Ezekiel 21:21,22 - Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible

For the king of Babylon stood, &c.— For the king of Babylon stands, &c.—He casts lots by, blends or mingles the arrows; he inquires by images, he pours upon or pries into the liver or entrails. Ezekiel 21:22. On his right hand is the lot against Jerusalem, to appoint captains to open the mouth for slaughter. The method of divination by arrows is still in use among the Turks and idolatrous Arabs, and is thus well described by D'Herbelot: "The idolatrous Arabs used a sort of lots, which they called lots by arrows. These arrows were without head or feather, and called in their language Achdah or Azlam. They were three in number, inclosed in a bag, held in the hands of one whom they called Mohaver Hobal, or the diviner; who gave answers for Hobal, an ancient idol in the temple of Mecca before the coming of Mahomet. Upon one of these arrows was written, Command me, Lord. Upon the second, Forbid, or prevent, Lord: the third arrow was blank. When any one wanted to determine upon an action, he went to the diviner with a present; who drew one of the arrows from his bag; and if the arrow of command appeared, the Arab immediately set about the affair; if that of prohibition appeared, he deferred the execution of his enterprize for a whole year: when the blank arrow came out, which was called in the Arabic Minih, he was to draw again. The Arabs consulted these arrows upon all their affairs, and particularly their marriages, the circumcision of their children, their journeys, and expeditions in war; they also made use of them for the dividing of any thing, and particularly the parts of the victim or camel, which they sacrificed upon certain stones, or to certain idols, which were placed round the temple at Mecca. Mahomet in the chapter of the Koran intitled Maidat, or 'of the table,' at the beginning, where he is speaking of things prohibited to the Mussulmen, expressly forbids this practice in these words; Make no division with the arrows of lot." See Bibliotheque Orientale, under the word ACDAH. The authors of the Universal History remark, that this superstitious custom of divining by arrows was used by the ancient Greeks and other nations. The Commentary of St. Jerome on the present passage strikingly agrees with what we are told of the aforesaid custom of the old Arabs; "He shall stand (says he) in the highway, and consult the oracle after the manner of his nation, that he may cast arrows into a quiver, and mix them together, being written upon or marked with the names of each people, that he may see whose arrow will come forth, and which city he ought first to attack." See Potter's Antiquities, vol. 1: p. 334 and Sale's Preliminary Discourse to the Koran, p. 126.