中国以外的甲骨占卜

一篇关于甲骨文的通俗文章，题目直译为《如何像肩胛骨占卜术士那样读骨》。虽然中国的甲骨多数使用的是乌龟背骨，少数用牛骨，文章一律用scapulimancy统称，该词直译为“肩胛骨占卜术”。

How to Read the Bones Like a Scapulimancer

作者Jacob Mikanowski，大概是加州伯克利分校历史系博士研究生。文章大部分讲述中国商代甲骨，文末有两段与其他文明的比较，对国内读者有一定意义。兹摘录并翻译如下，括弧中文字是我的。

原文：What is certain is that the Shang elevated the art of divination by bone to its greatest heights. They were, however, not the only ones to practice it. Everywhere from Yamato, Japan, to the Arabian Peninsula, people practiced scapulimancy. A scapula warned Attila about his defeat at the battle of Châlons, while Genghis Khan used scorched sheep bones as a check on the reports of his astrologers. One of the most intriguing uses of scapulimancy comes from the Naskapi, an Algonquian-speaking tribe who lived in the tundra lands of Canada’s Labrador Peninsula. The pattern of cracks in a caribou shoulder blade contained their prophecies. The most important question was always this: What direction should the hunters go in search of game? This was a matter of life and death. First, the hunters would try to find the answer in a dream. When they woke up, the bone would hold the key to interpreting what they saw while they were asleep.
翻译：可以肯定的是，（中国的）商将兽骨占卜的艺术提升到极点。然而，他们并非（世界上）唯一做这件事的人。从日本大和国到阿拉伯半岛，人们都从事（动物）肩胛骨占卜术。一块肩胛骨警告（进攻东西罗马帝国的匈人）阿提拉（在今法国的）沙隆之战的失利，而成吉思汗用烧焦的羊骨检查他的占星师的报告。肩胛骨占卜术最有趣的用途之一来自纳斯卡皮人，他们是讲（北美印第安）阿尔冈琴语言、居住于加拿大拉布拉多半岛冻土带的部落。驯鹿肩胛骨的裂缝图案包含有某种预言。最重要的问题总是这样的：猎人应该向什么方向去寻找猎物？这是生死攸关的问题。首先，猎人会尝试在梦中寻找答案。当他们醒来时，兽骨提供给他们睡着时所见到的事情进行解析的答案。

原文：In the 1950s, the Yale anthropologist Omar Khayyam Moore theorized that there was a good reason for this practice. If the Naskapi hunters pursued caribou in the same places year after year, they risked depleting their stocks to fatally low levels. The unpredictable nature of the shoulder bone cracks served as a check on any unconscious biases that could have led to overhunting from pursuing the same paths season after season. If this is true, the practice supports two vastly different ideas of prophecy. To the Naskapi, the scapula was a random number generator, a 20-sided die, a way of trusting chaos to guarantee the security of the tribe. For the Shang, by contrast, the scapula bone worked like a radio, tuning in to the spirit world. Its predictions were above all a way of keeping uncertainty at bay.
翻译：在20世纪50年代，耶鲁大学人类学家欧玛尔·海亚姆·摩尔提出一种理论，认为这种做法有一个很好的理由。如果纳斯卡皮猎人年复一年地在同一个地方追捕驯鹿，他们就有消耗自己的库存到致命的低水平的危险。肩骨裂痕的不确定性阻档了下意识的偏好，这种偏好可能会导致因每个季节走同一路线的过度捕猎。如果这个理论是正确的，这种做法就支持了关于预言的两种截然不同的观点。对于纳斯卡皮人，肩胛骨是一个随机数发生器，是一个20面的骰子，是通过相信混沌来保障部落安全的一种方式。而对于（中国的）商，肩胛骨好比一台收音机，在收听神灵世界的声音，它的预告使不确定性不致太过分。

这最后一句是指前面我没有摘录和翻译的一节，说商王本人是主要的占卜士，因此对模棱两可的占卜结果总是做出对于自己有利的解释，但甲骨裂痕至少在一定程度上使他不至于太过随意，好比上帝对独裁者的一种制约。

2016年10月1日

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