The Religions of Ancient Egypt and Babylonia Part 9

I have not caused any man to be treacherously murdered.

I have not dealt treacherously with any one.

I have not diminished the offerings of bread in the temples.

I have not spoiled the shewbread of the G.o.ds.

I have not robbed the dead of their loaves and cerecloths.

I have not been unchaste.

I have not defiled myself in the sanctuary of the G.o.d of my city.

I have not stinted and been n.i.g.g.ardly of offerings.

I have not defrauded in weighing the scales.

I have not given false weight.

I have not taken the milk from the mouth of the child.

I have not hunted the cattle in their meadows.

I have not netted the birds of the G.o.ds.

I have not fished in their preserves.

I have not kept the water (from my neighbour) in the time of inundation.

I have not cut off a water channel.

I have not extinguished the flame at a wrong time.

I have not defrauded the Ennead of the G.o.ds of the choice parts of the victims.

I have not driven away the oxen of the temple.

I have not driven back a G.o.d when he has left the temple.

I am pure! I am pure! I am pure!"(145)

The negative confession ended, the dead man turned to the forty-two a.s.sessors and pleaded that he was innocent of the particular sin which they had been severally appointed to judge. Then he once more addressed Osiris with a final plea for justification: "Hail to you, ye G.o.ds who are in the great hall of the Twofold Truth, who have no falsehood in your bosoms, but who live on truth in On, and feed your hearts upon it before the lord G.o.d who dwelleth in his solar disc. Deliver me from the Typhon who feedeth on entrails, O chiefs! in this hour of supreme judgment; grant that the deceased may come unto you, he who hath not sinned, who hath neither lied, nor done evil, nor committed any crime, who hath not borne false witness, who hath done nought against himself, but who liveth on truth, who feedeth on truth. He hath spread joy on all sides; men speak of that which he hath done, and the G.o.ds rejoice in it. He hath reconciled the G.o.d to him by his love; he hath given bread to the hungry, water to the thirsty, clothing to the naked; he hath given a boat to the shipwrecked; he hath offered sacrifices to the G.o.ds, sepulchral meals to the dead. Deliver him from himself, speak not against him before the lord of the dead, for his mouth is pure and his hands are pure!"(146)

Meanwhile the heart of the dead man-his conscience, as we should call it in our modern phraseology-was being weighed in the balance against the image of truth. Something more convincing was needed than his own protestation that he had acted uprightly and done no wrong. The heart was placed in the scale by Thoth, who, knowing the weakness of human nature, inclined the balance a little in its favour. Anubis superintended the weighing, while Thoth recorded the result. If the verdict were favourable, he addressed Osiris in the following words: "Behold the deceased in this Hall of the Twofold Truth, his heart hath been weighed in the balance, in the presence of the great genii, the lords of Hades, and been found true.

No trace of earthly impurity hath been found in his heart. Now that he leaveth the tribunal true of voice (justified), his heart is restored to him, as well as his eyes and the material cover of his heart, to be put back in their places, each in its own time, his soul in heaven, his heart in the other world, as is the custom of the followers of Horus. Henceforth let his body lie in the hands of Anubis, who presideth over the tombs; let him receive offerings at the cemetery in the presence of (Osiris) Un-nefer (the Good Being); let him be as one of those favourites who follow thee; let his soul abide where it will in the necropolis of his city, he whose voice is true before the great Ennead."(147)

In the judgment-hall of Osiris we find the first expression of the doctrine which was echoed so many ages later by the Hebrew prophets, that what the G.o.ds require is mercy and righteousness rather than orthodoxy of belief. And the righteousness and mercy are far-reaching. The faith that is to save the follower of Osiris is a faith that has led him to feed the hungry, to give drink to the thirsty, to clothe the naked, to abstain from injuring his neighbour in word or thought, much less in deed, and to be truthful in both act and speech. Even the slave is not forgotten; to have done anything which has caused him to be ill-treated by his master, is sufficient to exclude the offender from the delights of paradise. Man's duty towards his fellow-man is put on a higher footing even than his duty towards the G.o.ds, for it comes first in the list of righteous actions required from him. It is not until the dead man has proved that he has acted with justice and mercy towards his fellows, that he is allowed to pa.s.s on to prove that he has performed his duty towards the G.o.ds.

And the Osirian confession of faith was not a mere conventional formulary, without influence on the life and conduct of those who professed it. There are already allusions to it in the Pyramid texts, and in the tombs of a later period the deceased rests his claim to be remembered upon the good deeds he had done while on earth. To feed the hungry, to clothe the naked, and to deal justly, are duties which are constantly recognised in them. "I loved my father," says Baba at El-Kab, "I honoured my mother.... When a famine arose, lasting many years, I distributed corn to the needy." The Egyptian sepulchres contain few records of war and battles; of deeds of kindness and righteous dealing there is frequent mention.(148)

Of the fate of the wicked, of those whose hearts were overweighed in the balance and who failed to pa.s.s the tribunal of Osiris, we know but little.

Typhon, in the form of a hideous hippopotamus, stood behind Thoth in a corner of the hall, ready to devour their entrails. In the Book of the Other World, of which I shall have to speak in another lecture, the tortures of the lost are depicted quite in medieval style. We see them plunged in water or burned in the fire, enclosed in vaulted chambers filled with burning charcoal, with their heads struck from their necks or their bodies devoured by serpents. But the Book of the Other World is the ritual of a religious system which was originally distinct from the Osirian, and it is probable that most Egyptians expected the final annihilation of the wicked rather than their continued existence in an eternal h.e.l.l. The divine elements in man, which could not die, were equally incapable of committing sin, and consequently would return to the G.o.d who gave them, when the human individuality to which they had been joined was punished for its offences in the flesh. The soul could remain united only to that individuality which had been purified from all its earthly stains, and had become as the G.o.d Osiris himself. The individuality which was condemned in the judgment of Osiris perished eternally, and in the mind of the Egyptian the individuality and the individual were one and the same.

Lecture VIII. The Sacred Books.

Like all other organised religions, that of ancient Egypt had its sacred books. According to St. Clement of Alexandria, the whole body of sacred literature was contained in a collection of forty-two books, the origin of which was ascribed to the G.o.d Thoth. The first ten of these "Hermetic"

volumes were ent.i.tled "the Prophet," and dealt with theology in the strictest sense of the term. Then followed the ten books of "the Stolist,"

in which were to be found all directions as to the festivals and processions, as well as hymns and prayers. Next came the fourteen books of "the Sacred Scribe," containing all that was known about the hieroglyphic system of writing, and the sciences of geometry and geography, astronomy, astrology, and the like. These were followed by two books on music and hymnology; and, finally, six books on the science and practice of medicine.(149)

The Hermetic books were written in Greek, and were a compilation of the Greek age. Such a systematic epitome of the learning of ancient Egypt belonged to the period when Egyptian religion had ceased to be creative, or even progressive, and the antiquarian spirit of Greek Alexandria had laid hold of the traditions and inst.i.tutions of the past. But they were derived from genuine sources, and represented with more or less exact.i.tude the beliefs and practices of earlier generations. They were, it is true, a compilation adapted to Greek ideas and intended to satisfy the demands of Greek curiosity, but it is no less true that the materials out of which they were compiled went back to the remotest antiquity. The temple libraries were filled with rolls of papyri relating not only to the minutest details of the temple service, but also to all the various branches of sacred lore. Among these were the books which have been called the Bibles of the ancient Egyptians.

Foremost amongst the latter is the Ritual to which Lepsius gave the name of the Book of the Dead. It was first discovered by Champollion in the early days of Egyptian decipherment, and a comparative edition of the text current during the Theban period has been made by Dr. Naville. Papyri containing the whole or portions of it are numberless; the chapters into which it is divided are inscribed on the coffins, and even on the wrappings of the dead, as well as on the scarabs and the _ushebtis_ that were buried with the mummy. It was, in fact, a sort of pa.s.sport and guide-book combined in one, which would carry the dead man in safety through the dangers that confronted him in the other world, and bring him at last to the judgment-hall of Osiris and the paradise of Alu. It described minutely all that awaited him after death; it detailed the words and prayers that would deliver him from his spiritual enemies; and it put into his mouth the confession he would have to make before the tribunal of the dead. Without it he would have been lost in the strange world to which he journeyed, and hence the need of inscribing at least some portions of it on his tomb or sepulchral furniture, where their ghostly doubles could be read by his ka and soul.

The Book of the Dead was the Bible or Prayer-book of the Osirian creed.

Its universal use marks the triumph of the worship of Osiris and of the beliefs that accompanied it. It was for the follower of Osiris that it was originally compiled; the judgment with which it threatened him was that of Osiris, the heaven to which it led him was the field of Alu. The Pyramid texts of the Fifth and Sixth Dynasties imply that it already existed in some shape or other; the Osirian creed is known to them in all its details, and the "other world" depicted in them is that of the Book of the Dead.(150)

But the Book of the Dead is a composite work. Not only are the religious conceptions embodied in it composite and sometimes self-contradictory, on the literary side it is composite also. It was, moreover, a work of slow growth; glosses have been added to it to explain pa.s.sages which had become obscure through the lapse of time; the glosses have then made their way into the text, and themselves become the subject of fresh commentary and explanation. Chapters have been inserted, paragraphs interpolated, and the later commentary combined with the original text. The Book of the Dead as it appears in the age of the Theban dynasties had already pa.s.sed through long centuries of growth and modification.(151)

The Pyramid texts show the same combination of the doctrines of the Osirian creed with those of the solar cult as the Book of the Dead.(152) But the combination is that of two mutually exclusive systems of theology which have been brought forcibly side by side without any attempt being made to fuse them into a harmonious whole. They display the usual tendency of the Egyptian mind to accept the new without discarding the old, and without troubling to consider how the new and old can be fitted together.

It was enough to place them side by side; those who did not think the Osirian creed sufficient to ensure salvation, had the choice of the solar creed offered them with its prayers and incantations to the sun-G.o.d. But it was not an alternative choice; the heaven of the solar bark in its pa.s.sage through the world of the night was attached to the heaven of Alu with its fields lighted by the sun of day.

It is evident that the chapters which introduce the doctrines of the solar cult are a later addition to the original Book of the Dead. That was the text-book of the Osirian soul, with whose beliefs the doctrines of the solar cult were absolutely incompatible. While the one taught that the dead, without distinction, pa.s.sed to the judgment-hall of Osiris, where, after being acquitted, as much on moral as on religious grounds, they were admitted to a paradise of light and happiness, the other maintained that only a chosen few, who were rich and learned enough to be provided with the necessary theological formulae, were received in the solar bark as it glided along the twelve hours of the night, thus becoming companions of the sun-G.o.d in his pa.s.sage through a realm of darkness that was peopled by demoniac forms. The Osirian and solar creeds issued from two wholly different religious systems, and the introduction of conceptions derived from the latter into the Book of the Dead, however subordinate may be the place which they occupy, indicates a revision of the original work. It was not until the book had gained a predominant position in Egyptian religious thought that it would have been needful to incorporate into it the ideas of a rival theology. But the incorporation had taken place long before the Pyramid texts were compiled, perhaps before the day when Menes united the two kingdoms of Egypt into one.

There are yet other evidences of a composite theology in the Book of the Dead. In one chapter we have the old doctrine of the Ka confined to the dark and dismal tomb in which its body lies; in another we see the soul flying whithersoever it will on the wings of a bird, sitting on the branches of a tree under the shade of the foliage, or perched on the margin of flowing water. But such theological inconsistencies probably go back to the age when the book was first composed. The conceptions of the Ka and of the soul, however inconsistent they may be, belong to so early a period, that they lay together at the foundation of Egyptian religious thought long before the days when an official form of religion had come into existence, or the Book of the Dead had been compiled.

In some instances it is possible to fix approximately the period to which particular portions of the book belong. Professor Maspero has shown that the 64th chapter, once considered one of the oldest, is in reality one of the latest in date. It sums up the different formulae which enabled the soul of the dead man to quit his body in safety; and accordingly its t.i.tle, which, however, varies in different recensions, is a repet.i.tion of that prefixed to the earlier part of the work, and declares that it makes "known in a single chapter the chapters relating to _going forth from day_." According to certain papyri, it was "discovered" either in the reign of Usaphaes of the First Dynasty or in that of Men-kau-Ra of the Fourth Dynasty, under the feet of Thoth in the temple of Eshmunen, written in letters of lapis-lazuli on a tablet of alabaster. The details of the "discovery" are not sufficiently uniform to allow us to put much confidence in them; the tradition proves, however, that the Egyptians considered the chapter to be at least as old as the Fourth Dynasty; and the belief is supported by the fact that on the monuments of the Eleventh Dynasty it is already an integral part of the book. If, then, a chapter which is relatively modern was nevertheless embodied in the book in the age of the earlier dynasties, we can gain some idea of the antiquity to which the book itself must reach back, even in its composite form.(153)

The first fifteen chapters, as Champollion perceived, form a complete whole in themselves. In the Theban texts they are called the "Chapter of going before the divine tribunal of Osiris." In the Saite period this is replaced by the more general t.i.tle of "Beginning of the Chapter of _going forth from day_."(154) They describe how the soul can leave its mummy, can escape forced labour in the other world through the help of the _ushebti_, can pa.s.s in safety "over the back of the serpent Apophis, the wicked," and can acquire that "correctness of voice" which will enable it to repeat correctly the words of the ritual, and so enter or leave at will the world beyond the grave. The 15th chapter is a hymn to the Sun.

The 17th chapter begins a new section. It sums up in a condensed form all that the soul was required to know about the G.o.ds and the world to come.

But it has been glossed and reglossed until its first form has become almost unrecognisable. The commentary attached to the original pa.s.sages became in time itself so obscure as to need explanation, and the chapter now consists of three strata of religious thought and exposition piled one on the top of the other. As it now stands it unites in a common goal the aspirations of the followers of Osiris and of those of the solar cult; the dead man is identified with the G.o.ds, and so wends his way to the divine land in which they dwell, whether that be the fields of Alu or the bark of the Sun.

The chapters which follow are intended to restore voice, memory, and name to the dead man. With the restoration of his name comes the restoration of his individuality, for that which has no name has no individuality. Then follows (in chapters xxvi.-x.x.x.) the restoration of his heart, which is regarded first as a mere organ of the body, and then in the Osirian sense as the equivalent of the conscience. As an organ, the figure of a heart placed in the tomb was sufficient to ensure its return; as the living conscience and principle of life, something of a more mysterious and symbolic nature was needed. This was found in the scarab or beetle, whose name _kheper_ happened to coincide in sound with the word that signified "to become."(155)

In a series of chapters the soul is now protected against the poisonous serpents, including "the great python who devours the a.s.s," which it will meet with in its pa.s.sage through the limbo of the other world. As Professor Maspero remarks, the large place occupied by these serpents among the dangers which await the soul on its first exit from the body, make it plain that in the days when the Book of the Dead was first being compiled, venomous snakes were far more plentiful than they ever have been in the Egypt of historical times. Indeed, the python, whose huge folds are still painted on the walls of the royal tombs of Thebes, had retired southward long before the age of the Fourth Dynasty. To an equally early period we may refer the forty-second chapter, in which the soul is taught how to escape the slaughter of the enemies of Horus, which took place at Herakleopolis during the Osirian wars,-a chapter, however, in which, it may be observed, the elder Horus is already confounded with the son of Osiris.(156)

Chapters xliv. to liii. are occupied in describing how the dead man is thus preserved from "the second death." Ill.u.s.trations are drawn both from the punishments undergone by the enemies of the sun-G.o.d in the story of his pa.s.sage through the world of night, and from the old beliefs connected with the lot of the Ka. He was neither to be beheaded, nor cast head downwards into the abyss, nor was he to feed on filth like the Ka for which no offerings of food had been provided. The dangers from which he is thus preserved are next contrasted with the joys that await him in the paradise of the Blest (chs. liv.-lxiii.).

The 64th chapter, which sums up the preceding part of the book, and const.i.tutes a break between it and what follows, has already been considered. The ten chapters which succeed it are all similarly concerned with "coming forth from the day." They thus traverse the same ground as the first fifteen chapters of the book, but they deal with the subject in a different way and from a different point of view. They are a fresh proof of the composite character of the work, and of the desire of its authors to incorporate in it all that had been written on the future life of the soul up to the time of its composition. Professor Maspero believes that they embody the various formulae relating to the severance of soul and body which were current in the priestly schools.(157)

Equally separate in tone and spirit are the next six chapters (lxxv.-xc.), which have emanated from the school of Heliopolis. They deal with the destiny of the Ba or "soul" rather than with that of the Osirian, and describe the transformations which it can undergo if fortified with the words of the ritual. It may at will transform itself into a hawk of gold, a lotus flower, the moon-G.o.d or Pta?, even into a viper, a crocodile, or a goose. But first it must fly to Heliopolis and the solar deities who reside there, and it is in Heliopolis that its transformation into the G.o.d Pta? is to take place.

The next chapter, the 91st, transports us into a different atmosphere of religious thought. It deals with the reunion of the soul and the body. But the two which follow forbid the Egyptian to believe that this meant a sojourn of the soul in the tomb. On the contrary, the soul, it is said, is not to be "imprisoned"; while the 93rd chapter "opens the gates of the sepulchre to the soul and the shadow (_khaib_), that they may go forth and employ their limbs." And the land to which they were to go was a land of sunlight.