Ep320: Divination & Tarot - Dr Ben Joffe

Aug 15, 2025

Ben Joffe, an anthropologist and scholar of Tibetan Buddhism, dives into the fascinating world of divination and tarot. He explores the cultural significance of divination and its relationship with intuition and randomness. Joffe shares his personal journey with tarot, offers practical advice for readers, and addresses the ethical complexities surrounding these practices. He reflects on how tarot can empower clients, the dangers of dependency, and the transformative potential of storytelling in both divination and personal growth.

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INSIGHT

Divination As Organic Pattern Detection

Divination is an organic human impulse to detect patterns across past, present and future through ritualized randomness.
Ben links this to Buddhist dependent origination: signs and omens arise naturally from interdependence.

ADVICE

Avoid Divination Addiction And Overreach

Beware pattern overprojection: divination can become compulsive and conspiratorial if applied to everything.
Ben cautions clients and readers to keep divination in its place and avoid addiction to readings.

ANECDOTE

On-the-Spot Reading With Party Objects

Ben and his ex improvised a party reading using a beer bottle and objects on a table as the divinatory assemblage.
The ad-hoc reading used an imagined 12-house wheel and produced a meaningful result for the querent.

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In this interview I am once again joined by Dr Ben Joffe, anthropologist, occultist, and scholar practitioner of Tibetan Buddhism. Dr Joffe leads a deep dive into the topic of divination, explores its underlying mechanisms and practical methods, and compares different cultural understandings of the practice. Dr Joffe details his understanding of the tarot as a scholar and reader, shares his advice for those who wish to learn the system, and reveals how to use tarot for information gathering, sorcery, and magickal workings. Dr Joffe also reflects on his own journey as a tarot reader, addresses criticisms that tarot and other psychic methods are exploitative, and considers the uneasy relationship between divination and licensed counselling. … Video version: https://www.guruviking.com/podcast/ep320-divination-tarot-dr-ben-joffe Also available on Youtube, iTunes, & Spotify – search ‘Guru Viking Podcast’. … Topics include: 00:00 - Intro 02:12 - What is divination? 06:08 - Synchronicity and randomness 09:37 - Dependent origination 14:34 - Ben’s extensive study of divination 22:13 - Mechanistic vs intuitive 29:17 - Scrying and establishing parameters 34:56 - Childhood divination 39:59 - What should divination mean for the client? 41:50 - Addiction to divination 43:50 - Cold reading and choosing a question 48:45 - Ben’s recounts his own history as a diviner 01:20:43 - Structure of the tarot 01:27:16 - How to read tarot 01:48:38 - Tarot reading mistakes 01:53:46 - Tibetan butter lamp divination 01:57:11 - Collaboration vs cold reading 02:02:10 - Studying the history of tarot 02:06:58 - 6 reasons to engage with tarot 02:09:22 - Critique of modern, inclusive decks 02:12:43 - Bad omens and gatekeeping 02:20:17 - Is tarot exploitative pseudo-counselling? 02:47:23 - Why not just become a counsellor? 02:54:19 - Is tarot over-psychologised? 02:55:25 - Ben reflects on his recurring clients 03:01:11 - The power of the right question 03:07:39 - Shaman and tarot reader as therapy-adjacent 03:13:18 - Does clairvoyance actually have value? 03:16:16 - Caution about taking life advice from Buddhist lamas 03:21:44 - Wild West of Tiktok diviners 03:22:49 - Anti-divination laws 03:29:14 - Tibetan and Buddhist divination  … Previous episodes with Dr Ben Joffe: - https://www.guruviking.com/search?q=joffe To find out more about Dr Ben Joffe, visit: - https://perfumedskull.com/ - http://www.skypressbooks.com/ … For more interviews, videos, and more visit: - https://www.guruviking.com Music ‘Deva Dasi’ by Steve James