Because I didn’t have time to read or research or anything this week about spiritual warfare, I had thought to give this week’s podcast a miss. I didn’t want to waste people’s time by talking about nothing. As I began thinking about it this morning, though, I realized I could talk about something else, just share a story or something, and still be meeting my goal and guidelines. To that end, I decided to talk about psychic vampires.
It looks like I ought to write about them sometime, but for now I urge you to listen to the podcast below to learn about psychic vampires and my thoughts on them.
Spiritual Warfare Recap
From the iTunes description: Weekly recap of recent events, what I’ve found in my studies, and some thoughts on spiritual warfare. My aim is to approach this topic practically and realistically–a lot of what’s out there on spiritual warfare is ambiguous at best, and completely ignorant at worst, so I’m hoping to establish something better for the benefit of the Church.
Subscribe to the podcast using iTunes or via the standard RSS. You can also receive an email for each new podcast if that’s how you prefer to roll.
- Lighting a Signal Fire
- Fear is the Beginning of Wisdom
- Spiritual Warfare Recap: Armor Bearers
- Spiritual Warfare Recap: Battling Ourselves
- Spiritual Warfare Recap: Newspaper Definition
- Spiritual Warfare Recap: Devils and Demons
- Spiritual Warfare Recap: Verifying Facts, Finding Truth
- Spiritual Warfare Recap: Psychic Vampires
Related posts:
Psychic vampires are a much older subject than the 1800’s. The most famous that will have a great deal of record will be the Incubi and Succubi in the 1300’s. These were worked into many works written by Christians and you will find a mix of both pagan and Christian beliefs about them. They were described as minions of the devil. There are of course non-Christian myths that can be found in many cultures that seem to feed on various human emotions.
One thing I’ve noticed that seems to be common about the myths is that the demons described as vampires need some vehicle of energy delivery. The Incubi and Succubi needed lust to intensify in their victims in order to successfully feed. Traditional vampires needed the life force in the blood. Many pesky spirits would mischeviously cause anger in humans. This anger was sometimes seen as a food source for these spirits. Each one had a different taste for different types of life force feeding.
I would think the Christian method of warding off such things would have to involve God. The blood vampires normally seem to relate to people, so I will ignore the complexities of protecting blood. The vampires working off of lust, anger, and other emotions that accompany vice seem to fit well into the definition of a demon. They are beings that feed off emotions connected to human vice. It would seem that praying to God to suppress the cause of these emotions would seem appropriate. I’m not sure why you would give them a seperate category than demons as a Christian.
I’m working more from a hypothetical standpoint than anything. I tend to dislike the idea that any emotion is truly a vice. I view emotions more as a link from our primitive instincts to both our soul and body. A kind of messenger service that sends physical signals to our body and spiritual signals to our soul. I don’t think the emotion itself is evil. I think a person’s evil stems from their intentions to do what they know is wrong, and that the emotions are just a tool for allowing primitive instincts to shape the desire of a soul that is not physical. I firmly believe that these instincts exist for good reasons, but it is obvious that there are times these instincts need to be superceded by the mind or soul.
Rob,
Do you happen to have some resources on succubi/incubi to which you could refer me? I don’t think I buy them as being existent (I’ve never thought much of them before, and certainly never encountered one (not that that means anything), but they sound a lot like the fallen angels that Wink describes from Enoch and… the other passage in the Hebrew Bible I’m forgetting at the moment), but I’d like to learn more.
Yeah, should probably edit that to get rid of the parenthetical statements and make more sense, but hopefully you’ll get it
Thanks again for commenting! You continually remind me of how little I know, which is not a bad thing to realize.