Texts in Conversation
Deuteronomy prohibits Israel from engaging in foreign divination, a list of practices that Isaiah later echoes when depicting Babylon’s reliance on them. The repetition creates a contrast in which what Israel was warned to reject becomes the identifier of Babylon’s downfall.
Share:
Deuteronomy 18:10
Hebrew Bible
8 He must eat the same share they do, despite any profits he may gain from the sale of his family’s inheritance. 9 When you enter the land the Lord your God is giving you, you must not learn the abhorrent practices of those nations. 10 There must never be found among you anyone who sacrifices his son or daughter in the fire, anyone who practices divination, an omen reader, a soothsayer, a sorcerer, 11 one who casts spells, one who conjures up spirits, a practitioner of the occult, or a necromancer. 12 Whoever does these things is abhorrent to the Lord, and because of these detestable things the Lord your God is about to drive them out from before you.
Date: 6th Century B.C.E. (Final composition) (based on scholarly estimates)
Source
Isaiah 47:12
Hebrew Bible
10 You were complacent in your evil deeds; you thought, ‘No one sees me.’ Your self-professed wisdom and knowledge lead you astray, when you say, ‘I am unique! No one can compare to me!’ 11 Disaster will overtake you; you will not know how to charm it away. Destruction will fall on you; you will not be able to appease it. Calamity will strike you suddenly, before you recognize it. 12 Persist in trusting your amulets and your many incantations, which you have faithfully recited since your youth! Maybe you will be successful—maybe you will scare away disaster. 13 You are tired out from listening to so much advice. Let them take their stand—the ones who see omens in the sky, who gaze at the stars, who make monthly predictions—let them rescue you from the disaster that is about to overtake you! 14 Look, they are like straw that the fire burns up; they cannot rescue themselves from the heat of the flames. There are no coals to warm them, no firelight to enjoy.
Date: 7th-5th Centuries B.C.E. (based on scholarly estimates)
Source
Search:
Notes and References
"... On the surface, none of the divinatory techniques practiced in Israel whether licit, illicit, or falling somewhere in between, bear strong resemblances to the Mesopotamian divinatory traditions. Fully legitimate forms include divining by Urim and Thummim (Numbers 27:21; Exodus 28:15-30), ephod (1 Samuel 14:41; 23:6-12) and "inquiring of YHWH" (1 Samuel 14:35-37; 22:10-17; 23:1-12; 30:7-8; 2 Samuel 2:1). Dreams could be a legitimate means of obtaining knowledge (Genesis 28:10-22; Judges 7:13; 1 Samuel 28:6; 1 Kings 3) or they could be misleading and false (Deuteronomy 13:2-6; Jeremiah 29:8). The elusive teraphim, household idols or apotropaic figurines, could also have a divinatory function (Hosea 3:4; Ezekiel 21:21; Zechariah 10). The prohibitions against foreign divination in particular (Leviticus 19:26, 31; 20:6 and Deuteronomy 18:10-11, 14), cannot be clearly identified with or connected in any substantial way to specific Mesopotamian forms. The liver models found at Hazor, Megiddo, Ebla, and Ugarit and the corpus of omen texts recovered from Ugarit clearly attest to a pre-Israelite transmission of Mesopotamian practices to the Levant. While the biblical record preserves clear evidence of familiarity with Mesopotamian practices, there is no biblical corollary to the divinatory texts produced in Mesopotamia. There are a few direct references to Mesopotamian practices (Ezekiel 21:21; Isaiah 47:12-13; Daniel 5:11). Echoes of, or, perhaps, direct references to Mesopotamian texts, find their way into other conceptually very different genres ..."
Hallo, William W., and K. Lawson Younger
The Context of Scripture: Canonical Compositions from the Biblical World
(p. 422) Brill, 2003
* The use of references are not endorsements of their contents. Please read the entirety of the provided reference(s) to understand the author's full intentions regarding the use of these texts.
Your Feedback:
Leave a Comment
Anonymous comments are welcome. All comments are subject to moderation.