may
drink and she shall say, Drink, and I will give thy camels drink also, let the same be the wife appointed by God for Isaac " (Gen. xxiv. Omens, 12-19). Jonathan, when he is about to Accidental attack the Philistines, says: "Behold, and Others, we will pass over unto these men, and we will discover ourselves unto them. If they say thus unto us, Tarry until we come to you then we will stand still in our place, and will not go up unto them. But if they say thus, Come ip unto us; then we will go up: for the Lord haih delivered them into our hand and this shall be. a sign unto us" (I Sam. xiv. 8-11). The prophet Isaiah even gives to the pious king Hezekiah a sign, as an indication that he will get well (II Kings xx. The Lord commands Gideon to choose those 9). warriors who lap the water with their tongues like a dog, but to reject those who get down on their knees to drink (Judges vii. 5). The diviners advised the Philistines to send back the Ark of the Lord in order that the deaths among them might cease
"Now therefore make a new curt, and take two milch kine, on which there hath come no yoke, and tie the kine to the cart, and bring their calves home from them. And take the ark of the Lord, and lay it upon the cart and put the jewels of gold, which ye return him for a trespass offering, in a coffer by the and send it away, that it may go. And see, if side thereof it goeth up by the way of his own coast to Beth-shemesh, then he hath done us this great evil but if not, then we shall knowthat it is not his hand that smote us it was a chance that hapAnd the kine took the straight way to the way pened to us. of Beth-shemesh, and went along the highway, lowing as they went, and turned not aside to the right hand or to the left" (I Sam. vi. 7-12).
.
.
.
King David trees
308
THE JEWISH ENCYCLOPEDIA
Augrury
listens to a
sound in the tops of the
when he asks God whether he shall go against the
a fact that reminds us of QvlofiavTeia and " sihat dekalin " (compare below also "elon me'onenim," Judges ix. 37; and Baudissin, " Studien zur Vergleichenden Semitischen Religionsgesch." ii. 194, note 4). The incident of Balaam, who attempted prognostication on a hill, refers perhaps to some divination of this kind, since he too uses the characteristic word " nahash " (Num. xxiii. 23). It is highly improbable that the Hebrews prognosticated from the drifting of the clouds, as has been assumed from pTJMD (derived from pj;, cloud) nor was any attention paid to the lightning flash, which belonged to Augury among the Romans. The Law strictly and repeatedly forbade all Augury (Lev. xix. 26; Deut. xviii. 10, etc.). The interpretation of signs, however, as in the case of Eliezer and Jonathan, where nothing was done in the way of conjuration, was not considered to be Augury. Philistines (II
Sam.
v. 24),
The Talmudic Period
Augury
is
more
fre-
quently referred to in post-Biblical times, but it would be rash to assume therefore that it was more widely practised. As among the classical peoples
and among the Germans to-day, the arts Augury proved effective only with the person who believed in them, and only such a person was injured by them (Yer. Shab. 8d; Bab. Ned. 32a; L. Blau, "Das Altjildische Zauberwesen," p. 77, note 4). The prohibition in Lev. xix. 26 (16STU71 NP, " neither shall ye use enchantment ") is referred by Sifra on of antiquity
of
that passage (ed. Weiss, p. 90) to divination by means of weasels, fowls, and stars, meaning the omens found in the flight and cries of birds and in similar signs
while Sifre, Deut. 171 takes it in a still more general sense, saying " Who is amenahesh [enchanter] ? He, My bread fell out of my for instance, who says or 'A snake mouth' or My staff out of my hand 'A fox ran to my left and his crept to my right furthermore, he who says tail crossed my path Do not begin anything to-day, because it is the new moon or It is Friday' or It is the Sabbath evening. " In the parallel passage, Sanh. 65&, other evil omens are added; namely, if a man's son calls after him if a raven croaks at him, or a deer gets in his way; and more explicitly, if one avoids being the
'
'
'
'
'
'
'
'
'
'
first
to
The
pay the
tax.
belief in
animal omens was widely spread
the Babylonians, who also divined by the behavior of fish, as was well known (Lenormant, "Die Magie und Wahrsagerei der Chaldaer," p. 473;
among
Blau, I.e. pp. 45 etseq.; Pauly-Wissowa, "Real-Eucy klopadie der Classischen Alterthumswissenschaf t,
Snake and cloud omens were
iv. 1397, IxflvofiavTha).
known (Levy, "Chal. Worterb." ii. 102J). Augury proper was known among the Jews, but was considered as a foreign Roman or Arabic art.
also
Josephus narrates ("Ant."
xviii. 6,
§ 7; xix.
8,
§
2)
that a bird (an owl) alighted on the tree against which Agrippa was leaning while a prisoner
Flight and
at
Rome
whereupon a fellow
pris-
German, prophesied that he would become king, but that if the bird appeared a second time, it would mean he would die. The third of the Sibylline Books (line 224) says about the Jews: "They do not consider the omens of flight as observed by the augurCries of Birds,
oner, a
In the account of the martyrdom of Isaiah ("Ascensio Jesaia?," ii. 5) it is stated that in the time of King Manasseh not only magic and other crimes increased, but also Augury by the flight of birds, which is denoted by " we-nihesh " (II Kings xxi. 6). According to the Aristeas Letter (§§ 165 et seg.), the weasel is the symbol of the informer. This apparently has some connection with the avspichim. Augury and astrology are "the wisdom of the East," mentioned in I Kings v. 10 (Pesik. 33*, D'JHV -|"D3 DnoTljn ni^rKa). By the "bird of the air" (Eccl. x. 20) is meant the raven, in Augury, says a Palestinian teacher of the Talmud of the third century (Lev. R. xxxii. 2; compare 'Aruk, s.v. nt "VtD p"Dn n03m:niyn; Blau, I.e. p. 48, note 2). The Arabic expression itself, as well as the mention of the raven, the bird of omen of the Arabs, proves that Arabic Augury is here referred to. When Rab Tlish was in prison a man who understood the language of the birds interpreted to him the cry of a raven as meaning "Tlish" (flee!), "Tlish" (flee!). Rab paying no attention the raven being proverbially a liar a dove addressed him, and when her cry was interpreted in the same way, he obeyed the
ers."
—
—
warning and escaped, since the dove means Israel that is, the dove is Israel's bird of omen (Git. 45a, bottom). The place where the flight of birds was observed is also mentioned (NJITtD Targ. Yer. to Num. xxxi. 10 compare Sifre on the passage, and Levy, I.e. ii. 157a). With one exception the doves of Herod cried Kvpte, Kvpie (lord, lord !) and when
one was taken to task by the others, she cried Xeipie that is, " Herod was a slave " whereupon she this
—
