said that children should not be exposed to Christianity without the consent of their parents. Yet, witchcraft today is all rated "G," but is it family oriented? Please understand, Satan has a family-oriented program. He wants desperately to reach your family. Those involved in witchcraft are also referred to those who study the craft. Strangely enough, craft is the root word for "crafty." And one would have to admit that they live up to their name.
The third way the media encourages witchcraft and Satanism is they give a distorted view of Christianity. Let's look again at some quotes from the U.S. Chaplain 's Manual. What is witchcraft's role in relationship with other religions? According to the American Council of Witches,
". . . cooperation with other religions are cordial, except those groups which have sought to persecute and defame the Craft.
Secular Humanism in the Wizard of Oz:
The Wizard of Oz,
In most circles, this book and movie would be an illustration of safe fiction, the kind we want our children to read. After all, it upholds the importance of home, the value of courage, heart, wisdom and honesty.
From
Wikipedia:
Regarding the original Baum storybook, it has been said: “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz is America’s greatest and best-loved home grown fairytale. The first totally American fantasy for children, it is one of the most-read children’s books . . . and despite its many particularly American attributes, including a wizard from Omaha, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz has universal appeal.” The film itself is widely considered to be one of the most well known, beloved films of all time, and was one of the earliest films to be deemed “culturally significant” by the United States Library of Congress.
“Culturally significant” is an apt description, I think. The movie and book, in my opinion, prepared several generations to accept secular humanism in place of Christianity. A bold statement, perhaps, but not without grounds.
First, the author himself, L. Frank Baum, was a theosophist. Again from Wikipedia:
Theosophy is a doctrine of religious philosophy and metaphysics … [which] holds that all religions are attempts by the “Spiritual Hierarchy” to help humanity in evolving to greater perfection, and that each religion therefore has a portion of the truth.
No wonder, then, Dorothy and friends arrive in Oz only to discover that the wizard, as the supposedly all powerful ruler (and therefore a God figure), is a fraud. No wonder in the end, good witch Gilda tells Dorothy she’s had the ability to go home all along, she just had to find it inside her. No wonder the Tinman discovered he had heart all along, the lion learned he had courage, and the scarecrow, brains. Throughout the story, there is this strong thread,
You can do it, you can, you can.
And what a popular message that is today. Self-help seminars, books, infomercials, all proclaiming this belief in the human spirit. How many athletes say that in wrap-up interviews!
We just had to believe in ourselves.
So now in western culture we have Man, clawing up behind Satan, trying to replace God. In part because of a piece of “safe” fiction.
There were, I’ve heard, some objections to the movie when it came out—because it had witches in it, I was told. So if the good and bad witches had been replaced by good and bad shoe salesmen, the problems would be taken care of?
The search for safe fiction can be a dangerous, dangerous pursuit. It looks for whitewashed walls, all the while oblivious that a tomb may be behind them.
Article Sources:
The Wizard of Oz | A Christian Worldview of Fiction
The Demonic Witchcraft Wizard of Oz
