The Deception of the Belly-Speaker

They stun those who listen, and they flatter those who are submissive regarding what they wish to happen in the future; thus also the appearance of the belly-speaker is transformed. On the one hand, it explained the prophetic sayings of Samuel, but it seemed to prophesy without knowing anything, but rather it proposed foreign things as its own and struck the interlocutor with amazement; because of these things, it easily stole and snatched away the mind of that person.

What then does it add after these things? 'And you,' it says, 'tomorrow, you and your son Jonathan with me, and the Lord will give the camp of Israel into the hands of other tribes' (1 Sam 14:44-45). But the demon was saying these things as if they were its own. It must be sought whether it was saying true things, as it seemed, and whether it announced them by chance and coincidence, and whether it was able to foreknow these things.

First, it does not appear that Saul was destroyed on the sixth day, as the appearance was saying. For if, having heard the words from extreme despondency, 'he did not eat bread all that day and all that night' (1 Sam 14:43), it says 'that day,' as the Scripture forbids the aunt, and after this, the woman, dissuading him, again urged him to prepare food, it is evident that on the second day, after that all-night and all-day fast, having been cast down to the ground in utter collapse, he rose and sat more decorously on the couch, while the woman, having taken the calf which she had carelessly, slaughtered it, preparing a meal and frying unleavened cakes, made the food pleasant.

Since she also brought to him and to those around him, having prepared it skillfully, the one himself took a meal at the table; it is necessary to understand that he had reached other nocturnal hours, if he had indeed departed from there by night. Thus, this thing itself proves the demon was lying; for it did not happen, as it said ('tomorrow' you will be 'with me'), as it had occurred.