The Concept of Divination in Ancient Israel and Its Implications for Contemporary Christians

Divination is an interaction and relationship between Divinity and humanity. It is a religious phenomenon that could be initiated by either of the parties involved. When the Divine initiates divination, it is called intuitive/inspired divination. But when humans initiate it, it is inductive divination. Divination is often initiated by humans because of their sense of limitation, thereby desiring the Divine to help them proffer solutions to their challenges. There are prohibitions against divination in the Pentateuch (Lev. 19:26 and Deut. 18:10). But the nations that surrounded Israel fully engaged in divination. Yahweh and Israel communicated through dreams, visions, audible voice-notes, and also through mechanical instruments like the Urim and Thummim and the Lots. This paper sought to examine the perspective of Israel on the concept of divination and also see the implications of such perspective for contemporary Christians. Phenomenological, exegetical and analytical methods were adopted in the work. The work discovered that Israel engaged in divination, though in the Yahweh-approved ones. Yahweh engaged Israel through vision, dream and audible conversations while Israel engaged Yahweh through the Urim and Thummim and the Lots. The work concluded that all humans and religions engage in divination and recommends that since divination is communication with God, contemporary Christians should explore and exploit all biblical means of communication with God to their advantage.