Rites performed to divine an outcome, a will or a hidden cause, from casting lots to reading omens. Grouped here as formal ritual acts rather than under the esoteric practices filed elsewhere, since a divinatory rite typically follows a fixed procedure of its own.
Facts
Overview
What Defines This GroupingRites performed to obtain knowledge not otherwise available - about a decision, an outcome or a hidden cause - by a procedure the tradition holds to be reliable. Systems differ in whether the answer is taken to come from a deity, from an impersonal order, or from the diviner's trained reading of a sign, and the difference governs how each is practised. 2 Status
Standing as a Comparative CategoryA standard analytic category in the study of religion 2 Learn More
The Divinatory Rituals
This group holds divinatory rituals, the rites by which a question is put to the divine or to hidden knowledge and an answer is read from signs, drawing on the structured procedures of divination in a ceremonial setting.
The browser will find divinatory rituals from various traditions. The entries describe each rite's method and interpretive frame, noting the tradition to which it belongs.
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Sources
1. Divinity Atlas Directory Taxonomy, First Edition Category Tree
2. Encyclopedia of Religion
Mircea Eliade (ed.); Lindsay Jones (ed., 2nd ed.), Macmillan Reference, 2005s.v. DivinationView the Source Divinity Atlas Directory Prose, First Edition Category Descriptions
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