Here’s an excerpt from Osho, talking about divination to a student of astrology. He says that it’s possible to make predictions about people only because ‘people live like mechanical things’. (Strong words, but you know what he means.)
“If you know the past of the person, unless the person is a buddha, you will be able to predict his future because he is going to repeat it. If he has been an angry person in the past he is carrying the tendency to be angry: that tendency will have effects in the future.”
A Buddha’s future cannot be predicted. But for everyone else, we should,
“Make it clear to people that you are simply showing the tendencies, the possibilities; these are not certainties. Because what happens sometimes – and that is the thing that I would like you to remember – is that if you say that something is going to happen, you help it to happen, because then the man becomes certain.
Then rather than helping him to become aware and get rid of his past, you help his past to be repeated more smoothly.”
So rather than predicting, it’s the diviner’s responsibility to make people aware that whatever can be seen in the future is a tendency, and can be changed. Negative things can be avoided; positive things could still be missed. So divination is about becoming more aware:
“So if you can use this for making people more alert and meditative, more responsible for their lives, more clear that this is their past – the future has not happened and the past will try in every way to make the future almost like the past; now they have to escape from the clutches of the past – you can be of great help, you can be a blessing to people.
And you have the energy – start working! Get into it as deeply as possible.”
I’m not sure how much anyone can ‘make’ another person more alert, responsible, or anything else. (Wonderful transformations of awareness can and do happen to people who have readings, but that’s nothing the diviner did.) But it’s surely the diviner’s responsibility to convey as much truth as she can, and that would include not only telling people where their current road leads, but pointing out that they can divert onto other roads.
There’s also the factor of free will & choice, i.e., a person does have say about their own future. I think divination is different & nobler than pedestrian predictions of the future. In my practice I come across many people who seek answers from psychics. And it’s often in search of an explanation about the past, especially relationship break-ups. What tends to happen based on the quality of the reading & the self-awareness of the subject is that melodrama is simply perpetuated & strengthened.
It seems to me that the important factor is personal growth, not what the future will be, or the ‘whys’ of the past. And divination is in the archetypal realm, highlighting patterns & trends, rather than specifics of time & place, number of children & the eye color of your ideal mate.
There’s also the self-responsibility of the subject. No matter what looking glass is used, it’s useless unless the individual takes responsibility for their own life & choices. The insights have to be internalized.