Divination is intricately linked to notions of sex. The concept of intermediary implies “the idea of a deity entering a human, which casts the seer into the role of the receptive, entered, deity-possessed female.”1 Within the sources from the old Eastern Mediterranean, those mediating between mortals and the otherworldly are gendered: we see representations of both gods and human go-betweens in male and female forms. While in Hebrew Scripture and Hellenic accounts, females are seen engaging in both technical and intuitive divination methods,2 in Mesopotamia, the male is always the figure behind hepatoscopy, astral observations, auguries, and casting out spirits.
In the plethora of divinatory forms, prophecy is distinguished as the domain where individuals of other than male gender are most prevalently featured. Recent years, specifically the past thirty, have ushered in an abundance of research on female seers, as well as the interplay of prophecy and sex in the Hebrew Scriptures. This thesis aims from a comparative stance to explore the subject of sex and prophetic divination. Initially, I provide a classification of the sex of prophets and deities in the seasoned Eastern Mediterranean, which will be followed by a discourse on the involvement of prophets in terms of sex. The closing of this scrutinization delves into how deities, particularly the goddess Ištar, are represented sexually, and their supposed involvement.
Prophets’ Gender: Classification
My numerical investigation into the genders of prophets and deities (see Appendix 1) grounds itself on the corpus of writings found within the SBLWAW archive titled Prophets and Prophecy in the Ancient Near East.3 References within this work adhere to the chronicle’s enumeration, comprised of 175 scripts, chiefly in Akkadian, originating from Mari (sixty-eight inscriptions), Assyria (sixty-one inscriptions), amongst other locations throughout Mesopotamia, with a few West Semitic entries, a single Egyptian document recounting events in the Phoenician city of Byblos, and a Luwian monument from northern Syria. These documents present prophets in a diverse array of descriptors. In the dispatches and administrative records from Mari, as well as the Assyrian prophetic expressions, seers are frequently cited by name, but anonymous credentials, or collective mentions of prophets, are equally common.
The identification by sex for those prophets whose names are recorded is consistently confirmed; however, for unnamed seers, this isn’t always so, particularly in citations where the prophecy is imparted without mention of the prophet’s identity. Named seers are acknowledged in fifty-nine texts, inclusive of thirty-three citations pertaining to twenty-eight male beings4 and eighteen citations relating to sixteen female entities.5 Additionally, there are eight texts mentioning five prophets of indeterminate sex, either because of an assinnu title indicating a non-traditional sex role,6 or the allusion to the prophet’s sex is vague; the latter occurs thrice in colophons to prophecies from Assyria7 to which I shall later return. Thus, forty-eight prophets are known by name.
Seers who remain anonymous yet whose sex is specified appear forty-nine times; among these, thirty-five are identified as male8 and fourteen as female.9 It is unclear if these references might pertain to the same individuals mentioned repeatedly. In cases where seers are referred to as a congruence, their identities are sometimes simply as “prophets” without a sex designation (ten instances);10 as “male and female prophets” (five instances, one also includes assinnus);11 and twice as “female prophets” within a ceremonial text from Mari and in a record from Assyria.12
Examining the sources from Mari against those from Assyria reveals a noticeable distinction in the sex profiles of the prophets: the male/female ratio of individual prophets with specified sex is forty to seventeen at Mari and nine to fourteen in Assyria. Supposing these values reflect reality to any degree, it could indicate that around sixty percent of the prophets at Mari were males, while in Assyria, females would account for approximately the same percentage.
Regarding the scant resources on West Semitic divination, we find that two prophets—not only Balaam as per the Deir Alla script13 but also an individual known as Qên from the seal-amulet at Deir Rifa14—possess male appellations, and the other three, documented in the Lachish letters15 and the Egyptian narrative of Wenamon,16 are also of male persuasion. If this indicates a male proclivity among West Semitic diviners, the paltry five instances make it a hard conclusion. Nonetheless, the Hebrew Bible, with its handful seem to be as prominent as oracular figures. This augury confirms the same twofold divine personnel profile: male prophets predominantly linked with male deities, and female prophets frequently conveying messages from male deities. This consistent theme across cultures highlights the gender dynamics involved in the transmission of divine insight.
Poseidippus of Pella / Courtesy Vatican Museums, Public Domain
Abandoning the numeral data extracted from the manuscripts collated in Prophets and Prophecy in the Ancient Near East, it’s insightful to observe that women’s centrality in oracle utterance extends beyond the Ancient Near East, discernible also within Hellenic scripts.28 Hellenic augurs (manteis) skilled in hepatoscopy and avian augury are customarily men. However, contrary to Mesopotamia where technical fortune-telling was predominantly a male’s craft,29 indications of females partaking in this profession within Greek narratives surface occasionally.30
An epitaph bearing the legend “Satyra the augur” (Satyra ha mantis);31 a verse credited to Poseidippus of Pella that mentions “Asterie the augur” interpreting avian omens;32 along with a grave stele from Mantinea showcasing a female figure gripping a liver in her left palm.33 These instances suggest that the primarily male domain of augury was not entirely unattainable for females; women remarkable for their divinatory practices might be underrepresented in Grecian annals, which predominantly recount the exploits of fortune-tellers amidst martial events, oftentimes excluding female involvement.
While feminine seers constitute anomalies to the established norm, this scenario transforms with respect to unmediated divine communication. As previously noted, the historic Grecian prophets, believed to function under an altered psychological state, are virtually all ladies.34 The Pythias of Delphi, forming one of the most esteemed and durable prophetic establishments in the Eastern Mediterranean, were solely women. Equally exclusive gender-based roles were adopted by the prophetesses at Apollo’s shrine in Didyma following its reconstruction in the 330s BCE, as well as by “the priestesses, who doubled as prophetesses”35 at Zeus’s pilgrim site in Dodona.
The solitary main oracle seat consistently attributed with male prophets was Apollo’s shelter at Claros, where, per Iamblichus, a man uttered prophecies after imbibing water from the consecrated spring.36 Tacitus highlights the peculiarity that not a woman, as in Delphi, but a man delivered the oracular declaration at Claros.37 Additionally, it is worth mentioning that in mythological accounts, Dodona’s prophets are portrayed as men (the helloi or selloi),38 though historical customs recognize only women prophets. In an account by both Ephoros and Proklos, an established role for both female and male prophets is implied, suggesting perhaps a shift from male to female prophets at Dodona.39 At Didyma too, the articulators of divinations were male descendants of the Branchidae lineage until the edifice’s ruination in 494 BCE.40 Broadly speaking, while the Hepatoscopy experts were generally men, it’s notable that exceedingly scant men appear as prophetic soothsayers in Greek accounts; as Armin Lange puts it, “rophetic manteis manifest only within archaic myths. And even then, they are anomalies.”41 Such an oddity is evident in a third-century CE monument from Didyma, where an individual named Titus Flavius Ulpianus claims to have had a mystical revelation.42
Even in other mythical Greek characters, the female essence prevails, such as the women declaring oracles of Loxias (Apollo) in Phoibos’s expanse;43 Cassandra in the works of Aeschylus’ Agamemnon and elsewhere;44 and Manto, the daughter of the soothsayer Teiresias and mother of Mopsus, who articulated and even chronicled oracles.45 The Sibyl, envisioned as offspring of a nymph and a man named Theodoros, stands as a renowned example of the legendary prophetic feminine; she too was perceived as Apollo’s devotee and consort.46 The conservation of her legends hails from Erythrae in Asia Minor. From the late fourth century BCE, Sibyls started cropping up with local distinction. Varro, a writer from the first century BCE, was acquainted with a multitude of at least ten Sibyls in diverse locations; the story of the Sibyl in Cumae is particularly well-known.48 The import of the Sibylline oracles was esteemed enough to warrant collection inside Apollo’s sanctuary in Rome,49 and they found adoption by both Jews and Christians.50 The historical legitimacy of the Sibyl figure is undetermined; only a piece of evidence from Callisthenes hints at a historical prophetic figure from Erythrae, a woman named Athenais, who affirmed Alexander the Great’s divinity.51
In traditions outside of the realm of wedge-shaped script, female gods seem less prevalent as bearers of prophecies. The scant West Semitic prophets known are all men, invariably connected to masculine divinities. In Greek texts, moreover, females are predictably characterized as spokespersons for male gods, Zeus or Apollo (indeee, Apollo is denoted by the title mantis52 or as the prophētēs for Zeus53), while goddesses seem to play lesser roles as figures of prophecy. This pattern across cultural narratives underscores the underlying gender roles in the dispatch of omniscient wisdom.
manifest as bearers of prophetic announcements. The Hebrew Scriptures validate a single deity, Yahweh, depicted chiefly in masculine terms, and its prophets are primarily male, although the existence of some notable female prophets suggests that the concept of a prophetess serving Yahweh was not deemed inconceivable by the scriptural authors.
This information indicates that there wasn’t an across-the-board agreement concerning the gender of prophets and deities in the antiquated Eastern Mediterranean world. Yet, certain trends can be cautiously charted based on the geographic origins of the literary works. Biblical and West Semitic literature generally show a preference for a male deity/male prophet pairing, whereas in Hellenic culture, a pattern of male deity/female prophet is more prevalent. At Mari, prophets of both sexes chiefly serve male gods, with a majority being men. In contrast, Assyrian texts frequently portray prophecies from deities as predominantly female, with prophetesses outnumbering their male counterparts.
Such diversity can likely be ascribed to the variances in socio-religious frameworks and customs. However, it’s critical to acknowledge that our reliance on archival records limits direct insight into historical realities, shaping our perception of ancient prophecy according to available documents. For instance, the representation of prophecy in the Hebrew Bible cannot be directly aligned with what transpired in ancient Israel and Judah, especially considering the gender distribution of prophets. Indeed, the biblical record is a composition reflecting its authors’ views. Likewise, the Assyrian depiction of prophecy strongly aligns with state doctrine, as propagated in the temples dedicated to Ištar, suggesting that both the scarcity of female prophets in the Bible and the prominence of Ištar in Assyrian prophecy might partly stem from intentional literary constructs.
Gender and Human Involvement
Anthropological studies and the history of religions universally suggest that, almost without exception, women and individuals who do not fit traditional male roles have been key figures due to their presumed sensitivity to divine messages and their capabilities to bridge the divine and terrestrial realms.54 The act of prophesying itself is not contingent on gender. Anyone is capable of attaining the altered mental states essential for delivering prophecies, and there’s no distinction in this capacity among the genders. The earlier statistics corroborate this: throughout the ancient Eastern Mediterranean, the vocation of prophecy was accessible to all genders.
While local differences in the esteem of prophets of varying genders may have existed, it is evident that, in the ancient Eastern Mediterranean, the role of a prophet—or for that matter, a magus55—was not confined to one gender. This freedom is not reflective of the majority of occupations; in Mesopotamian society, gender was one of the divine determinants structuring societal roles, and this was mirrored in the delineation of vocational roles. Specifically, the field of technical divination (including astrology, extispicy, augury, and others) was predominantly a sphere for males, with female participation being less evident in Mesopotamia. Greek sources do cite some female diviners (manteis), and in the Hebrew scriptures, particular forms of divination practiced by women are mentioned, such as the medium of En-Dor (1 Sam. 28), as well as women employing specialized means of prophecy in Ezekiel 13:17–23.57 Nevertheless, it seems clear that the prophetic function was substantially less influenced by gender than were other forms of divination. There must be attributes inherent to the prophetic and/or magical practice that explain the gender neutrality, allowing prophecy to be an exceptional style of predictive practice, enabling a socio-religious role that was not gender-biased.
At this point, it’s imperative to clarify what we mean by the term ‘agency.’ Considering that prophecy, by its various definitions, is a form of religious action performed within a religious framework, the prophetic agency should be regarded as a particular variety of the broader religious agency, which sociologist Laura M. Leming interprets.
Although Leming offers her delineation based on contemporary contexts (her analysis pertains to American women with strong Catholic ties), she emphasizes that agency “does not function in isolation but within particular social surroundings,” which, in my estimation, makes her concept of religious agency equally relevant to different contexts, including ancient settings. Critically, her interpretation accounts for both the transmission of tradition and an “active possession,” allowing for a comprehension of religious agency in the light of both continuity and change.59
Therefore, prophetic agency can be seen as instrumental (subdued self-awareness: prophets as passive conduits) as well as autonomous (validated self-awareness: prophets as self-driven entities).60 Such forms of agency are neither inherently gendered nor mutually exclusive, since the definition of prophetic agency is ultimately decided by the observers. A single prophet’s actions may be seen as instrumental from the stance of contemporaneous religious leadership, while simultaneously perceived as autonomous from the perspective of contemporaneous dissenters or scholars of modern times. When interpreted as passive conduits, the real agency is attributed to the deity, thus the human prophet’s role in the dissemination does not pose a threat to the divine authority. Conversely, when envisaged as self-motivated entities, prophets of either gender are seen not just as tools of a divine being but also as individuals acting on their own initiative.
The purpose of prophecy is to sway the audience by invoking the divine sanction behind the words uttered by the human mouthpiece. Accordingly, prophecy embodies both the transmissive aspect as it mirrors the familiar religious domain to the recipients, and the transformative aspect, pressing the recipients to pay attention to possibly unanticipated divine mandates. These dual purposes are hallmarks of ancient divinatory modalities; Walter Burkert refers to the paradox of divination “between establishment and crisis or even insurrection, between the integration of divination’sproceedings and delegates in the societal-political framework and prognostication as a ground-breaking, mutinous, at times uncontrollable might.61
The element of gender within the affairs of spiritual, or prophetic, influence is intrinsically linked to the prevailing gender paradigm within the specific societal milieu of prophetic endeavor; that is to say, the gender paradigm is established prior to prophetic influence, not the other way around. Consequently, any assertions pertaining to the role of gender within the prophetic domain must invariably be evaluated in the context of the gendered dynamics of the particular (generally patriarchal) community, giving heed to attributes in prophetic influence that diverge from the traditional expectations tied to gender performance and their execution.
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