Sometime ago The Scientific American offered $5000 for a proved case of psychic phenomenon. A host of mediums immediately announced their intention of competing for it. But when it was announced that the Chairman of the Committee of Investigation would be Houdini, the greatest master of legerdemain in the world, most of them withdrew! Incidentally the $5000 still remains unclaimed. Houdini himself spent many years in studying and investigating the claims of spiritistic mediums, and dismissed them as utterly unfounded. In his book, Houdini sums up his conclusions in these devastating words “I have not found one incident that savoured of the genuine”.
     In Luke 16 we find the rich man pleading with Abraham to send the spirit of Lazarus from beyond the grave to witness to his five brethren. In refusing Abraham said in v26 “And beside all this, between us and you there is a great gulf fixed: so that they which would pass from hence to you cannot; neither can they pass to us, that would come from thence”. He reminded him that neither the wicked nor the righteous dead can communicate with the living. Indeed, the very attempt to do so is forbidden in passages such as Deuteronomy 18:10-11.
     Taking up this subject Moses tells us in Leviticus 19:31 “Regard not them that have familiar spirits, neither seek after wizards, to be defiled by them: I am the LORD your God”. He warned them that the very attempt to speak to the dead bringing them into contact with demons would defile them. Sir William Crookes, a noted British scientist and inventor of the radiometer said concerning so called mediums "their work renders them more and more nervous, more and more excitable, and its only logical consequence is insanity”. To meddle with the realm of the spirits is not only forbidden but exceedingly dangerous. It destroys the soul, body and mind.

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