RHABDOMANCY—LOTS—DREAMS—SEERS = 429 
who “ looked in the liver ’’), the Bible reveals signs and omens 
resembling or identical with those in use elsewhere. 
We read, for instance, of Rhabdomancy, or divination by 
rods, ‘‘my people asketh counsel at their stock, and their 
staff declareth unto them.’’! Drawing of Lots, probably by 
different coloured stones,? Astrology,? and Oneiromancy, or 
dream divination.4 
Strabo reports as attached to the Temple at Jerusalem a 
class of official dreamers, apparently for purposes of divination 
or prophetic deliverances. Of the important part played by 
dreams in both the Old and New Testaments, those of Jacob, 
Joseph, Solomon, and Joseph the husband of Mary, are inter 
alia evidence. In the Temple institution ® may possibly be 
detected the continuance of the Semitic pre-Mosaic custom 
of sleeping places before a temple (as at Serabit-al-Khadim) 
for dreamers § in quest of omens, although the references to 
it in the O.T. itself are very slight, and only occur in connection 
with Bethel stones and Seers.7 
The Seers were a recognised class of persons, who by an 
exceptional gift could disclose to inquirers secrets of the present 
and immediate future (rt Sam. ix. 6, and x. 2-6). Samuel 
himself belonged to the college or class of Seers. Like the 
diviners, they received fees; thus Saul’s servant suggests the 
giving to the Seer, whose words invariably come to pass, “a 
quarter of a shekel of silver.” 
1 Hosea, iv. 12. Cf. Herodotus, IV. 67. 
2 7 Sam, xiv. 41-2. Uvim and Thummin seem pebbles kept in the Ephod. 
3 Isaiah, xlvii. 13. 
4 Gen. xxxi. 10-13; Judges, vii. 13. 
5 Petrie, op. cit., p. 49. 
® Cf, the custom at certain Greek temples, whereby every person, who 
paid the fee and complied with the rules laid down, was allowed to sleep in or 
near the sanctuary for the purpose of receiving omens in a dream. The men 
slept in the east, the women in the west of the dormitory. Frazer, op. cit., 
II. 44. A good monograph on the subject is by Miss M. Hamilton, Incubation, 
London, 1906. Oneiromancy was highly esteemed in Israel, as in Egypt and 
elsewhere. Joseph’s skill (Gen. xl. and xli.) no doubt aided his rapid 
advancement by Pharaoh. 
7 «Sacred stones or monoliths were regular features of Canaanite or Hebrew 
sanctuaries: many of these have been excavated in modern times.”” Some 
of these Bethel stones are described “‘ as uttering oracles in a whistling voice, 
which only a wizard was able to interpret.” Frazer, op. cit., II., p. 59 and 
p- 76. 
