Does the Old Testament have a word for 'demon'?
Yes — shed (H7700) — but it appears only twice in the entire Old Testament, always as an object of illicit sacrifice with no attributed power, speech, or agency. The entire explicit demonic vocabulary across all 39 books amounts to fewer than 75 occurrences.
Yes, but it appears only twice in the entire Hebrew Bible — and that rarity is itself the point.
The word for "demon" (שֵׁד, shed, H7700) is borrowed from Akkadian. It shows up twice, both times in the context of illegitimate sacrifice:
"They sacrificed to the shedim, not God, to gods they had not known." — Deuteronomy 32:17
"They sacrificed their sons and daughters to the shedim." — Psalm 106:37
That's it. Neither passage describes what these beings do, what power they have, what they look like, or how they operate. They receive sacrifice — that's the only thing the text tells you. No personality, no hierarchy, no mythology.
The rest of the Old Testament's demonic vocabulary is equally sparse. The word sa'ir (שָׂעִיר, H8163) usually just means "goat" — it appears 59 times, and the vast majority are ordinary cultic goats in the sacrificial system. It carries a demonic sense in only four passages (Leviticus 17:7; 2 Chronicles 11:15; Isaiah 13:21; 34:14), and in each case it's describing creatures inhabiting ruined desolate cities. Lilit (לִילִית, H3917) appears exactly once — in Isaiah 34:14, listed alongside jackals and ostriches in a desolation oracle against Edom. The text gives Lilit no story, no victims, no power at all. The elaborate Lilith mythology that shows up in later Jewish tradition isn't in Isaiah. And Azazel (עֲזָאזֵל, H5799) appears four times in Leviticus 16, always in the Yom Kippur ritual, as the destination of the scapegoat — a word so uncertain that scholars still debate whether it's a place name, a personal name, or a common noun meaning "complete removal."
Add it all up: two occurrences of shed, four of sa'ir in the demon sense, one lilit, four azazel. Eleven verses across 39 books. The silence isn't accidental — it reflects a theological structure where every adversarial force in the Old Testament is sent by YHWH, permitted by YHWH, or answerable to YHWH. There's no conceptual space for an independent demonic realm.
For the full vocabulary analysis and what this silence means theologically, see the study The Silence and the Storm, section "The Thin Vocabulary."
Does the Old Testament say Satan incited David to take a census?
1 Chronicles 21:1 says 'satan stood against Israel and incited David.' 2 Samuel 24:1 records the same event with 'the anger of YHWH incited David.' Both are true simultaneously: the Adversary acted within YHWH's sovereign purpose using the same verb for the same action.
What is the divine council in the Old Testament?
The heavenly court — YHWH enthroned with beings standing before him for dialogue and commissioning — appears across three genres (Job, 1 Kings 22, Zechariah 3) with shared vocabulary, and Psalm 82 shows YHWH judging these council members for failing their mandate over the nations.