Exodus 22:18
in Exodus 22You must not allow a sorceress to live.
BSB
The same verse in ASV and KJV ▾
ASV
Thou shalt not suffer a sorceress to live.
KJV
Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live.
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This verse in Exodus 22
Commentary
5 notes on this verseThou shalt not suffer a witch to live - If there had been no witches, such a law as this had never been made. The existence of the law, given under the direction of the Spirit of God, proves the existence of the thing. It has been doubted whether מכשפה mecash-shephah, which we translate witch, really means a person who practiced divination or sorcery by spiritual or infernal agency.
This site's exposition
Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live
on Exodus 22:18-20
Three death sentences interrupt a long run of property law, against sorcery, against lying with a beast, and against sacrificing to any god but the LORD. Deuteronomy 18:9-12 names the practices behind the first and says the nations of Canaan did them, and Israel had watched Egypt's own sorcerers fail in chapters 7 to 9. The word behind utterly destroyed in verse 20 is cherem, which Adam Clarke takes as a thing devoted to destruction with no possibility of redemption. The chapter has been pricing oxen and here the price is a life.
The record, by era
The Puritans and the Awakening2 voices
The justice of our law herein is supported by the law of God recorded here. Unnatural abominations are here made capital; such beasts in the shape of men as are guilty of them are unfit to live (
quarantine:debris (2026-07-29) — unbalanced-parens
Thou shall not suffer a witch to live.
The Nineteenth Century1 voice
A commentator
Albert Barnes1798–1870
Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869)
proposed
Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live - See the marginal references. and Lev 20:27. The witch is here named to represent the class. This is the earliest denunciation of witchcraft in the law. In every form of witchcraft there is an appeal to a power not acting in subordination to the divine law. From all such notions and tendencies true worship is designed to deliver us. The practice of witchcraft was therefore an act of rebellion against Yahweh, and, as such, was a capital crime. The passages bearing on the subject in the Prophets, as well as those in the law, carry a lesson for all ages. Isa 8:19; Isa 19:3; Isa 44:25; Isa 47:12-13; Mic 5:12, etc.
The words behind it
3 Hebrew wordsEvery Hebrew word of this verse in the order it stands, with what it means and the door to its own study. The last column counts the times a word stands in the whole Bible: the rarer the word, the more the places it appears belong together.
| Hebrew | Sound | Meaning | Word study | In the Bible |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| מְכַשֵּׁפָ֖ה | mekhashefah | a sorceress | H3784 → | |
| לֹ֥א | lo' | not | H3808 → | 5168 times |
| תְחַיֶּֽה׃ ס | techaiyeh | you will let live | H2421 → | 282 times |
מְכַשֵּׁפָ֖הa sorceress
mekhashefahH3784 →
לֹ֥אnot
lo'H3808 →5168 times
תְחַיֶּֽה׃ סyou will let live
techaiyehH2421 →282 times
A shaded row is a word that stands 400 times or fewer in the Bible.
The walk
8 stopsEach card is a verse this one points to, and under it the verses that one points to in turn. Where several paths arrive at the same place, that place is listed first: the text keeps returning to it.
Through
Leviticus 19:31You 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.
it leads to
- Leviticus 20:27
A man or a woman who is a medium or spiritist must surely be put to death. They shall be stoned; their blood is upon them.’”
Reached by 3 separate paths from here.
- Isaiah 8:19
When men tell you to consult the spirits of the dead and the spiritists who whisper and mutter, shouldn’t a people consult their God instead? Why consult the dead on behalf of the living?
Reached by 2 separate paths from here.
- Deuteronomy 18:10–14
Let no one be found among you who sacrifices his son or daughter in the fire, practices divination or conjury, interprets omens, practices sorcery,
Reached by 2 separate paths from here.
- 2 Chronicles 33:6
He sacrificed his sons in the fire in the Valley of Hinnom. He practiced sorcery, divination, and witchcraft, and consulted mediums and spiritists. He did great evil in the sight of the LORD, provoking…
- Leviticus 20:6–7
Whoever turns to mediums or spiritists to prostitute himself with them, I will also set My face against that person and cut him off from his people.
- Leviticus 20:27
Through
Leviticus 20:6Whoever turns to mediums or spiritists to prostitute himself with them, I will also set My face against that person and cut him off from his people.
it leads to
- 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.
Reached by 3 separate paths from here.
- Leviticus 19:31
Through
Leviticus 20:27A man or a woman who is a medium or spiritist must surely be put to death. They shall be stoned; their blood is upon them.’”
it leads to
- Leviticus 20:6
Whoever turns to mediums or spiritists to prostitute himself with them, I will also set My face against that person and cut him off from his people.
- Leviticus 20:6
Through
1 Samuel 28:3Now by this time Samuel had died, and all Israel had mourned for him and buried him in Ramah, his own city. And Saul had removed the mediums and spiritists from the land.
it leads to
- 1 Samuel 25:1
When Samuel died, all Israel gathered to mourn for him; and they buried him at his home in Ramah. Then David set out and went down to the Wilderness of Paran.
- 1 Samuel 25:1
Where this verse is studied
About Exodus
This page draws on Adam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible; Albert Barnes, Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869); John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament (1748-1763) and Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible.