Divination

Divination (קֶסֶם ke'sem, a lot [see below], or some kindred term; Gr. μαντεία [but Πυθών, Pytho, in Ac 16:16]; used in the verb form קָסִם, kasam', only of false prophets, etc., e.g. of the Hebrews, De 18:10,14; Mic 3:6-7,11; of necromancers, 1Sa 28:8; of foreign prophets, as of the Philistines, 1Sa 6:2, and Balaam, Jos 13:22; and specifically of the three kinds of divination common among the Shemitic nations, viz. arrows, entrails, and Teraphim, Eze 21:21) is a general term descriptive of the various illusory arts anciently practiced for the discovery of things secret or future. The curiosity of mankind has devised numberless methods of seeking to accomplish this result. By a perversion and exaggeration of the sublime faith which sees God everywhere, men have laid everything, with greater or less ingenuity, under contribution, as means of eliciting a divine answer to every question of their insatiable curiosity: e.g. the portents of the sky and sea (Plutarch, De Superstitione, passim); the mysteries of the grave (νεκρομαντεία and σκιομαντεία); the wonders of sleep and dreams (thought to be emanations from the gods, Homer, Il. 1:63; Hymn in Mercur. 14; Virgil, AEn. 5:838); the phenomena of victims sacrificed (deities were supposed to be specially interested or near at hand; comp. the ἱερομαντεία in Potter's Gr. Ant. 2:14); the motions and appearances of the animal creation (such as the flight of birds, a copious source of superstition in the - ρνιθοσκοπία of the Greeks and the auguriumn of the Latins, and the aspect of beasts); and the prodigies of inanimate nature (such as the ἐνόδια σύμβολα, omens of the way, upon which whole books are said to have been written; the κληδόνες, ominous voices); and the long list of magic arts, which may be found in Hoffmann's Lexicon, 2:97, and Potter on the Occult Sciences (in the Encycl. Metropol. part 5, which contains some thirty names ending in many, or compounds of μαντεία, all branches of the magic art). Nor have these expedients of superstition been confined to one age or to a single nation. The meteoric portents, for instance, which used to excite the surprise and fear of the old Greeks and Romans, are still employed among the barbarians of Africa (e.g. musana of the Manika tribe, Krapf's Trav. in E. Africa, page 115 sq.); and as the ancients read fearful signs in the faeces of animals (Virgil, Georg. 1:469), the savage Bakmains indicate the presence of the terrible alligator with their boleo ki bo, "there is sin" (Livingstone's Trav. in S. Africa, page 225). SEE SUPERSTITION. This art "of taking an aim of divine matters by human, which cannot but breed mixture of imaginations" (Bacon, Ess. 17), accordingly has been universal in all ages and all nations, alike civilized and savage. It arises from an impression that, in the absence of direct, visible guiding Providence, the Deity suffers his will to be known to men, partly by inspiring those who from purity of character or elevation of spirit were susceptible of the divine afflatus (θεομάντεις, ἐνθουσιασταί, ἐκστατικοί), and partly by giving perpetual indications of the future. which must be learned by experience and observation (Cicero, Div. 1:18; Pliny, 30:5).

(a.) The first kind of divination was called natural (ἄτεχνος, ἀδίδακτος), in which the medium of inspiration was transported from his own individuality, and became the passive instrument of supernatural utterances (Virg. AEn. 6:47; Ovid, Met. 2:640, etc.). As this process involved violent convulsions, the word , μαντική, soothsaying, is derived from μαίνεσθαι, to rave, and alludes to the foaming mouth and streaming hair of the possessed seer (Plato, Tim. 72, B, where the μάντις is carefully distinguished from the προφήτης). But even in the most passionate and irresistible prophecies of Scripture we have none of these unnatural distortions (Nu 23:5; Ps 39:3; Jer 20:9), although, as we shall see, they were characteristic of pretenders to the gift. SEE SOOTHSAYER.

(b.) The other kind of divination was artificial (τεχνική), and probably originated in an honest conviction that external nature sympathized with and frequently indicated the condition and prospects of mankind-a conviction not in itself ridiculous, and fostered by the accidental synchronism of natural phenomena with human catastrophes (Thucyd. 3:89; Josephus, War, 6:5, 3; Foxe's Martyrs, 3:406, etc.). When once this feeling was established the supposed manifestations were infinitely multiplied, and hence the numberless forms of imposture or ignorance called capnomancy, pyromancy, arithmomancy, libanomancy, botanomancy, cephalomancy, etc., of which there are abundant accounts in Cicero, De Div.; Cardan, De Sapientia; Anton. 5. Dale, De Orig. Idol.; Fabricius, Bibl. Antiq. pages 409-426; Carpzov, App. Crit. pages 540-549; Potter's Antiq. 1, chapter 8 sq. Indeed, there was scarcely any possible event or appearance which was not pressed into the service of augury; and it may be said of the ancient Greeks and Romans, as of the modern New Zealanders, that, "after uttering their karakias (or charms), the whistling of the wind, the moving of trees, the flash of lightning, the peal of thunder, the flight of a bird, even the buzz of an insect, would be regarded as an answer" (Taylor's New Zealand, page 74; Bowring's Siam, 1:153 sq.). A system commenced in fanaticism ended in deceit. Hence Cato's famous saying that it was strange how two augurs could meet without laughing in each other's face. But the supposed knowledge became in all nations an engine of political power, and hence interest was enlisted in its support (Cicero, De Legg. 2:12; Livy, 6:27; Sophocles, Antig. 1055; comp. Mic 3:11). It fell into the hands of a priestly caste (Ge 41:8; Isa 47:13; Jer 5:31; Da 2:2), who in all nations made it subservient to their own purposes. Thus in Persia, Chardin says that the astrologers would make even the shall rise at midnight and travel in the worst weather in obedience to their suggestions. SEE ASTROLOGER.

⇒"Divination." topical outline.

The invention of divination is ascribed to Prometheus (AEschylus, Pr. Vinct. 492), to the Phrygians and Etrurians, especially sages (Cicero, De Div. 1; and Clem. Alex. Strom. 1:326, where there is a great deal more on the subject), or (as by the fathers generally) to the devil (Firmic. Maternus, De Errore, Prooem; Lactant. 2:16; Minuc. Felix. October 27). In the same way Zoroaster ascribes all magic to Ahriman (Nork, Bram. und Rab. page 97). Similar opinions have prevailed in modern times (Sir Thomas Browne, Vulgar Errors, 1:11). SEE MAGIC.

Egypt, the cradle of arts and sciences, if she did not give it birth, seems 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. SEE JANNES (AND JAMIBRES).

⇒Bible concordance for DIVINATION.

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. Nor was it confined to the vicinity of Palestine, for as early as the time of Balaam (q.v.) we find it practiced by professional characters to the very banks of the Euphrates (Nu 22:5,7; see Biedermann, De mercede divinitoria, Vitemb. 1717). The diviners, who abounded both amongst 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 Chaldmea to which the distinction belongs of being the mother-country of diviners. SEE CHALDAEAN. Such a degree of power and influence had they attained in that country, that they farmed the highest caste and enjoyed a place at court; nay, so indispensable were they in Chaldaean 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 Chaldaea 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 captivity 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.). SEE EXORCISM.

Superstition not unfrequently goes hand in hand with skepticism, and hence, amid the general infidelity prevalent through the Roman empire at our Lord's coming, imposture was rampant, as a glance at the pages of Tacitus will suffice to prove. Hence the lucrative trades of such men as Simon Magus (Ac 8:9), Bar-jesus (Ac 13:6,8), the slave with the spirit of Python (Ac 16:16), the vagabond Jews, exorcists (Lu 11:19; Ac 19:13), and other mountebanks (γόηες, 2Ti 3:13; Re 19:20, etc.), as well as the notorious dealers in magical writings (Ε᾿φέσια γράμματα), and the jugglers (περίεργα) at Ephesus (Ac 19:19). Among the Jews these flagrant impostors (ἀπατεῶνες, Josephus) had become dangerously numerous, especially during the Jewish war; and we find them constantly alluded to in Josephus (War, 6:5, 1, 2; comp. Mt 24:23-24; Tacit. Hist. 5:12; Joseph. Ant. 20:5, 1, etc.). As was natural, they, like most Orientals, especially connected the name of Solomon with their spells and incantations (Joseph. Ant. 8:2). The names of the main writers on this wide and interesting subject will be found mentioned in the course of this article, and others are referred to in Fabricius, Bibl. Antiq. cap. 12, and Bottcher, De Inferis, page 101 sq. SEE CURIOUS ARTS.

⇒Definition of divination

Against every species and degree of this superstition the sternest denunciations of the Mosaic law were directed (Ex 22:18; Le 19:26,31; Le 20:27; De 18:10-11), as fostering a love for unlawful knowledge (comp. the Koran, chapter 5; Cato, De Re Rust. 5; "vana superstitione rudes animos infestant;" Columell. 2:1); because prying into the future beclouds the mind with superstition, and because it would have been (as indeed it proved to be, Isa 2:6; 2Ki 21:6) an incentive to idolatry; indeed, the frequent denunciations of the sin in the prophets tend to prove that these forbidden arts presented peculiar temptations to apostate Israel (Hottinger, Juris Hebr. leges, pages 253, 254). But God supplied his people with substitutes for divination, which would have rendered 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.). According to the Rabbis, the Urim and Thummim lasted until the Temple; the spirit of prophecy until Malachi; and the Bath-Kol, as the sole means of guidance from that time downwards (Maimonides, de Fundam. Leg. cap. 7; Abarbanel, Prolegg. in Daniel.). See below.

How far Moses and the Prophets believed in the reality of necromancy, etc., as distinguished from various forms of imposture, is a question which at present does not concern us. But even if, in those times, they did hold such a belief, no one will now urge that we are bound to do so at the present day. Yet such was the opinion of Bacon, Bishop Hall, Baxter, Sir Thos. Browne, Lavater, Glanville, Henry More, and numberless other eminent men. Such also was the opinion which led Sir M. Hale to burn Amy Duny and Rose Cullenden at Bury in 1664 and caused even Wesley to say, that "to give up a belief in witchcraft was to give up the Bible." (For a curious statute against witchcraft [5 Eliz. cap. 15], see Collier's Eccl. Hist. 6:366.) Much discussion, moreover, 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 daemoniacal agency. The latter opinion is embraced by almost all the fathers of the primitive Church, who appeal, in support of their views, to the plain language of Scripture; to the achievements of Jannes and Jambres in the days of Moses; to the divine law, which cannot be chargeable with the folly of prohibiting crimes that never existed; and to the strong presumption that pretensions to interpret dreams, to evoke the dead, etc., would never have met with credit during so many ages had there not been some known and authenticated instances of success. On the other hand, it has been maintained with great ability and erudition 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 47:11-13; Isa 44:25; Jer 14:14; Jon 2:8). SEE WITCHCRAFT.

I. Of the many instances of divination which occur in Holy Scripture, some must be taken in a good sense. These have accordingly been classed by J. C. Wichmannshausen (Dissert. de Divinat. Babyl. [ed. Hichius et Messerer.],Viteb. 1720 sq.) as truly "divine." (See Peucer, De praecipuis divinationum generibus, Zerbst. 1591; F.a.M. 1607.) SEE INSPIRATION.

1. Cleromancy (κληρομαντεία), divination by lot. This mode of decision was used by the Hebrews in matters of extreme importance, and always with solemnity and religious preparation (Jos 7:13). The land was divided by lot (גּוֹרָל, κλῆροι, sors; Nu 26:55-56; Jos 14:2); Achan's guilt was detected by lot (Jos 7:16-19); Saul was elected king by lot (1Sa 10:20-21); and, more remarkable still, Matthias was chosen to the vacant apostleship by solemn lot, and invocation of God to guide the decision (Ac 1:26). This solemnity and reverence it is which gives force to such passages as Pr 16:33; Pr 18:18. (See Augustine, De Doctr. Christ. 1:28; Thom. Aquin. 2:2, qu. 95, art. 8.) Under this process of גּוֹרָל, or lot, were appointed the interesting ordinances of the scape-goat and the goat of the sin-offering for the people (Le 16:8-10). SEE LOT.

2. Oneiromancy (-νειρομαντεία), divination by dreams (De 13:2-3; Jg 7:13; Jer 23:32; Josephus, Ant. 17:6, 4). The interpretation of Pharaoh's dreams by the divinely-gifted Joseph (Ge 41:572), and the retracing and interpretation of those of Nebuchadnezzar by the inspired prophet (Da 2:27, etc. and again 4:19-28), as opposed to the diviners of false dreams (Zec 10:2), are very prominent cases in point; and, still more, the dreams themselves divinely sent (as those in Ge 20:6; Jg 7:15; 1Ki 3:5; so those in Mt 1:20; Mt 2:12-13,19,22), must he regarded as instances of divination in a good sense, a heavenly oneiromancy (comp.

Mohammed's dicta: "Good dreams are from God;" "Goodd reams are one of the great parts of prophecy," Lane's Arab. Nights, 1:68). This is clear from Nu 12:6 (where dreams [to the sleeping] and visions [to the awake] are expressly mentioned as correlative divinations authorized by God), compared with 1Sa 28:6. Many warnings occur in Scripture against the impostures attendant on the interpretation of dreams (Zec 10:2, etc.). We find, however, no direct trace of seeking for dreams such as occurs in Virgil, AEn. 7:81; Plautus, Curcul. 1:1, 2, 61. SEE DREAM.

3. The Urim and Thummim (Nu 27:23), which seem to have had the same relation in true divination that the Teraphimn (q.v.), or idolomnncy, had in the idolatrous system (see Ho 3:4). SEE URIM AND THUMMIM. Similar to this was divination by means of the Ephod (q.v.).

4. Phonomancy, by means of the Bath-Kol (בִּת קוֹל, daughter of the voice, i.e., direct vocal communication), which God vouchsafed especially to Moses (see De 34:10). Various concomitants of revelation were employed by the Deity: as the Rod-Serpent (Ex 4:3); the Leprous Hand (verse 4); the Burning Bush (3:4); the Plagues (7-12); the Cloud (16:10, 11); but most instances are without phenomena (De 4:15; 1Ki 19:12-13,15, and perhaps Mt 3:13). This, the true Bath-Kol, must not be confounded with the fabulous one of the Rabbis, which Dr. Lightfoot calls "a fiction of their own brain to bring their doctors and their doctrines into credit" (Works, 3:132). SEE BATH-KOL.

5. The Oracles: first, of the Ark of the Testimony, or Covenant (אֲרוֹן הָעֵדוּת), described in Ex 25:22, and 1Ki 6:16-31 (comp. Ps 28:2); secondly, of the Tabernacle of the Congregation, or Testimony (אֹחֶל הָעֵדוּת), described in Ex 29:42-43. In the account of the Temple, both in 1Ki 6; 1Ki 2 Chronicles, the word דּבַיר is used fifteen times to designate the "Oracle," i.e., the Holy of Holies (see 1Ki 6:16), in which was placed the Ark of the Covenant (verse 19), whose golden cover, called the Mercy-seat, was the actual situs oraculi (Hottinger, Thes. Philip. page 366). That there were several oracles of heathen gods known to the Jews we may infer both from the mention of that of Baal-zebub at Ekron (2Ki 1:2-6), and from the towns named Debir. "Debir quod nos oraculum sive responsunz possumus appellare, et ut contentiosius verbum exprimamus e verbo λαλητήριον, vel locutorium dicere" (Jerome, ad Ephesians 1). The word "oracles" is applied in the N.T. to the Scriptures (Ac 7:38; Ro 3:2, etc.). On the general subject of oracles, see Anton. 5. Dale, De oraculis; Smith, Dict. of Class. Ant. art. Oraculum; Potter's Antiq. 1:286-326; Sir T. Browne, Tract 11, and Vulg. Err. 7:12, etc. SEE ORACLE.

6. The Angelic Voice, דּבִר מִלאָך (e.g. Ge 22:15; Jg 13:3,13). SEE ANGEL.

7. The Prophetic Institution (נבוּאָה, see Buxtorf, Lex. Rabb. col. 1286). This was the most illustrious and perfect means of holy divination (as the oracular system in the heathen world was the most eminent perversion and imitation of it), and was often accompanied with symbolical action (2Ki 13:17; Jer 51:63-64). We may learn the importance of the place it was designed to occupy in the Theocracy as a means of divination, by the express contrast drawn between it, on the one hand, and the divinations of idolatry on the other. Comp. verse 14 with verse 15 of Deuteronomy 18:(See Michaelis's Laws of Moses, art. 36.) Under this head of prophecy we must, of course, include the רוּחִ חִקּדֶשׁ, as the Jews call the Inspiration of the Holy Spirit. The revelations of the Old Testament are most suitably included in these heavenly utterances, Λόγια Θεοῦ. (See Heb 5:12; 1Pe 4:11.) Such are the chief modes of divine communication to men, or inspired divination: they are referred to in Heb 1:1. The antithesis there points to the Son of God as the Ultimate Oracle (the Logos of John), the fulfiller of the promise, which Moses gave when he prohibited all spurious divination. SEE PROPHET.

8. Before we close our notice of divination in a good sense, we must adduce two instances of the Hebrew word at the head of this article, קסם (ksm). Of the thirty-one occurrences of this expressive term in the O.T., no less than twenty-nine bear an evil meaning. In Pr 16:10, and Isa 3:2, we claim for it a good sense. In the former of these passages the noun קֶסֶם (Sept. μαντεῖον; Vulg. divinatio) is rendered in the A.V. a divine sentence [marg. "divination"], and denotes "sagacity such as of diviners" (Poli Synops. in loc. Melancthon, as quoted by bishop Patrick in loc., refers to the acute wisdom of Solomon in his celebrated judgment, and of Gonzaga in his sentence on the governor of Milan, as instances of this קסם; we might add the case supposed by Solomon himself of the sagacious poor man who successfully defended the city against the mighty invader, Ec 9:15). In Isa 3:2, the word occurs in the Poel form, קסֵם (Sept. στοχαστής; Vulg. ariolus), and is rightly rendered in the A.V. prudent; the company in which the term is found requires for it a good signification. See above.

9. It only remains under this head to allude to the fact that great importance was peculiarly attached to the words of dying men. Now although the observed fact that "men sometimes, at the hour of their departure, do speak and reason above themselves" (Relig. Medici, 11), does not, of course, take away from. the death-bed prophecies of Scripture their supernatural character (Ge 49; 2Ki 13, etc.), yet it is interesting to find that there are analogies which resemble them (Il. 22:355; and the story of Calanus; Cicero, De Div. 1:30; Shaksp. Rich. Il. 2:1; Daniell, Civil Wars, 3:62, etc.).

II. Forms of divination expressly forbidden in Scripture. Allusion has already been made in this article to De 18:10-12. 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 קֹסֵם קסָמַים, kosem' kesamim', one divining divinations (Sept. μαντευόμενος μαντείαν, Vulg. qui ariolos sciscitatur, A.V. "that useth divination"), the same word which we have just noticed in a good sense. The verb קָסִם, like the Arabic equivalent, primarily signified to cleave or divide (Meier, Hebr. Wiirtzelworterbuch, page 344; Fürst, Hebr. Worterb. 2:322; Hottinger, Lex. Heptagl. 44:1); 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 : וכו88 הלכות עבודת כוכבים, cap. 11, § 6) includes besides these methods, gastromancy, lithomancy, and catoptromancy; and Rashi (on De 18:10) makes קסם 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 μαντεύεσθαι μαντείαν, to divine a divination; wherein it is followed by the Targum of Jonathan, as well as by the Syriac and Arabic versions (J. Clodius, Dissert. de Magia Sagittar. [Viteb. 1675] 1:5; and Wichmannshausen, Dissert. 1:4). The word is used of Balaam (Jos 13:22), of the Philistine soothsayers (1Sa 6:2), of the Hebrew false prophets (Mical 3:3, 6, 7, 11, and in other passages), without specifying any mode of divination. We therefore regard this as a general phrase introductory to the seven particular ones which follow. The absence of the copulative ו, which is prefixed to every other word but מעונּן, confirms this view. As the word, however, involves the notion of "cutting," some connect it with the Chald. גָּזרַין (from גָּזִר, to cut), Da 2:27; Da 4:4, etc., and to be taken to mean astrologers, magi, genethliaci, etc. (Juv. 6:582 sq.; Diod. Sic. 2:30). Others refer it to the κληρομάντεις (Schol. ad Eur. Hipp. 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 (Nu 26:55; Es 3:7; Pr 16:33; Pr 18:18). 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. מעוֹנֵן, meönen'. This word is variously derived and explained. In our A.V. it is, in two out of seven times of its occurrence (besides the praet. and fut.), rendered "observer of times" (as if from עוֹנֶה, a set time, Fuller, Misc. Sac. 1:16, 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 [Fasti] says, "Mense malum maio nubere vulgus ait") and years (Maimonides, Aboda Sarac cap. 9; Spencer, De Leg. Hebr. 1:387). So perhaps in Job 3:5; just as the Greeks and Romans regarded some days as candidi, others as atri (Hesiod. Opp. et D. 770; Sueton. Aug. 92, etc.). It is not necessary to refer Ga 4:10 to this superstition; the Mosaic institution of sacred seasons is itself there prohibited, as being abrogated to Christians (Selden, De ann. civil. vet. Jud. c. 21; and Alford, in loc.). The Sept. version, by the verb and part. κληδονίζεσθαι (in four places), and the noun κληδονισυός, (in two others), refers to divination by words and voices (Suidas, κληδινισμοί, αί διά τῶν λόγων παρατηρήσεις). Festus derives omen itself (quasi oramen), because it proceeds from the mouth (qua fit ab ore). Words of ill omen (δυσφημἱαι, which Horace calls nale omninata verba, and Plautus obscenata [prob. obscaevata]), were exchanged for bona nomina, as when Cicero reported to the Senate the execution of Lentulus and others by the word "vixerunt," they have ceased to live, instead of "mortui sunt," they are dead. So Leotychides embraced the omen of Hegesistratus (Herodot. 11:91). Hebrew instances of this observing of words occur in Ge 24:14, and 1Sa 14:9-10, where a divine interposition occurred; in 1Ki 20:33, the catching at the word of the king of Israel was rather a human instinct than a παρατήρεσις, or marking, in its proper (superstitious) sense. Akin to and arising from this observance of verbal omens arose the forms of biblomancy called Sortes Homericae, Virgiliance, Bibliae, etc. The elevation of Severus is said to have been foretold by his opening at Virgil's line, "Tu regere imperio populos, Romane, rhemento. "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 AEneid 4, where Dido predicts a violent death to AEneas, while the latter, chanced upon AEneid 11, at Evander's lamentation over his son. According to Nicephorus Gregoras, the Psalter was the best book for the Sortes Biblicae, but Cedrenus informs us that the N.T. was more commonly used (Niceph. Greg., 8, Aug. Ep. 119; Prideaux, Connect. 2:376, etc.; Cardan, De Varietate, page 1040). This superstition became so rife that it was necessary to denounce it from the pulpit as forbidden by the divine precept, "Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God." The Moslems consult the Koran in similar manner, but they take their answer from the seventh line of the righthand page (see Occult Sciences, page 332). A belief in the significance of chance words was very prevalent among the Egyptians (Clem. Alex. Strom. 1:304; Plutarch, De Isaiah 14), and the accidental sigh of the engineer was sufficient to prevent even Amasis from removing the monolithic shrine to Sais (Wilkinson, Anc. Egypt. 4:144). The universality of the belief among the ancients is known to every scholar (Cicero, De div. 1; Herod. 2:90; Virgil, AEn. 7:116, etc.). SEE BIBLOMANCY.

Another origin for מעונן is found by some (comp. Vitringa, Comment. ad Isa. 2:6) in the noun עִיַן, the eye, the root of which occurs once only (1Sa 18:9) as a verb, "Saul eyed David." This derivation would point to fascination, the Greek βασκανία and the Latin fascinum. Vossius derives these words from φάεσι καίνειν, to kill with the eyes. Pliny (Holland's transl. 1:155) says: "Such like these are among the Triballians and Illyrians, who with their very eiesight can witch (effascinent), yea, and kill those whom they looke wistly upon any long time" (comp. Aul. Gell. 9:4, 8;

Plutarch, Sympos. 5:7). Reginald Scot speaks of certain Irish witches as "eyebiters" (Discovery of Witchcraft, 3:15). Whole treatises have been written on this subject, such as the De Fascino, by the Italian Vairus in 1589; the Opusculum de Fascino, by Gutierrez, a Spaniard, in 1563; and the Tractatus de Fascinatione in 1675, by a German physician called Frommann. (See also Shaw, Trav. page 212.) In Martin's Description of IV. Isles of Scotland, "Molluka beans"' are mentioned as amulets against fascination. Dallaway (Account of Constantinople as quoted in Occult Sciences, page 210) says that "nothing can exceed the superstition of the Turks respecting the evil eye of an enemy or infidel. Passages from tne Koran are painted on the outside of houses, etc., to divert the sinister influence." A belief in the "evil eye," -φθαλμὸς βάσκανος (עִיַן רָע), was universal, and is often alluded to in Scripture (De 23:3; Mt 20:15; Tob. 4:7, μὴ φθονησάτω σου ὁ -φθαλμός; 1Sa 18:9, "Saul eyed David"). The passages of the ancients on the subject are collected in Potter's Ant. 1:383 sq. SEE EYE.

But the derivation of מעונן which finds most favor with modern authorities deduces the word from עָנָן, a cloud, so that the diviner would ply his art by watching clouds, thunders, lightnings (Meier, Hebr Wurzelwb. 5:6, page 92; Fürst, Worterb. 2:167, who, however, finds room for all the derivations; and Gesenius, s.v. ענן, leans to the figurative sense of to cloud, viz. to use covert arts). Rosenmüller, Scholia in Levit. 19:26, follows Aben Esra, who thinks this diviner obtained his omens from observation of the clouds. The notion that the terms קֶדֶם east, אָחֹר west, יָמַין, south, שׂמאֹל, north, were derived from the position of the Planetarius as he faced the east, taking his celestial observations (Goodwin's Moses and Aaron, 4:10), is rejected by his annotator Carpzov with the greatest disgust. Jeremiah (Jer 10:2) clearly refers to this divination, which had its counterpart in Greek and Latin literature (e.g. in Il. 2:352, Nestor speaks of right-hand flashes as being lucky (see also Odys. 15:304). Diodorus Siculus (3:340, ed. Bipont.) mentions the divination by means of thunder (κεραυνοσκοπία, and the αἱ ἐν τοῖς κεραυνοῖς διοσημεῖαι) of the Etrurians (comp. "fulguratores hi fulgurum inspectores," Cato, De Mor. Claud. Neron.; Nonius, 63:21; Cicero, De Div. 2:53. [In Orelli. 2301, fuiguriator.]) Pliny, in 2:43, treats of the physical, and in 2:54, of the oracular qualities of thunder, lightning, etc.; as does L.A. Seneca in Natur. Quast. 2:41. Statius mentions the winds for purposes of divination (Thebaid. 3:512-538). See Humboldt, Kosmos, 2:135, for the probable scientific adaptations by the Etrurians of their divining arts. To this class we must refer "the astrologers" (שָׁמִיַם חֹברֵי here only found); "the star-gazers, or rather star-prophets" (הִחֹזַים בִּכּוֹכָבַים); and "the monthly prognosticators," or rather they that make known at the new moons what will happen to thee (מֵאֲשֶר יָבאֹוּ עָלָיַך מוֹדַיעַים לֶחַדָשַׁים; see Rosenmiller, in loc.), which are all mentioned in the sublime challenge of God to the Chaldee sorcerers in Isa 47:13. Astrology retained a long hold even on the minds of astronomers; e.g. Stoffler from its evaluation predicted a deluge for 1524; Cardan his own death: Wallenstein was a great amateur of astrology; Tycho Brahe studied and practiced it; so did Morinus; Kepler supposed that the planets by their configurations exercised certain influences over sublunary nature; Lord Bacon, moreover, thought that astrology needed only to be reformed, not rejected (Arago, Pop. Astron. [by Smyth and Grant] 2:8; Brewster, Martyrs of Science, 150, 211). SEE PROGNOSTIGATOR.

In Jg 9:37, the expression "oak of Meonenim (enchantments)" refers not so much to the general sacredness of great trees (Homer, Od. 14:328, as to the fact that (probably) here Jacob had buried his amulets (Ge 35:4; Stanley, Sin. and Pal. Page 142). SEE MEONENIM.

3. The next word in our list (De 18:10) is מנִחֵשׁ, menachesh', "an enchanter," (Sept. οἰωνιζόμενος; Vulg. qui observat auguria). In Ge 44:5,15, this somewhat general word is used of divining by the cup, or cylicomancy (κυλικομαντεία). Primitively this was the drinking-cup which contained the libation to the gods (Potter). This divination prevailed more in the East and in Egypt. The κόνδυ, used in the Sept. to designate Joseph's cup, resembles both the Arabic adn: and the Hindu kundi, sacred chalice: (Schleusner, Lex. V.T. s.v.; Kitto, Bib. Illus. 1:398). One of the Assyrian kings, in the sculptures from Nimroud, holds a divining-cup in his right hand (Bonomi's Nineveh, etc. page 306). The famous cup of Jemshid, which is the constant theme of the poetry and mythology of Persia, was said to have been discovered full of the elixir of immortality, while digging to lay the foundation of Persepolis. It possessed the property of representing the whole world in its concavity, and all things good and bad then going on in it. Homer describes Nestor's cup in similar manner; and Alexander the Great had a mystic cup of a like kind. In the storming of Seringapatam the unfortunate Tippoo Saib retired to gaze on his divining-cup; after standing a while absorbed, he returned to the fight and soon fell. The "great magitien" Merlin's cup is described (Spenser's Faerie Queene, 3:2, 19), "Like to the world it'selfe, it seem'd a world of glas." In Norden's Travels in Egypt, and Capt. Cook's Voyages, the use of divining-cups in modern Nubia and at Tongataboo, one of the Friendly Islands, is mentioned (compare Kitto, Daily Bible Illustrat. 1:424). The Orientals ascribe much of Solomon's wisdom to his possession of a sacred cup; a Giamschid, or vase of the sun (D'Herbelot, s.v. Giam, Occult Sciences, page 317). Parkhurst and others, denying that divination is intended, make it a mere cup of office (Bruce's Travels, 2:657), "for which he would search carefully." But in all probability the A.V. is right. The Nile was called the cup of Egypt, and the silver vessel which symbolized it had prophetic and mysterious properties (Havernick, Einl. z.d. Pentat.). The divination was by means of radiations from the water, or from magically- inscribed gems, etc., thrown into it (a sort of ὑδρομαντεία, κατοπτρομαντεία, or κρυσταλλομαντεία Cardan, De rerum Variet. cap. 93), like the famous mirror of ink (Lane, Mod. Eg. 2:362), and the crystal divining-globes, the properties of which depend on a natural law brought into notice in the recent revivals of Mesmerism. Jul. Serenus (De Fato, 9:18) says that after certain incantations a daemon was heard in the water. For illustrations of Egyptian cups, see Wilkinson, 3:258. This kind of divination is not the same as cyathomancy (Suidas, s.v. κοτταβίζειν), which consists in drawing omens from a common drinking-cup; much like the vulgar practice, still prevalent, of reading fortunes in the fantastic forms assumed by the grounds in a teacup. SEE CUP.

But the versions of the Sept. and Vulg. give quite a different turn to our מנחשׁ, and point to that part of the augurial art which consisted of omens from birds, i.e., ornithomancy (-ρνιθομαντεία, οἰωνισμός, - ρνιθοσκοπική). The Syriac and Arabic versions favor this view (augurari ab animali alato). Birds in their flight over the earth were supposed to observe men's seeret actions, and to be cognizant of accidents, etc. (comp. Ec 10:20). Aristophanes (Birds) says, "None but some bird, perhaps, knows of my treasure:" so that the birds assume prerogatives of deity; "We are as good as oracles and gods to you," etc. The notes, the flight, and the feeding of birds were the main phenomena (Bochart, ed. Leusd. 2:19). Homer is full of this divination (Il. 12:310; Od. 15:160, et passim). So the Latin classics; see Servius, Virg. zn. 3:361 ("aves oscines, praepetes"); also Cicero, Fam. 6:6, 13; De Divin. 2:72, etc.; and Livy, 10:40 (tripudium

solistimum). For qualities of various birds, see Potter, 15, and Occult Sciences, pages 142, 143. This divination was much in vogue in the East also; so Philostratus (Vit. Apollon. 1:14) and Porphyry (De Abstin. Animal. 3) say. Rabbinical doctors discover augury among King Solomon's attainments, in such passages as Ec 10:20, and 1Ki 4:30. Rashi comments חכם בלשון העוּפות, learned in the tongue of birds; so Kimchi and the Mid. bar Rabba, 19. SEE ENCHANTER. The root נחשׁ: has the primary sense of a low hissing, whispering sound; from this arises the derivative נָחָשׁ, a serpent, of frequent occurrence in the O.T. Gesenius, Thes. page 875; Lex. by Robinson, page 665; and Furst, Hebr. Worterb. page 31, prefer to derive from the primary sense (q.d. divinare vel augurari as general terms); but Bochart, 2:21, 22, peremptorily derives from the secondary sense of the serpent, and discovers in this מנִחֵשׁ the divination called ophiomancy (-φιομαντεία). Fürst admits this as "tolerable." Classical instances of divining by serpents occur in Iliad, 2:308; AEneid, 5:84; Cicero, De Div. 1:18,36; Valer. Maxim. 1:6, 8; Terent. Phorm. 4:4, 26; Clem. Alex. Strom. 7; Horace, Carm. 3:27, 5. (According to Hesychius, s.v. οἰωνός, and Suidas, s.v. οίωνιστική, omens from serpents as well as from birds formed a usual branch of the augur's art; hence probably the general phrase employed in the Sept. and other versions.) Serpent-charming, referred to in Ps 58:5, and Jer 8:17. is a part of this divination. Frequent mention of this art also occurs in both ancient and modern writers. (See Kalisch on Ex 7:12, who refers to AElian, Hist. Anim. 17:5; Sil. Italic. 3:300; Strabo, 12:814; Gellius, Noct. Attic. 16:11; Shaw, Travels, page 354; Niebuhr, Travels, 1:189; Bochart, Hieroz. 3:162; Description de l'Egypte 8:108; 18:1, 333 [in 1:159, there is a description of the feats of some Cairo jugglers with the serpent Haje]; Quatremere, Mem. sur l'Egypte, 1:202; Minutoli, Travels, page 226; Hengstenberg, Mos. and Egypt, pages 97- 103; Lane, Mod. Egypt, 2:230). The serpent was the symbol of health and healing (Plin. 24:4, 22); Moses's brazen serpent (Nu 21:9), which was a symbol of deliverance (Wisd. 16:6; comp. Joh 3:14), was at length made an object of idolatrous worship. Hezekiah, to destroy the charm, reduced-its name to its mere material (נחִשׁ הִנּחשֶׁת =נחֻשׁתִּן), 2Ki 18:4. SEE NEHUSHTAN. These menacheshim, therefore, were probably ophiomants-people who, like the ancient Psylli (Pliny, H.N. 7:2; 18:4) and Marmaridae (Sil. Ital. 3:301), were supposed to render serpents innocuous and obedient (Ex 7:9; Jer 8:17; Ec 10:11), chiefly by the power of music (Nicand. Meriac. 162; Lucan, 9:891; AEn. 7:753), but also, no doubt, by the possession of some genuine and often hereditary secret (Lane, Mod. Egypt, 2:106 sq.; Arnob. adv. Gent. 2:32). They had a similar power over scorpions (Francklen's Tour to Persia). SEE CHARMER.

4. מכִשֵׁŠ, mekashsheph' (Sept. φαρμακός; Vulg. maleficus; Auth. Vers. "witch"). This word has always a bad sense in the Old Test. in the twelve instances in which the verb [always Piel] and the noun are used. The Syriac, however (kasap), bears the good sense of prayer and public service to God .( δέησις, λειτουργία, in Ac 4:31; Ac 13:2). The Arabic (kashaf) suggests the meaning of the missing Kal — "to reveal." In Ex 7:11, this word describes (in plur.) the magicians of Pharaoh, who are also there called חֲכָמַים, sages, and (as also in 7:22; comp. Ge 41:8,24) חִרטֻמַּים, ἱερογραμματεῖς (Clem. Alex. 6:633), or sacred scribes of Egypt. This latter title identifies these with the Magi, or sacerdotes, of the Chaldaean court (see Da 2:10,27). The prophet was himself made by the king of Babylon רִב חִרטֻמַּין, "master of the magicians" (Da 5:11). The arts of these diviners (להָטַים, Ex 7:11, לָטַים, verse 22), which enabled them to withstand Moses, were doubtless imposing, but so inferior to the miracles by which they were ultimately foiled (8:19), and their gods confounded (12:12). The conjecture of Aben Ezra, that it was "their skill in the secrets of physical science" (quoted in Carpzov, Apparatus, page 543), such as is attributed to the Etrurianfulguratores by Humboldt (Kosmos, 1.c.), which enabled them to sustain their impious contest, is not unreasonable. The names of two of these chartummim (or מכִשּׁפַים) are given by Paul, 2Ti 3:8. (For Talmudic traditions about these, see Buxtorf, Lex. Tal. col. 945; comp. Pliny, Hist. Nat. 30:1, who associates Jamnes and Jotapes with Moses as Jews; Apuleius, Apol. 108 [ed. Casaub.], who mentions Moses, Jannes, etc., as inter magos celebrati; Numenius Pythag. in Eusebius, Praep. Evang. 9:8, who mentions Ι᾿αννῆς καὶ Ι᾿αμβρῆς Αἰγύπτιοι and Μουσαῖος οΙ῾᾿ουδαῖος. The Moslems call these magicians Sadur and Gadur; D'Herbelot, s.v. Mousa; and Sale, Koran, page 237; Schoettgen, Hor. Hebr. page 893; Rosenmüller, on Exodus 1.c.). How:they produced the wonders which hardened the heart of Pharaoh, whether by mechanical or chemical means, or by mere legerdemain, or by dtemoniacal assistance (as supposed by the fathers, and Josephus, Ant. 2:5), we can only conjecture. The N.T. gives us the names of other diviners also-in this respect differing observably from the reserve of the O.T. — e.g. of Simon Magus (Ac 8:9, μαγεύων); of Barjesus or Elymas (Ac 13:6,8, ὁ μάγος); the sons of Sceva (Ac 19:13-14, ἐξορκισταί). We have alluded to the supposed scientific basis of the arts of these מכשפים, or חכמים, or חרטמים (for the identity of these, see Kalisch, on Exodus p. 114; and Keil and Delitzsch's Bibl. Commentar, 1:357). The term under consideration might no doubt involve the use of divining-rods for the purpose of finding water (aqurelicium), etc., dependent on physical laws only partially understood (Mayo's Pop. Superstitions). SEE MAGICIAN.

By Umbreit, on Job, and Deyling (Observ. Sacr. 3:129), the words כַּמרַירֵי יוֹם, "the blackness of the day," in Job 3:5, are taken to mean certain "incantations which darken the day," practiced by magicians (some think them also indicated in the 8th verse by the words אוֹררֵיאּיוֹם, "that curse the day") who were able, as the superstitious imagined, to change the brightest day into the darkest midnight. Popular ignorance has always connected magical power with scientific skill. The foretelling of the rise and setting of sun, moon, and stars, and the prediction of eclipses, used to invest astronomers of old with a marvelous reputation (Virgil, AEn. 4:489; Ovid, Metam. 12:263; Horace, Epod. 5:45; Tibull. 1:2, 42. So Shakspeare, Temp. 5:1). In Ex 22:18, the feminine מכִשֵּׁפָה, mekashshephah', occurs (also translated a witch in the A.V.). In the Theocratic system, where women as well as men were endued with supernatural gifts (such as Deborah, Hannah, Huldah), female pretenders were to be found-indeed, according to Maimonides (Moreh Neb. 3:37), and Babyl. Gemara (Sanhed, in Ugolini Thies. 25:776), they were more rife even than males. Their divination is referred to in Eze 13:23, and described verses 17-22 (comp. Triumphii Dissert. de pulvillis et peplis prophetiss. in Thes. Nov. ad Crit. Sacr. 1:972, and Ephrem Syrus, in Rosenmüller in loc., who supposes the "pillows" to be amulets for divination fitted to their sleeves). SEE WITCH.

5. The next phrase in the Mosaic catalogue of forbidden divination is (De 18:11) חֹבֵר, chober', "a charmer" (Sept. ἐπαείδων; Vulg. incantator). The root chabar' denotes binding, or joining together. Gesenius (by Robinson, page 293) refers to a species of magic which was practiced by binding magic knots (comp. Gordian knot). Carpzov (Apparatus, page 544) quotes Rabbinical authority, and Bochart (Hieroz. 2:3, 6), for a kind of divination which drew together noxious creatures (serpentes and scorpiones) for purposes of sorcery; and in Ps 58:6, the very phrase before us is applied to serpent charmers. (See above, under 3.) Gaulmin (in Carpzov) mentions δεσμὸς θεῶν, as if the very gods might be bound by magic arts. The Sept. version suggests our spell-bound. "Spell is a kind of incantation per sermones vel verba," says Somner. Hence the frequent allusions to such a charm in poetry. The refrain in the chorus of the Furies (AEschylus, Eumen. 296, 318, 327), αὐονά (a spell- blight), is imitated by Byron (Manfred, 1:1). So Milton (Comus, 852); Jonson's witch (in the Sad Shepherd) is said "to rivet charms;" comp. Beaum. and Fletcher (The Loyal Subject, 2:2). This last quotation directs us to the best explanation of divination by חבר. Its idea is binding together; the ring has always been regarded as the symbol of such conjunction (comp. wedding-ring, in the marriage service of the Church of England). In the phenomena of dactylomancy (δακτυλομαντεία), or divination by ring (Potter, 2:18; Smedley, Occult Sciences, pages 37-40, 343), we have the most exact illustration of the subject before us. Josephus (Ant. 8:2, 6), among the attributes of king Solomon's wisdom, ascribes to him much magical skill, and, with the rest, necromancy and spells, and goes on to specify an instance of exorcism by virtue of Solomon's magic ring. D'Herbelot (s.v. Giam, already quoted) calls Jemshid the Solomon of Persia; and, according to Minutoli (Reise, page 83), Solomori is ordinarily regarded in Moslem countries as the great master of divination. SEE CHARMER.

6. שֹׁאֵל אוֹב, shod' ob, "a consulter with familiar spirits" (Sept. ἐγγαστρίμυθος; Vulg. qui Pythones consulit). Most writers treat this class of diviners as necromancers (so Gesenius, Thes. page 34). But, whatever be the close connection of the two as deducible from other passages, it is impossible to suppose that in De 18:11, שֹׁאֵל אוֹב is synonymous with הִמֵּתַים דֹּרֵשׁים אֶל, which follows almost next. Bottcher, De Inferis, carefully distinguishes between the two expressions (page 108), and then identifies the אוֹב, which occurs in the plural in Job 32:19 (in its primary sense of a leathern bottle, or water-skin), with the noun of the same form which is found in so many other passages with a different meaning. In these the Sept. has invariably used ἐγγαστρίμυθος, which connects our phrase with ventriloquism, as a branch of the divining art. (For the supposed connection between the primary and secondary senses of אוֹב, see Gesenius, Thes. page 34, and Lex. by Robinson, page 20; also Bottcher, page 107. The analogy is also in close consistency with the words of Job. (Umbreit, in loc.) Having settled the sense of the word, Bittcher goes on to draw a noticeable distinction in certain phrases where it occurs. First, אוֹב in the singular number designates the familiar spirit (i.e., what he calls "murmelbauch," venter fremens [in a correct sense], or "murmelwesen," daemon fremens [in a superstitious sense]). Hence we have such phrases as בִּעֲלִת אוֹב, mistress [or owner] of a familiar spirit (1Sa 28:7); שֹׁאֵל אוֹב, a consulter or questioner of a familiar spirit [i.e., says Bottcher, "ventriloquus vates ipse"] (De 18:11). Secondly, אוֹב, when governed by the particle בּ, refers not to the vates, or professional consulter, but to the person who requests his aid: thus, while שֹׁאֵל אוֹב is said of the diviner (loc. cit.) לַשׁאוֹל בָּאוֹב (with the particle) is applied to king Saul, who sought the familiar spirit by the aid of the vates, or pythonissa (1Ch 10:13). "The same distinction," says Bottcher, "is also maintained by the Targumists and Talmudists." (Comp. 1Sa 28:8, "'Divine to me, בָּאוֹב, by the familiar spirit.") Thirdly, אֹבוֹת, in the plural, is used in a concrete sense to indicate the ventriloquists or diviners themselves, and not the " familiar spirits" which were supposed to actuate them (De Inferis, page 101, § 205, where the learned writer adduces similar cases of metonymy from other languages: as γαστέρες ἀργαί, "slow-bellies," Tit 1:12; so our "Wits about town;" the German "Witzkopfe," "Dickbluche," etc.) By this canon we discover the general accuracy of our A.V. in such passages as Le 19:31, where הָאֹבֹת is well rendered, "Them that have familiar spirits." Comp. Le 20:6; 1Sa 28:3,9; 2Ki 23:24; Isa 8:19; Isa 19:3. In Isa 29:4, the same concrete rendering is applied to אוֹב in the singular, contrary to Bottcher's first and third canons; but this rendering is inferior to what Böttcher would suggest, viz. "Thy voice shall be as of a familiar spirit, out of the ground," etc. This is the only passage where the accuracy of our version, thus tested, seems to be at fault; it contrasts strikingly, with the Sept. in this point, which maintains no distinction between the sing. and the plur. of this word, other than the mechanical one of putting ἐγγαστρίμυθος for אוֹב, and ἐγγαστρίμυθοι for אֹבֹת. The Vulgate is more cautious, e.g. it renders most of the plurals magi, rightly, but is, on the whole, inferior to the A.V. in accuracy, for it translates both the sing. אוֹב: of 2Ki 21:6, and the plur. אֹבֹת of 2Ki 23:24, by the same word, Pythones, and similarly Isa 8:19; Isa 19:3. (For a description of the Delphian Pytha, or Pythonissa, and why ventriloquist faculties were attributed to her [whence one of her designations, ἐγγαστρίμυθος], see Potter's Antiq. c. 9.) A vast amount of information touching the Hebrew γαστρομαντεία, and its connection with the witch of Endor, is contained in the treatise of Leo Allatius, and Eustathius Antiochen, De Engastrimytho; and the Samuel redivicus of Michael Rothard, all reprinted in Critici Sacri, 8:303-458. See also St. Chrysostom, Opera (ed. Bened.), 7:445. A concise statement is contained in Bottcher's work, pages 111-115. The identity of אוֹב and אֹבוֹת with necromancy, contrary to Bottcher's view, is maintained in D. Millii Dissertatio, especially in chapter 6, whom Gesenius follows in Thes. s.v. אוֹב. See the Dissertatio in Ugol. Thesaur. 23:517-528. For ancient Jewish opinions on the apparition of Samuel to Saul, see Josephus, Ant. 6:14, 2, and Whiston's note in loc.; also Ecclesiasticus 46:20. On this subject, the second letter of Sir W. Scott, On Demonology and Witchcraft, with the note in the appendix of the volume, is well worthy of perusal. Whatever reality God may have permitted to this remarkable case of divination, the resort to it by Saul was most offensive to the divine Being; the king's rejection is partly ascribed to it in 1Ch 10:13: somewhat similar is the reason assigned for God's vengeance on Manasseh (2Ki 21:11. See the remarkable canons 61 and 65 of the Trullan [Quinisextum] Council; Beveregii Synod. 1:227, 235). SEE FAMILIAR SPIRIT.

7. יַדּעֹנַי, yiddeini', from יָדִע, to know, is uniformly rendered in A.V. by "wizzard," akin to "wise" and to the German verb "wissen" (old German wizan), to know. (Sept. in four places, γνώστης, a knowing one; Vulg. ariolus, most frequently.) This Hebrew noun occurs eleven times, and in every instance is coupled with אוֹב; we may thus regard it as indicating a usual concomitant (perhaps of cleverness and dexterity) with ventriloquism: this view is confirmed by the Sept. ἐγγαστρίμυθος, as the rendering of יַדּעֹנַי in Isa 19:3, a verse which proves the Egyptian arts of divination were substantially the same as the Hebrew in that age (comp. Bottcher, page 115, § 231; and see Rawlinson's note on Herod. 2:83, in explanation of a seeming discrepancy between the prophet and the historian). In another passage of Isaiah (8:19) there occurs a good description of these הִיּדּעֹנַים, in the two epithets הִמּצִפצפַים, expressive of the chirping, piping sounds of young birds, and הִמִּהגַּים, applied to the cooing of the dove, in 8:19. (With the former of these, compare Horace, Sat. 1:8, 40, and with the latter, Virgil, AEneid, 3:39. So in Homer, Il. 11:101, the shade of Patroclus departs with what Shakspeare [Hamlet, 1:1] calls a "squeak and gibber." An unexpected illustration of these arts may be met with in Captain Lyons's Private Journal, page 358, where he de scribes the feats of the Esquimaux ventriloquist Toolemak of Igloolik. Compare the curious account of a modern necromancy left us by Benvenuto Cellini; both of these are narrated in Sir D. Brewster's Letters on Natural Magic, pages 68-75, and 176-178.) The Sept. version, much more inexact than the English, renders the יַדּעֹנַי of De 18:11 by τερατασκόπος, or observer of omens; what the prodigies were, which, according to the extravagant belief of the Rabbinical writers, were used by these diviners, may be seen in Carpzov, Apparatus, pages 545, 546, where, among others, are adduced the bird Jiddoa and the monster Jaddua, to account for the origin of our term. This last was, according to the Rabbis, a certain beast in shape like a man (καταβλεπάδα),'the bones of which the diviner held in his teeth (Maimon. De Idol. 6:3; Bulenger, De Div. 3:33; Delrio, Disquis. Mag. 4:2; Godwyn's Mos. and Aar. 4:10). The Greek diviner ate certain efficacious parts of animals (Porphyr. De Abstinent. 2). For other bone divinations, see Rubruquis's China, page 65, and Pennant's Scotland, page 88 (in Pinkerton). SEE WIZARD.

8. The last designation used by Moses in the great passage before us (De 18:10-11) is הִמֵּתַיםדֹּרֵשׁ אֶלאּ, doresh' el ham-methim' (one seeking unto the dead; Sept. ἐπερωτῶν τοὑς νεκρούς; Vulg. qui gucerit a mortuis veritatem). This points to the famous art of necromancy, the νεκρομαντεία, or (as they preferred to write it) νεκυομαντεία of the Greeks. This was a divination in which answers were given by the dead. It was sometimes performed by the magical use of a bone or vein of a dead body, or by pouring warm blood into a corpse, as if to renew life in it (Lucan, Phar. 6:750). Sometimes they used to raise the ghosts of deceased persons by various ceremonies and invocations. Ulysses, in Odyssey, book 0, having sacrificed black sheep in a ditch, and poured forth libations, invites the ghosts, especially that of Tiresias, to drink of the blood, after which they become willing to answer his questions. (Compare the evocation of the shade of Darius, for counsel, after the defeat at Salamis, in the Persae of Eschylus, 630-634.) This evocation of spirits was called ψυχαγωγία; the offerings of the dead on this occasion were mild and unbloody; but Gregory Nazianzen (in Orat. II, contra Julian.) speaks also of "virgins and boys slaughtered at the evocation of ghosts." From Isa 65:4, it would appear that the ancient Jews increased the sin of their superstition by using unclean offerings on such occasions: "They remain among the graves, and lodge in the monuments" (יָלַינוּ, will spend the night in these adyta); such were the favorite haunts of the necromancers: "they eat swine's flesh" — an idolatrous practice (comp. Ovid, Fasti, 1:349; Horace, Sat. 2:3, 164. Varro, De Re Rust. 2:4); "and broth of abominable things is in their vessels." (We are reminded of the celebrated witch scenes in Shakspeare, Macbeth, I, 3; III, 5; and especially IV, 1.) Rosenmüller, in. loc., refers, for a like incantation, to Marco Polo, Travels in the East, 3:24; and Sir J.F. Davis, in his China (last ed.), 2:73, mentions certain magic spells practiced by the Taou sect, "with the blood of swine, sheep, dogs, and other impure things." A curious case of necromancy also occurs in the story of the philosopher Chuang-tsze and his wife, in the same volume pages 87, 88. In the 15th chapter of Sketches of Imposture, etc. (in the Family Library), "on Sepulchral and perpetual lamps," may be found an interesting account of the reasons which induced the Egyptians to bestow so great attention on their dead; one of them, quoted from Kircher's History of Egyptian Antiq., rests on the opinion "that the souls of the deceased tarry with their bodies in the grave." This, added to the conception of the more enlarged knowledge of the dead, lay at the foundation of necromancy. The earliest historical tale of this sort of divination which we recollect is related by Herodotus concerning Periander of Corinth and his wife Melissa, whose spirit he consulted for information about a hidden treasure (5:92). In one of the most interesting dialogues of Lucian, the "Menippus," or "Necyomanteia," a very good description is given of various necromantic ceremonies. (For an abstract, see Occult Sciences, by Smedley, etc. pages 183, 185.) In Tertullian's treatise, De Anima, occurs a remarkable passage on necromancy, at the conclusion of which he says, "If certain souls have been recalled into their bodies by the power of God as manifest proofs of his prerogative, that is no argument that a similar power should be conferred on audacious magicians, fallacious dreamers, and licentious poets" (c. 56, 57). We may observe, in concluding this subject, that in confining (with Bottcher) necromancy proper to the last phrase on Moses's list, דֹּרֵשׁ אֶלאּהִמֵּתַים, we have the authority of the A.V., which limits the word necromancer (ἄπαξ λεγόμενον in our Bible) to this phrase. SEE NECROMANCER.

III. Forms of divination merely referred to in the Bible, without special sanction or reprobation. We here find the same general phrase as in the foregoing passage of Deuteronomy introductory to another but much shorter catalogue; for in the remarkable passage of Eze 21:21 [or 26 in the Hebrew], we have the three famous divinations of the king of Babylon. The prophet represents the monarch as standing "at the parting of the way, at the head of the two ways, to use divination" (לַקסֹם קֶסֶם).

1. He "made the arrows bright" (rather, he shook them together,Vulg. commiscens sagittas, קַלקִל בִּחַצִים, Sept. ἀγαβράσαι ῥαβδία), "each arrow having inscribed on it the name of some town to be assaulted. From the quiver the arrows were drawn one by one, and the city which was written on the first arrow drawn out was the first to be beleaguered" (Jerome, in loc.). In this instance Jerusalem was the ill-fated object of this divination, as we learn from the next verse, where the divination for Jerus. (הִקֶּסֶם ירוּשָׁלֵם) signifies the arrow bearing the inscription of the doomed capital, as it first emerged from the divining-quiver (Prideaux, Connect. 1:85). Estius says "he threw up a bundle of arrows to see which way they would light, and, falling on the right hand, he marched towards Jerusalem." We have here a case of belomancy (βελομαντεία). This superstition, which is prohibited in the Koran (chapters 3:39; 5:4), was much practiced by the idolatrous Arabs (D'Herbelot, Bibl. Or. s.v. Acdah). Their arrows, which were consulted before any thing of moment was undertaken, as when a man was about to marry, or undertake a journey, or the like, used to be without heads or feathers, and were kept in the temple of some idol. Seven such arrows were kept at the temple of Mecca, but in divination they generally used but three. On one of these was written, my Lord hath bidden me; on the second was inscribed, my Lord hath forbidden me; while the third was blank. If the first was drawn, it gave the god's sanction to the enterprise; the second prohibited it; but the third being drawn required that the arrows should again be mixed and again drawn until a decisive answer was obtained (Pococke's Spec. Arab, page 324, etc.; Gesenius, Thes. p. 1224; Sale's Koran, Prelim. Dissert. page 90; Clodius, Diss. de Mag. Sagitt. 3:2). Della Valla, however, says (page 276), "I saw at Aleppo a Mohammedan who caused two persons to sit on the ground opposite each other, and gave them four arrows into their hands, which both of them held with their points downward," etc. The two arrows in the right hand of the Assyrian king (sculptured on one of the large slabs brought from Nimroud) are conjectured to be proofs that divination by arrows was practiced in ancient Nineveh. The king is represented as attended by two divinities with fir-cone and basket, and therefore is in a religious and not a martial occupation (Bonomi, Nineveh and its Palaces, 3d edit. page 306). Three suitors of an Eastern princess decided their claims by shooting each an arrow inscribed with his own name. The most distant arrow indicated the name of the successful competitor (Roberts's Orient. Illust. page 491). We read of a somewhat similar custom in use among the ancient Teutons (Tacitus, Germ. 10), and among the Alani (Am. Marcell. 31); also among the modern Egyptians (Lane, 2:111). This sort of divination of the king of Babylon must not be confounded with the arrow shot (βελοβολία) of Jonathan, the affectionate expedient of his secret warning to David, 1Sa 20:20, etc., in which, though there were three arrows, there was no uncertain divination, but an understood sign (Browne, Vulg. Errors, 5:23, 27). Again, in the shooting of arrows by Joash, king of Israel, at the command of the dying prophet (2Ki 13:17-18), there is in the three arrows only an accidental, not a real resemblance; moreover, we have in this action not an unauthorized superstition, but a symbolical prophecy (comp. the symbol with Virgil, AEn. 9:52). SEE ARROW.

2. "He consulted with the images," שָאִל בִּתּרָפַים (Sept. ἐπερωτῆσαι ἐν τοῖς γλυπτοῖς; Vulg. interrogavit idola), literally teraphim. These household gods of the Shemitic nations are often mentioned in the Old Testament from the time of the Syrian Laban (Ge 31:19) to this of the Chaldee Nebuchadnezzar (see Aug. Pfeiffer, De Teraphim, in Ugolini Thesaur. 23:566, who, unnecessarily indeed, suggests, on grammatical grounds, that the king of Babylon may have used these three divinations previous to his leaving home). Dr. Fairbairn (on Eze 21:21) says, "This is the only passage where the use of teraphim is expressly ascribed to a heathen." This form of idolomancy (εἰδωλομαντεία) is, however, elsewhere named (Zec 10:2; 1Sa 15:23, תֹּרֵŠ= an inquirer). These were wooden images (1Sa 19:13) consulted as "idols," from which the excited worshippers fancied that they received oracular responses. The notion that they were the embalmed heads of infants on a gold plate inscribed with the name of an unclean spirit is Rabbi Eliezer's invention. Other Rabbis think that they mean "astrolabes, etc." SEE TERAPHIM.

3. "He looked in the liver," רָאָה בִּכָּבֵר (Sept. κατασαοπησάσθαι v.r. ἡπατοσκοπησάσθαι; Vulgate, exta consuluit). Here we have a case of a well-known branch of splanchnomancy (σπλαγχνομαντεία), or divination by the inspection of entrails, which was called extispicium (or art of the haruspices), practiced in Rome by the Etrurian soothsayers, and much referred to in both Greek and Latin authors. Cicero (De Divin. 2:15) mentions the importance of the liver in divination of this kind; hence this branch was called hepatoscopy (ἡπατοσκοπία, Herodian. 8:3, 17; see also Pliny, 11:37; Ovid, Metamorph. 15:136). Arrian (Alex. 7:18) mentions an evil prognostication in reference to the deaths of Alexander and Hephaestion; and Suetonius (Aug. 95:2) a happy one. Strabo also (3:232, ed. Casaub.) mentions this divination as practiced by the Lusitani: not only animals offered in sacrifice, but captives in war furnished these barbarians with victims for this bloody divination. A still more hideous mode of divination is mentioned of the ancient Britons, who would cut down at a blow of the sword one of their human sacrifices, in order to observe the posture of his fall, his convulsions, flow of the blood, etc., and so gather their predictions according to the rule of their ancestors. This is is the only instance mentioned in Scripture of this superstition. The liver was the most important part of the sacrifice for divining purposes (Artemid. Oneirocr. 2:74; Cicero, De Div. 2:13). SEE LIVER

4. One of the remaining isolated terms of divination in the Scriptures is הָאִטִּים, ha-ittim' "the charmers," which occurs in Isa 19:3, in a passage descriptive of the idolatry and superstition of Egypt. It is derived by Gesenius and Meier from a root אָטִט, atat, akin to Arab. Atta, which singifies to utter a dull murmuring sound. Meier defines the noun in question by murmurers or lispers. If so, we have here a class of the ventriloquists already described. But the Sept. gives another turn to the word, rendering by ἀγάλματα as if, coming after הָאלִֵילִים gods, it meant their shrines. Herodotus (2:83) tells us the Egyptians possessed many oracles besides that of Latona at Buto, which was most esteemed of all. He adds that "the mode of delivering the oracles (αἱ μαντήÞαι) varied at the different shrines." See above.

5. In Da 2:2, four classes of diviners are mentioned: two of these are described above; of the others אִשָּׁפִים, ahshaphim (chald. אָשׁפִין in Da 2:27), is probably allied by derivation with the word מכִשֵּׁŠ, mekashsheph, which we have already described (Meier says "אָשִׁŠ=כָּשִׁŠ"). The noun אִשׁפָּה, ashpah (a quiver), from the same root, suggests the notion of concealment and covering. This, the probable meaning of our term, suits very well with the idea of divination, though it ill accords with the A.V., which, in all the eight passages in Daniel where it is found, renders it astrologers. Divination by the stars is not implied in the original. The Sept. in every place except one (and that is doubtful, see Trommii Concord. 2:1) translates אשŠ by μάγος, and the Vulg. generally by magus. This suggests the association of the אשפים with the magians of Matthew ii. 1. (Dutripon, Concord. Biblic. Sacr. page 824). This, add to the fact that אשפים is generally coupled with the chartummim and the chaldaeans, probably influenced our translators in their choice of the English word. The original, however, is much less specific. Some philologists have imagined the word αόφος is no other than אשŠ with the first letter dropped, and have also connected it with the Persian sophi. Such a derivation would rather point to occult arts and cabalistic divination. See Astrologer.

6. The expression used by Daniel in 1:20 הָאִשָּׁפִים הִחִרטֻמִּים, ha- chartummim' ha-ashshaphim, "the magicians (and) the astrologers" is an asyndeton, for other places prove the second to be a different class from the first (see above). The close conjunction of the אשפים with the chartummim indicates their participation of the qualities of the latter, the ἱερογραμματεῖς, or sacred scribes of both Egypt and Babylon, over whom Daniel was appointed rab or master. In the learned Dissertatio D.Millii de chartummim aliisve orientalium magis (Ugolini Thes. 23:529,538) nearly all the accomplishments of the divining art are attributed to this influential caste, beginning with the genethliac mysteries. The horoscope, which was much in use by these γενεθλιακοί brings us back to astrology, which (though not implied in the designation אשפים was no doubt a part of their wisdom. Gesenius, in Thes. and Lex. derives the word chartummim from חֶרֶט cheret "a graving tool" and (on the anuthority of Creuzer, Symbolik u.Mythologie, 1:245; and Jablonski, Proleg. In Panth. Aegypt page 91, etc) connects the arts of the chartummim with the sacred hieroglyphical writings. Not less probably, from such a derivation, these diviners might be connected with the system of talismans, so rife in the East, and in Egypt in ancient times. SEE AMULET. The talisman (Arabic tilsam, Greek τέλεσμα) is defined (in Freytag, Lex Arab. s.v. 3:64) to be "a magical image upon which under a certain horoscope, are engraved mystic characters, as charms against enchantment or fascination." Talismans, among other uses, are buried with treasures to prevent them from being discovered. Thus this divination appears as a counterpart against another species (in rhabdomanch) which was used for the discovery of treasure. Equally varied are the gifts ascribed to the chartummim in the translations of the Sept. And Vulg. In eleven of the fifteen occurrences of the word (all descriptive of the magicians of Egypt and Babylon), ἐπαοιδός and incantator are used in these versions; φαρμακός and veneficus in two; and in the remaining two ἐξηγητής and interpres. According to Jablonski, the name is derived from an Egyptian word chertomthaumaturgus, wonder-worker, (for other conjectures, see Kalisch, Gen. page 647; Heidegger, Hist. Patr. 20:23) of course it must have the same derivation in Da 1:20, and therefore cannot be from the chaldee dhardamand skilled in science (Jahn, Bibl. Arch 402). If their divination was connected with drawn figures, it is paralleled by the Persian Rummal (calmet) the modern Egyptian Zaurgeh, a gable of letters ascribed to Idris or Enoch (Lane, 1:354), the renowned chinese king, lines discovered by Fouhi on the back of a tortoise, which explain everything, and on which 1450 learned commentaries have been written (Huc's China, 1:123 sq); and the Jamassu, or marks on paper, of Japan (Kempfes Hist. 115). SEE MAGICIAN

7. כִּשׂדִּים, Kasdim (Sept Χαλδαῖοι; Vulg. Chaldaei) Here, says Cicero (De Div. 1:1) we have a class "so named, not from their art, but from their nation." But only a section of the nation, the learned cast: "the dominant race," says Ernest Renam, "who gave their name, though only a minority, as the Turks elsewhere, to the mass of the population, which differed from them in descent" (Histoire des langues Semitiques, pages 67,68). They are mentioned by Herodotus (1:181) as a sacerdotal caste. Cicero, l.c., notices their devotion to astrology, and "their working out a science by which could be predicted what was to happen to each individual, and to what fate he was born." Diodorus Siculus, after Ctesias, assigns the same office at Babylon to the Chaldaeans as the priests bore in Egypt (Hist. 2:29). Juvenal (Sat. 6:552) and Horace (Carm. 1:11) refer to the Chaldean divination. The prophet Isaiah (47:12, 13) mentions several details of it in terms which we have already described. How the same appellation, כִּשׂדִּים, came to designate both the military and the learned classes of Babylon (comp. 2Ki 24:5,10 etc., with Da 2:2), and how conflicting are the views of the modern learned as to the origin of the Chaldaeans, see Renan, l.c., and Sir H. Rawlinson, in note or Rawlinson's Herod. 1:319. SEE CHALDAEAN.

8. One name more (occurring in Da 2:27; Da 4:4; Da 5:7,11) remains to be noticed descriptive of the sauans of Babylon — ג זרַין, gazerin (Sept. Γαζαρηνοί, Vulg. Aruspices; A.V. "soothsayers") Gesenius and Rosenmüller agree in deriving this word from גָזִר, gazar, to divide, cut up etc.; but they differ in the application of the idea, the former making it mean the heavens divided into astrological sections (of which he gives a diagram in his Comm. zu Jes. 3:555); the latter (Schol. in Daniel, II. cc.) supposint it to refer to the division and inspection of the entrails of victims by aruspices: both these kinds of divination have been described above. Others refers to Josephus (War, 6:5, 3) for astronomical portents such as the gazerin would interpret (see also St. August. De Doctr. Christ. 2:32, etc.). Jerome, in his Commentary in loc., defends his own version, aruspices, by the authority of Symmachus. The Sept. and Theodotion translate the word Γαζαρηνούς as if it were a proper noun, like כִּשׂדִּים Chaldaeans. SEE SOOTHSAYER.

9. In Ho 4:12, we read, "My people ask counsel at their stocks (or wood, בּעֵצוֹ יַשׁאָל); and their staff declareth unto them" (מֵקלוֹ יִגַּיד). Those who hold that two separate prognostications are here referred to, generally make the former a consultation of wooden idols, or teraphim, which has already been treated (see Rosenmüller and Pococke, in loc.). Jeremiah reproaches the Jews for "saying to a stock (עֵוֹ), My Father" (2:27); and Habakkuk, "Woe unto him that saith to the wood (עֵוֹ), Awake" (2:19). But Pocock (on Ho 4:12) gives reasons for supposing that only one sort of superstition is meant in this verse, namely, rhabdomancy (ῥαβδομαντεία), divination by staves or rods. Many kinds of this are on record. Maimonides (Praecept. neg. 31) mentions the practice of "taking a staff and striking the ground with it, and making horrid noises, while the diviners would stand in a reverie, intently looking on the ground, till they became like men struck with epileptic fits; when reduced to this frenzy they would utter their prophecy." The learned Rabbi says he saw such a case himself in Barbary. Chaskuni (quoted by Drusius on De 18:10) adduces another method by which "the diviner measures his staff with his finger or his hand: one time he says I will go; another time, I will not go; then, if it happens at the end of the staff to be I will not go, he goes not." Rabbi Moses Mikkotzi (in Pococke, 1.c.)

mentions a divination by a piece of stick, peeled on one side, which, thrown afar out of the hand, decided a doubt, according as the peeled or unpeeled side fell uppermost. Tacitus (Germ. 10) describes a similar prognostication among the Germans. Theophylact, after Cyril, on this passage of Hosea, mentions the use of two rods, set upright, with enchantments and muttering of verses. "The rods," says he, "falling through the influence of daemons, suggested answers to inquirers, according as they fell to the right or to the left, forward or backward." Staves were sometimes carried about as the shrines of deities, says Festus. Tibullus (L. Eleg. 11:15) refers to these modern deities. In allusion to the same superstition, Clement of Alexandria (Strom. 1:151) mentions certain tubes as the shrines of deities (comp. Euseb. Prep. Evang. 1:9). Another explanation is that the positive or negative answer to the required question was decided by the equal or unequal number of spans in the staff (Godwyn, 1.c.). Parallels are found among the Scythians (Herod. 4:67, and Schol. Nicandri, Σκύθαι μυρικίνῳ μαντεύονται ξύκῳ), Persians (Strabo, 15, page 847), Assyrians (Athen. Deipn. 12:7), Chinese (Stavorinus's Java; Pinkerton, 11:132), and New Zealanders (called Niu, Taylor's New Zealand, page 91). These kinds of divination are expressly forbidden in the Koran, and are called al Meisar (chapter 5, Sale's Prelim. Dissert. page 89). Herodotus (7:11) describes the Alani women as gathering and searching anxiously for very smooth and straight wands to be used in this superstitious manner. Sir J. Chardin says it is common in India for diviners to accompany conquerors, to point out where treasures may be found; and he adduces a case at Surat: when Siragi went thither, he made his soothsayers use divining rods, struck on the ground, or on walls, etc. Harmer (2:282) supposes a reference to such a practice may be implied in Isa 45:3 (see St. Chrysostom, Opera [ed. Bened.] 11:518, 824). Sir J.F. Davis (China, 2:101) mentions a Chinese "mode of divination by certain pieces of wood, in shape the longitudinal sections of a flattish oval. These are thrown by pairs, and, as they turn up, a judgment is formed of a future event by consulting the interpretation afforded by a Sibylline volume hung up in the nearest temple." Captain Burton, in his Eastern Africa, mentions some not dissimilar practices of divination; nor are these "fooleries of faith," as he calls them, unknown among ourselves. Even now miners in the south-west of England walk with their dowsing stick in hand over suspected spots; a motion of this divining rod is in their view an infallible sign of a lode. Similar superstitions have lately been practiced in this country in searching for petroleum. Rudolf Salchlin has written a treatise on this curious subject: Idolomantia et Rhabdomantia and christiana, size Dissertatio historico-theologia ad Ho 4:12 (Berne, 1715). A good deal of information may be obtained in Jacobi Lydii Syntag. Sacr. de re Militari, c. 3 (Ugolini, Thes. 27:142-146), and in Delrio, Disquis. Magic. lib. 4, c. 2, quaest. 3, section 1, sub fin.; section 3, sub init. SEE STOCK; SEE STAFF. Compare Mercersburg Review, July, 1861. On the general subject, see Andr. Riveti, Opp. (Roterd. 1651), 1:1244 sq. On the arts of divination practiced by the ancient Greeks and Romans, see Smith's Dict. of Class. Antiq. s.v. Divinatio. SEE SORCERY.