Having lived in the vicinity of some of these poor misguided souls it appears to be more along a cultist belief.
They also point to Acts 28:3-5 in support.
“Acts 28:3 And when Paul had gathered a bundle of sticks, and laid them on the fire, there came a viper out of the heat, and fastened on his hand. 4 And when the barbarians saw the venomous beast hang on his hand, they said among themselves, No doubt this man is a murderer, whom, though he hath escaped the sea, yet vengeance suffereth not to live. 5 And he shook off the beast into the fire, and felt no harm.”
It should be noted that the snakes are ‘milked’ before hand and the experienced snake handlers have become immunized by repeated bites over time from small amounts of venom from the milked snakes. Deaths do occur to persons overly sensitive or a snake that inadvertantly got by the milking process.
Most cultist type beliefs are centered on one verse or passage, taken out of context, to supoprt and be the basis of their belief system. Often when there is overwhelming textual evidence to the contrary.
For example – The A.D. 70 Doctrine, Realized Escatology. This heresey is unbelievably extreme. The thrust is thes: the destruction of Jerusalem in A.D.70 is the pivotal event of history. At that time all Bible prophecy was consummated, including the second coming of Christ, the ressurrection of the dead, the judgement day, and the end of the world!
Try to make sense out of that from a Biblical or any other perspective.
There is a book called Salvation On Sand Mountain which was written by a reporter who was covering the trial that either ralph124c or Guin mentioned (same case?). It is a very interesting read and documents his acceptance by the church to the point where he actually handles a snake.
There’s something I’m wondering about these snake-handling cults.
There is a cobra cult in some areas of India and they have an annual festival in which cobras are captured, carried around in processions, and brought into people’s homes where they are treated as honored guests for the day. Some of the snakes have become so accustomed to this after being captured and treated as a god every year (the snake is returned to the same place it was captured) that the person “catching” the snake has only to set a large jar down near the entrance to its burrow, and the cobra will crawl out and straight into the jar. I’ve seen actual footage of this, it was amazing. The snakes seemed, if not to be actually enjoying all the attention, at least not to mind.
I imagine there are people in these snake-handling groups who can validly claim never to have been bitten. Since it is apparent that the snakes are kept in enclosures, and not captured for each service, do the people with the “strongest faith” simply know which of the snakes are most accustomed to being handled and thus very mellow about it, and go for those snakes every meeting?