About JJ
Ancient languages, primary sources, and an unwillingness to let a footnote go.
Tell me when the book is out
I am JJ Johnson. I hold a Master of Theological Studies from Harvard Divinity School, where I studied the Hebrew Bible, Second Temple Judaism, and Semitic philology; and since 2017 I have hosted Southern Demonology, a podcast about the history of angels, demons, and the vocabulary that grew up around them. In practice the training means that I spend an unreasonable amount of time asking what a word meant before somebody decided what the word ought to mean.
Most episodes begin the same way. Somebody repeats a confident claim about an ancient belief, I go looking for the source, and the source turns out to be either much later than advertised or considerably more interesting than the claim. That pattern is the reason this book exists.
I should be clear about the posture, since the subject invites misunderstanding in both directions. I take spiritual danger seriously, and I am also unwilling to pretend that a nineteenth century occult handbook preserves second century practice merely because the handbook says so. Those are separate questions, and keeping them separate is most of the discipline.
Away from the sources, I am usually buying books I have no shelf space for, arguing with a translation, or trying to explain to my family why a footnote has ruined an otherwise pleasant evening.
If the book sounds familiar
The book grew out of Southern Demonology, where I work through the history of angels, demons, and the language used to describe them, generally by taking a familiar paranormal claim, looking for the evidence behind the claim, and following the trail into whatever older material turns up.
The podcast is the better place to start if you would like to hear the method before committing to a book, and several episodes cover ground the book treats at greater length.
