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Why was divination taught at Hogwarts?

Just for that subject, Dumbledore had to hire a fraud like Sybill Trelawney. I know it was because of her prophecy that Dumbledore and wizarding world knew about Harry Potter and the end of Voldemort, but she wasn't predicting anything real during her time as a teacher (except the one about Dark Lord rising again).

How was divination helping students in Hogwarts?

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    Trelawney made a few more accurate predictions than you give her credit for: scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/124525/…
    – F1Krazy
    Commented Jul 5, 2017 at 9:27
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    In fact, I can't think of a prediction of Trelawney's that didn't ultimately come true in some fashion. Even her random prediction to Umbridge came true in the form of Centaurs.
    – DisturbedNeo
    Commented Jul 5, 2017 at 10:04
  • Also, Divination wasn't the only subject that taught the art of predicting the future. Look up Arithmancy, the art of predicting the future using numbers, Hermione Granger's favourite subject.
    – DisturbedNeo
    Commented Jul 5, 2017 at 10:07
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    I have neither voted to close this question, nor given a downvote (in fact, the opposite). This seems like an interesting question, and answerable too. Related: scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/95287/…
    – Voronwé
    Commented Jul 5, 2017 at 10:41
  • @DheerajKumar this question is now a Hot Network Question. You can expect quite a bit more votes coming in, likely making up for those few down votes. Enjoy the ride!
    – SQB
    Commented Jul 5, 2017 at 15:20

1 Answer 1

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We have another question about the position of Sybill Trelawney at Hogwarts:

Did Dumbledore create Divination position just to get the prophet (Sybil) under Hogwarts protection?

Its sole answer confirms that Dumbledore actually wanted to remove Divination from the curriculum, but kept it just to get and keep Sybill Trelawney at Hogwarts, due to her prophesy regarding Voldemort.

So the students of Hogwarts are still being taught Divination as an excuse to keep Sybill Trelawny employed and protected at Hogwarts. Presumably, Dumbledore didn't have a high opinion of Divination, but likely considered it harmless.

I had gone there to see an applicant for the post of Divination teacher, though it was against my inclination to allow the subject of Divination to continue at all.
(Emphasis mine)

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    that's something i was looking for. Thanks bud. accepting this.
    – Dheeraj Kumar
    Commented Jul 5, 2017 at 11:36
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    @DheerajKumar Thanks! Also, don't let a couple of down votes get to you. Remember that one up vote cancels five down votes.
    – SQB
    Commented Jul 5, 2017 at 11:38

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