08 – Contextualizing ‘Divination’: Perspectives from South Asia

October 3, 2025

3:45 pm

H06

The ability to foretell future events has held widespread sway across cultures. Knowledge systems that portend on the basis of prognostication or divination, oneiromancy (dream interpretation), augury through plants and animals, divination by the means of dice, omens, numbers, remedial and palliative skills, horoscopy, etc. have been widely practiced traditions. Since these traditions dealt with abstruse yet popular ideas and practices that were beyond the limits of normal human understanding, these offer unique entry points into analyses of the social, cultural, political, economic, and intellectual backdrops of societies. The functional aspects of these forms of knowledge, such as the reasons and circumstances for their origin and development, and their utility need to be explored. How the practitioners viewed themselves, their divinatory practices, and their reasons for practicing it; and conversely, how they were perceived by the society are some pertinent questions. However, these practices were not always accepted within their own religious framework, i.e., the so-called “pure” form of religion. Consequently, these became the spaces for interactions and integration, as well as contestations. At the same time, religious traditions accorded varied value or moral judgements to similar practices in other traditions, thereby making these practices sites or tools for othering. Given that these knowledge systems and practices are sites of contesting values of identities and differences, can these be used as categories for comparative analyses across a wide socio-cultural range and varied geographies? A broader understanding of the import of these practices within their respective context can become a point of enquiry/scholarly category. The panel will attempt to explore these traditions in order to understand religious doctrines and social practices.

Convenors

Dr. Jha Trisha
Dr. Megha Yadav

Presentations

The ‘Dynastic Dilemma’ in Andhra Pradesh Politics: Examining the Role of Caste in Shaping the State’s Political Succession

Avala Ramu - Queen Mary University of London, Queen Mary University of London, London, United Kingdom

Early Buddhism and Oneiromancy: Questions of Philosophy, Power, and Gender

Yadav Megha - Eshwari School of Liberal Arts, SRM University- AP, Amaravati, India

Fortune-telling Beggars: The Case Study of Samis’ Divination Practices of dharo (dice) in Pakistan

Saba Sindhri - Centre d'etudes Sud Asie et Himalayennes (CESAH), EHESS, Aubervilliers, France

Myth as Critique: Buddhist Perspectives on Divination in the Saddharmasmṛtyupasthānasūtra

Meng Xiaoqiang - The Leiden University Institute for Area Studies, Leiden University, Leiden, Netherlands

Locating Aṅgavijjā: Prognostication in Jaina Tradition (c. First Century BCE – SixthCentury CE)

Jha Trisha - Centre for Historical Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, India

Faces in Smoke’ The Indigenous Divination Practices: An Immersive Field Study of Shamans of Northern Pakistan

Khan Muhammad Ibrahim - N/A, N/A, Islamabad, Pakistan

Between Faith and Power: The Construction of Saint Alphonsa in Bharananganam

ABY ANJANA - Institute for History, Leiden University, Leiden, Netherlands