What Did the Ancient World Believe About Demons?
The world of the Bible did not emerge out of an empty philosophical landscape. It was born in a region saturated with gods, spirits, omens, incantations, and a deep human instinct to explain suffering and evil. To understand the Bible’s teaching on demons, we must first understand the world behind the text—a world that assumed the unseen realm was active, unpredictable, and intertwined with daily life. Scripture does not borrow pagan ideas; rather, it enters this supernatural environment and decisively transforms it. The biblical authors speak into a world already convinced of spirits, yet they reshape that conviction under the sovereignty of Yahweh.
The Biblical Picture
Before considering the ancient cultures surrounding Israel, it is important to recognize that the Bible itself assumes a real supernatural world. It does not introduce spirits or explain their existence because its first readers lived in a world where such beings were an unquestioned part of reality. Yet Scripture does something surprising: it simplifies, corrects, and reorients this world under one central truth—Yahweh alone is God, and every spiritual being, whether faithful or rebellious, exists under His authority.
Unlike the surrounding nations, Israel did not attempt to bargain with spirits, perform rituals to appease them, or manipulate the supernatural realm through magic. God does not negotiate; He commands. He is not one spiritual power among many; He is the Creator of all. And unlike the ancient cultures that viewed spirits as mischievous, neutral, or morally fluid, the Bible frames demons as personal, rebellious beings aligned against God’s purposes. In Scripture, the unseen realm is real, but it is not chaotic. It stands under the absolute sovereignty of the Lord.
The Theological & Historical Core
1. A Spiritually Saturated World
From Mesopotamia to Egypt, the ancient Near East understood the universe as spiritually alive. People believed that invisible beings influenced every part of life—storms, illness, childbirth, war, famine, and even dreams. Demons were thought to cause fevers, epilepsy, nightmares, drought, and madness. The world felt precarious and vulnerable, and human life existed between the unpredictable wills of gods and the constant threat of hostile spirits. This was the air Israel breathed. The biblical writers did not have to explain spiritual warfare; their world already assumed it.
2. Mesopotamia: The World’s Oldest Demonology
No region recorded more about demons than Mesopotamia. Its clay tablets describe a complex spiritual world filled with harmful beings, elaborate rituals, and specialists who attempted to drive spirits away.
Pazuzu, the desert wind-demon, embodied the scorching, disease-bearing winds of the wilderness. His grotesque form—lion-like or dog-like head, bulging eyes, skeletal torso, wings, talons, and a scorpion tail—was feared, yet his image was paradoxically used to repel other spirits. Mesopotamians believed one dangerous being could be forced into protecting someone from a greater threat. Lamashtu, the most feared of the she-demons, was believed to attack pregnant women and newborns, spreading sickness and death. Her rituals for banishment were among the most elaborate in the ancient world.
The ancient exorcist, the āšipu, performed long sequences of incantations, burned incense, washed with sacred water, manipulated figurines, and invoked friendly deities to restrain harmful ones. Deliverance, in their view, was not moral transformation but a delicate act of spiritual negotiation.
Israel’s Scriptures enter this world with a stark contrast. The God of Abraham does not plead with spirits or use lesser demons to fight greater ones. His authority is singular and unrivaled.
3. Ugarit and Israel’s Cultural Neighborhood
To the west, the city of Ugarit provides an extraordinary window into the worldview of Canaan, Israel’s geographical and cultural neighbor. Its texts describe a realm populated by the dead, who were believed to bless or harm the living, and rituals were performed to summon or appease ancestral spirits. Israel’s law responds sharply to this environment, forbidding attempts to communicate with the dead and drawing clear boundaries that separated Israel from the nations.
Ugaritic writings also speak of territorial spirits, cosmic mountains, and divine councils—ideas that appear in Scripture but are radically reframed. In the Bible, Yahweh presides over the true heavenly council. The nations are allotted under lesser divine beings by His decision, not theirs. Spiritual beings exert influence over regions, yet all are accountable to the Most High. Israel’s “high places,” so often condemned by the prophets, reflect these spiritual geographies. The Bible does not reject the unseen world assumed by its neighbors; it reveals the One who governs it.
4. How This World Prepared the Stage for Scripture
Understanding the ANE does not diminish Scripture. It clarifies its radical distinctiveness. The biblical worldview was not foreign or fantastical in its original setting. Ancient peoples already believed the supernatural realm was real. But Scripture confronts this world with a theological revolution. Whereas the nations saw spirits as morally ambiguous forces that could be manipulated, the Bible reveals demons as agents of rebellion and destruction. Whereas the nations performed rituals in hopes of control, Israel trusted a sovereign God who cannot be coerced. Whereas ANE exorcists depended on incantations and ritual precision, Jesus commands with a word.
The Gospels portray a world that fully expected spiritual conflict, but they also present something utterly new: the arrival of a King whose authority eclipses every spirit and every ancient ritual. Jesus does not bargain. He does not negotiate. He does not perform ceremonies. He speaks, and demons flee.
How Christians Should Think and Respond Today
This ancient context offers several gifts to modern believers—gifts we desperately need in a disenchanted age. It reminds us that Scripture assumes a real supernatural realm and takes spiritual conflict seriously. It also reminds us that the Bible’s worldview is both ancient and radically distinct. While the ANE recognized the power of unseen forces, Scripture reveals the God who reigns over them. Studying ancient demonologies does not lead us toward superstition; it anchors us in biblical realism.
It also helps us recognize that human suffering has multiple dimensions—physical, emotional, psychological, and spiritual—and that spiritual influence was not an irrational assumption of ancient people but a recognition that human experience is complex. Most importantly, this background amplifies the authority of Christ. In a world accustomed to priests chanting for hours and negotiating with hostile beings, Jesus stands alone as the One who simply commands. His authority is unmatched, His kingdom unstoppable, and His presence decisive.
Conclusion
The ancient Near Eastern worldview forms the background of the Bible’s story, but Scripture does not mirror it. Instead, it exposes, corrects, and redeems it. The nations believed in spirits, but only Israel proclaimed one sovereign God over them all. The nations feared demons, but only in Scripture do we see a Savior who forces them into silence with a word. Understanding the ancient world does not water down the Bible; it reveals how extraordinary its message truly is.
The God of Abraham is not one power among many—He is the Maker of heaven, earth, and every unseen power. And the authority of Jesus Christ is not one voice in a crowded spiritual landscape—it is the voice before which every power, ancient or modern, must submit.
