In the Koran, chapter V, The Table or The Chapter of Contracts, “divining arrows” are said to be “an abomination of the work of Satan,” and the injunction is given “therefore avoid them that ye may prosper.” It is noticeable that in the early Biblical narrative one form of divination is mentioned, if not with approval, at any rate without overt reproach. Upon the occasion of the second journey of Jacob’s sons to Egypt to buy corn in the time of famine, Joseph gave orders that their sacks were to be filled with food, that each man’s money was to be put in the mouth of his sack, but that in the sack of Benjamin was also to be concealed the “cup, the silver cup.” And the next morning when they had set out homewards and were gone a little way out of the city they were overtaken by a band of Joseph’s servants under the conduct of his steward who arrested their progress and accused them of the theft of the cup: “Is not this it in which my lord drinketh, and whereby indeed he divineth? Ye have done evil in so doing” (_A.V._). The Vulgate has: “Scyphus quem furati estis, ipse est in quo bibit dominus meus et in quo augurari solet: pessimam rem fecistis” (Genesis xliv. 5). And later when they are brought back in custody and led into the presence of Joseph he asks them: “Wot ye not that such a man as I can certainly divine?” Vulgate: “An ignoratis quod non sit similis mei in augurandi scientia?” In the first place it cannot be for a moment supposed that Joseph’s claim, which here he so publicly and so emphatically states, to be a diviner of no ordinary powers was a mere device for the occasion. From the prominence given to the cup in the story it is clear that his steward regarded it as a vessel of especial value and import, dight with mysterious properties. This cup was used for that species of divination known as hydromantia, a practice almost universal in antiquity and sufficiently common at the present day. The seer, or in some cases the inquirer, by gazing fixedly into a pool or basin of still water will see therein reflected as in a mirror a picture of that which it is sought to know. Strabo, XVI, 2, 39, speaking of the Persians, writes: παρὰδε τοῖς πέρσαις οἱ Μάγοι καὶ νεκυομάντεις καὶ ἔτι οἱ λεγόμενοι λεκανομάντεις καὶ ὑδρομάντεις. King Numa, according to one very ancient tradition, divined by seeing gods in a clear stream. “For Numa himself, not being instructed by any prophet or Angel of God, was fain to fall to hydromancy: making his gods (or rather his devils) to appear in water, and instruct him in his religious institutions. Which kind of divination, says Varro, came from Persia and was used by Numa and afterwards by Pythagoras, wherein they used blood also and called forth spirits infernal. Necromancy, the Greeks call it, but necromancy or hydromancy, whether you like, there it is that the dead seem to speak” (_S. Augustine De Ciuitate Dei_. VII. 35).[27]