It must be emphasized that I am not saying every person deemed to have a mental illness is attributed to demons. However, in my experience with praying for deliverance for people, I have come across cases where people were vexed by demons that targeted and attacked the mind, some who unwittingly opened the doors to them by the use of drugs, various New Age/Occult practices, or something else. They likely would have been diagnosed with mental illness. Some were on the verge of completely losing their mind or having a mental breakdown because of the demons. The demons inside the person confessed by duress, when prayed against by the name and authority of the Lord Jesus Christ, that their name or function was to cause mental illness. Some people were so heavily attacked they feared they would end up in a psychiatric hospital. In fact, some whom I have prayed for were once hospitalized because of mental health issues, but when prayed for found relief as demons were expelled.

What is the benefit of knowing demons can be behind mental illness? If it is fundamentally a spiritual issue then no doctor or medication can cure such a person with mental illness. The demons need to be cast out! And that can only be done by the name and authority of the Lord Jesus Christ. There are many people plagued with mental illness but never cured because the world of science, at least in large part, doesn’t believe in the spiritual realm. Meanwhile, satan’s kingdom laughs as the enemy operates undetected.

Is there any scriptural support that demons can cause mental illness? Absolutely! In Mark ch. 5, Jesus encountered a demoniac who “always, night and day… was in the mountains, and in the tombs, crying, and cutting himself with stones (verse 5).” Jesus expelled the demons from him, and the people saw “…him that was possessed with the devil, and had the legion, sitting, and clothed, and in his right mind: and they were afraid (verse 15).” Note: after the deliverance, his mind was restored which means the demons were behind him not having a right mind. The demons were behind his insanity. Today, the secular world would have deemed him as having a mental illness or just plain crazy.

I will provide more evidence to support the idea demons can be behind mental illness from the book The Coming Darkness (emphasis in bold mine):

Mediums and other channelers, for example, are often known to have psychological disturbances; so are psychics, witches, and Satanists. For example, Dr. Jeffrey Russell of the University of California at Santa Barbara observes, “Satanism… has had a great effect on people of unsound mind. Some people have been psychologically damaged by it. There’s no doubt about that.” Occultists and their victims frequently end up in mental institutions when the experiences they have encountered push them over the edge. Dr. Koch refers to a New Zealand psychiatrist who “claims that 50% of the neurotics being treated in the clinics in Hamilton are the fruit of Maori sorcery.” He also says he knows of Christian psychiatrists who believe that sometimes over half of the inmates at their psychiatric clinics are sufferings from occult oppression rather than mental illness, but that this occurs only in areas where occultism is extensively practices.

In “Mental Health Needs and the Psychic Community,” the late psychic researcher D. Scott Rogo warned, “The types of negative reactions people initially have to their psychic experiences may lead to permanent psychological damage if not immediately treated.” Rogo further observes that three of the most typical negative reactions to having a psychic encounter are 1) alienation from social relationships, 2) fear of impending insanity, and 3) a morbid preoccupation with psychic experiences.

A four-day symposium of the American Academy of Religion, the Society of Biblical Literature, and the American School of Oriental Research also noted the dangers of the occult in relation to mental health. In a paper delivered before the symposium, Roger L. Moore, a psychologist of religion at Chicago Theological Seminary, observed that there are “haunting parallels” between the paranoid schizophrenic and the deeply involved occultist. He warned that “participation in the occult is dangerous for persons who are the most interested in it because they are the least able to turn it on and off…. And a lot of them have become paranoid psychotics.”

Alice McDowell Pempel of Cornell University delivered another paper on the consequences of drug-induced altered state of consciousness (ASC), and noted the “possibility for madness is ever present” if those who meet up with monsters and demons in these states view them as real. Of course, psychic and occult practices characteristically induce altered state of consciousness and this in itself poses risks. Psychiatrist Arnold M. Ludwig points out, “As a person enters or is in an ASC, he often experiences fear of losing his grip on reality and losing his self-control.”

Psychotherapist Elsa First warns that cultivating ASCs may result in a “permanent alienation from ordinary human attachments.” Medium Wanda Sue Parrott also notes the ease with which psychics may lose a grip on reality:

“What is the greatest threat to human well-being in the world of psychic phenomena? I would say from experience, fear. Fear of losing one’s sanity and self-control are nearly as common as fear of losing one’s soul.”

The fear of insanity seems to be a genuine concern, for as former witch Irvine alleges, “Be warned: those who walk down the dark road of witchcraft lose their reason, often going completely insane…. Minds are twisted and warped.”

Psychic Harmon H. Bro refers to the occultly influenced mental conditions of some people–conditions which overcome their sanity as they seek to become more and more psychic: “I shall not soon forget the power-driven widow who frantically burned incense in her bedroom to rid it of ‘evil entities’ and aimlessly constructed ‘aura-charts’ of angels as she withdrew from her friends and family into a hate-supported schizophrenic world.“

Psychical researcher Robert H. Ashby, author of A Guidebook to the Study of Psychical Research, relates one case of a Ouija-board-induced breakdown. The spirit (“Joe”) started out typically with a surprising knowledge of personal details of the participants’ lives. He was very witty and entertaining besides. But once the person was in emotional dependence on advice from the board, the message changed:

“(The) next stage was frankly sexual propositions that soon had the girls disturbed; but when they asked that the (the spirit) stop this, the messages became threatening, the warnings including something ‘Joe’ termed ‘psychic rape’ if they did not comply with his wishes. At this point, Wendy was so frightened that she stopped sitting at the board. Linda, however, was so ‘hooked’ that she felt it more dangerous to stop than to continue, for Joe ordered her fiercely to keep on with the ritual. Eventually, the climax arrived when Joe told Linda that she must drop out with him, for they were, he assures her, ‘soulmates’ from former lives. The punishment if she did not do his bidding was serious physical disfigurement or even death at his hands….

Linda became a recluse, unwilling to seek psychiatric help (Joe had warned her against that), afraid to continue school, and sinking steadily into a desperate mental state…. Linda refused to see me because Joe had whispered to her that he would kill her if she did.

The pattern outlined above… is all too common in Ouija board experiences.”

Raymond Van Over, a former editor of the International Journal of Parapsychology, refers to one girl, who, through her occult involvement felt:

“She was being attacked telepathically by a vampire who was after her blood. His voice kept cursing her and telling her disgusting things to do. One didn’t need to be a psychiatrist to see that she was deeply disturbed and on the verge of a breakdown… She suffered a complete mental collapse.”

Anita Muhl, M.D., is an authority on automatic writing. She refers to one actress who became interested in spiritism by this method, and was finally admitted to a mental hospital. In the hospital she felt she had been taken over by the spirit of her dead father:

“That same evening the patient suddenly threw herself to the floor and went through numerous gross symbolic movements…. She spoke of being thrown to the floor by occult powers.”

The actress subsequently went through several releases and readmittances to the hospital and, after a year, was discharged with a diagnosis of “Paranoid Condition– Much Improved.” For the next year, she continued to develop mediumistic powers and believed she was healed of numerous physical ailments by her spirit controls. But while lecturing in another city, she spontaneously fell into a trance on a crowded street. She had to be taken to a hospital first and then to a mental institution where she developed feelings of grandeur and experienced other traumas. Eventually released, “she continued to lead a miserable unadjusted life.”

Although advocating automatic writing as a possible tool for psychotheraphy(!), even Dr. Muhl confesses that when used for working off fantasies, when the material is destructive (which is often the case), the person is “apt to become more and more unstable and sometimes psychotic.”

For example, Dr. Muhl herself gives numerous case histories of the problems associated with automatic writing, pointing out that the messages “often prove dangerous” and cause a tendency to schizophrenic reactions. “The subject begins to lose interest in everyday contacts and responsibilities and often becomes delusional and hallucinated. I have seen many a fine business and professional man lose his grip through too intense interest in automatic writing.” The person becomes “less and less able to face reality” and these automatisms “frequently precipitate a psychosis.” She says that any other use of automatic writing besides for therapy (!) is “very dangerous.”

It is both ironic and unfortunate that hundreds of psychotherapists today see benefits to automatism and other forms of the occult in counseling. Use of these practices (including automatic drawing, speech, painting, musical composition; tarot card therapy, shamanism and sorcery, ASCs, pendulums, meditation, psychosynthesis, etc.) is dangerous and should be avoided.

John Ankerberg & John Wendon, 177-182

Kurt Koch (1913-87), who had decades of experience counseling the occultly subjected, gave examples of those who were involved with the occult or New Age practices resulting in symptoms of mental illness, presumably due to demonization, even for a person’s descendants :

Ex 296 A missionary and his wife came to me for advice. The missionary’s brother heard voices and had compulsive ideas. The doctor’s diagnosis is schizophrenia. The family history revealed that both the grandfather and great-grandfather were magic charmers…

Ex. 297 A man came to me for counseling in Blumenau. He told me that he suffered from compulsive drives. He often heard voices saying, “murder your wife,” or “take your own life.” On being questioned, he informed me that his mother practiced spiritistic table-tapping. He also told me that all his children were abnormal. At the age of 10, 12 and 15 they still wet their beds and did other abnormal things.

Ex 298 In England, a doctor came to me counseling. He had a nervous breakdown and had been suspended from his profession. He had been given nine electric shock treatments at a psychiatric clinic. When I asked him to tell me the history of his illness, I discovered that his father had been a freemason and also a spiritist. His mother was a fortuneteller and spiritist healer. It is actually quite usual for such a marriage to produce children who are severely oppressed. This was the case with this doctor.

Ex 299 In England, an Anglican priest told me the story of his brother. Years before his brother had had trouble with his knee. The doctors who examined him thought that it was tuberculosis. Then a pendulum practitioner was called in. He said, “No, it is not tuberculosis.” How did this man make his diagnosis? On his table he had a paper with a list of the various bacilli and bacteria. He put his left hand on this paper. To the right of the table was a transistor with an electrode and a meter connected up between. He laid his right hand on this. Then he concentrated mentally on the patient, who was also present in the room. Then he moved his left hand down the list of bacilli. The transistor gave the highest reading when he came to the right disease. As a result, the Anglican priest’s brother was able to be healed. Two years later, the man who had been healed developed religious mania. Pendulum diagnosis and treatment belong within the field of occult practices.

Ex 300 A woman came to me for counseling. She complained of the disintegration of her family and her marriage. Her husband would sometimes rage and roar like a bull, and then he would become quite sensible and normal again. He had already spent some time in a mental institution. His grandfather had been an active magic charmer.

Ex 301 In Canada, a spiritist woman came to me. She told me that her grandmother had been a spiritist, and that she herself was a spiritist medium. She confessed that all four grandchildren of this spiritist grandmother were mentally abnormal. This spiritist medium came to me because she wanted to protest against my address on the subject of healing. In the address, I had declared that spiritist healings also cause oppression. She denied this and stated that she herself had been healed by a spiritist healer. She went on to say that she had the ability to make contact with good spirits. She could hear them, feel them, and sense their presence. Sometimes, it was true, bad spirits would find their way in as well, but she was able to drive these away by prayer. This confirmed my suspicions. This woman is already suffering from a mediumsitic psychosis.

Occult ABC, pages 275-276

Demons are almost always behind such aforementioned mental issues, especially when one gets involved in occult or New Age practices as it is a demonic door opener.

“For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.” – 2 Timothy 1:7

---

If you don’t know Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior you can receive Him into your heart, and He can deliver you from darkness and sin and have your name written in His Book of Life.

If you are sincere you can say this simple prayer to the Father (it doesn’t have to be word for word):

“God, I recognize that I have not lived my life for You up until now. I have been living for myself and that is wrong. Please forgive me of all of my sins just as I forgive others. I need You in my life; I want You in my life. I acknowledge the completed work of Your only begotten Son Jesus Christ in giving His life for me on the cross, I believe in my heart Jesus is Lord and was raised from the dead and I long to receive the forgiveness you have made freely available to me through this sacrifice. Come into my life now, Lord. Take up residence in my heart and be my king, my Lord, and my Savior. From this day forward, I will no longer be controlled by sin, or the desire to please myself, but I will follow You all the days of my life. Those days are in Your hands. I ask this in the Lord and GOD Jesus’ precious and holy name. Amen.”