- 125 - You need not be shocked at the idea of the mediums at the school in Ramah sitting about, or, according to the custom of the times, lying about in their underclothes. Even today, mediums dress as lightly as possible when participating in séances, as everything must be done to prevent them from developing a great amount of heat, since heat, as you know, has a disturbing and retarding effect on odic condensation. For this reason, also Saul lay down in his underclothes. When it is reported that he lay there all that day and all that night, this does not mean that he was in a ‘trance’ the whole time. He was kept there for that length of time, because it was the good spirit world’s last attempt to bring him back unto God, from Whom he had become estranged by his disobedience. He was no longer in touch with the good spirit world but had fallen under the spell of an evil spirit. He had in fact come to Ramah that day for the purpose of capturing and killing David. All this was now held up before his eyes in a last Divine appeal in the many different messages brought by the spirits of God, who spoke through the mediums present. Samuel himself, by earnest admonition, did his utmost to save the man he had anointed as the first king from the destruction that threatened. This was the purpose also of the various Divine services Samuel performed in the presence of Saul and to which the Bible makes no reference: he sought to touch the king’s heart and to induce him to change his ways. • Divine service was indeed the most important part of the curriculum in the ‘medium schools’. The objectives were to bring the mediums being developed there – or ‘student prophets’ as they were called in those days – into sincere communion with God in their whole inner attitude and to establish an unshakeable belief and abiding trust in God as the foundation upon which the mediumistic abilities of the students could develop. In this way they would become qualified to serve their fellowmen as worthy instruments of God and His world of spirits. • For the dangers that threatened mediums in those times were the same as today. The greatest of these dangers, then as in all ages, was the craving for honour and money. Mediums were highly regarded. Not only did the worldly rulers try to have numerous mediums, but many well-to-do families kept a medium, whom they called ‘priest’, in their employ for consulting the Beyond. These mediums were given valuable presents and their entire livelihood. Most of them were what would today be called ‘planchette mediums’, who consulted the spirit world by means of a ‘breastplate of judgment’ made in imitation of the breastplate of judgment used in the Tabernacle. You will find what I have said confirmed in the Book of Judges. It is reported there how a man named Micah restored to his mother the money he had taken from her, and how she used part of the money to have a ‘carved and moulded Divine image’ made, which was installed in Micah’s house. Micah appointed one of his sons to serve him as a ‘priest’. He also induced a Levite from Bethlehem to serve him in the same capacity, saying unto him: Judges 17: 10-11: ‘Stay with me, be my father and priest; I will give you ten shekels of silver every year and provide for your clothing and livelihood. When he further encouraged him, the Levite agreed to live with the man.’ What appears in your translation as a ‘carved and cast Divine image’ were the two parts of a ‘planchette’. It is humanly understandable that the mediums made every effort to remain in the good graces of those with whom they lived, and therein lay the great danger. In their desire to transmit only
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