– In pagan antiquity, it was the response of a deity to those who consulted it through diviners, pythonesses, priests, necromancers, etc.
– This practice was forbidden to the Israelites:
Leviticus 19:26 , 31 : You shall not eat anything containing blood. You shall not practice divination or magic.
Dt 18,10-14 : Let no one be found among you […] who gives himself to divination, astrology, omens, sorcery.
Is 8,19 : If they say to you: Consult the spirits of the dead, the soothsayers, those who know secrets.
Jer 27 :9 : Do not listen, therefore, to your prophets and diviners, nor to your predictors.
Jr 29,8 : Do not be enticed by the prophets who are among you, nor by the diviners.
– They should resort only to Yahweh, through priests and prophets (or seers):
Numbers 12 : “Hear well,” he said, “what I will say, If there be a prophet among you.”
Deut 18:15-22 : The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among your brothers.
1Sm 9,9-10 : In ancient times, in Israel, everyone who went to inquire of God said: “Come, let us go to the seer”.
– The formulas that usually indicated the presence of Yahweh were: “oracle of the Lord”, “thus says the Lord” and “Word of the Lord”:
1 Samuel 2:30 : Therefore, this is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says.
1Kings 20:13 : This is what the Lord says: “Do you see this immense multitude?”.
2Kings 9,26 : As sure as yesterday I saw the blood of Naboth and the blood of his sons flow – Word of the Lord!
2 Kings 19:33 : But he will return by the way he came, without entering the city – declares the Lord.
Jer 1,8 : You must not fear them, for I will be with you to deliver you – oracle of the Lord.
Jer 2:2 : Go and cry out these words in the ears of Jerusalem – oracle of the Lord.
Jr 22,24 : For my life! — oracle of the Lord.
Jr 23,31 : I will ask the prophets to account, whose tongues do not hesitate to proclaim: oracle of the Lord.
Ez 13,6 : They only see absurd visions, they only make misleading predictions, they who say: oracle of the Lord.
Ez 20,5 : Say to them: this is what the Lord Yahweh says: on the day I chose Israel.
Am 2:6 : Says the Lord: Because of the threefold and fourfold crime of Israel.
– Nor should they resort to the domestic gods (the teraphim) and draw lots with the Urim and Thummim, which were allowed for a while:
Gen 31:19 : Rachel, taking advantage of a moment when her father was shearing his sheep, stole her father’s teraphim.
Ex 28:30 : On the breastplate of judgment you shall put the Urim and the Thummim, so that they may be on Aaron’s chest.
Num 27:21 : He will present himself to Eleazar the priest, who will consult the oracle of Urim for him.
1Sm 14,41-42 : Jonathan and Saul were designated by lot and the people were free.
Ne 7.65 : Until a qualified priest could be found to consult God by the Urim and Thummim.
– For there was the practice, coming from other peoples, of consulting God by drawing lots, by observing the sacrificed victims, or, still, by listening to the dead:
Gen 4 :4 : Abel, on his side, offered of the firstlings of his flock and of their fat.
Jos 7,14-15 : You will come tomorrow, tribe by tribe; the tribe appointed by the Lord shall come forward family by family.
1Sm 19,20 : Saul sent men to arrest him, but when they saw the community of prophets in delirium.
1Sm 28,13-14 : And the king: “Do not be afraid! What do you see? The woman: “I see a god rising from the earth.”
Acts 1,24-25 : O Lord, who knows the hearts of all, show us which of these two you have chosen.
