Mastema: When Hostility Gets a Name

Send us Fan Mail What happens when supernatural hostility stops being just a force and becomes a prince? In the second episode of Southern Demonology’s four-part arc on the development of evil in Second Temple Judaism, JJ turns to Mastema, one of the most fascinating and misunderstood figures in ancient Jewish demonology. We begin with the word itself. Mastema originally means hostility or enmity, but over time that abstract idea becomes increasingly personified until Jubilees presents Mastem...