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WITCHCRAFT,

The belief that some individuals can perform magic with the help of spirits was almost universal in antiquity. Egyptian records tell of conjurers and soothsayers who derived their powers from alien gods. In the Egyptian account of the encounter between Moses and Pharaoh, Moses appears as a practitioner of black magic and his followers as servants of an alien and abhorrent god. In the Biblical account of the same episode, the Egyptian experts who competed with Moses appear as evil sorcerers. Witches and magicians figured significantly in the civilizations of ancient Greece and Rome. There are very few references to witchcraft in early Christian documents. It was initially considered a sin to accuse a neighbor of being a witch. Growing unrest during the later Middle Ages and early modern period found expression in deviations from church teachings, which were seen as the work of the devil. The churchs stance on witchcraft then began to change.

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