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type=Course|
features=Techniques of predicting the future|
appearance=[[../..Muggles' Guide to Harry Potter/Books/Prisoner of Azkaban|Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban]]}}
== Overview ==
{{Muggles' Guide to Harry Potter/Beginner Spoiler}}
From watching the antics of the Divination teacher [[../..Muggles' Guide to Harry Potter/Characters/Sibyll_Trelawney|Professor Trelawney]], one rapidly gets the impression that divination in the Wizarding world is no more a science than fortune-telling in the Muggle world. Formalized as it is, with its tea leaves, palmistry, crystal balls, and dream interpretation, it still seems to be as deeply buried in nonsensical mysticism as any gypsy fortune-teller on a Muggle fairground. However, Professor Trelawney does produce, in the span of seventeen years (so far), two completely valid predictions.
The alternate Divination teacher, [[../..Muggles' Guide to Harry Potter/Characters/Firenze|Firenze]], seems to be more interested in teaching the methods of [[..Muggles' Guide to Harry Potter/Magic/Centaur/]] divination, and emphasizing that not all things '''can''' be determined completely.
== Analysis ==
We must be careful to separate Divination from [[..Muggles' Guide to Harry Potter/Magic/Prophecy/]]. Divination can be taught; Prophecy is apparently a very rare gift, inborn and apparently uncontrollable. It would appear that prophets quite often fall into Divination as a career.
It is particularly interesting that Divination can be taught and tested, but does not seem to involve any particular magic. We can see quite clearly, as [[../..Muggles' Guide to Harry Potter/Characters/Hermione Granger|Hermione]] does, that what Professor Trelawney is doing is little more than a fraud; she is using all the non-magical tricks that Muggle fortune-tellers use, including the foggy and mystical pronouncements. Yet she seems to be teaching out of approved textbooks, and there is evidently some testable technique involved, because there is an OWL exam (and presumably a NEWT exam as well) covering the subject. One wonders whether the purpose of the course is to codify a set of fraudulent techniques, and if so, for what reason.
It is possible that the published techniques are meant only to improve the sensitivity of the mind, and are not meant to be taken seriously. It is possible that the purpose of teaching Divination is simply to make it more likely that the apprentice Seer, assuming the inborn ability, would actually improve his or her chances of producing a true Prophecy. If this is the case, then it is somewhat unusual that Trelawney herself seems to be so serious in her techniques. It is possible that she herself does not know that she is a true Seer; the two times we have seen her making a real Prophecy, she has been unable to remember doing so. We do not know how common this trait is in Prophecy.
Prophecy itself seems to be surprisingly common; in the [[../..Muggles' Guide to Harry Potter/Major Events/Battle at the Department of Mysteries|Battle at the Department of Mysteries]] at the end of [[../..Muggles' Guide to Harry Potter/Books/Order of the Phoenix|Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix]], it appears that there are many shelves full of recorded prophecies.
== Questions ==
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