Is a conjecture or surmise formed concerning some future event from something which is supposed to be a presage of it; but between which there is no real connection, only what the imagination of the diviner is pleased to assign in order to deceive. Divination of all kinds being the offspring of credulity, nursed by imposture, and strengthened by superstition, was necessarily an occult science, retained in the hands of the priests and priestesses, the magi, the soothsayers, the augurs, the visionaries, the priests of the oracles, the false prophets, and other like professors, till the coming of Jesus Christ, when the light of the Gospel dissipated much of this darkness. The vogue for these pretended sciences and arts is nearly past, at least in the enlightened parts of the world. There are nine different kinds of divination mentioned in Scripture. These are,
1. Those whom Moses calls Meonen of Anan, a cloud, Deu 18:10.
2. Those whom the prophet calls, in the same place, Menachesch, which the Vulgate and generality of interpreters render Augur.
3. Those who in the same place are called Mecasheph, which the Septuagint and Vulgate translate "a man given to ill practices."
4. Those whom in the same chapter, ver.11. he calls Hhober.
5. Those who consult the spirits, called Python.
6. Witches, or magicians, called Judeoni.
7. Necromancers, who consult the dead.
8. Such as consult staves, Hos 4:12. called by some Rhabdomancy.
9. Hepatoscopy, or the consideration of the liver.
Different kinds of divination which have passed for sciences, we have had:
1. Aeromancy, divining by the air.
2. Astrology, by the heavens.
3. Augury, by the flight and singing of birds, &c.
4. Chiromancy by inspecting the hand.
5. Geomancy, by observing of cracks or clefts in the earth.
6. Haruspicy, by inspecting the bowels of animals.
7. Horoscopy, a branch of astrology, marking the position of the heavens when a man is born.
8. Hydromancy, by water.
9. Physiognomy, by the countenance. (This, however, is considered by some as of a different nature, and worthy of being rescued from the rubbish of superstition, and placed among the useful sciences. Lavater has written a celebrated treatise on it.).
10. Pyromancy, a divination made by fire. Thus we see what arts have been practised to deceive, and how designing men have made use of all the four elements to impose upon weak minds.
a conjecture or surmise, formed concerning future events, from things which are supposed to presage them. The eastern people were always fond of divination, magic, the curious arts of interpreting dreams, and of obtaining a knowledge of future events. When Moses published the law, this disposition had long been common in Egypt and the neighbouring countries. To prevent the Israelites from consulting diviners, fortune tellers, interpreters of dreams, &c, he forbade them, under very severe penalties, to consult persons of this description, and promised to them the true spirit of prophecy as infinitely superior. He commanded those to be stoned who pretended to have a familiar spirit, or the spirit of divination, Deu 18:9-10; Deu 18:15. The writings of the prophets are full of invectives against the Israelites who consulted diviners, and against false prophets who by such means seduced the people.
2. Different kinds of divination have passed for sciences, as
1. Aeromancy, divining by the air.
2. Astrology, by the heavens.
3. Augury, by the flight and singing of birds, &c.
4. Cheiromancy, by inspecting the lines of the hand.
5. Geomancy, by observing cracks or clefts in the earth.
6. Haruspicy, by inspecting the bowels of animals.
7. Horoscopy, a branch of astrology, marking the position of the heavens when a person is born.
8. Hydromancy, by water.
9. Physiognomy, by the countenance.
10. Pyromancy, a divination made by fire.
3. The kinds of divination, to which superstition in modern times has given belief, are not less numerous, or less ridiculous, than those which were practised in the days of profound ignorance. The divining rod, which is mentioned in Scripture, is still in some repute in the north of England, though its application is now confined principally to the discovery of veins of lead ore, seams of coal, or springs. In order that it may possess the full virtue for this purpose, it should be made of hazel. Divination by Virgilian, Horatian, or Bible lots, was formerly very common; and the last kind is still practised. The works are opened by chance, and the words noticed which are covered by the thumb: if they can be interpreted in any respect relating to the person, they are reckoned prophetic. Charles I. is said to have used this kind of divination to ascertain his fate. The ancient Christians were so much addicted to the sortes sanctorum, or divining by the Bible, that it was expressly forbidden by a council. Divination by the speal, or blade bone of a sheep, is used in Scotland. In the Highlands it is called sleina-reached, or reading the speal bone. It was very common in England in the time of Drayton, particularly among the colony of Flemings settled in Pembroke- shire. Camden relates of the Irish, that they looked through the bare blade bone of a sheep; and if they saw any spot in it darker than ordinary, they believed that somebody would be buried out of the house. The Persians used this mode of divination.
4. Of all attempts to look into futurity by such means, as well as resorting to charms and other methods of curing diseases, and discovering secrets, we may say, that they are relics of Paganism, and argue an ignorance, folly, or superstition, dishonourable to the Christian name; and are therefore to be reproved and discouraged.
Divination is a general term descriptive of the various illusory arts anciently practiced for the discovery of things secret or future. The human mind has always shown a strong curiosity to ascertain the course of fortune, and the issue of present or contemplated schemes; and in those countries and ages where ignorance of physical laws has combined with superstition to debase it, it has sought to gratify this innate disposition to pry into futurity, by looking for presages in things between which and the object of its anxiety no connection existed but in the diviner’s imagination. Scarcely a single department of nature but was appealed to, as furnishing, on certain conditions, good or bad omens of human destiny; and the aspect of things, which, perhaps by the most casual coincidence, marked some event or crisis in the life of one or two individuals, came to be regarded, by blind credulity, as the fixed and invariable precursor of a similar result in the affairs of mankind in general. By such childish and irrational notions was the conduct of the heathen guided in the most important, no less than in the most ordinary occurrences of life; and hence arose the profession of augurs, soothsayers, et hoc genus omne of impostors, who, engrafting vulgar traditions on a small stock of natural knowledge, established their claims to the possession of an occult science, the importance and influence of which they dexterously increased by associating it with all that was pompous and imposing in the ceremonies of their religion.
This science, if that can be called science which was the product of ignorance and fraud united, was divided into various branches, each of which had its separate professors. In a general view, divination may be considered as either natural or artificial: the first being founded on the notion that the soul possesses, from its spiritual nature, some prescience of futurity, which it exemplifies particularly in dreams, and at the approach of death: the second, resting on a peculiar interpretation of the course of nature, as well as on such arbitrary observations and experiments as superstition introduced. The different systems and methods that were anciently in vogue are almost incredible: as, for instance, Aëromancy, divining by the air; Arithmomancy, by means of numbers; Capnomancy, by the smoke of sacrifices; Chiromancy, by the lines on the palms of the hands; Hydromancy, by water; Pyromancy, by fire, etc. but without attempting an enumeration and explanation of all the arts of divination that were anciently practiced, let us confine ourselves to the mention of those which occur in sacred history.
1. Wise men (Exo 7:11; Isa 44:25; Jer 50:35; Dan 2:12, etc.), a term applied generally to magicians, or men who were skilled in natural science.
2. ’Wizards’ or wise men, and ’a witch,’ from an Arabic verb signifying ’to reveal,’ both practicing divination by the same arts, i.e. pretending to reveal secrets, to discover things lost, find hidden treasure, and interpret dreams.
3. One who foretold what was to happen by the flight of birds, or the use of lots.
4. One who, though rendered by our translators ’an observer of times,’ foretold political or physical changes by the motion of the clouds, along with whom Isaiah conjoins those who made the same predictions from eclipses, and the conjunction of the stars (Isa 47:13).
5. ’An enchanter’ was probably one who practiced Ophiomancy, or the art of charming serpents, which was, and still is, a favorite trick of jugglery in the East.
6. ’A charmer,’ one who placed words and things in a certain arrangement, or muttered them, as a kind of spell.
7. ’A consulter with familiar spirits,’ or ’a ventriloquist,’ was a wizard who asked counsel of his familiar, and gave the responses received from him to others—the name being applied in reference to the spirit or demon that animated the person, and inflated the belly, so that it protuberated like the side of a bottle (see Lev 20:27; 1Sa 28:8; also Act 16:16).
8. ’A necromancer,’ one who, by frequenting tombs, by inspecting corpses, etc. like the witch of Endor, pretended to evoke the dead, and bring secrets from the invisible world (Gen 41:8; Exo 7:11; Lev 19:26; Deu 18:10-12).
9. Belomancy, as it is called, a form of divination by means of arrows (Eze 21:21; see also 2Ki 13:14-19), a notable example of which occurs in the history of Nebuchadnezzar, who, being undecided whether to march first against Jerusalem or Rabbah, allowed neither his policy nor resentment to decide the course of his expedition, but was determined wholly by the result of superstitious rites. The way of divining by arrows was, having first made them bright ’in order the better to follow them with the eye,’ to shoot them, and to prosecute the march according to the direction in which the greatest number of arrows fell; or, having ’mixed together’ some arrows with the names of the devoted cities marked on them, to attack that first which was first drawn out; or to put in a bag three arrows, as is the practice of the Arabs, one of which is inscribed with the words ’Command me, Lord,’ the second with ’Forbid me, Lord,’ while the third is left blank; so that if the first is taken out, he was to go; if the second, he was to desist; if the third is drawn, no decision being given, the experiment is to be repeated.
10. Rhabdomancy, or divination by rods (Hos 4:12). This has been confounded with the preceding. But the instruments of divination which Hosea alludes to are entirely different from those described by Ezekiel, arrows being used by the latter, whereas the former speaks of ’staff.’ The form of divination by the staff was, after placing it upright, to let it fall, and decide by the direction in which it fell, or, according to others, by measuring the staff with the finger, saying at each span, ’I will go’ or ’I will not go’ and determining the course, according as it happened to be the one or the other at the last measurement. Both of these, as Jerome informs us, were frequently practiced by the Assyrians and Babylonians. Herodotus (vi.) describes the Alani women as gathering and searching anxiously for very smooth and straight wands to be used in this superstitious manner.
11. Another way of divining was by ’images’ (Eze 21:21), which are generally considered talismans, but which the Persian and other versions render astrological instruments or tables.
12. Another form of divination was, ’by looking into the liver’ of a newly killed sacrifice, and by observing its state and color according to certain rules, to draw a favorable or unfavorable omen.
The last form which it is of consequence to notice as alluded to in Scripture was by ’the cup.’ But in what manner it was practiced; whether it was by observing the appearance of some magical ingredients that were infused into the vessel; or whether allusion is made to a famous cup which the immemorial tradition of the East says has been in the possession of some great personages, and represents the whole world; or, finally, whether the original word rendered ’divineth,’ should be rendered by ’searching’ or ’inquiring earnestly,’ as many learned writers, anxious to save the character of Joseph from the imputation of sorcery (Gen 44:5), have labored to prove, it is absolutely impossible, and we shall not attempt, to determine.
Egypt, the cradle of arts and sciences, if she did not give it birth, seem to have encouraged the practice of divination at an early age, and whether any of its forms had become objects of popular superstition, or were resorted to for the purposes of gain in the days of Joseph, it is well known that at the time of the Hebrew Exodus there were magicians in that country whose knowledge of the arcana of nature, and whose dexterity in the practice of their art, enabled them, to a certain extent, to equal the miracles of Moses. By what extraordinary powers they achieved those feats, how they changed their rods into serpents, the river water into blood, and introduced frogs in unprecedented numbers, is an inquiry that has occasioned great perplexity to many men of learning and piety. Some have imagined that the only way of accounting for the phenomena is to ascribe them to jugglery and legerdemain; the serpents, the frogs, and the other materials requisite having been secretly provided and dexterously produced at the moment their performances were to be exhibited. Others contend that these conjurors were aided by familiar spirits or infernal agents, with the Divine permission, in the performance of their wonderful feats. ’Earth, air, and ocean,’ says a sensible writer, ’may contain many things of which our philosophy has never dreamed. If this consideration tend to humble the pride of learning, it may remind the Christian that secret things belong not to him, but to a higher power.’
It is reasonable to suppose that as Moses never had been in any other civilized country, all the allusions contained in his writings to the various forms of divination were those which were practiced in Egypt; and, indeed, so strong a taste had his countrymen imbibed there for this species of superstition, that throughout the whole course of their history it seems to have infected the national character and habits. The diviners, who abounded both among the aborigines of Canaan and their Philistine neighbors (Isa 2:6), proved a great snare to the Israelites after their settlement in the promised land; and yet, notwithstanding the stern prohibitions of the law, no vigorous efforts were made to put an end to the crime by extirpating the practitioners of the unhallowed art, until the days of Saul, who himself, however, violated the statute on the night previous to his disastrous fall (1 Samuel 28). But it was Chaldea to which the distinction belongs of being the mother country of diviners. Such a degree of power and influence had they attained in that country, that they formed the highest caste and enjoyed a place at court; nay, so indispensable were they in Chaldean society that no step could be taken, not a relation could be formed, a house built, a journey undertaken, a campaign begun, until the diviners had ascertained the lucky day and promised a happy issue. A great influx of these impostors had, at various times, poured from Chaldea and Arabia into the land of Israel to pursue their gainful occupation, more especially during the reign of the later kings (Isa 8:19), and we find Manasseh not only their liberal patron, but zealous to appear as one of their most expert accomplices (2Ki 21:6; 2Ch 33:6). The long captivities in Babylon spread more widely than ever among the Jews a devoted attachment to this superstition; for after their return to their own country, having entirely renounced idolatry, and, at the same time, no longer enjoying the gift of prophecy or access to the sacred oracles, they gradually abandoned themselves, as Lightfoot has satisfactorily shown, before the advent of Christ, to all the prevailing forms of divination (Comment. on Matt.).
Against every species and degree of this superstition the sternest denunciations of the Mosaic law were directed (Exo 22:18; Lev 19:26; Lev 19:31; Lev 20:27; Deu 18:10-11), as fostering a love for unlawful knowledge and withdrawing the mind from God only wise; while, at the same time, repeated and distinct promises were given that, in place of diviners and all who used enchantments, God would send them prophets, messengers of truth, who would declare the divine will, reveal futurity, and afford them all the useful knowledge which was vainly sought for from those pretended oracles of wisdom. Much discussion, however, has been carried on by learned men to determine the question whether the ancient tribe of diviners merely pretended to the powers they exercised, or were actually assisted by demoniacal agency. The latter opinion is embraced by almost all the fathers of the primitive church. On the other hand, it has been, with great ability and erudition, maintained that the whole arts of divination were a system of imposture, and that Scripture itself frequently ridicules those who practiced them as utterly helpless and incapable of accomplishing anything beyond the ordinary powers of nature (Isa 44:25; Isa 47:11-13; Jer 14:14; Jon 2:8).
The Eastern people were fond of divination, magic, and the pretended art of interpreting dreams and acquiring a knowledge of futurity. When Moses published the law, this disposition had long been common in Egypt and the neighboring countries; and to correct the Israelites inclination to consult diviners, wizards, fortune-tellers, and interpreters of dreams, it was forbidden them under very severe penalties, and the true spirit of prophecy was promised to them as infinitely superior, Exo 22:18 Lev 19:26,31 20:27. Those were to be stoned who pretended to have a familiar spirit, or the spirit of divination, Deu 18:9-12 ; and the prophecies are full of invectives against the Israelite who consulted such, as well as against false prophets, who seduced the people, Isa 8:19 47:11- 14 Eze 13:6-9. A fresh impulse to these superstitions was gained from intercourse with the Chaldeans, during the reign of the later kings of Judah and the captivities in Babylon, 2Ki 21:6 2Ch 33:6 . See MAGIC, SORCERERS.\par Divination was of several kinds: by water, fire, earth, air; by the fight of birds, and their singing; by lots, dreams, arrows, clouds, entrails of sacrifices, pretended communication with spirits, etc., Eze 21:21 .\par
Divination. Divination is a "foretelling future events, or discovering things secret by the aid of superior beings, or other than human means". It is used, in Scripture, of false systems of ascertaining the divine will. It has been universal in all ages, and all nations alike, both civilized and savage.
Numerous forms of divination are mentioned, such as
divination by rods, Hos 4:12,
divination by arrows, Eze 21:21,
divination by cups, Gen 44:5,
consultation of teraphim, 1Sa 15:23; Eze 21:21; Zec 10:2, see Teraphim.;
divination by the liver, Eze 21:21,
divination by dreams, Deu 13:2-3; Jdg 7:13; Jer 23:32, and
consultation of oracles. Isa 41:21-24; Isa 44:7.
Moses forbade every species of divination, because, a prying into the future, clouds the mind with superstition, and because, it would have been an incentive to idolatry. But God supplied his people with substitutes for divination which would have rended it superfluous, and left them in no doubt as to his will in circumstances of danger, had they continued faithful.
It was only when they were unfaithful that the revelation was withdrawn. 1Sa 28:6; 2Sa 2:1; 2Sa 5:23, etc. Superstition, not unfrequently, goes hand in hand with skepticism, and hence, amid the general infidelity prevalent throughout the Roman empire at our Lord’s coming, imposture was rampant.
Hence, the lucrative trade of such men as Simon Magus, Act 8:9,
Bar-jesus, Act 13:6,
the slave with the spirit of Python, Act 16:16,
the vagabond Jews,
exorcists, Luk 11:19; Act 19:13 and
others, 2Ti 3:13; Rev 19:20, etc.,
as well as the notorious dealers in magical books at Ephesus. Act 19:19.
Eze 13:7. Used in Scripture of false systems of ascertaining the divine will, such as are allied to idolatry: as necromancy, which evoked the dead (1Sa 28:8); prognostication by arrows (Eze 21:21). The arrows marked with names of places to be attacked were shaken (for "He made His arrows bright," translated, "He shook") together in a quiver; whichever came out first intimated the place selected; or else threw them in the air to see in alighting which way they inclined, toward Jerusalem or Ammon. Inspecting entrails. The healthy or unhealthy state of the sacrificial entrails intimated success or failure. In the Nineveh sculptures the king is represented with a cup in his right hand, his left hand resting on a bow, also two arrows in the right hand, possibly for divination. The "magicians" of Egypt in Gen 41:8, (
Daniel was made "master of the magicians" (Dan 5:11);
"So Saul died for his transgression (Hebrew shuffling evasion of obedience) ... and also for asking counsel of one that had a familiar spirit, to inquire of it" (1Ch 10:13). "Wizards,"
Scripture has written for all ages (Isa 8:19-20):"when they shall say, Seek unto them that have familiar spirits; and unto wizards that peep and that mutter, should not a people seek unto their God? (should they seek) for the (good of) the living to the dead? To the law and to the testimony ... if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them." This tests and condemns modern spiritualism, the sign of "the latter times and the last days" (1Ti 4:1), "seducing spirits and doctrines suggested by demons" (2Ti 3:1-8). The phenomena seem supernatural and Satanic, and the communications often lying, as was to be expected from "the father of lying" (Joh 8:44). The Angekoks, Esquimaux sorcerers, when converted, have declared that their sorceries, when they were heathen, were not mere impostures, that they were acted on by a power they could not control; but when they believed in Jesus they had neither the will nor the power to do what they used in their pagan state.
Brainerd states the same as to the Indian diviners, namely, that all their former powers of divination departed the moment the word of God entered their souls. Satan’s design in spiritualism is, judging from the alleged spirit communications, to supersede Scripture with another authority (namely, spirit communications) in matters of faith. Satan and his demons are the real speakers in these pretended communications from the spirits of the dead. The "associate spirit" of spiritualism answers to the Scripture "familiar spirit" of the wizards. The pythoness and the witch of Endor were each a "medium" between the consulters and the powers of darkness. The consulters are put en rapport with the latter, not really with the departed dead. Scripture (Ecc 9:5-6, "the dead know not anything ... neither have they any more a portion forever in anything done under the sun"; 2Ki 2:9; Luk 16:19-31) implies that it is not the spirits of the dead that make the alleged communications, though these communications assert that it is; this assertion is from a lying spirit, such as was in Ahab’s prophets (1Ki 22:22).
The dead do not return, they are personated by evil spirits. Spiritualism is virtually condemned in Deu 18:10; 2Ki 17:17; 2Ki 21:6. "Sorcerers" are especially mentioned as about to abound with "lying wonders," and to be adjudged to damnation, at the Lord’s coming again (2Th 2:9-11; Mal 3:5; Rev 21:8; Rev 22:15). The three frog-like demons out of the mouths of the anti-trinity, the dragon, the beast, and the false prophet, shall "work miracles" to tempt the ten kings under Antichrist to the last battle for the kingship of the world, against Christ, in "the great day of God Almighty" (Rev 16:13-14; compare Zec 13:2; Mat 24:24; Rev 13:14-15). Paul was "grieved," so far was he from seeking and welcoming like spiritualists the pythoness’ testimony to him (Act 16:17-18); for the Spirit of Christ and the spirit of divination cannot dwell together in the same soul.
God condemns those who "remain among the graves and lodge in the monuments" (Isa 65:4) for necromancy, to consult the dead. The warning in Isa 8:19-20; Mar 5:3, applies to all times. The witch of Endor was "mistress of a spirit by which the dead are conjured up" (1Sa 28:7,
Saul apparently did not see Samuel’s person, but recognized the "mantle." Saul’s inconsistency is convicted by Samuel: "wherefore then dost thou ask of me, seeing the Lord is departed from thee, and is become thine enemy?" If God was departed from him he should have been the more afraid to increase Jehovah’s displeasure by breaking the laws in consulting the dead, as if they were less under God’s control than the living. Abject superstition never reasons. Samuel’s prophecy of his and his sons’ death on the morrow, and Israel’s defeat by the Philistines, proves Samuel’s appearance to have been of God, and not by demoniac agency nor an illusion (Sir 46:20). God for special reasons awakened His servant out of his repose ("why hast thou disquieted me," etc.) to appear, not at a conjuring call which He forbids, but to show the witch and the king the terrible penalty of disobedience and witchcraft, as he (Samuel) had long ago declared in more general terms when alive (1Sa 15:23; 1Sa 28:17-19).
Jehovah’s principle is (Eze 14:4; Eze 14:7-8), "every man that setteth up his idols in his heart and putteth the stumbling-block of his iniquity before his face, and cometh to the prophet, I the Lord will answer him that cometh, according to the multitude of his idols, that I may take the house of Israel in their own heart ... I will answer him by Myself" (by My own special interposition), answering the fool according to his folly, making the sinner’s sin his own punishment. In Egypt books containing magic formulae belonged exclusively to the king, the priests and wise men, who formed a college, being called in by Pharaoh when needful. The
The Septuagint explain it of "observers of words," so as to decide by them whether success will attend an undertaking or not (Gen 24:14; 1Sa 14:9-10; 1Ki 20:33). Others take it from
Divination by rods is alluded to in Hos 4:12, "their staff declareth unto them"; a rod stripped of bark on one side, not on the other, was thrown up; if the bore side alighted uppermost it was a good omen, otherwise a bad omen. The Arabs mark one rod God bids, the other God forbids; whichever came out first from the case decided the issue. Consultation of idols’ oracles is referred to in 2Ki 1:2-6. The only true "oracle" (
(
5. The next phrase in the Mosaic catalogue of forbidden divination is (Deu 18:11)
5. In Dan 2:2, four classes of diviners are mentioned: two of these are described above; of the others
The talisman (Arabic tilsam, Greek
Divination is the profession of foretelling future events. Deu 18:10. Various modes of doing this have been resorted to in different nations. Thus Joseph’s cup was used in this art. Gen 44:5. The Egyptian magicians used to practise divination: so did the Chaldæans at Babylon. Divination was practised among the Greeks. The appearance of the sky and of the heavenly signs, the flight and song of birds, the phenomena presented by the entrails of victims, etc., were supposed to prognosticate events; and, according to these prognostications, public as well as private actions were regulated. The Romans were equally zealous in divining. The hold that such practices had upon the public mind was very strong. We need the less wonder at it when we notice the eagerness with which, even now, persons will resort to a specious fortune-teller. There is frequent mention of diviners in Scripture; and the Hebrews are repeatedly warned against the pretensions of those who affected to foretell events.
The one exception noticed above is 1Sa 15:23, where we read that ’rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft;’ but it would be better to say ’the sin of divination.’ The word used is Kasam (
The Philistines had their diviners (1Sa 6:2), and the witch of End or was asked ’to divine by the familiar spirit’ (1Sa 28:8) in Isa 44:25, it is said of God that He ’frustrateth the significant tokens of liars (i.e. their false miracles), and maketh diviners mad;’ and in Jer 14:14, false prophets ’prophesy unto you a false vision and divination, and a thing of nought and the deceit of their heart.’ See also Jer 27:9; Jer 29:8; Eze 12:24; Eze 13:6-7; Eze 13:9; Eze 13:23; Eze 21:29; Eze 22:28; Mic 3:6-7; Zec 10:2.
In Isa 3:2 the word is rendered ’prudent;’ and in Pro 16:10 we read that ’a divine sentence,’ i.e. a word of divination, ’ is in the lips of the king.’ The diviners were doubtless shrewd men, well acquainted with the affairs of those whom they had to do with, and able to deliver their prognostications in oracular and enigmatical language.
Three special modes of divination are alluded to in Eze 21:21, ’The king of Babyl on stood at the parting of the way, at the head of two ways, to use divination: he made his arrows (or knives) bright, he consulted with his images (or seraphim), he looked in the liver.’
The ordinary word for a diviner in the LXX is
The numerous references in scripture to the various forms of occult science, as it is now called, and the strong denunciations against the Israelites having anything to do with it, show that it was a dangerous reality, however much deception might at times have been associated with it. We read of it first in Gen 41:8, when Pharaoh called for all the magicians, chartummim, of Egypt and the wise men, to interpret his dream. All their resources failing, God’s man in the prison was called forth to show the dream, and this proved the occasion of working out God’s purposes respecting Joseph. Doubtless the above class of men were eminent for their learning, as those were at the court of Babylon, over whom Daniel was made chief. Dan 4:7; Dan 4:9.
Among those in Egypt there were some at least who were able to exercise powers beyond what they obtained by human learning. When Moses was endeavouring by means of signs to convince Pharaoh of the power of God, the magicians of Egypt were able to turn their rods into serpents, and to simulate the first two plagues with their enchantments. Exo 7:22; Exo 8:7. These plagues were ’turning the water into blood’ and ’bringing up frogs upon the land.’ This was beyond mere human power, and certainly the magicians did not work by the power of God; it must therefore have been by the power of Satan. We know not the nature of the enchantments used, the word is lat, and signifies ’secret, magic arts.’ Satan can suggest what incantations to employ, if man is willing, and can exercise his powers as far as permitted by God. After the first two plagues the power was stopped, and the magicians had to own, when lice were produced, "This is the finger of God."
In Deu 18:10-11 there is a list of things bearing on our subject which were denounced by the Lord:
1. DIVINATION, qesem, ’prediction.’ A remarkable passage in Eze 21:21-22 gives some instances of how the heathen divined. The king of Babylon had come to two roads, and wanting to know whether he should take the road to Rabbath or to Jerusalem, resorted to divination. First ’he shook his arrows’ (as it should be translated). Doubtless two or more arrows were marked each with the name of one of the cities, and shaken in the quiver, whichever arrow was taken by the right hand decided which road was to be taken. Jerusalem fell to the right hand. Perhaps the king was doubtful, so he consulted with images, teraphim; it is not known how these were used for divination: cf. Zec 10:2. The king still sought another guide: ’he looked in the liver.’ By certain set rules the intestines of a sacrifice were said to be propitious or the reverse. The king using three sets of prognostications shows that he had no great confidence in his divinations: he may have been often deceived by them previously. How different from an answer from God vouchsafed to Israel!
Other means of divination are named, as, ’divining by the cup.’ Gen 44:5; Gen 44:15. This was practised by the Egyptians and Persians and is thus described: small pieces of metal and stones, marked with signs were thrown into the cup, and answers gathered from the marks as they fell. Sometimes the cup was filled with water, and, as the sun fell upon the water, images were seen or fancied on its surface. Another reference is "My people ask counsel at their stocks and their staff declareth unto them." Hos 4:12. The Arabs used two rods, on one of which was written God bids, and on the other God forbids, these were shaken together, and the first that fell, or was drawn, was taken for the answer; or one rod was thrown up and the direction in which it pointed when it fell was answer. It will be seen here that a ’stock’ or god was invoked that what the staff declared should be controlled by him. So in all divination, incantations were used, and the gods invoked to let the replies given be the most favourable. Behind all this we know there were demons who controlled the results given, so as to work out the purposes of Satan.
In the Acts we find a damsel possessed with a spirit of divination, or of Python. This was the prophetic oracle at Delphi, held to be the centre and focus of Gentile divination. An evil spirit connected with that oracle possessed this young woman. The testimony of the evil spirit to the servants of the most high God is remarkable: it may have been compelled to speak thus when brought face to face with the power of God (as the demons owned Christ): but the apostle could not tolerate commendation from such a source - the spirit was cast out by a superior power. Her soothsaying or divination was stopped, and her master lost the source of his evil gains Act 16:16-19.
2. OBSERVER OF TIMES, or, as others translate it, ’a practiser of augury:’ it may have included both. The word is anan, which is also translated ’enchanter, soothsayer, and sorcerer.’ An observer of times had his lucky and unlucky days, and nothing must be set on foot without the gods being consulted. We have an instance of this in Esther, when Haman wanted to find a lucky day on which his plans against the Jews should be carried out. They resorted to the lot, but doubtless invoked their god to give it success. Others practised augury for the like purpose of ascertaining the will of their god. Thunder, lightning, observing the clouds, the flight of birds, or the appearance of certain birds, answered their questions.
3. ENCHANTER, nachash, ’a whisperer.’ This seems to refer to the songs sung or charms muttered as a preliminary to obtaining a response from the spirits they wished to consult. It was one of the things that Manasseh resorted to. 2Ki 21:6.
4. WITCH or SORCERER. The Hebrew word is kashaph, and refers to the practice of magical arts, with the intent to injure man or beast, or to pervert the mind; to bewitch. It may be that they had no power to injure another unless that person, out of curiosity or friendship, was a willing listener to the incantations used. Manasseh practised also this wickedness. 2Ch 33:6. Nineveh is compared to a well-favoured harlot, the mistress of witchcrafts. Nah 3:4. The woman at Endor is usually called a witch.
5. CHARMER, from chabar, ’to join together, to fascinate.’ It is associated with another word, lachash, ’to speak in a soft gentle manner,’ and then is applied to the charming of serpents. Psa 58:5. In like manner man is deceived and disarmed of his aversion to intercourse with evil spirits until he finds himself under their sway. In Isa 19:3 another word, ittim, is translated ’charmer’ with a similar meaning, as giving a gentle sound in the incantations of the sorcerers.
6. CONSULTER WITH FAMILIAR SPIRITS. The word is ob, which signifies ’a leathern bottle or skin,’ and is supposed to imply that the persons alluded to were professedly inflated with a spirit. It occurs sixteen times and is translated in all the places as above. As an example of the meaning of this word we have the woman at Endor whom Saul consulted: she is said to have had a familiar spirit. Saul at once said to the woman, "Bring me him up whom I shall name unto thee." The woman, as soon as her life was secured by an oath, replied, "Whom shall I bring up unto thee?" Apparently it was her profession to call up departed spirits, but on this occasion she recognised the work of a superior power, for when she saw Samuel she cried with a loud voice. Samuel told Saul that he and his sons on the morrow would be with him. Whether having the power to call up departed spirits is always implied in the above word is not known. A remarkable thing, in connection with those who have a familiar spirit, is that apparently there is a voice heard ’out of the ground.’ Isa 29:4.
7. WIZARD, from yiddeoni, ’a knowing, wise one.’ The only thing said in scripture concerning such is that they ’chirp and mutter.’ Isa 8:19. This was doubtless a part of their incantations, used to bewilder those who came for advice, and needful perhaps to arouse to action the spirit they wished to consult. The counsel may have been good at times in order the more effectually to draw the deluded ones under the influence of the evil spirits.
8. NECROMANCER, from darash methim, ’to consult the dead.’ This occurs only in Deu 18:11, though the same is implied in Isa 8:19; Should the living go to the dead? should they not seek unto their God? And in Psa 106:28 we read of some who ’ate the sacrifices of the dead,’ which may have been a preliminary to consulting them. The above is the list given in Deu 18:10-11; a few still demand attention.
9. ASTROLOGERS, habar shamaym, ’dividers of the heavens’ for astrological purposes. Isa 47:13. The word for ’astrologers’ throughout Daniel is a different word, ashshaph, and does not imply any connection with the heavens, but is rather ’sorcerers’ or ’enchanters,’ as we read with reference to Babylon in Isa 47:9; Isa 47:12, where a multitude of sorceries and great abundance of enchantments are spoken of. Along with the Babylonish astrologers in Isa 47:13 are associated STAR-GAZERS, who may have prognosticated events from the altered positions of the planets in respect to the stars. To this is added MONTHLY PROGNOSTICATORS, who probably drew their deductions from the moon. Connected with Babylon is also the word SOOTHSAYER, gezar, ’to divide, determine fate or destiny’ by any pretended means of predicting events.
In the N.T., besides the case referred to of the damsel possessed by a spirit of Python, we read of others, such as Simon who used sorcery and bewitched the people of Samaria for a long time, Act 8:9-11; and Elymas the sorcerer, a Jew who was met with in Cyprus, who perverted the right ways of the Lord. Act 13:6; Act 13:8. These used magical arts (called ’curious arts’ in Act 19:19) and bewitched the people. Another word is used for sorceries in the Revelation,
The above is a brief glance at the subtle power of Satan in the unseen world, by which he deludes mankind, at least where man is the willing victim. Is it not clear that divination should not be confounded with mere jugglery? However much that may be associated with it, the real power of Satan is behind it. Some sorcerers converted in modern times in various parts of the earth have confessed that they were controlled by a power beyond their own; but that it ceased entirely on their believing and confessing Christ. It is important to see that this power is of Satan, because of the great increase in the present day of attempting to have intercourse with the spirits of the dead, to which even Christians may be, and indeed have been, drawn out of mere curiosity. "Let no man beguile you of your reward . . . . intruding into those things which he hath not seen, vainly puffed up by his fleshly mind." Col 2:18.
* It has been doubted by many whether it was really Samuel that arose, because of his being God’s prophet. The woman had reckoned that her familiar demon would personate as usual: hence her fear when God allowed Samuel’s spirit in this special instance to appear. Of course Satan can do nothing without God’s permission, but it must be remembered that it is Satan that had the power of death, Heb 2:14; and both Hades and Death, as powers of Satan, will eventually be cast into the lake of fire. Rev 20:14.
By: Kaufmann Kohler
The forecasting of the future by certain signs or movements of external things, or by visions in certain ecstatic states of the soul (see Dreams and Prophecy). Divination rests on the belief that spirits inhabit the various elements of life and are able to impart the knowledge of the future to man, and it is, like all idolatrous practises, forbidden by the Law. "Neither shall ye use enchantments nor practise augury." "Turn ye not unto them that have familiar spirits nor unto the wizards" (Lev. xix. 26, 31, Hebr.). "There shall not be found with thee . . . one that uses divination, one that practiseth augury, or an enchanter, or a sorcerer, or a charmer, or a consulter with a familiar spirit, or a wizard, or a necromancer. For whosoever doeth these things is an abomination unto the Lord, and because of these abominations the Lord thy God doth drive them out from before thee" (Deut. xviii. 10, 11, Hebr.).
The general term for "divination" in Hebrew is 
(Deut. l.c.; I Sam. vi. 2, xv. 23 [A. V. "witchcraft"], xxviii. 8: 
, "divine unto me by the familiar spirit"; Ezek. xii. 24; Isa. iii. 2 [A. V. "prudent"); Zech. x. 2; and elsewhere). Balaam used divination (Num. xxii. 7, xxiii. 22; Josh. xiii. 22 [A. V. "soothsayer"]). For the original meaning or etymology of 
reference has been made to Ezek. xxi. 26 (21), where Nebuchadnezzar is represented as standing at the parting of the ways and shaking the arrows to and fro to determine which way he should go, whether to Jerusalem or to the capital of the Ammonites. Accordingly "Ḳasam" is explained after the Arabic "istaḲsam" (to obtain a divine decision), from "Ḳasam" (distribute, or divide), as signifying the casting of lots by throwing the arrows from the quiver, a practise familiar to the Arab Bedouins (see Jerome to Ezek. l.c.; Herodotus, iv. 67; Gesenius, "Thesaurus," s.v.; W. R. Smith, in "Journal of Philology," xiii. 276; Wellhausen, "Skizzen und Vorarbeiten," 1887, pp. 126 et seq.).
Specific forms of divinations are mentioned in Lev. xix. 26 (
, "enchantments"); Deut. xviii. 10, 14 (R. V. "augury"); Judges ix. 37 (Hebr. "the soothsayers' terebinth"); II Kings xxi. 6; Isa. ii. 6 ("the Philistines are filled with 
[probably to be emended to 
= "divination"] and soothsayers"); Isa. lvii. 3 (
, A. V. "ye sons of the sorceress"); Jer. xxvii. 9; Micah v. 11 (12). The real meaning and etymology of the word are obscure. Smith (l.c.) explains it from the Arabic "'ann" (to murmur, or hum hoarsely), this being the practise of the Arabic soothsayer. The explanation suggested by the Hebrew and adopted by most commentators and lexicographers is "the observation of the movements of the clouds" (
; compare Jer. x. 2; Josephus, "B. J." vi. 5, § 3). Lenormant("Magie und Wahrsagekunst," p. 456), quoting a Babylonian rule, "When bluish dark clouds rise on the horizon the wind will blow during the day," and a divination from the movement of the clouds from the time of the Byzantine emperor Leo I. favors this explanation of 
, offered also by Ibn Ezra on Lev. ad loc. Also the "terebinth of the sooth-sayers" (Judges l.c.; compare II Sam. v. 24) indicates "the practise of divination from the movements of air-currents (see Baudissin, "Studien zur Deutschen Religionsgeschichte," 1878, ii. 226). Luther's translation, "Tageswächter" (Observer of Auspicious Times; see Rashi ad loc.), rests on an etymological combination with 
(= "time").
(lit. "he that observes the movement or the hissing of the serpent," 
; see Baudissin, l.c. i. 287) is a term used in general for one who observes omens (Gen. xliv. 5, 15, A. V. "divineth"; Lev. xix. 26, A. V. "augury"; Num. xxiii. 23, xxiv. 1; II Kings xvii. 17, xxi. 6, A. V. "enchantments"; compare Gen. xxx. 27; I Kings xx. 33). The term is applied in the story of Joseph (Gen. l.c.) to the observation of figures formed by water or oil in a cup, called by the Greeks "hydromancy." It was known also to the Romans, who ascribed its origin to the Persians, with whom the practise was especially in vogue, as may be learned from the cup of Jemshid in the Shah Nameh. But the Chaldeans and Arabians were also familiar with it (see Lenormant, l.c. pp. 463 et seq.; Lane, "Customs and Manners of the Modern Egyptians," ii. 362). Another form of divination is the' casting of rods (see Hosea iv. 6): "My people ask counsel at their stock, and their staff declareth unto them"—a practise called "rhabdomancy" or "xylomancy" by the Greeks, and similar to the casting of arrows mentioned above (see the commentaries ad loc. and Wellhausen, l.c.).
(Ezek. l.c.), "looking in the liver," is the Greek "hepatoscopy." (See Lenormant, l.c. p. 453, for the Chaldean, Phenician, Greek, and Roman practises.) The convulsive motions of the lung and liver when taken from the sacrificial victim (the liver was regarded as the seat of life, Prov. vii. 23) were watched as a means of forecasting the future.
For other forms of divination and for divination in rabbinical literature see Astrology; Augury; Necromancy; Superstition; Witchcraft.
Bibliography:
Cheyne and Black. Encyc. Bibl. s.v.;
Smith, Dictionary of the Bible, s.v.;
Winer, B. R.;
Hamburger, R. B. T. s.v. Wahrsagerei;
Schenkel, Bibel-Lexikon, s.v. Zauberei;
Lenormant, Magie und Wahrsagekunst der Chaldäer, Jena, 1878.
DIVINATION.—See Magic, Divination, and Sorcery.
(Latin: divinare, to foretell)
Seeking after the knowledge of future or hidden things through means inadequate by nature and unlawful. By natural means some effects can be foreseen with physical certainty; others surmised as probable; others are contingent upon future, free causes and knowable only to God. Divination implies the direct or indirect solicitation of a preternatural evil agency to supplement a natural deficiency. Its practise or patronage is sinful, varying with circumstances. As old as humanity, it existed in every age and country, and nowhere is it completely abandoned. Christianity undermined its power, and after centuries of effort it disappeared as an official system.
Divinatory methods are numerous. Besides man’s innovations scarcely an object or movement escapes interpretation. They are grouped into three classes:
Express invocation of a superhuman power, including oneiromancy (Greek: oneiros, dream; manteia, prophesying), by dreams; necromancy (Greek: nekros, dead person), by spiritism; by other apparitions; pythonism (Greek: python, possessing demon), by possessed persons; hydromancy (Greek: hydor, water), by water; aeromancy (Greek: aer, atmosphere), by air; geomancy (Greek: ge; earth), by terrestrial substances; auspices (Latin: auspex, entrail- and bird-seer), by entrails of sacrifices, etc.
Tacit invocation by natural signs, including astrology (Greek: astron, star; logos, knowledge), by the stars; augury (Latin: augur, seer), by birds, men, etc., which now comprises all foretelling by signs; omens (Latin: omen, prophetic sign), by chance words; chiromancy (Greek: cheir, hand), by lines of the hand.
Tacit invocation by artificial signs, including geomancy by lines or pebbles; drawing of straws; dice; cards, etc.
New Catholic Dictionary
The seeking after knowledge of future or hidden things by inadequate means. The means being inadequate they must, therefore, the supplemented by some power which is represented all through history as coming from gods or evil spirits. Hence the word divination has a sinister signification. As prophecy is the lawful knowledge of the future divination, its superstitious counterpart, is the unlawful. As magic aims to do, divination aims to know. Divination is practically as old as the human race. It is found in every age and country, among the Egytians, Chaldeans, Hindus, Romans, and Greeks; that tribes of Northern Asia had their shamans, the inhabitants of Africa their mgangas, the Celtic nation their druids, the aborigines of America their medicine-men -- all recognized diviners and wizards. Everywhere divination flourished and nowhere, even to-day, is it completely neglected. Cicero’s words were, and apparently always will be, true, that there is no nation, civilized or barbarian, which does not believe that there are signs of the future and persons who interpret them. Cicero divided divination into natural and artificial. Natural (untaught, unskilled) included dreams and oracles in which the diviner was a passive subject of inspiration, and the prediction that from a power supposed to be then and there within him. Artificial (taught, studied) comprised all foretelling from signs found in nature or produced by man. Here the diviner was active, and the divination came apparently from his own skill and observation. This division is almost the same as that given by St. Thomas with respect to the invocation of demons: divination with express invocation of spirits, embracing dreams, portents, or prodigies, and necromacy, and divination with tacit invocation through signs and movements observed in objects in nature, such as stars, birds, figures, etc., or through signs and arrangements produced by man, such as molten lead poured in water, casting of lots, etc. Dreams here mean those expressly prepared and prayed for with hope of intercourse with gods or the dead. Portents or prodigies are unusual and marvellous sights coming from the lower world. Here we are considering artificial divination. METHODSThe variety of divinatory methods is very great. Scarcely an object or movement in the heavens, on the earth, or in the air or water escaped being metamorphosed into a message of futurity. Add to these the invention of man, and there is a glimpse of the immense entanglement of superstitions in which pagan people groped their way. They can, however, be grouped into three classes, as seen from St. Thomas’s division. A detailed list has been given by Cicero, Clement of Alexandria in his "Stromata", and others of the Fathers. Under the first class, express invocation, come oneiromancy or divination by dreams; necromancy, by so-called apparitions of the dead or spiritism; apparitions of various kinds, which may be either external or in imagination, as Cajetan observes; Pythonism or by possessed persons, as the Delphic Pythoness; hydromancy, by signs in water; aeromancy, by signs in air; geomancy, by signs in terrestrial substances (geomancy has also another meaning); aruspices, by signs in the entrains of victims, etc. The second class, tacit invocation and signs found ready-made in nature, embraces judicial or genethliac astrology, pretending to tell the future through the stars; augury, through the notes of birds, and later covering prediction through their mode of acting, feeding, flying, and also the neighing of horses and sneezing of men, etc.-- with us it comprises all foretelling by signs; by omens, when chance words are turned into signs; chiromancy, when the lines of the hand are read; and many similar modes. The third class, tacit invocation and signs prepared by man, includes geomancy from points or lines on paper or pebbles thrown at random; drawing of staws; throwing dice; cutting cards; letting a staff fall or measuring it with the fingers saying, "I will or I will not"; opening a book at random, called Sortes Virgilianae, so much was the Æneid used in this fashion by the Romans; etc. This last transferred to the Bible is still common in Germany and elsewhere. Hypnotism is also used for purposes of divination. HISTORYTo attempt to trace the origin of divination is a waste of time, since like religion it is universal and indigenous in one form or another. Some nations cultivated it to a higher degree than others, and their influence caused certain modes of divination to spread. By its practice they gained a wide reputation for occult power. Pre-eminent in history stand the Chaldeans as seers as astrologers, but the ancient Egyptians and Chinese were also great adepts in elaborate mysterious rites. Which of them had priority therein is still an open question, though the larger share in the development of divination, especially in connection with celestial phenomena, is attributed to the Chaldeans, a vague term embracing here both Babylonians and Assyrians. In Greece from the earliest historical times are found diviners, some of whose methods came from Asia and from the Etruscans, a people famous for the art. While the Romans had modes of their own, their intercourse with Greece introduced new forms, and principally through these two nations they spread in the South and West of Europe. Before Christianity divination was practised everywhere according to rites native and foreign. In early days priest and diviner were one, and their power was very great. In Egypt the pharaoh was generally a priest; in fact, he had to be initiated into all the secrets of the sacerdotal class, and in Babylonia and Assyria almost every movement of the monarch and his courtiers was regulated by forecasts of the official diviners and astrologers. The cuneiform inscriptions and the papyri are filled with magical formulae. Witness the two treatises, one on terrestrial and the other on celestial phenomena compiled by Sargon several centuries before our era. In Greece where more attention was paid to aerial signs the diviners were held in high esteem and assisted at the public assemblies. The Romans, who placed most reliance in divination by sacrifices, had of official colleges of augurs and aruspices who by an adverse word could postpone the most important business. No war was undertaken, no colony sent out without consulting the gods, and at critical moments the most trifling occurrence, a sneeze or a cough, would be invested with meaning. Alongside all this official divining there were practised secret rites by all kinds of wizards, magicians, wise men, and witches. Chaldean soothsayers and strolling sibyls spread everywhere telling fortunes for gain. Between the regulars and the irregulars there was a very bitter feeling, and as the latter often invoked gods or demons regarded as hostile to the gods of the country, they were regarded as illicit and dangerous and were often punished and prohibited from exercising their art. From time to time in various countries the number and influence of the regular diviners were diminished in account of their pride and oppression, and no doubt at times they in turn may have adroitly mitigated the tyranny of rulers. With an increase of knowledge the fear and respect of the cultivated people for their mysterious powers so decreased that their authority suffered greatly and they became objects of contempt and satire. Cicero’s "De Divinatione" is not so much a description of its various forms as a refutaton of them; Horace and Juvenal launched many a keen arrow at diviners and their dupes, and Cato’s saying is well known, that he wondered how two augurs could meet without laughing at each other. Rulers, however, retained them and honoured them publicly, the better to keep the people in subjection, and outside classical lands, workers of magic still held sway.Wherever Christianity went divination lost most of its old-time power, and one form, the natural, ceased almost completely. The new religion forbade all kinds, and after some centuries it disappeared as an official system though it continued to have many adherents. The Fathers of the Church were its vigorous opponents. The tenets of Gnosticism gave it some strength, and neo-Platonism won it many followers. Within the Church itself it proved so strong and attractive to her new converts that synods forbade it and councils legislated against it. The Council of Ancyra (c. xxiv) in 314 decreed five years penance to consulters of diviners, and that of Laodicea (c. xxxvi) about 360, forbade clerics to become magicians or to make amulets, and those who wore them were to be driven out of the Church. A canon (xxxvi) of Orleans 511) excommunicates those who practised divination auguries, or lots falsely called Sortes Sanctorum (Bibliorum), i.e. deciding one’s future conduct by the first passage found on opening a Bible. This method was evidently a great favourite, as a synod of Vannes (c. xvi) in 461 held forbidden it to clerics under pain of excommunication, and that of Agde (c. xlii) in 506 condemned it as against piety and faith. Sixtus IV, Sixtus V, and the Fifth Council of Lateran likewise condemned divination. Governments have at times acted with great severity. Constantius decreed the penalty of death for diviners. The authorities may have feared that some would-be prophets might endeavour to fulfil forcibly their predictions about the death of sovereigns. When the races of the North, which swept over the old Roman Empire, entered the Church, it was only to be expected that some of their lesser superstitions should survive. All during the so-called Dark Ages divining arts managed to live in secret, but after the Crusades they were followed more openly. At the time of the Renaissance and again preceding the French Revolution, there was a marked growth of noxious methods. The latter part of the nineteenth century witnessed a strange revival, especially in the United States and England, of all sorts of superstition, necromancy or spiritism being in the lead. Today the number of persons who believe in signs and seek to know the future is much greater than appears on the surface. They abound in communities where dogmatic Christianity is weak.The natural cause of the rise of divination is not hard to discover. Man has a natural curiosity to know the future, and coupled with this is the desire of personal gain or advantage, some have essayed, therefore, in every age to lift the veil, at least partially. These attempts have at times produced results which cannot be explained on merely natural grounds, they are so disproportionate or foreign to the means employed. They can not be regarded as the direct work of God nor as the effect of any purely material cause; hence they must be attributed to created spirits, and since they are inconsistent with what we know of God, the spirits causing them must be evil. To put the question directly: can man know future events?Let St. Thomas answer in substance: Future things can be known either in their causes or in themselves. Some causes always and necessarily produce their effects, and these effects can be foretold with certainty, as astronomers announce eclipses. Other causes bring forth their effects not always and necessarily, but they generally do so, and these can be foretold as well-founded conjectures or sound inferences, like a physician’s diagnosis or a weather observer’s prediction about rain. Finally there is a third class of of causes whose effects depend upon what we call chance or upon man’s free will, and these cannot be foretold from their causes. We can only see them in themselves when they are actually present to our eyes. Only God alone, to whom all things are present in His eternity, can see them before their occur. Hence we read in Isaias (41:23), "Show the things that are to come hereafter, and we shall know that you are gods." Spirits can know better than men the effects to come from the second class of causes because their knowledge is broader, deeper, and more universal, and many occult powers of nature are known to them. Consequently they can foretell more events and more precisely, just as a physician who sees the causes clearer can better prognosticate about the restoration of health. The difference, in fact, between the first and second classes of causes is due to the limitations of our knowledge. The multiplicity and complexity of cause prevent us from following their effects.Future contingent things, the effects of the third class, spirits cannot know for certain, except God reveal them, though they may wisely conjecture about them because of their wide knowledge of human nature, their long experience, and their judgents based upon our thoughts as revealed to them by our words, countenances, or acts. Unless we wish to deny the value of human testimony, it cannot be doubted that diviners foretold some contingent things correctly and magicians produced at times superhuman effects. The very survival of divination for so many centuries would otherwise be inexplicable and its role in history an insoluble problem. On religious grounds to say that divination and kindred arts were complete impostures would be to contradict Scripture. In it we read laws forbidding magic, we have facts like the deeds of Jannes and Mambres before Pharaoh, and we have a declaration of God showing it possible for a sign or wonder to be foretold by false prophets and to come to pass (Deuteronomy 13:1-12). But, except when God gave them knowledge, their ignorance of the future resulted in the well-known ambiguity of the oracles.Attempts to give artificial divination a merely natural basis have not succeeded. Chrysippus (de Divinatione, ii, 63) spoke about a power in man to recognize and interpret signs, and Plutarch (de Oraculis) wrote on the special qualifications an augur should have and the nature of the signs, but a preternatural influence was recognized in the end. Some modes, may have been natural in their origin, especially when necessary causes were concerned, and many a prediction made without occult intervention, but these must have been comparatively rare, for the client, if not always the seer, generally believed in supernatural assistance. That some analogy may be traced between an eagle and victory, an owl and sadness--though to the Athenians a welcome omen--and that to lose a tooth is to lose a friend, may readily be admitted, but to try to connect these with future contingent events would be to reason badly from a very slight analogy, just as to stab an image, to injure the person it represents, would be to mistake an ideal connection for a real one. Human instinct demanded a stronger foundation and found it in the belief in an intervention of some supernatural agency. Reason demands the same. A corporeal sign is either an effect of the same cause of which it is a sign, as smoke of fire, or it proceeds from the same cause as the effect which it signifies as the falling of the barometer foretells rain, i.e., the change in the instrument and the change in the weather come from the same cause. Man’s future actions and signs in nature stand in no such relation. The sign is not an effect of his future act; neither do the sign and his act proceed from the same cause. The other kinds of signs from the living creatures can be passed over by almost the same reasoning. From those who believed in fatalism, or pantheism or that man, gods, and nature were all in close communion, or that animals and plants were divinities, a belief in omens and auguries of all kinds might be expected (see ANIMISM). Everywhere, as a matter of fact, divination and sacrifice were so closely connected that no strict line could have been drawn in practice between divination with and without express invocation of gods or demons. The client came to offer sacrifice, and the priest, the diviner, tried to answer all his questions, while the private wizards boasted of their "familiar spirits". THEOLOGICAL ASPECTFrom a theological standpoint divination supposes the existence of devils who have great natural powers and who, actuated by jealousy of man and hatred of God, ever seek to lessen his glory and to draw man into perdition, or at least to injure him bodily, mentally, and spiritually. Divination is not, as we have seen, foretelling what comes from necessity or what generally happens, or foretelling what God reveals or what can be discovered by human effort, but it is the usurpation of knowledge of the future, i.e. arriving at it by inadequate or improper means. This knowledge is a prerogative of Divinity and so the usurper is said to divine. Such knowledge may not be sought from the evil spirits except rarely in exorcisms. Yet every divination is from them either because they are expressly invoked or they mix themselves up in these vain searchings after the future that they may entangle men in their snares. The demon is invoked tacitly when anyone tries to acquire information through means which he knows to be inadequate, and the means are inadequate when neither from their own nature nor from any Divine promise are they capable of producing the desired effect. Since the knowedge of futility belongs to God alone, to ask it directly or indirectly from demons is to attribute to them Divine perfection, and to ask their aid is to offer them a species of worship; this is superstition and a rebellion against the providence of God Who has wisely hidden many things from us. In pagan times when divining sacrifice was offered it was idolatry, and even now divination is a kind of demonolatry or devil worship (d’Annibale). All participation in such attempts to attain knowledge is derogatory to dignity of a Christian, and opposed to his love and trust in Providence, and militates against the spread of the Kingdom of God. Any method of divination with direct invocation of spirits is grievously sinful, and worse still if such intervention ensues; with tacit invocation divination is in itself a grievous sin, though in practice, ignorance, simplicity, or want of belief may render it venial. If, however, notwithstanding the client’s disbelief the diviner acts seriously, the client cannot be easily excused from grievously sinful cooperation. If in methods apparently harmless strong suspicion of evil intervention arises it would be sinful to continue if only a doubt arise as to the natural or diabolical character of the effect protest should be made against the intervention of spirits; if in doubt as to whether it be from God or Satan, except a miraculous act be sought (which would be extremely rare), it should be discontinued under pain of sin. A protestation of not wishing diabolical interference in modes of divination where it is expressly or tacitly expected is of no avail, as actions speak louder than words. A scientific investigator in doubt about the adequacy of the means can experiment to see if such superhuman intervention be a fact, but he should clearly express his opposition to all diabolical assistance. The divining-rod, if used only for metals of water, may perhaps be explained naturally; if used for detecting guilty persons, or things lost or stolen as such (which may be metals), it is certainly a tacit method. To believe in most of the popular signs simply ignorance or weakness of mind (see SUPERSTITION). DIVINATION IN THE BIBLEThe Hebrews coming from Egypt -- a land teeming with diviners -- and dwelling in a country surrounded by superstitious tribes, would have their inborn desire for foreknowledge intensified by the spirit of the times and their environments; but God forbade them repeatedly to have anything to do with charmers, wizards, diviners, necromancers, etc., all of whom were abomination in His sight (Deuteronomy 18:10, 11). The ideal was in Balaam’s day when "there is no soothsaying in Jacob, nor divination in Israel" (Numbers 23:23), and to preserve this, the soul that went aside after diviner God declared He would destroy (Leviticus 20:6) and the man or woman in whom there was a divining spirit was to be stoned to death (Leviticus 20:27). God, however, as St. Chrysostom puts it, humoured the Hebrews like children, and to preserve them from excessive temptation, lots were allowed under certain conditions (Joshua 7:14; Numbers 26:55; Proverbs 16:33; in N.T. See also LOTS). Hebrew seers were permitted to answer when it pleased Him (Origen, c. Cels. I, xxxvi, xxxvii), prophets might be consulted on private affairs (I K. ix. 6), and the high priest could respond in greater matters by the Urim and Thummim. Gifts were offered to seers and prophets when consulted, but the great prophets accepted no reward when they acted as God’s representatives (IV K., v. 20). When the Hebews fell into idolatry, divination, which always accompanied idolatry, revived and flourished, but all during their history it is evident that secretly and again more openly wrongful arts were used and as a result condemnations were frequent (1 Kings 15:23; 2 Kings 17:17; Zechariah 10:2; Isaiah 44:25 etc.). It should be borne in mind that their history is very long one, and when we reflect how completely other nations were given over to all kinds of impious arts and silly observances we shall readily admit that the Hebrews were in comparison remarkably free from superstitions. When later these flourished more strongly and permantly it was during the decay of faith preceding and following the time of Christ (see Jos. Ant. Jud. XX, v, i, viii, 6; Bell. Jud. VI, v, 2). The Talmud shows the downward tendency.The various methods of divinig and kinds of diviners are not always clearly distinguished in Scripture, the Hebrew words being differently interpreted and sometimes merely synonyms. The following list is based on mainly upon Lesetre’s article in Vigouroux’s "Dict. de la Bible":-- Divination by consulting the Teraphim, small household gods of which we first read in the time of Abraham and Laban (Gen. xxxi, 19). How they were consulted is not known. It was apparently Chaldean form, as Laban came from that country. They are met with in Judges, xvii, 5; IV K., xxiii, 24, and elsewhere. They sometimes deceived their inquirers (Zechariah 10:2). The Hartummim, a name translated by "interpreters" (Vulg. conjectores) in the Douay version (Genesis 41:8), elsewhere (Dan., ii, 2) by "diviners" (Vulg. arioli) and other names, especially "Chaldeans". The Hakamim are the wise men (Vulg. sapientes) of the Bible (Genesis 41:8), a name given those skilled in divination in Egypt, Idumea (Abd., 8), Persia (Esther 1:13), Babylon (Jeremiah 1:35). Qesem or Miqsam designated divination in general and is always used in the Scripture in a bad sense except in Prov., xvi, 10. By it the witch of Endor raised up the dead Samuel (1 Samuel 28:8). "The king of Babylon stood in the highway, at the head of two ways, seeking divination (qesem), shuffling arrows; he inquired of the idols (teraphim), and consulted entrails" (Ezekiel 21:21). The arrows bore the signs or names of towns, and the first name drawn was the one to be attacked. This was Babylonian mode. The Arabs practised it so: three arrows were prepared and the first inscribed "The Lord wills it", the second "The Lord wills it not", and the third was blank. If the blank came a new drawing followed until an inscribed arrow was taken. The last method mentioned in text quoted was aruspicy (Vulg. exta consuluit). Nahash is soothsaying (Vulg. augurium) in the Bible (Numbers 22:23). The precise method signified by it is in dispute. The versions make it equivalent to divination by the flight of of birds, but this mode, so common among the Greeks and Romans, was apparently not used by the Hebrews except towards the time of Christ. From its derivation, as commonly accepted, it would mean divination by serpents, ophiomancy, but on the other hand it is never in this in the Scriptures. Balaam’s divination by animal sacrifices is so termed (Numbers 24:1) and also Joseph’s (Genesis 44:5, 15) which remains a vexed question in spite of Calmet’s triumphant solution (Dict. of the Bible, III, p. 30) except reasonable explanation of Grotius be accepted (Hummelauer, Com. in Gen., p. 561). Mekashsheph is the magician (Vulg. maleficus) in Ex., vii, 11, and the wizard in Deut, xviii, 10, who not only seeks the secrets of the future but works wonders. St. Paul mentions two of their leaders, Jannes and Mambres, and their modes are styled sorceries (Vulg. veneficia) in IV K., ix, 22 and (Vulg. maleficia) Micheas, v, 11. The word ’obh signifies the spirit called and the person calling him, the necromancer. In Deut., xviii, 11, it is expressed by "seeking the truth from the dead" (the best known case is that of the witch of Endor) and elsewhere by Pythons (Isaiah 8:19), divining spirits (1 Samuel 28:7). The Septuagint translates the words by "ventriloquist" because when the necromancers failed or wished to deceive the people they muttered as if from under the ground as though spirits so spoke; it recalls Shakespeare’s of "squeak and gibber". (Cf. Isaiah 29:4) A bottle or skin water-bag is ’obh; the use of the word here may come from the diviners containing the spirit or being inflated by it. The Yidde ’onim were diviners whom we generally find connected with necromacers, and the two terms are perhaps practically synonymous (1 Samuel 28:3; 2 Kings 21:6; etc). Divining by Me’onen included apparently many methods: divination by chance words, as when Abraham’s servant sought a wife for lsaac (Genesis 24:14; 1 Samuel 14:9; 1 Kings 20:33); auguries (Isaiah 11:6); observers of dreams (Deuteronomy 18:10), etc. There were also modes by charming serpents (Jeremiah 8:17), astrology (Isaiah 47:13), and by consulting the Ephod (1 Samuel 23:9). In the N.T. diviners are not specifically mentioned except in Acts, xvi, 16, concerning the girl who had a pythonical spirit, but it is altogether likely that Simon Magus (Acts 8:9), Elymas (Acts 13:6), and others (2 Timothy 3:13), including the possessors of the magical books burnt at Ephesus (Acts 19:19), practised divination and that it is included in the wonders by which Antichrist will seduce many (Revelation 19:20). Under the New Law all divination is forbidden because, placed on a higher plane than under the Old Dispensation we are taught not to be solicitous for the morrow (Matthew 6:34), but to trust Him perfectly Who numbers the very hairs of our heads (Matthew 10:30). In divination, apart from the fraud of the Father of Lies, there was much merely human fraud and endless deception the predictions were generally as vague and as worthless as modern fortune-telling, and the general result then as now favoured vice and injured virtue. (See ASTROLOGY.)-----------------------------------E.P. GRAHAM Transcribed by Joseph P. Thomas The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume VCopyright © 1909 by Robert Appleton CompanyOnline Edition Copyright © 2003 by K. KnightNihil Obstat, May 1, 1909. Remy Lafort, CensorImprimatur. +John M. Farley, Archbishop of New York
1. Definition.-Primitive man, under the influence of animatism and animism, came to think of himself as surrounded by in numerable spirits. These in course of time became differentiated into gods, goddesses, demons, ghosts, etc. These beings could influence, enter into, and animate not only each other, but human beings, beasts, and things. Man gradually realized that it was his duty to discover and cultivate relations, friendly or defensive, with these-a duty intensified by his covetousness of good and his aversion to calamities or privations. Some of the methods he employed for doing this became regulated and systematized into forms of worship, i.e. approved methods of approaching and propitiating the spirits. As these forms became more and more universally recognized, they acquired a sacred character, which differentiated them from, and placed them on a higher level than, other ceremonies. Still the latter continued to be practised, because the forms of worship did not meet all men’s necessities. Unusual circumstances occurred through which, or on account of which, the divinities communicated with men, or by reason of which men felt the need of communicating with those beings in whose hands lay the destinies of their lives. These survivals of the lower culture, from which the regular forms of worship had shaken themselves free, may be grouped under the name ‘Divination.’
The Latin name for a divine being was deus. Divus indicates the quality possessed by a thing which makes it ‘godlike’; divinus rather the qualities which mate a being ‘divine’; divinitas means ‘the divine nature’; divinare, ‘to see like a god’; and divinatio, ‘the power of seeing like a god.’ This came to be confined, in ordinary use, to the power of foreseeing. But the word has a much wider meaning. To Chrysippus and the Stoics, ‘divination’ was the means of communication between the gods and men. Cicero (de Div. i. 38) argues that, if there are gods, there must be men who have the power of communicating with them. In English ‘divination’ has the wider meaning akin to the original significance. Divination then rests on the idea that, apart from forms of worship, a divinity and a human being can, when necessary, come into living touch with each other, the divinity acting on or through the man, thus revealing his mind to him; or the man by approved methods so revealing his mind to the divinity that the latter acts on or through him.
2. Divination and magic.-Just as worship, by becoming systematized, left behind it the forms of communication called ‘divination,’ so divination, as it became more regulated and elaborated in the hands of professional diviners, left behind it cruder and lower forms of communication which may all be included under the term ‘magic.’* [Note: C. Haddon, Magic and Fetishism, 1906; F. B. Jevons, Comparative Religion, 1913.] The distinction between divination and magic may be briefly and not inaccurately stated thus: the diviner is in touch with the divinities because he is their servant; the magician, because, for the time being, he is their master. Thus, each of these forms of communication, though existing alongside of each other and accepted by the same people, has its own distinctive features.
3. Development.-If we think of the above three methods of communication between the divinities and men as existing, in embryo, in the earliest ages, we can realize how they were each developed by such great races as the Semites and the Aryans, and how the common inheritance of each of thesis was developed along distinctive lines by the different nations springing from them. Thus, to confine our attention to divination, we have that of the Semites,* [Note: Robertson Smith, RS2, 1894; Th. Nöldeke, Sketches from Eastern History, Eng. tr., 1892; ERE i. 390; J. E. Carpenter, Comparative Religion, 1913; HDB v. 83 ff. and the Literature there mentioned.] developing into that of the Mesopotamians,† [Note: E. Carpenter, op. cit.; A. H. Sayce, Religion of the Ancient Babylonians, 1887; G. Maspero, Dawm of Civilization2, 1896; Stephen Langdon, ‘Private Penance,’ in Transactions of the Third International Congress for the History of Religions, 1908, p. 249; L. W. King, Bab. Magic and Sorcery, 1896, Bab. Religion and Mythology, 1899; L. R. Farnell, Greece and Babylon, 1911; ERE i. 316, iv. 783, and Literature there mentioned; R. C. Thompson, The Report of the Magicians and Astrologers of Nineveh and Babylon, 1900, also The Devils and Evil Spirits of Babylonia, 1903-04.] Persians,‡ [Note: ERE iv. 818; J. H. Moulton, Early Religious Poetry of Persia, 1911.] Jews,§ [Note: ERE iv. 806; S. A. Cook, The Religion of Ancient Palestine, 1908: T. W. Davies, Magic, Divination, and Demonology among the Hebrews and their Neighbours, 1898; HDB i. 611 ff.] and Arabians;|| [Note: | ERE i. 659.] and that of the Aryans,¶ [Note: v. lhering, The Evolution of the Aryan, tr. Drucker, 1897; I. Taylor, The Origin of the Aryans, 1889; ERE i. 11 and the Literature there mentioned.] developing into that of the Vedas,** [Note: * Ib. iv. 827.] Greeks,†† [Note: † W. R. Halliday, Greek Divination, 1913; ERE iv. 796, vi. 401; Gilbert Murray, Four Stages of Greek Religion, 1912.] Romans,‡‡ [Note: ‡ W. Warde Fowler, The Religious Experience of the Roman People, 1911; ERE iv. 820.] Celts,§§ [Note: § Ib. iii. 277, iv. 787.] Teutons,|||| [Note: ||| Ib. iv. 827.] and Lithuanians;¶|¶ [Note: |¶ Ib. iv. 814.] while that of the Egyptians strongly influenced and was influenced by many of these.*** [Note: ** Ib. vi. 374; F. Cumont, The Oriental Religions in Roman Paganism, Eng. tr., 1911, p. 73 ff.]
The Pax Romana and the toleration of the Roman Government permitted the cults of innumerable divinities and all these forms of divination to spread throughout the Empire; and Jews, Christians, worshippers of all kinds of Eastern and Egyptian deities, diviners, ‘magicians, astrologers, and wizards jostled each other in a theological confusion to which no parallel can be found’ (K. Lake, The Earlier Epistles of St. Paul, 1911, p. 47).
4. Divination in the Apostolic Age.-It is difficult, but necessary, to realize this amazing profusion of divinities as a distinct feature of the Apostolic Age. Besides mentioning Jahweh, the God of the Hebrews, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit, worshipped by the Christians, and some of the innumerable ethnic deities, the literature of the Apostolic Age contains references to angels, archangels, living creatures, Satan, the Devil, the Wicked One, the Antichrist, demons, unclean and evil powers, dominions, principalities, authorities, thrones, and glories.
It is not easy to decide how far belief in these affected the various classes. But practically this is true: each man had his favourite divinity to which all Gentiles added a select group of deities whom they reverenced. Rationalists like the Sadducees denied the existence of ἄããåëïé and ðíåýìáôá (Act_23:8); many of the more educated viewed the existence of the minor supernatural beings with more or less scepticism; but the mass of people lived in the belief and the fear of these divine beings. In that age men felt themselves surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses (Heb_12:1), living in a world where the gods appeared (Act_14:11; Act_28:6), where Jesus appeared to St. Paul (Act_9:17; Act_9:27; Act_26:16) and to Stephen (Act_7:56), and His Spirit prohibited action (Act_16:7), where an itinerant preacher was received as a messenger of God, or even as Christ Jesus re-incarnated (Gal_4:14); where the Holy Spirit was a distinct living personality, where the assertion that a man was the Son of God made a Roman governor tremble (Joh_19:8), and the patience of His death caused a Roman centurion to exclaim: ‘This was a Son of God’ (Mat_27:54). In such a world the Satan fashioned himself into an ἄããåëïò öùôüò (2Co_11:14), äáßìïíåò entered into men, and were cast out by men (Luk_11:19, Mar_9:38), converts to the religion of Jesus who had believed and were baptized proposed to purchase the ability to confer the Holy Spirit (Act_8:19), the power of the evil eye was exercised (Mar_7:22), and ἀñ÷áß and äõíἁìåéò, ‘principalities’ and ‘powers’ (Rom_8:38), ‘mustered their unseen array.’ Nor must we think that the Christians stood far removed from the common beliefs of the age. This is clear from many things. Think of their belief in the Satan, the antagonist who stood over against God. He was conceived as a huge dragon, or old serpent (Rev_12:9; Rev_13:11 [as amended by Charles in his Studies in the Apocalypse, 1913, p. 100] Rev_20:2), and as such was identified with äéÜâïëïò. He was regarded as having his abode in the skies, in which he and his ἄããåëïé had been defeated by an ἀñ÷Üããåëïò Michael and his ἄããåëïé, and thrown down on the earth (Rev_12:7-9) to be flung into the abyss for a thousand years (Rev_20:3; Rev_20:7). He had his subordinate spirits. Special mention is made of ‘the Lawless One’ [according to à B] (2Th_2:3), and the ἄããåëïé who fought for him (Rev_12:7-9), and afflicted men’s bodies (2Co_12:7), and even destroyed them (1Co_5:5). He himself could masquerade as ἄããåëïò öùôüò (2Co_11:14), and could equip his servants with full powers, the miracles and portents of falsehood, and the full deceitfulness of evil (2Th_2:9-10). The Satan was the adversary of men; his chief aim was to seduce to wrong (Rev_20:3; Rev_20:8; Rev_20:10, Eph_2:2) by tempting to such sins as lying, cheating (Act_5:3), incontinence (1Co_7:5, 1Ti_5:15), gross sexual excess, ‘his deep mysteries’ (Rev_2:24, Eph_2:3). He gains advantages by clever manœuvres (2Co_2:11). He is the accuser of the members of the Christian brotherhood (Rev_12:10). He hinders good endeavours (1Th_2:18), but the God of peace crushes him under His people’s feet (Rom_16:20). Jews hostile to the religion of Jesus are thought of by the Christians as his servants who form his synagogue (Rev_2:9; Rev_3:9), and in places noted for wickedness he dwells in power as a king on his throne (Rev_2:13). By a deliberate act of judgment an offender could be consigned to the Satan’s power for the destruction of his body (1Co_5:5, 1Ti_1:20).
The natural and inevitable outcome of this multiplicity of divinities was the universal practice of divination. The testimony of history to this fact is fully confirmed by the discovery of contemporary texts, among which are ‘innumerable … horoscopes, amulets, cursing tablets, and magical books.… The whole ancient world is full of miracles’ (Deissmann, Light from the Ancient East2, 1911, pp. 284, 393). Divination and magic were prevalent not merely among sects like the Essenes, but among the Jews generally (Schürer, History of the Jewish People (Eng. tr. of GJV).] II. iii. [1886] p. 151ff., II. ii. [1855] p. 204). The writings of the Apostolic Fathers show the relation of the Christians to these arts. In the Didache among other commandments are these, ‘thou shalt not practise magic, thou shalt not use enchantments,’ ïὐ ìáãåýóåéò, ïὐ öáñìáêåýóåéò (ii.), and this entreaty, ‘become not an omen-watcher, nor one who uses charms, nor an astrologer, nor one who purifies,’ i.e. one who averts disease or removes sin by sacrifices, ìὴ ãἰíïõ ïἱùíïóêüðïò … ìçäὲ ἐðáïéäὸò, ìçäὲ ìáèçìáôéêὸò, ìçäὲ ðåñéêáèáßñùí (iii.). Hermas (Mand. xi. 4) cautions Christians not to consult soothsayers (ìáíôåýïíôáé). The Didache describes the Way of Death as full, among other things, of ‘magical arts and potions,’ ìáãåῖáé, öáñìáêßáé (v.), while in the Way of Darkness, among other things that destroy the soul, are ‘potions and magical arts,’ öáñìáêåßá, ìáãåßá (Ep. Barn. xx.). Ignatius speaks of the birth of Jesus as destroying or making ridiculous every kind of magic, ðᾶóá ìáãåßá (Eph. 19.), and exhorts his readers ‘to flee evil arts,’ ôὰò êáêïôå÷íßáò öåῦãå, but all the more to discourse in public regarding them (Ep. to Polycarp, v.). In Ps.-Ignatius, Ep. to the Antiochians, xi., ‘the practice of magic,’ ãïçôÝáò, is a vice forbidden even to the Gentiles. Aristides (Apol. xi.) in indicating the things which Christians should not do, omits all reference to divination or magic, and a similar omission is noticeable in Ep. Barn. xix. and in 1 Clement, xxx, xxxv. Hero is warned (Ps.-Ignatius, Ep. to Hero, ii.) to distrust any one teaching beyond what is commanded, even ‘though he work miracles,’ êἄí óçìåῖá ðïéῆ. In the description which Aristides declares the Greeks give of their gods, he writes that they say some of them were ‘sorcerers,’ öáñìáêïýò [Apol. viii.), ‘practising sorcery,’ öáñìáêåßáò (xiii.), and he calls Hermes ‘a magician,’ ìÜãïí (x.). But it is noticeable that in Ps.-Ignatius, Ep. to the Antiochians, xii. among the Church officials is ‘the exorcist,’ ἐðïñêéóôÞò, and in the Ep. to the Philippians, v., Christ is by way of honour called ‘this magician,’ ìÜãïò ïὖôïò, while in Ephesians, xx., the sacramental bread is called ‘the medicine of immortality,’ öÜñìáêïí ἀèáíáóßáò. Pagan testimony is to the same effect. The Emperor Hadrian (a.d. 117-138), writing to the Consul Servianus on the state of Egypt, says: ‘There is no ruler of a synagogue of Jews, no Samaritan, no Presbyter of the Christians who is not an astrologer, a soothsayer, a quack [mathematicus, haruspex, aliptes]’ (Script. Hist. August., 1774, ‘Vopisci Saturninus,’ 8).
These supernatural beings communicated with men by means of ἄããåëïé (‘angels’ or ‘messengers’) or prophets, by possession, by means of the hand, tongues, dreams, visions, trances, voices, sounds.
The human beings in touch with these supernatural beings, were variously named exorcists, soothsayers, sorcerers, enchanters; and, lower still, magicians, witches, and wizards. They had various methods of bringing the power of the divinities to act on men, all of which may be classed into two groups: (a) regular: blessing, cursing, pronouncing anathema, invoking the Name, embracing, laying on of hands, shadowing, signs and wonders, as e.g. healing, or smiting with disease such as blindness; (b) exceptional: the lot, the vow, the oath, and committing to Satan.
As religion has become spiritualized, divination has more and more lost its hold on the minds of men. The ultimate end will be reached when worship shall be the approach to the One Father by a man, who, because he is taught and led by the indwelling Spirit of Jesus, needs no divination, and who, because he can proffer his requests to the Father in prayer, scorns all magic. But the end is not yet.
Literature.-There is no book dealing with Divination in the Apostolic Age. Reference to its various phases will be found in modern Commentaries and in works on Comparative Religion, and Anthropology, as those of E. B. Tylor, A. E. Crawley, J. G. Frazer, F.B, Jevons, J. H. Leuba, and R. R. Marett. In addition to these and the authorities cited throughout the article , reference may be made to F. W. H. Myers, on ‘Greek Oracles,’ in Essays, 1883, and to the series of articles in Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics vi. 775ff.
P. A. Gordon Clark.
The practice of predicting the future and/or securing for a person the services of supernatural powers. It is also used as a means to gain knowledge.
The practice of seeking to know hidden information or predict future events through supernatural means. Divination includes methods such as reading omens, interpreting dreams, or consulting spirits.
See Magic.
Aquifer Open Bible Dictionary © 2026 Mission Mutual, an adaptation of the Tyndale Open Bible Dictionary © 2023 Tyndale House Publishers. Licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Attempts to discover the unknown or the future by supernatural means, involving communication with the spirit world. It is expressly forbidden by God and has disastrous consequences.
Divination was part of early beliefs and practices
GEN 41:24; ; EXO 7:11; ; ISA 31:1–31:2, ISA 47:9; ; JER 27:9; ; EZK 21:21; ; DAN 2:2, DAN 5:7
Examples of divination in NT times
ACT 8:9–8:13, ACT 8:18–8:24, ACT 13:6–13:12, ACT 16:16–16:18
The reality of a supernatural spirit world
The spirit world is real and alluring
ACT 8:11 See also GEN 44:5, GEN 44:15; 1SA 6:2; ACT 8:9–8:10
The spirit world is powerful and dangerous
2KI 9:22 See also NUM 22:6–22:7, NUM 22:12; 2KI 17:17; ZEC 10:2; EPH 6:12; 2TH 2:9–2:10; REV 18:23
Deliberate involvement with divination forbidden
LEV 19:31 See also EXO 22:18; LEV 19:26; DEU 18:10–18:14; 2KI 21:6; ISA 8:19–8:20; EZK 13:23; MIC 5:12; MAL 3:5; GAL 5:20
It is God's divine privilege to reveal or conceal things
Examples of the evil of divination
1SA 28:7 See also 1SA 28:3–28:15
Casting lots to make decisions
Divination is clearly forbidden but some practices such as casting lots seem acceptable ways of discovering God's will in particular circumstances: 1CH 26:13–26:16; ; NEH 11:1; ; ACT 1:26
Dictionary of Bible Themes © 1999 Martin H. Manser. Licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.