We now proceed to enumerate the phrases which indicate the forbidden cases of Divination. Allusion has already been made in the commence ment of this art. to Deut. xviii. ro-rz. As these verses contain the most formal notice of the sub ject, 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 csptp cp) (LXX.
pavrev6pevos Aaoretav; Vulg. Qui ariolos seiscitatur), the same word which we have just noticed in a good sense. The verb or3p, like the Arabic primarily signified to cleave or divide (Meier, Hebr. TYw.buch, 344; Fiirst, Hebr. Wor terb. ii. 322; Hottinger, Lexicon Heptagl. 44 t), thence it acquired the sense of deciding and deter mining ; 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 -yeop.avrela, pexpo Aavrela, brmuavrela, xcepoparrela, and others.' Maimonides (in his treatise n11s31 Not;ri '1.n, cap. xi. sec. 6), includes besides these methods yao-rpogavrela, XaoiLciii-ela, and naron rpouapreta ; and Raschi (on Deut. xviii. so) makes Opp mainly concerned with the process of Aai3 Sop-avreta. Amid the uncertainty arising from this generic sense of the word, the LXX. has rendered it by the general phrase p.apretieo-'5.cit ficivrelap ; wherein it is followed by the Tar gum of Jonathan as well as by the Syriac and Arabic versions. (J. Clodius, Dissent. de Afagia Sagittar. i. 5 ; and Wichmannshausen, Dessert. i. 4.) The word is used of Balaam (Josh. xiii. 22) ; of the Philistine soothsayers (I Sam. vi. 2) • of the Hebrew false prophets (Micah iii. 3, 6, 7, It, and in other passages), without specifying any mode of divination. We therefore regard this as a general phrase introduc tory to the seven particular ones which follow. [The absence of the copulative 1, which is prefixed to every other word but plyn confirms this view.] (a) This word is variously derived and ex plained. In our A.V. it is, in six out of ten times of its occurrence as a verb or part. poel. rendered observer of times,' comp. Luther, Tagewaler (as if from Mivtemptis statutum. Fuller, /Wisc. SS. i. 16, after Raschi.) 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 ; Alense nzalum math 'w here vulgnis az?) and years (Maimonides, Havoda Sara, cap. 9 ; Spencer, De Leg. I-Iebr. i. 387). It is not necessary to refer Gal. iv. so to this supersti tion; the Mosaic institution of sacred seasons is itself there prohibited, as being abrogated to Chris tians (Sclden, De Ann. Civil. Vet. yud. C. 21, and Alford in loc.) The LXX. version by the verb and part. KX.713opq"ecr9-ac (in four places) and the noun nkrOovuriths (in two others) refers to divina tion by words and voices [Suidas: ickribbto-p.ol, at sa, r (Dv X6-yui iraparnglicreis]. Festus derives omen itself, quasi oremen, because it proceeds from the mouth, quia fit ab ore. Words of ill omen (Un clinp.tat, which Horace calls male ominata verba and Plautus obscoenata [prob. obscmvata]) were ex changed for bona stamina, as when Cicero re ported 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. xi. 91). Hebrew instances of this ob serving of words occur in Gen. xxiv. 14, and I Sam. xiv. 9, to, where a divine interposition occurred ; in t Kings xx. 33, the catching at the word of the king of Israel was rather a •human instinct than a irapart)pnots in its proper [superstitious] sense. Akin to and arising from this observance of verbal omens, arose the Sortes Homerico, Virgiliana, Bib Lica•, etc. The elevation of Severus is said to have been foretold by his opening at Virgil's line, Tie regere populos, Romane, 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 ./Eneed iv. where Dido predicts a violent death to /Eneas, while the latter chanced upon .lneid xi., at Evander's lamentation over his son. According to Nicephorus Gregoras the Psalter was the best book for the Sortes but Cedrenus informs us, that the N. T. was more commonly used. 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 con
sult the Koran in similar manner, but they take their answer from the seventh line of the right-hand page. (See Occult Sciences, 332.) Another origin for inn is found by some in the noun the eye, which root occurs once only (I Sam. xviii. 9) as a verb, Saul eyed David.' This derivation would point to fascination, the Greek Bacricapta and the Latin fascinum. Vossius derives these words from cpcierst icalpetp to kill with the eyes. Pliny [Holland's trans., i. 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 Tooke wistly upon any long time.' (Cfr. Aul. Gell. ix. 4, 8 ; Plutarch, Sympos. v. 7.) Reginald Scot speaks of certain Irish witches as qebiters' (Discovery of Witchcraft, iii. 15). Whole treatises have been written on this subject, such as the De Fascist° by the Italian Vairus in 1589 ; the Opusculum de Fascist° by Gutierrez, a Spaniard, in 1563, and the Tractatus de Fascinatione in 1675 by a German physician called Frommann. (See also Shaw, Thaw p. 212.) In Martin's Description of W. Isles of Scotland Molluka beans' are mentioned as amulets against fascination. Dallaway (Account of Constantinople as quoted in Occult Sciences, 21o) says that nothing can exceed the superstition of the Turks respecting the evil eye of an enemy or infidel. Passages from the Koran are painted on the outside of houses, etc. etc., to divert the sinister influ ence.' Hottinger (quoted by Nicolai, on Sigonius, v. 9, note f.) defines C']',1) tilIN as what would now be called a mesmerist, qui velocitate manuum ha fascinat spectatorem ut existimet magna solertia eum efficere miracula,' and accounts for the prohi bition in Deut. xviii. 0—' (mod facile homines cum veris confundant miraculis, adeoque ad Atheismum viam sternant.' But the derivation of )BIfl which finds most favour with modern authorities deduces the word from py a cloud, so that the diviner would ply his art by watching clouds, thunders, lightnings (Meier, Hebr. Wurzel, 70. b. v. 6, p. 92 ; Flint. H. Worte•b. ii. 167, who, however finds room for all the derivations ; and Gesenius, s. v., 1.:11, leans to the figurative sense of to cloud, viz., to use covert arts). Rosenmiiller, Scholia in Levit. xix. 26, follows Aben Esra, who thinks this diviner obtained his omens from observation of the clouds. The notion that the terms nip east, 'ht.; west, /+}?: south, L • • ,Nnty north, were derived from the position of the Planetarius as he faced the east, taking his celes tial observations (Goodwin's Moses and Aaron, iv. so) is rejected by his annotator Carpzov as a putida hariolatio ! Jeremiah (x. 2) clearly refers to this divination, which had its counterpart in Greek and Latin literature (e.g., in Iliad ii., Nestor says 'Ao-r pthrrop brl ScEt baintua (patina', right hand flashes being lucky. (See also Odyssey 6. 304.) Diodorus Siculus (vol. iii. p. 34o, ed. Bipont.) mentions the Kepaovoo-sonta, and the at by rag neparmois Stoonuelat of the Etrurians. (Comp. fulguratores—hi fulgurum inspectores,' Cato de Mon. Glazed. Neron ; Nonius lxiii. 21 ; Cicero de Div. ii. 53. [In Orelli 2301, fulguriator.] Pliny, in ii. 43, treats of the physical, and in ii. 54 of the oracular qualities of thunder, lightning, etc. ; as does L. A. Seneca in Natur. &aut. ii. 47. Statius mentions the winds for purposes of divination (Thebaid. iii. 512-538). See Humboldt, Kosmos, ii. 135, for the probable scientific adaptations by the Etrurians of their divining arts.) To this class must we refer 'the astrologers' vi here only found) ; 'the star-gazers or rather star-prophets' wthEl) ; and the monthly prognostica cators,' or rather they that make known at the moons what will happen to thee ?rin 714y See Rosenmiiller in 'lac.) which are all mentioned in the sublime challenge of God to the Chaldee sorcerers, in Isa. xlvii. 13. Astro logy retained a long hold even on the minds of astronomers; e.g., Stoffler from its evaluation pre dicted a deluge for 1524 ; Cardan his own death : Wallenstein was a great amateur of astro logy ; Tycho Brahe studied and practised 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 re jected. (Arago, Pop. Astron. [by Smyth and Grant] ii. 8; Brewster, Martyrs of Science, 150, 211.) (b.) The next word in our list (Dent. xviii. to) is rjr:;p 'an Enchanter,' (LXX. o1win6i.tcpos. Vulg.