Q&A: Séance
Séance
Question
In your opinion, is it permissible to conduct a séance?
Reasons that seem to me to permit it:
A. I think it’s bullshit (although the very fact that I want to test it empirically is a bit suspicious)
B. The Rema says that “inquiring of the dead” refers to the body of the dead person and not to his spirit (or something along those lines). I’ll note that Rabbi Kook prohibited it.
Reason to prohibit it:
The prohibition was stated even if it’s bullshit, and maybe דווקא because of that.
Thank you very much!
Answer
There is a prohibition here of inquiring of the dead, and probably also of ov and yidoni. It makes no difference whether there is anything real to it or not (the medieval authorities already disagreed about that). The only relevant point in what you wrote is the Rema, but it seems to me that even according to his view this is an interpretation of the prohibition of inquiring of the dead. But resorting to magic is prohibited regardless.
Discussion on Answer
It is engaging in magic, except that you are skeptical about magic. But the prohibition is on engaging in magic, regardless of skepticism. I mentioned that there is a dispute among the medieval authorities over whether magic has any real substance or not, but there is no dispute about the prohibition on engaging in it. Maimonides, for example, holds that it is nonsense, but that itself is the prohibition: engaging in nonsense.
Assuming there is nothing real in magic, doesn’t intention matter for the nature of the act?
It seems reasonable to me that there is a prohibition on engaging in nonsense out of belief in it. But if I’m an actor in a film playing an idol worshiper, or if I’m researching the psychological effects of engaging in this imaginary kind of thing, it seems to me that that takes the wind out of the prohibition (literally and figuratively).
In a séance, for example, I want to feel the ideomotor effect that people claim moves the participants’ fingers. I in no way intend to engage in magic, which in my opinion does not exist at all.
That’s no longer engaging in nonsense; it’s engaging in researching the engagement in nonsense.
You were talking about wanting to test it empirically. That is called doing a séance. If you only want to investigate the psychological phenomena people undergo in a séance, there is room to permit it. It is permitted to study nonsense. Maimonides studied the writings of the Sabians in order to know what to answer. And about this the Talmud says, “You may study in order to understand and to teach” (Rabbi Eliezer studied and taught sorcery regarding cucumbers).
But if someone approaches it with a great deal of skepticism, then it’s not really magic anymore. Just like if I bend down to pick up something that fell near a tree, that doesn’t make me an idol worshiper. (A formulation inspired by you would be: “the magic is in the person, not in the object” [of course, only if there really is nothing to it])