п»їUnderstanding Snake Handling

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Snake handling is a religious practice in which individuals handle venomous snakes as part of a worship service. The practice is most commonly associated with a small number of Pentecostal churches in the Appalachian region of the United States. Snake handlers believe that God protects them from being bitten, but fatalities do occur. Handlers typically use a variety of techniques to avoid being bitten, such as wearing special gloves and clothing, handling snakes only when they are calm, and avoiding sudden movements or loud noises. The practice is controversial and illegal in many states.

Wild Animals

Pentecostal ‘Signs Following’ tradition Pastor Mack Wolford was handling a rattlesnake during a service at the Church of the Lord Jesus in Jolo, West Virginia, on Sept. 2, 2011, when he was bitten and died a year later [source: The Washington Post via Getty Images]. Similarly, Pastor Jamie Coots, who was part of the “holiness serpent handling” practice at his Kentucky church, died in 2014 from a rattlesnake bite [source: Burnett]. These incidents have sparked public interest in religious snake handling, a practice that has been around for several decades [sources: Burnett, Lewis, Wilking and Effron].

Handling dangerous snakes is not limited to religious preachers. Scientists study snakes to produce anti-venom treatments, investigate the force exerted during constrictor attacks, and slide feeding tubes down conscious snakes’ throats [source: Moon and Mehta, Pet Place]. Snake removers also exist to safely remove snakes from residential areas [source: Wexo].

Snake venom can cause extreme pain, convulsions, tissue death, paralysis, swelling, nerve damage, internal bleeding, multisystem organ failure, among other effects. Constrictors use their rear-angled teeth to latch onto prey and suffocate them [source: Team].

While handling deadly snakes is a risky business, professionals and preachers take different approaches to the practice. Professionals prioritize safety while preachers view it as a religious ritual. Safe and humane snake handling is a skill that requires knowledge about the animal [source: SSAR, Animal Ark]. Snake displayers, on the other hand, perform with snakes for entertainment, and their expertise varies [sources: MacGuill, Schudel, Klinkenberg].

Professional Snake Handling: Where Caution Reigns

Legendary snake handler Bill Haast has some one-on-one time with a cobra in 1972.
Alan Band/Fox Photos/Getty Images

Professionals who handle snakes aim to complete the task without harming anyone, including the snake itself. To achieve this, they use various tools such as snake hooks or tongs to keep venomous snakes from striking while moving or displaying them. Veterinarians also use soft, clear tubes or mesh panels to examine or treat snakes. Feeding tongs are used by zookeepers to deliver prey. However, milking a snake requires free-handling, which involves holding the snake with bare hands. The milker immobilizes the snake’s head by grabbing it near the jaw bones and puts their fingers on the venom glands, pressing inward to force the snake’s mouth open and fangs through a latex membrane stretched over a jar. To start venom flow, the glands are massaged. It’s important to have at least two handlers present during milking and any other snake-handling context. Snake handling for religious purposes looks vastly different from professional snake handling. Bill Haast, known as the “Snakeman,” was a legendary snake handler who supplied medical venom in the US. He milked various venomous snakes, including king cobras, to produce anti-venom. He even turned his own blood into a venom antidote by injecting small amounts of venom every day for decades, saving at least 20 lives.

A Question of Faith: Holiness Serpent Handling

In the early 1900s, a Tennessee preacher named George Hensley is said to have started the practice of holiness serpent handling. Hensley had a crisis of faith and, while struggling with a line from the Gospel of Mark, saw a venomous snake and was compelled to pick it up. When he was not harmed, he took this as a sign that he had to “take up serpents” to fully obey God [sources: Phillips, Mariani]. Serpent handling became more widespread in Appalachia in the 1930s, but by the 1940s, it was outlawed due to practitioner deaths [source: Scott]. However, the practice continued to survive, particularly among members of the Church of God with Signs Following [source: Lewis].

Serpent handlers prefer the term “serpent” to “snake” and use no tools to handle these deadly creatures. They employ no safety measures except faith and are known to handle several snakes at a time, even bouncing up and down in trance-like elation [sources: CNN]. Despite the obvious risks involved, several thousand people still practice serpent handling today, although not all of them handle the snakes [sources: Lewis, Wilking and Effron]. It is important to note that taking up serpents is about obeying God’s command, not about proving one’s faith [source: Scott].

Holiness serpent handling is illegal in almost every U.S. state where it is practiced, but the law is not enforced unless a dispute arises. Children are not allowed to perform this practice, and adults are not required to do so. Police did investigate in 1995 when a woman died after being bitten in a church, but no charges were filed.

Serpent Handling: Dealing with the Consequences

This prairie rattlesnake has its venom extracted. Even those who extract venom can get bitten.
В© Joe McDonald/Corbis

Over the past hundred years, about a hundred people have died from snake bites during religious serpent handling ceremonies [source: Duin]. It’s hard to compare this number to the total number of people who have handled snakes over the years. However, given the dangerous techniques used during these ceremonies and the refusal of participants to seek medical attention, it’s miraculous that the death rate isn’t higher [sources: Swaine, Wilking and Effron].

Anti-venom is nearly 100% effective if administered promptly [source: ZME Science]. Although many participants are bitten, most survive even if they refuse medical care. They often lose fingers or the use of their hands [source: Handwerk].

Some members of the serpent handling community believe that injury is a punishment for sin or the result of human error, such as not releasing the snake in time after the “spirit leaves them” [source: Loller]. However, most believe that the consequences are beyond their control. They are simply obeying God’s word, and whatever happens is up to Him. If someone gets bitten, it’s God’s will. If someone dies, it was simply their time [source: Handwerk].

It’s not just amateurs who get injured. Even those who extract venom from snakes get bitten regularly. Bill Haast, a famous milker and showman who owned the Miami Serpentarium, survived at least 172 bites over 60 years, including one from a blue krait whose venom is more potent than that of a cobra [source: Conservation Institute]. When a bite cost him his right index finger in 2003, he retired (at the age of 92) [sources: Hunter, Schudel].

In 2008 in Pakistan, conservationist Rafiq Rajput was killed by an Indian krait. He was moving the snake between cages when he was bitten, and the local hospital had no anti-venom [source: Hasan]. The same year, an inexperienced handler at a Venezuelan zoo was killed and partially consumed by a 10-foot (3-meter) Burmese python after entering its enclosure alone during a night shift [source: Telegraph]. In 2013, expert handler Dieter Zorn died within minutes of receiving multiple bites from an Aspic viper during a demonstration in France aimed at helping people overcome their fear of snakes [source: Sieczkowski].

Considering the frequency with which people handle deadly snakes, especially novices, one might expect more deaths. Jamie Coots had been bitten nine times before his death in 2014 [source: Burnett]. George Hensley received 400 bites before one killed him [source: Scott]. Perhaps it is a miracle, or maybe it has something to do with the snakes themselves.

Revisiting the Risks of Snake Handling

Some herpetologists believe that religious snake handling is rigged. When a group from The Kentucky Reptile Zoo inspected the snake room at Coots’ church, they found evidence of mistreatment and malnourishment. The cages were dirty and overcrowded, and it appeared that the snakes were not being fed or watered enough [source: Burnett].

Well-fed snakes inject more venom than hungry ones [source: Hayes]. Generally unhealthy snakes are less likely to strike, and the venom they inject is less potent [source: Burnett].

In 2013, authorities in Tennessee, where it is illegal to keep venomous snakes, raided the church of snake-handling preacher Andrew Hamblin and confiscated 53 snakes, all of which were in poor health. Many died within months of the raid [source: Smietana]. (Hamblin was not indicted for this violation.)

One possible reason for the relatively low number of snake bites in snake-handling churches is that snakes are not as hostile as some people believe. Snakes do not prey on humans and only attack in self-defense. They would prefer to escape from humans rather than bite them, even when they feel threatened. Venomous snakes are more aggressive than constrictors, but they still prefer to escape. Striking at large predators, which can easily kill snakes, is not evolutionarily advantageous. Venom is also valuable to snakes, and they only use it when necessary to catch prey. Pit vipers like rattlesnakes and copperheads deliver “dry bites” about a quarter of the time. Serpent handling may be less dangerous than it appears, or it may be due to faith or luck. Snake charmers in India do not actually charm snakes with music since snakes cannot hear. Instead, they sway because they are trying to keep a close eye on potential danger. While some academics and journalists are impressed with the strong faith of holiness serpent handlers, animal cruelty concerns may be warranted if snakes are kept in filthy and unhealthy conditions. Religious freedom may not protect animal abuse in this context if it is not necessary for the religious practice.

Jenny. “Articles Related to Snakes and Venomous Creatures.”

• “How Snakes Work”
• “Can snakes really come up a toilet pipe?”
• “10 Venomous Creatures in Your Backyard”
• “If I suck the venom out of a snakebite, will I live?”
• “Why would you take poison as medicine?”

Here are some more great links on snakes and related topics:

• “The Bible and Snake-handling – America Magazine, March 7, 2014”
• “Bill Haast, a Man Charmed by Snakes, Dies at 100 – The New York Times, June 17, 2011”
• “Society for the Study of Amphibians and Reptiles”
• “Video: 14-foot albino python found in South Florida backyard”

For those interested in learning more about snakes and venomous creatures, here are some recommended sources:

• Animal Ark. “Venomous Snake Handling Training Course.” (June 10, 2015) http://www.animalark.com.au/snake-handling-training-course
• Barish, Robert A. and Thomas Arnold. “Snake Bites.” Merck Manual: Consumer Version. (June 15, 2015) https://www.merckmanuals.com/home/injuries-and-poisoning/bites-and-stings/snake-bites
• Bible Gateway. “Mark 16:16-18.” (June 12, 2015) https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Mark+16%3A16-18&version=KJV
• Burnett, John. “For Snake-Handling Preacher, 10th Bite Proves Fatal.” NPR. Feb. 17, 2014. (June 20, 2015) http://www.npr.org/2014/02/17/278667290/for-snake-handling-preacher-10th-bite-proves-fatal
• Burnett, John. “Serpent Experts Try To Demystify Pentecostal Snake Handling.” NPR. Oct. 18, 2013. (June 10, 2015) http://www.npr.org/2013/10/18/236997513/serpent-experts-try-to-demystify-pentecostal-snake-handling
• Burnett, John. “Snake-Handling Preachers Open Up About ‘Takin’ Up Serpents’.” NPR. Oct. 4, 2013. (June 15, 2015) http://www.npr.org/2013/10/04/226838383/snake-handling-preachers-open-up-about-takin-up-serpents
• CNN. “A look at the snake-handling churches of Appalachia.” July 17, 2012. (June 20, 2015) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cwBVcsWYJd8
• Discovery. “How to Escape from a Boa Constrictor.” Naked After Dark. (April 27, 2014) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aTlftS9B7QA
• Duin, Julia. “Death of snake handling preacher shines light on lethal Appalachian tradition.” CNN: Belief Blog. June 1, 2012. (June 22, 2015) http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2012/06/01/death-of-snake-handling-preacher-shines-light-on-lethal-appalachian-tradition/
• Ernst, Carl H. and Evelyn M. Ernst “Venomous Reptiles of the United States, Canada, and Northern Mexico.” JHU Press. May 3, 2011. Chapter 3: Treatment of Envenomation by Reptiles. p. 37. Available from: https://books.google.com/books?id=o8DTAQffi4UC&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false
• Estep, Bill. “Snakebite death of Middlesboro pastor was quick, son says; medical treatment refused.” Lexington Herald-Leader. Feb. 16, 2014. (June 15, 2015) http://www.kentucky.com/2014/02/16/3092068_jamie-coots-well-known-snake-handling.html?rh=1
• Flank, Lenny. “Playing with the Big Boys: Handling Large Constrictors.” Melissa Kaplan’s Herp Care Collection. 1997. (June 11, 2015) http://www.anapsid.org/handling.html
• Flintoff, Corey. “In India, Snake Charmers Are Losing Their Sway.” NPR. Aug. 8, 2011. (June 10, 2015) http://www.npr.org/2011/08/08/139086119/in-india-snake-charmers-are-losing-their-sway
• Freeman, Cameron. “Holiness Snake-handling: A Context for Pentecostal Epistemology.” Cameron Freeman: Socio-cultural Anthropology. (June 15, 2015) http://cameronfreeman.com/socio-cultural/anthropology-religion-christian-tradition/context-pentecostal-epistemology/
• Handwerk, Brian. “Snake Handlers Hang On in Appalachian Churches.” National Geographic News. April 7, 2003. (June 10, 2015) http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2003/04/0407_030407_snakehandlers.html
• Hayes, William K. “Research on Venom Expenditure and Strike Behavior of Snakes.” Department of Earth and Biological Sciences, Loma Linda University. (June 20, 2015) http://www.llu.edu/medicine/ebs/hayes/research-a-snake-venom.page
• Hasan, Abrarul. “In memoriam 20081028.” Dawn. Oct. 28, 2008. (June 20, 2015) http://www.dawn.com/news/425828/in-memoriam-20081028
• Hood, Ralph W. Jr. “Contemporary Serpent Handling Sects of Appalachia.” Virginia Commonwealth University: World Religions & Spirituality Project. Oct. 16, 2012. (June 15, 2015) http://www.wrs.vcu.edu/profiles/SerpentHandlers.htm
• Hubbell, Claire. “Anti-predator Behavior in Costa Rican Snakes: A Comparison of Venomous and Non-venomous Species.” Department of Biology, Texas A&M University. 2012. (June 20, 2015) http://www.bio.tamu.edu/COURSES/CostaRica/263Summer2012/pdf/Claire%20Hubbell%20Final%20Written%20Paper%202012.pdf
• Hunter, Jenny. “Articles Related to Snakes and Venomous Creatures.”

The sources listed below contain information about managing venomous snakes at the zoo, snake milker jobs, surviving snake bites, snake handling in religion, famous snake handlers, and more. The sources include news articles, books, and videos, and cover a range of topics related to snakes and their interactions with humans.

– Craig. “Keeper Notes: Managing Venomous Snakes at the Zoo.” Dickerson Park Zoo. March 25, 2010.

– Hunter, Ray. “In Memory of Mr. Bill Haast.” Hunter Serpentology.

– Job Monkey. “Snake Milker Jobs.”

– Kamler, Kenneth. “Surviving the Extremes: A Doctor’s Journey to the Limits of Human Endurance.” New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2004.

– Klinkenberg, Jeff. “Rattler’s deadly bite sank into psyche of famous snake handler.” The Tampa Bay Times. Dec. 31, 2013.

– Lewis, James R. “The Encyclopedia of Cults, Sects, and New Religions.” Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 2002.

– Loller, Travis. “Kentucky snake handler’s death doesn’t shake belief.” Portland Press Herald. Feb. 26, 2014.

– MacGuill, Dan. “‘Snake charmer’ dies during viper demo.” The Local. June 20, 2013.

– Mariani, Mike. “Prodigal King of the Serpents.” Pacific Standard. Dec. 9, 2014.

– Martens, John W. “The Bible and Snake-handling.” America Magazine. March 7, 2014.

– Martin, Douglas. “Bill Haast, a Man Charmed by Snakes, Dies at 100.” The New York Times. June 17, 2011.

– MedlinePlus. “Snake bites.” Jan. 13, 2014.

– Miami Serpentarium Laboratories. “The Legend: William Edward Haast.”

– Mohney, Gillian. “‘Snake Salvation’ Pastor Dies From Snakebite.” ABC News. Feb. 16, 2014.

– Moon, Brad R and Rita S. Mehta. “Constriction strength in snakes.” In: R.W. Henderson and R. Powell (Editors), 2007.

– Miller, Joshua Rhett. “Snake handling puts religious freedom, public safety in spotlight after Kentucky death.” Fox News. Feb. 26, 2014.

– National Geographic. “Boa Constrictor.”

– Pet Place. “How to Medicate Your Reptile.” Dec. 10, 2014.

– Phillips, Casey. “Professor’s expertise in serpent handling paved way for Animal Planet documentary.” Times Free Press. Feb. 5, 2012.

– Reptile Gardens. “Snake Show.”

– Reptile World Florida. “Milking Deadly Venomous Snakes” (YouTube Video).

– Schudel, Matt. “Bill Haast dies at 100: Florida snake man provided venom for snakebite serum.” The Washington Post. June 18, 2011.

– Scott, Mary. “‘Appalachian phenomenon’ of snake handling explained.” USA Today. Feb. 17, 2014.

– Sideshow World. “The Snake Charmer.”

– Sieczkowski, Cavan. “Dieter Zorn, Snake Expert, Dies After Viper Bite During Presentation On Overcoming A Fear Of Snakes.” The Huffington Post. June 21, 2013.

– Smietana, Bob. “‘Snake Salvation’ Pastor Andrew Hamblin Won’t Be Indicted, Court Decides.” Religion News Service/The Tennessean. June 5, 2014.

This is a list of resources and articles related to snakes and snake handling. It includes a range of topics such as safety and husbandry, handling tools and techniques, snake restraint and veterinary procedures, as well as information on becoming a herpetologist. There are also articles on snake attacks and fatalities, as well as the religious and cultural significance of snakes. The resources include books, websites, and reports from organizations such as the World Health Organization.

FAQ

1. What is snake handling and how does it work?

Snake handling is a religious practice that involves the handling of venomous snakes as part of a worship service. The practice is most commonly associated with a small number of Pentecostal churches in the southern United States. Snake handlers believe that they are commanded by God to take up serpents, as described in the New Testament book of Mark. The snakes are typically kept in a wooden box near the pulpit, and are brought out during the service for handling. Handlers believe that they are protected from the snakes’ venom by their faith in God, and that they will not be harmed if they are bitten.

2. Why do snake handlers risk their lives by handling venomous snakes?

Snake handlers believe that they are following a biblical commandment to take up serpents, as described in the New Testament book of Mark. They see the practice as a way of demonstrating their faith in God and affirming their belief in the power of prayer. Some handlers also view the practice as a test of their own spiritual strength and endurance. Despite the risks involved, many handlers continue to practice snake handling because they believe that it brings them closer to God.

3. What kind of snakes do snake handlers use?

Snake handlers typically use venomous snakes such as rattlesnakes, copperheads, and water moccasins. The specific species of snake used can vary depending on the church or denomination. Some handlers also use non-venomous snakes such as corn snakes or king snakes as a substitute for venomous species. Regardless of the species used, handlers believe that the snakes are an important part of their worship service and that handling them is a way of demonstrating their faith.

4. Is snake handling legal?

Snake handling is illegal in many states, including Alabama, Georgia, and Tennessee. In states where it is legal, there are often regulations in place to ensure the safety of both the handlers and the public. For example, in West Virginia, where snake handling is legal, handlers must obtain a permit from the state and are required to follow certain safety protocols, such as keeping the snakes in a secure enclosure and wearing protective clothing.

5. What are the risks of snake handling?

The risks of snake handling are significant. Even experienced handlers can be bitten, and snake bites can be fatal. Venomous snakes can cause a range of symptoms, including swelling, pain, and difficulty breathing. In some cases, a bite can lead to organ failure and death. In addition to the risk of injury or death from snake bites, snake handling can also put other people at risk if the snakes escape or are mishandled.

6. Are there any alternatives to snake handling for demonstrating faith?

There are many other ways of demonstrating faith that do not involve handling venomous snakes. Many churches and religious organizations offer opportunities for prayer, meditation, and community service. Some churches also incorporate music, dance, and other forms of artistic expression into their worship services. For those who are interested in the spiritual aspects of snake handling, there are also alternative practices that do not involve live snakes, such as the use of snake imagery or symbolism in art or literature.