II. Forms of divination expressly forbidden in Scrip- ture. Allusion has already been niade in this article to Deut. xviii, 10-12. As these verses contain the most formal notice of the subject, we will first take the seven or eight kinds of diviners there denounced in the order in which they are mentioned.
1. At the very outset we encounter in the phrase D'^aDJ^ DDp, kosem' kesamim', one divimng dwina- tions (Sept. fiavT€v6fUvoc fiavriiav, Vulg. qui ctriolos sciscitatur, A. V. ** that useth divination"), the sami word wliich we have just noticed in a good sense. The verb DD)^, like the Arabia equivalent, primarily sig- nified to cleave or divide (Meier, ffeifr. WUrtzelwdrier- buch, p. 844 ; Ftirst, Hebr, WGrterb, ii, 822 ; Hottinger, Lex. Heptagl. xliv, 1) ; thence it acquired the sense of deciding and determining, and became a generic phrase for various kinds of divination. Rabbi David de Pomis says, ** It is a word of large signification, embracing many specific senses, such as geomancy, necromancy, oneiromancy, cheiromancy, and others." Maimonides (in his treatise D-^aDnD miSJ nisbn
131, cap. xi, § 6) includes besides these methods, gas- tromancy, llthomancy, and catoptromancy ; and Raslii (on Deut. xviii, 10) makes DDp mainly concerned with the process of rhabdomancy. Amid the uncertainty arising from this generic sense of the word, the Sept. has rendered it by the general phrase fiavnma^ai fiavniav, to divine a divination ; wherein it is follow- ed by the Targum of Jonathan, as well as by the Syr- iac and Arabic versions (J. Clodins, Dissert de Magia Sagittar. [Viteb. 1676] i, 5; and Wichmannshausen, Dissert, i, 4). The word is used of Balaam (Josh, xiii, 22), of the Philistine soothsayera (1 Sam. vi, 2), of the Hebrew fiilse prophets (Micah iH, 8, 6, 7, 11, and in other passages), without specifying any mode of divi- nation. We therefore regard this as a general phrase introductory to the seven particular ones which follow. The absence of the copulative 1, which is prefixed to every other word but "jSUD, confirms this view. As the word, however, involves the notion of "cutting," some connect it with the Chald. ']*^'^JJ (fix>m ^JJ, to cut), Dan. ii, 27 ; iv, 4, etc, and to be taken to mean astrologers, magi, genethliaci, etc. (Juv. vi, 582 sq. ; Diod. Sic. ii, 80). Others refer it to the KKfjpo^dvTtii: (Schol. ad Eur. ffipp. 1057), since the use of lots was very familiar to the Jews (Gataker on Lots, ad init.) ; but it required no art to explain their use, for they were regarded as directly under God's control (Num. xxvi, 65 ; Esth. iu, 7 ; Prov. xvi, 88 ; xviii, 18). Both lots and digitorum micatio (odd and even) were used in distributing the duties of the Temple (Otho, Lex, Rab, s. V. Digitis micando). See above.
2. 131?^, mtSnen', This word is variously derived and explained. In our A. V. it is, in two out of seven times of its occurrence (besides the pnet. and fut), ren- dered "^ observer of times'' (as if firom h315, a set time, Fuller, Misc. Sac. i, 16, after Rashi). The idea is, the assigning certain times to things, and distinguishing by astrology lucky from unlucky days, and even months (as when Ovid [Fcwfi] says, "Mense malum maio nu- bere vulgus ait") and years (Maimonides, Aboda Sara, cap. 9 ; Spencer, De Leg. Hebr, i, 887). So perhaps in
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Job iii, 5, jast as the Greeks and Romans regarded some days as candidi, others as atri (Uesiod. 0pp. et D. 770 ; Sueton. Aug. 92, etc.)- It is not necessary to refer Gal. iv, 10 to this aupersUtUm; the Mosaic institution of sacred seasons is itself there prohibited, as being ab- rogated to Christians (Selden, De ann, civil, vet. Jud. c. 21 ; and Alford, in loc.). The Sept version, by the verb and part KkriSovi^itr^ai (in four places), and the noun kkridovnTiioi (in two others), refers to divination by words and vciees (Soidas, KXrjdivurfioi, ai did rCbv \6yutv iraparr}ph<Ttit). Festus derives omen itself (quad oramen\ because it proceeds from the mouth (guiaJU ab ore). Words of ill omen (fvo^fdai, which Horace calls mal^ ominata verbcL, and Plantus obtctB- ncUa [prob. obscasvcUa']')^ were exchanged for bona nom- inal as when Cicero reported to the Senate the execu- tion of Lentulus and others by the word " vixerunt," they have ceated to live, instead of ** mortui sunt," they are dead. So Leotychides embraced the omen of Hege- sistratus (Herodot xi, 91). Hebrew instances of this observing of words occur in Gen. xxiv, 14, and 1 Sam. xir, 9, 10, where a divine Interposition occurred ; in 1 Kings XX, 83, the catching at the word of the king of Israel was rather a human instinct than a irapariipf- <nc» or marking^ in its pn^er (superstitious) sense. Akin to and arising fh>ra this observance of verbal omens arose the forms of hiblomanry called Sortes Ho- merica^ VirgUiawB^ BibUcai, etc. The elevation of Se- verus is said to have been foretold by his opening at Yirgil's line, **Ta regere imperio populos, Bomane, memento. " Most remarkable were the responses which it is said Charles I and Lord Falkland obtained, when they consulted their Virgils before the civil war. The former opened j^neid iv, where Dido predicts a vio- lent death to i£neas, while the latter chanced upon jEneid xi, at Evander's lamentation over his son. Ac- cording to Nicephorus Gregoras, the Psalter was the best book for the Sortes Biblicse, but Cedrenus informs us that the N. T. was more commonly used (Niceph. Greg, viii, Aug. Ep. 119 ; Prideauz, Conned, ii, 376, • etc. ; Cardan, De Varietate, p. 1040). This superstition became so rife that it was necessary to denounce it ftwn the pulpit as forbidden by the divine precept, ' ' Thou Shalt not tempt the Lord thy God. " The Mos- lems consult the Koran in similar manner, but they take their answer firom the seventh line of the right- hand page (see Occult Sciences^ p. 832). A belief in the 8i<?niiicance of chance words was very prevalent among the Egyptians (Clem. Alex. Strom, i, 804 ; Plu- tarch, De h, 14), and the accidental sigh of the engi- neer was sufficient to prevent even Amasis from re- moving the monolithic shrine to Sais (Wilkinson, Anc. Egypt, iv, 144). The universality of the belief among the ancients is known to every scholar (Cicero, De div. i ; Herod, ii, 90 ; Virgil, .£n. vii, 116, etc.)^ See BiB-