The verse in Deuteronomy asks a haunting question: "How could one pursue a thousand, and two put ten thousand to flight?" (Deuteronomy 32:30). The answer, the Torah says, is that God had given them over. When divine protection is withdrawn, no army is large enough to stand.
A folk tale preserved in the medieval Jewish traditions illustrates this principle with a story about a wizard and a Jew. The wizard was a man of great power, feared throughout his region. He could command storms, speak with the dead, and bend the will of lesser men. He boasted that no force on earth could defeat him.
A Jewish scholar passing through the wizard's territory heard these boasts and was unimpressed. "Your power comes from below," the scholar said. "It was given to you by spirits who serve their own purposes. The power I rely on comes from above, from the Creator of all spirits, and it cannot be broken."
The wizard laughed and challenged the Jew to a contest. He summoned a windstorm. The scholar recited a psalm, and the wind died. The wizard called fire from the earth. The scholar spoke the Name, and the fire turned to smoke. The wizard sent a host of demons. The scholar stood his ground, reciting the Shema, and the demons scattered like sparrows before a hawk.
One man had pursued a thousand. Not through sorcery, not through military might, but through faith in the one God whose power exceeded all the dark arts of the world combined. The tale circulated through Jewish communities in Eastern Europe as a reminder that the battle between magic and prayer always ends the same way. The wizard commands the creation. The Jew calls upon the Creator. And there is no contest.