Prophecy

Hellenic religion

• Prophecy appears in Delphi.

  Delphi was famous for Apollo’s oracle. Prophecy here is a seated, civic, expensive answer, not Ifá and not a raven’s cry.

  from Pausanias · Description of Greece, c. 150–180 CE

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• Prophecy is associated with Oracle.

  An oracle is one institutional form of prophecy. The word should not be stretched until every omen is an oracle.

  from Pausanias · Description of Greece, c. 150–180 CE

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• Prophecy appears in Hellenic religion.

  Pausanias treats oracular prophecy as living Hellenic sanctuary practice—Delphi and kin—beyond the single Delphi place edge. A named prophecy in that periegesis, not prophecy→delphi alone and not home-forbidden fortune chrome.

  from Pausanias · Description of Greece, c. 150–180 CE

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• Apollo is associated with Prophecy.

  Delphic answers are one famous Greek form of prophecy. The seat, the cost, and the god are local.

  from Pausanias · Description of Greece, c. 150–180 CE

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• Prophecy is connected to Divination.

  Divination is the craft of asking; prophecy is often the name for the answer. They meet without being identical.

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• Prophecy is associated with Fate.

  An answer about what will happen assumes something is already tending that way. How tightly fate binds is a local argument.

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• Prophecy is connected to Omen.

  An omen can be treated as a prophecy that arrived without being asked. Delphi’s asked answer is another institution.

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• Omen is connected to Prophecy.

  An omen is a happening read as a sign; prophecy is often the name for what the sign is said to mean. They meet without being identical.

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Roman religion

• Prophecy appears in Roman religion.

  Virgil’s Aeneid gives the Cumaean Sibyl a prophetic office before she guides Aeneas below. That is Roman epic prophecy, not Delphi’s civic oracle and not Virgilian fate-talk alone.

  from Virgil · Aeneid, 19 BCE (unfinished at the poet’s death)

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Islam

• Prophecy appears in Islam.

  The Qur’an treats nubuwwa and the sending of prophets as a central claim of revelation. Islamic prophecy speech in that revelation, not Cumaean Sibyl prophecy already walked and not fortune-telling dumps.

  from M.A.S. Abdel Haleem (translation) · The Qur’an, 2004 (this translation); Arabic text 7th century CE

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Norse tradition

• Prophecy appears in Norse tradition.

  Völuspá in the Poetic Edda is völva prophecy-speech of past and ending. A named prophecy craft in that poem, not a Greek oracle dump and not every foresight slogan.

  from Anonymous (Eddic poems); Carolyne Larrington (translation) · Poetic Edda, medieval Icelandic compilation; Larrington trans. 1996/2014

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• Odin is associated with Prophecy.

  Snorri’s frame includes questions about the world’s course and ending. Odin’s hunger for news is not the same as a Greek oracle’s seated answer.

  from Snorri Sturluson · Gylfaginning, c. 1220

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Buddhist traditions

• Prophecy appears in Buddhist traditions.

  Watson’s Lotus Sūtra gives vyākaraṇa — the Buddha’s prediction that hearers will become buddhas. Prophecy/prediction speech in that sūtra’s English seat, not omen-craft alone and not a fortune-telling dump.

  from Burton Watson (translation) · The Lotus Sutra, 1993 (this translation); Sanskrit/Chinese recensions much older

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European folklore

• Raven is associated with Prophecy.

  In various European folk beliefs a raven’s appearance or cry can be read as an omen, often of death. That is a different meeting from the Norse pairing with Odin, and should not be folded into it.

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• Owl is associated with Prophecy.

  Some European folk beliefs treat an owl’s cry as a death-omen. That is not Athena’s bird and not a universal night-wisdom.

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Mesopotamian tradition

• Eclipse is associated with Prophecy.

  Mesopotamian omen series treat lunar and solar eclipses as signs that can be read for king and land. That is a cuneiform technical literature, not Ptolemy’s natal craft.

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