Divination is the attempt to gain knowledge hidden from ordinary means, of the future, of the unknown, of the will of the gods or the right course of action, through the interpretation of signs, omens or specially consulted media. It is among the most universal of human religious activities, found in virtually every culture and period, and it takes an enormous variety of forms: the reading of the entrails of sacrificed animals, the flight of birds, the casting of lots, the patterns of cracks in heated bone or shell, the fall of coins or yarrow stalks, the arrangement of cards, the positions of the stars, dreams, and the utterances of inspired oracles. What unites them is the conviction that the seemingly random or the specially prepared can be made to yield meaning, because the cosmos is ordered and interconnected and its hidden pattern can be read by those who know how.
Scholars broadly distinguish two great types. In inductive or artificial divination the diviner interprets signs according to a learned system of correspondences, the meaning of each omen fixed by tradition and rule. In intuitive or inspired divination knowledge comes directly through an oracle, a prophet or a medium possessed or inspired by a divine power.