I am a cleromancer. I have been rolling the dice more and more as the months have passed. I have dozens of them in a little jar at my desk, twenty-sided dice. I carry them with me. But I find that the more I roll the dice, the more I am tempted to defy the dice. I have had confirmation, several times in the past, that defying the dice leads to misfortune of some kind. My watch getting scratched, my shirt getting burnt, the powers that be try to warn me, and I defy them still. I rolled on transferring my notes from the private wiki to a program called Obsidian. The die rolled a three. I asked the dice, and thus God, if something bad would happen if I did so. The die rolled a thirteen -- which I interpret as "there is a moderate chance". I still did it. Misfortune has yet to descend upon me, but I fear that it's only a matter of time. I rolled on buying a new watch and I think I rolled like a two. I still did it. Maybe I'm violating God's will.
This writeup will be a personal reflection on my personal views and practice of cleromancy. I am not trying to be scientific, academic, or dispassionate. This is subjective.
so, without further ado...
What makes a cleromancer?
I think this question implies another two questions.
how to be a good cleromancer?
Can I call myself a cleromancer if I still defy the dice at times? Though, perhaps defiance is a natural part of individuation; the collective and personal unconscious collide to form passalidae, and the dice seem to be the embodiment of the subliminal will of the universe. By integrating cleromancy into my lifestyle, by clinging to superstition, perhaps I am integrating the subliminal will of the universe into my psyche. My personal unconscious becomes more than a subjective unconscious: it becomes subliminally actualized.
All this jargon. Jungian individuation. Collective unconscious. Subliminal. It's all my conscious trying to articulate something that I feel intuitively: there is order in chaos.
Additionally, to what degree should I take this? What should I roll on? If it's meaningless things like "what to eat?", "what to wear?", is it true cleromancy? But when it comes to more important things, would it be considered inappropriate and facetious to entrust something important to something other than my own volition? I must also consider that, if I roll on something important, am I prepared to obey the dice if the result isn't what seems "right"?
what constitutes 'belief' in cleromancy?
Of course, I roll the dice often. I obey the dice often. But surely it would be impious to assume that I can force a divinity to respond to me just by rolling dice. Divinities cannot be forced or bound, so this would imply that a divinity will only respond if I roll in a pious manner. So how do I know if it's purely random, or if the divinity is present? It nauseates me to think that I've become superstitious enough to have "faith". Yet I still roll, and I still obey. Most of the time.
That's one logical hurdle. There is another -- one could argue that attributing randomness to a deity in itself is inherently impious, because if it is truly random, it makes the deity seem capricious. Random, spontaneous, unpredictable, because you are interpreting meaning from random. In my opinion, this impiety can be avoided by modulating the questions such that any answer would seem like a logical one.
Why am I, passalidae, a cleromancer?
the "proper reason" for cleromancy
Fulfilling a divinity's will. I loosely consider myself a Christian, and throughout the Bible, people would pray and then divine by casting lots (cleromancy). One could argue that that's just old testament stuff, but the apostles themselves cast lots when choosing Matthias to replace Judas. They prayed to Christ. It seems that they only do it for big important things, but a lot of Christians argue that one's faith should inhabit all spheres of one's life; domestic, professional, and religious. If this is true, should one not give the divinity a say in all these spheres? Thus, modulating this cleromancy into one's domestic life is one of multiple methods of "living out God's will".
Alternatively, one could argue that the "correct" method is to pray for guidance and then focus on one's intuition to sense if God is saying anything. Maybe there's some validity to this, maybe not, but it doesn't really appeal to me at all, because I think a person's intuition can easily misfire. However, it could be argued that interpreting the results of the dice are a form of intuition. I don't know if this strictly a tomato tomato kind of deal, because they are very different.
cleromany for dysphoria atonement
This section a bit dark as it focuses on dysphoria and guilt, so if you prefer to skip the next three paragraphs, that is okay.
I was reading a blog post years back. It was a woman writing about her experience with transgender dysphoria. "De-actualize and reconstitute," was the term she used. Change how you present yourself in order to negate cognitive dissonance. It made me think a bit about it. What is passalidae? What defines "me"? I feel like there's something primitively visceral about dysphoria that I can relate to. It's not a matter of gender for me, but some other form of body dysmorphia. I have this obsessive impulse I have to smother, constantly thinking about the thought of becoming incorporeal, freed from my flesh. If I take a minute to look at my face in the mirror, I deeply hate it. I hate everything about it. I don't really struggle with dysphoria anymore because I deliberately choose not to look in the mirror more than is absolutely necessary (to shave and get some hairgel in. Two minutes.) I used to lay in bed and fantasize about what it would feel like to rip my skin off. I would close my eyes and imagine my body dissolving in acid like ice in warm water, my spirit being freed of a body. I was obsessed. It was all I thought about. I imagined what it would feel like to spread my consciousness out over a forest meadow in winter, aware of every flake that fell.
There's something so ancient and absolute about this impulse. There's also something ancient and absolute about the dice. I don't know how to describe it completely. It feels like I am talking to something more ancient than the universe. Absolute, this hatred of my body; absolute, the dice of the divinity.
I don't know how to phrase it, but I also feel like obeying the dice is absolution. My twin died in birth. When I found out, this weird idea formed in the womb of my mind: I am usurping my twin's existence. I don't know how to make this idea go away. I know it's "bad" to think such a thing. This dysphoria that swells in me when I look at my face, I think it's the product of this idea. Obeying a divinity through cleromancy makes me feel that I am "making it right", that I am "fixing" an injustice, somehow.
Indecision
This is the most obvious and probably a very accurate reason that I cleromance. I am horrendously, awfully, immensely indecisive. I will never decide what to wear, what to eat, what to read, what to play, what to do with my free evening. I will paralytically cycle between options until the entire night is over. The dice free me to actually enjoy my day, the burden of decision lifted from my shoulders.
but how to "properly" cleromance?
What do I personally do? Pray and roll. That's how I do it. I utter my criteria outloud: e.g. "if this is an even roll, I will drink coffee. If this is an odd roll, I will drink an energy drink." And then I roll. Sometimes I preface it with "God, your will be done with this roll," but this is rare.
it is not "logical"
But how do I know I'm doing it right? There's no way to be sure. I try to assert my criteria such that one answer doesn't necessarily seem more logical, but it's impossible to avoid: if I ask "should I buy this watch?", the strictly logical and pragmatic answer is always going to be "no", since I already have a watch. The question becomes -- is God strictly logical and pragmatic? From a Christian point of view, the answer is no; all throughout the Bible, God seems to do a number of very illogical things: committing genocide, immensely harsh punishments for minor sins, etc. I don't believe in biblical infallibility, but I consider myself a Christian, so it's this weird limbo of worshipping God but not really knowing what or how much I believe in the illogical aspects of the faith. Is that cherry-picking? Probably.
if not logical, what about pious?
Piety is difficult to quantify. One could argue that true piety is simply only doing things that are well-intended, and not doing what is ill-intended. There's the aphorism, though, "the road to hell is paved with good intentions." Let's explore that idea, though, since I've brought it up. What does "well-intended" mean in the terms of a cleromancer?
It's not possible to impose "virtue" onto rolls, but perhaps only modulating rolls such that there isn't an option that's strictly "unvirtuous". For example, I could easily avoid a roll such as "even is give food to the homeless schizoid, odd is vandalize his sign." Perhaps the "virtuous" roll would be, "even is give food to the homeless schizoid, odd is money." But what is pious about that? In what way does the virtue of my roll integrate a divinity into the picture? One could argue that a true and proper Christian should try to lead the homeless to accepting Jesus so that he can do his mysterious god magic within their soul. Okay, let's modulate this "piety" into a roll. "Even is I give the homeless schizoid food, odd is I evangelize him." This is not sustainable, because once someone enters this mindset, every single roll should be modulated around evangelism.
So what is piety? I don't know. Maybe it's just whatever kind of action produces "good fruit".
"Actions speak louder than words," I think a transposition of this term is "fruit speaks louder than intentions". When I went to church every week, the pastor would focus on how "good actions bear good fruit", "you will know them (true christians) by their fruit". If you think you're doing a good thing, but the "fruit" that grew from your action ends up hurting people, is it truly good? But then, one could argue that doing "bad" things because "the ends justify the means" equates to producing "good fruit" in the end. Bill Gates sterilizing thousands of people in overpopulated countries: he is violating these people, but will the fruit be good? Will he improve the quality of life for these people?
Is modulating one's ideology around "good fruit", then, also a form of impiety, if it leads to bad actions with good intentions?
What about adhering to a deity's values? Christians argue that God is fundamentally good. He values humility, meekness, honesty, selflessness, compassion. What if I try to live a lifestyle that embodies these values? Is that piety? There are many people who take pride in being good Christians. Isn't pride a vice? I remember going to some Christian worship conference when I was a teenager and the guy made a huge show about getting on his knees and crying in prayer in front of 3000 people. He was one of those holy-rollers, too. The guy that those people are so fond of quoting, Jesus, made a very explicit point of saying that piety should be personal and secret.
okay, but how do I apply any of this to cleromancy?
How am I producing "good fruit" or integrating "virtues" into my rolls?
I think that's the wrong way of approaching it. Trying to modulate the rolls such that a person's options are "pious" are going to make it difficult to actually roll pragmatically. I think the "correct" and "pious" way to go about it is to simply avoid the "impious" rolls. This allows the cleromancer to roll on any given choice with ease of conscience, knowing that s/he isn't violating some unspoken rule. What to wear, what to eat, what to read, what to watch. You don't have to try to integrate pious options into these rolls; you simply have to avoid evil options.
Cleromancy and Christianity
I guess I'll finish off this writeup by writing about how I justify "divination" with my self-proclaimed Christianity.
the "good guys" in the bible perform cleromancy
For those entrenched in biblical infallibility, I justify it by bringing to mind, as I mentioned before, there are several instances of the "good guys" divining through random choice, including in the New Testament. The Bible refers to it as "casting lots". The prophet Joshua does so in Joshua 18:6, land was divided through lots in 1 Chronicles 24:5, temple duties in 1 Chronicles 25:8.
Most compellingly, though, is that the Apostles (who defined the terms of the New Covenant and wrote a huge portion of the Bible) practiced cleromancy; they prayed a prayer to God asking for guidance, and then cast lots.
"Then they prayed, “Lord, you know everyone’s heart. Show us which of these two you have chosen to take over this apostolic ministry, which Judas left to go where he belongs.” Then they cast lots, and the lot fell to Matthias; so he was added to the eleven apostles." - Acts 1.24-26.
a lot of Christians practice some form of divination
A LOT of Christians will say that God has spoken to them. I grew up in a church where people would give prophecies to each other, God beamed the prophecies into their heads for the other person. They would also speak in tongues. Dumbed down, the idea is that person prays to God and God communicates to them. This is the baseline premise of rolling the dice. But how is a person's personal intuition more reliable than dice? One could argue that God beamed the pre-roll prayer into a cleromancer's head, and God beamed the terms with which the roll should be modulated.
Should you, the reader, become a cleromancer?
Cleromancy isn't for everyone
I know a lot of people like to say everyone should adhere to their lifestyle. Christians evangelize like crazy, trying to prosyletize as many people as they possibly can into whatever their specific subset is, because clearly they're right and everyone else to exist is wrong. Leftists may try to indoctrinate you into radical authoritarian intolerant "tolerance". Mormons and JW's go door to door, seeking victims. Marxists want to convince people communism is the best of any economic system to exist. Throughout history people have coerced conversion on threat of death. So I don't imagine it would be any surprise to anyone if I tried to convince people that my spiritual practices are universal.
I don't, however, think my practice should be universal. I'm not here to convince you, I'm not going to try to pursuade you. But I think rolling dice can be helpful for making decisions, and if someone truly does believe that random isn't truly random, it can be a fun way to integrate this belief into your life. If you want to try it out, I say go for it, but if you feel content without such superstition, that's okay too. You also don't need 20 sided dice like I use, you can just flip a coin, or use regular dice.
Spontaneity can be fun!
You can use the dice to choose a new pair of earrings, try new foods, buy a shirt in a color you don't usually wear! Throwing some new choices or unintuitive decisions into the mix can cause you to step out of your usual routine.
Conclusion
I've been trying to think of a good way to conclude this writeup and I can't think of one. It's been sitting in my drafts for like a week. Here is a poem about my cleromancy.
a poem by passalidae
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A universe bound by convex geometry,
the cleromancer, slave to fate,
fortune's fool, casts his lot,
platonic solid, icosahedral,
he seeks not perfection
in the die, but absolution.