Denna uppsats är en studie i divination som användes i fornnordisk, samisk, irländsk-keltisk, grekisk och romersk religion. Syftet med uppsatsen har varit att undersöka om det finns något som kan sägas vara typiskt inom den fornnordiska divinationsformen. De teman jag koncentrerat mig på för att besvara dessa frågor är status, roll, genus, metod och plats. De metoder jag använt mig av är deskriptiv och komparativ litteraturstudie. Dessutom tillämpas hermeneutisk metod. Resultatet visar att det som kan sägas vara typiskt för den fornnordiska divinationen är att völvorna hade högre status än sejdmännen, manliga völvor. Något annat som är typiskt och som kan ha ett samband med völvans högre status är den stav hon bär som därför kan tolkas som en maktsymbol. Det finns paralleller till den fornnordiska divinationen i alla de religioner som tas upp i denna uppsats, dock verkar de flesta likheterna finnas i den keltiska och den samiska religionen gällande utförandet av divinationen och divinatörernas roller.

The primary focus of this thesis is in the relationship between popular religion and culture in Taiwan. The influences of major religions and schools of thought including ancestor worship, Confucian morality, Sinicized Buddhism, religious Taoism, and Animism, and the traditions and rituals associated with them have all contributed to the structure of popular religious practices in Taiwan today. This thesis therefore approaches popular religion in Taiwan from both historic and contemporary perspectives. First, a framework based on the historic development of philosophies and popular religious practices that began in the Shang dynasty and evolved through social turbulence and religious transformation will be established. Then, employing ethnographic research methods and analysis, field research conducted in four case study temples housing a selection of the most popular deities worshiped in Taiwan will be discussed. Including information from both surveys and key informant interviews, this thesis aims to show how popular religion in contemporary Taiwan is of a utilitarian nature. The historic framework will then be applied to contemporary religious practice in Taiwan, to explain how both historical factors and the evolution of popular religion has created a religiously tolerant and socially cohesive society. Of key interest to this thesis is religious divination, both due to its prevalence in popular religious culture, and its inherent utilitarian qualities. In the process of the aforementioned analysis, the dual phenomenon of finding deities from different traditions housed side by side in a single temple, and traditional aspects of popular religion being perceived as elements of cultural will be accounted for in both historic and current social contexts. Key words: Ancestor worship, Family cult, Confucianism, Taoism, Buddhism, Popular Religion, Deities, Utilitarian, Divination

Le héros grec Amphilochos, descendant mythique de la célèbre famille des hérosprophètes Mélampodides, était, comme son père Amphiaraos, un devin reconnu et un soldat aux aptitudes militaires formidables. Après avoir participé à la seconde expédition contre Thèbes et à la guerre de Troie, celui-ci aurait pérégriné dans bon nombre de contrées en fondant plusieurs cités situées entre l’Espagne et la Syrie. Quelque temps après sa mort brutale en combat singulier contre un autre devin nommé Mopsos, Amphilochos fut élevé au rang de divinité oraculaire à Mallos de Cilicie, une cité dont il avait été lui-même le fondateur. À l’époque romaine, Amphilochos avait acquit, en plus d’un statut ontologique supérieur, une très grande réputation dans cette région où il rendait des oracles à des pèlerins qui venaient eux-mêmes le visiter dans son antre. Cette recherche, qui vise d’une part à étudier de façon exhaustive la légende d’Amphilochos, tente surtout de déterminer, malgré un nombre restreint d’indices, les modalités de la révélation oraculaire dans le sanctuaire de Mallos de Cilicie. / The Greek hero Amphilochos, the mythical descendant of the famous family of the Melampodides hero-prophets, was, like his father Amphiaraos, a recognized soothsayer and a soldier with formidable military skills. After taking part in the second expedition against Thebes and the Trojan War, he is said to have wandered in many a land and founded several cities lying between Spain and Syria. Soon after his sudden death in a single combat with another seer named Mopsos, he was elevated to the rank of oracular divinity in Mallos of Cilicia, a city which he himself founded. During the Roman period, Amphilochos, indued with increased ontological status, got into high repute in this region where he gave oracles to the pilgrims who came and visited him by themselves in his abode. This research, which aims first to explore exhaustively the legend of Amphilochos, attempts above all to determine the terms of the oracular revelation in the sanctuary of Mallos of Cilicia, in spite of little compelling evidence.

My essay explores how people talk about a woman´s supernatural ability in relation to normality and abnormality. In order to find this out I´ve made interviews with people inclose relations to Hildur Lawergren. Hildur lived all her life in Fole on Gotland where she was often interviewed in local papers and on the radio about her predictions on the coming weather. She used melted candles to make her predictions. The candles were melted down on Christmas eve. From patterns that the melted candles made Hildur claimed to make out pictures in her mind of the coming weather. When I analyzed my interviews I could see how the people close to Hildur struggled with understanding Hildurs ability. They had to find ways to handle the borders between normal and accepted abilitys and Hildurs more unusual ability. People often confronted Hildurs close relatives with questions of how the ability functions and if the relatives also had the ability. In some ways the people closest to Hildur separated her ability from the person Hildur, that was a beloved mother and grandmother. This shows when they mention the ability as “it” or “that”. I´ve concluded that the ability is seen as inheritable and is then possible to develop further using certain techniques. But if a person has not inherited the ability from birth it’s not at all possible to develop it later.

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Among the Xhosas, the healing sickness called intwaso is interptreted as a call by the ancestors to become a healer. Transpersonalists also see these initiatory illnesses as spiritual crises, while according to the widely accepted Western psychiatric view, illness is purely perceived in physical and psychological terms. A case study was conducted where a single participant who has undergone the process of ukuthwasa and is functioning as a traditional healer was interviewed. A series of interviews were done where information was gathered about significant experiences related to ukuthwasa process. Tapes were transcribed and a case narrative was written and interpreted using the traditional Xhosa beliefs, the western psychiatric and the transpersonal psychology perspectives. Strengths and weaknesses of each perspective were then examined.

This study explored the origins, evolution and influence of the tradition of San Lázaro as it currently pertains to the Cuban-American Santeria community in Miami. The main argument of the study is that in the context of the contemporary religious culture of Santeria in Miami, San Lázaro is a hybrid spirit. Many manifestations of healing entities have come to merge in the person of this spirit. Though practitioners identify with specific manifestations of this spirit, the processes of transmigration have blurred the lines of deep-rooted faiths and created a fusion of meanings from disparate traditions, making San Lázaro an ambivalent personality. San Lázaro’s ambivalence is the very quality that makes him such an important Orisha. As a deity whose personalities demonstrates the combination of a diversity of qualities, including those that contradict each other, San Lázaro is deployed in a very broad range of healing context, making him a versatile Orisha. This study clarified the contrasting qualities this deity embodies and traces the socio-historical context in which the deity acquires the layers of meanings it is currently associated with. Drawing on interviews with Lázaranian worshipers [Lázarenos] in Miami and engaging in Bourdieu’s concept of Habitus, the study provided a window into the nature of the tradition of San Lázaro and how its usage is linked with the African heritage of the worshipers.

Divination is a trope Cormac McCarthy employs time and again in his work. Augury, haruspicy, cartomancy, voodoo, sortition and oneiromancy all take their places in the texts, overtly or otherwise, as well as divination by bloodshed (a practice so ubiquitous as to have no formal name). But mantic practices which aim at an understanding of the divine mind prove problematic in a universe that often appears godless—or worse. My thesis uses divination as the starting point for a close reading of each of McCarthy’s novels. Research into Babylonian, Greek, Roman and African soothsaying practices is included, as well as the insights of a number of McCarthy scholars. But the work of extra-­‐literary scholars—philologists, Jungian psychologists, cultural anthropologists and religious historians whose works explore the origins of human violence and the spiritual impulse—is also invoked to shed light on McCarthy’s evolving perspective.

This thesis aims to explore the history of blind diviners in Korea, using a review approach toexamine the existing literature in Korean on the topic. Beginning with a discussion of theorieson the origins and practices of blind diviners during the pre-modern period, and then movinginto the drastic changes that occurred during the Japanese colonial period, the thesis ends withan exploration of how the situation has developed for blind diviners in the modern period. Thethesis utilizes four main sources: Chu (2008, 2020), Pak and Chŏng (2019), and Son (2019).With this exploration of the topic, this thesis aims to amend the lack of available literature inEnglish by exploring the phenomenon of blind diviners, especially the disability aspects oftheir existence, utilizing some of the literature available in Korean. / Syftet med denna uppsats är att utforska blinda siares historia i Korea genom en litteraturreview av den befintliga litteraturen på koreanska inom ämnet. Uppsatsen inleder med deblinda siarnas ursprung och arbete under den förmoderna perioden, och övergår sedan till dedrastiska förändringar som inträffade under den Japanska kolonialtiden. Uppsatsen avslutasmed en utforskning av hur situationen har utvecklats för blinda siare under den modernaperioden. Uppsatsen använder fyra huvudkällor: Chu (2008, 2020), Pak och Chŏng (2019)och Son (2019). Med denna utforskning av ämnet syftar denna uppsats till att fylla ut en delav avsaknaden av litteratur på engelska, särskilt de mindre utforskadefunktionsnedsättningsaspekterna av blinda siares existens, genom att använda en del av denlitteratur som finns tillgänglig på koreanska.

This essay explores the divinatory practice of incubation in ancient Egypt during the Graeco-Roman period with a particular focus on the magical and religious significance of the practice. Two main sanctuaries, Abydos and Deir el-Bahari have been investigated with a focus on the gods Bes and Osiris in the former and Amenhotep and Imhotep in the latter. The study has mainly examined surviving epigraphy and the ritual and cultic elements of the sites in relation to physical space as a prerequisite for ritual incubation. In addition, this study has related Greek influences on the practice of incubation in Egypt as a potential source of origin but has also investigated indigenous Egyptian traditions both for questioning the origin of and placing the practice into context. / Denna uppsats undersöker den spådomspraktik så kallad inkubation i Antika Egypten under dess Grekisk-romerska period med ett särskilt fokus på den magiska och religiösa meningen med praktiken. Två primära helgedomar, nämligen Abydos och Deir el-Bahari, har undersökts med ett fokus på gudarna Bes och Osiris i den förra och Amenhotep samt Imhotep i den senare. Studien har främst undersökt kvarlevande epigrafik och den rituella och det kultiska elementet av platserna i relation till fysiskt utrymme som en föregångare för rituell inkubation. Dessutom har denna studie relaterat grekiska influenser på inkubation i Egypten som ett potentiellt ursprung men har även undersökt inhemsk egyptisk tradition både i frågan om dess härkomst och för att ställa praktiken i sin kontext.