Does Galatians 5:20 Prove That the Use of Drugs Is a Fleshly Sin?

No.

This mistake came about because someone looked up the word “witchcraft” used in Galatians 5:20 in the Greek and found that it was pharmakeia.  Strong’s first definition of pharmakeia is “the use or the administering of drugs,” so the person concluded that any use of drugs must be a “work of the flesh” along with adultery and all the other things in Paul’s list.  Then he probably heard that pharmakeia was the word from which we get the word pharmacy, and he decided that all doctors, drugs stores and drugs must be of the flesh and thus sinful.

Witch doctors do use “potions” and supply drugs to people.  The use of drugs with witchcraft is clearly sinful.  But what about prescriptions from your family doctor?  If Paul were against drugs in general, he would have to have been against doctors, including Luke “the beloved physician.”  Paul would have had to describe Luke as “the fleshly doctor of deception” or some such term if he really believed that.  It was clear that Paul and Luke were on good terms; they traveled together in Acts.  So Paul was not against drugs (the use of them or administering of them) in general.  Jesus said that the sick need a physician, so He could not have believed that those who administer drugs are of the flesh and are to be avoided.  In fact, if you must avoid all physicians to stay out of sin, you must run away from God Himself, who names Himself Jehovah Rapha (The Lord Your Physician)!

The next thing is that if you’re going to come up with doctrine based on a Greek word, at least have the decency to look it up elsewhere in Scripture.  Today’s online tools make this easy.  You’ll find that the only other 2 places pharmakeia is used, it refers to sorceries, and no one ever complains about those translations:

“Neither repented they of their murders, nor of their sorceries, nor of their fornication, nor of their thefts.” – Revelation 9:21

“And the light of a candle shall shine no more at all in thee; and the voice of the bridegroom and of the bride shall be heard no more at all in thee: for thy merchants were the great men of the earth; for by thy sorceries were all nations deceived.” – Revelation 18:23

You would be hard-pressed to try to prove that prescription drugs deceived all the nations and brought judgment upon Babylon.

The next thing is that if you’re going to quote Strong, at least read the whole citation.  Strong’s ALSO lists other meanings as poisoning (something witches might well try), sorcery, magical arts (often found in idolatry and fostered by it) and metaphorically the deceptions and seductions of idolatry.  So there is absolutely no “proof” that pharmakeia refers to drugs at all!  There is no other Bible passage to support that theory.

So Scripture in general demonstrates that Galatians 5:20 is NOT a prohibition against the medical use of drugs and the prescribing of drugs.