On divination: an exercise in comparative method

• Main Author: Jørgen Podemann Sørensen
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Donner Institute 1999-01-01
• Series: Scripta Instituti Donneriani Aboensis
• Subjects: Divination > Comparative studies; Cross-cultural studies; Cosmology > Comparative studies
• Online Access: https://journal.fi/scripta/article/view/67252

Some comparative methods aim at establishing universals, others seek human causes that will account for cross-cultural or transhistorical resemblance. The sole aim of the comparative method presented here is to improve our questionnaire. All theories, including those claiming universals, contribute to our professional questionnaire; and that is how, in spite of the theoretical monsters we have to kill every year, our discipline has been making some progress throughout its history. Time may have come, then, to concentrate our comparative endeavours on questions to ask. Divination is the production, observation and interpretation of signs in order to obtain a religious basis for decision and action. This working definition excludes ecstatic prophecy and straightforward clairvoyance and concentrates on what is sometimes called inductive divination. We shall consider a few divination systems from different parts of the world', but before doing so we should make clear what we are after. If we want to arrive at an idea of divination as a religious pattern, we should study the structure and content of each  divination procedure, giving priority to the question of how it makes sense to its users as a true basis for making decisions.