They asked him, ‘Tell us, who is responsible for making all this trouble for us? What kind of work do you do? Where do you come from? What is your country? From what people are you?’ He answered, ‘I am a Hebrew and I worship the Lord, the God of heaven, who made the sea and the dry land.’ This terrified them and they asked, ‘What have you done?’ (They knew he was running away from the Lord, because he had already told them so.) A huge storm came up and the whole crew was terrified and wanted to know who was responsible for the possible sinking of them and the ship, so- “they cast lots and the lot fell on Jonah.
Jonah hated the Ninevites and boarded a ship going in the opposite direction. The Jewish prophet Jonah was told by God to go to Nineveh and tell them if they did not repent, they would be destroyed. 1000 BC, a millennium before Jesus/Messiah was even born.) John 19:23, 24 We know from this episode that Romans in the 1st century AD, also, cast lots for decisionsįrom the Book of Jonah we learn that Phoenician (?) sailors were casting lots in the 8th century BC. So they said to one another, ‘Let’s not tear it, but instead let us cast lots to see who will get it.’ This was to fulfill the Scripture: ‘ They divided My garments among them, and cast lots for My clothing.’ So that is what the soldiers did.” (The ancient prognostication of this act which the writer has italicized comes from Psalm 22:18, written c. It was seamless, woven in one piece from the top to bottom. “When the soldiers had crucified Jesus, they divided His garments into four parts, one for each soldier, with the tunic remaining. At a crucifixion, soldiers were allowed to take from the crucified any thing they thought of value and Jesus’ robe was particularly attractive to them so they did not want to divide it into four equal parts. Perhaps the most famous casting of lots in the Bible is the casting of lots by the Roman soldiers who crucified Jesus. This random form of determining an outcome is called “cleromancy” coming from the Greek word kleros meaning “lot, inheritance.” We get our words “clerk, “clergy” and “cleric” from kleros probably because in ancient times those positions were originally chosen by lot and/or were inherited. Proverbs 16:33 is central to understanding that the ancient Jews and Christians believed God’s will could be determined by the casting of lots. In the Old and New Testaments lots were cast for many important decisions. “The lot is cast into the lap, but its every decision is from the Lord.”