The Religion of Ancient Egypt Part 5

CHAPTER XV

THE INFLUENCE OF EGYPT

How far Egypt in its earlier days had influenced the faiths of other countries we cannot trace, owing to our ignorance of the early civilisations of the world. But in the later times the extension of the popular religion of Egypt can only be paralleled by the spread of Christianity or Islam. Isis was worshipped in Greece in the fourth century B.C., and in Italy in the second century. Soon after she won her way into official recognition by Sulla, and immediately after the death of Julius a temple to Isis was actually erected by the government. Once firmly established in Rome, the spread of Imperial power carried her worship over the world; emperors became her priests, and the humble centurion in remote camps honoured her in the wilds of France, Germany, Yorkshire, or the Sahara.

Not only Isis but also Osiris claimed the world's {91} worship. In the new form of the Osir-hapi of Memphis, or Serapis, the Ptolemies identified him with Zeus, both in appearance and by attributes. And, by the time of Nero, Isis and Osiris were said to be the deities of all the world. An interesting outline of this subject will be found in Professor Dill's _Roman Society from Nero to Aurelius_.

Besides these parent G.o.ds their son Horus also conquered the world with them. Isis and Horus, the Queen of Heaven and the Holy Child, became the popular deities of the later age of Egypt, and their figures far outnumber those of all other G.o.ds. Horus in every form of infancy was the loved _bambino_ of the Egyptian women. Again Horus appears carried on the arm of his mother in a form which is indistinguishable from that adopted by Christianity soon after.

We see, then, throughout the Roman world the popular worship of the Queen of Heaven, _Mater Dolorosa_, Mother of G.o.d, patroness of sailors, and her infant son Horus the child, the benefactor of men, who took captive all the powers of evil. And this worship spread and increased in Egypt and elsewhere until the growing power of Christianity compelled a change. The old worship continued; for the Syrian maid became {92} transformed into an entirely different figure, Queen of Heaven, Mother of G.o.d, patroness of sailors, occupying the position and attributes already belonging to the world-wide G.o.ddess; and the Divine Teacher, the Man of Sorrows, became transformed into the entirely different figure of the Potent Child. Isis and Horus still ruled the affections and worship of Europe with a change of names.

Egypt also exercised an immense influence upon the Church in the Trinitarian controversy. That was a purely Egyptian dispute, between two presbyters brought up in the atmosphere of intricacies about the _ka_, the _khu_, the _khat_, the _ba_, the _sahu_, the _khaybat_, and the various other ent.i.ties which const.i.tuted man. To carry forward similar refinements concerning the Divine Nature was as congenial to such minds as it was incomprehensible to the Western. And the dispute finally rested on the question of whether 'before time' was the same as 'from eternity.' Such was the struggle which Arius and Athanasius thrust upon the Church; a dispute which would never have been heard of in such a shape but for their Egyptian origin.

In another direction Egypt was also dominant. From some source--perhaps the Buddhist mission {93} of Asoka--the ascetic life of recluses was established in the Ptolemaic times, and monks of the Serapeum ill.u.s.trated an ideal to man which had been as yet unknown in the West. This system of monasticism continued, until Pachomios, a monk of Serapis in Upper Egypt, became the first Christian monk in the reign of Constantine. Quickly imitated in Syria, Asia Minor, Gaul, and other provinces, as well as in Italy itself, the system pa.s.sed into a fundamental position in mediaeval Christianity, and the reverence of mankind has been for fifteen hundred years bestowed on an Egyptian inst.i.tution.

We thus see how the religious ideas of six thousand years or more have still survived and continued their power over civilised man, renamed but scarcely changed; and it is shown how new religious ideas can but transform, but not eradicate, the ancestral beliefs of past ages.

RELIGIONS: ANCIENT AND MODERN.

ANIMISM.

By EDWARD CLODD, Author of _The Story of Creation_.

PANTHEISM.

By JAMES ALLANSON PICTON, Author of _The Religion of the Universe_.

THE RELIGIONS OF ANCIENT CHINA.

By Professor GILES, LL.D., Professor of Chinese in the University of Cambridge.

THE RELIGION OF ANCIENT GREECE.

By JANE HARRISON, Lecturer at Newnham College, Cambridge, Author _Prolegomena to Study of Greek Religion_.

ISLAM IN INDIA.

By T. W. ARNOLD, a.s.sistant Librarian at the India Office, Author of _The Preaching of Islam_.

ISLAM.

By SYED AMEER ALI. M.A., C.I.E., late of H.M.'s High Court of Judicature in Bengal, Author of _The Spirit of Islam_ and _The Ethics of Islam_.

MAGIC AND FETISHISM.

By Dr. A. C. HADDON, F.R.S., Lecturer on Ethnology at Cambridge University.

THE RELIGION OF ANCIENT EGYPT.

By Professor W. M. FLINDERS PETRIE, F.R.S.

THE RELIGION OF BABYLONIA AND a.s.sYRIA.

By THEOPHILUS G. PINCHES, late of the British Museum.

BUDDHISM. 2 vols.

By Professor RHYS DAVIDS, LL.D., late Secretary of The Royal Asiatic Society.

HINDUISM.

By Dr. L. D. BARNETT, of the Department of Oriental Printed Books and MSS., British Museum.

SCANDINAVIAN RELIGION.

By WILLIAM A. CRAIGIE, Joint Editor of the _Oxford English Dictionary_.

CELTIC RELIGION.

By Professor ANWYL, Professor of Welsh at University College, Aberystwyth.

THE MYTHOLOGY OF ANCIENT BRITAIN AND IRELAND.

By CHARLES SQUIRE, Author of _The Mythology of the British Islands_.

JUDAISM.

By ISRAEL ABRAHAMS, Lecturer in Talmudic Literature in Cambridge University, Author of _Jewish Life in the Middle Ages_.