Ancient Egypt, 2nd Intermediate Period, c. 1750 - 1570 BC. [65] Thus, temples were central to Egyptian society, and vast resources were devoted to their upkeep, including both donations from the monarchy and large estates of their own. The Egyptians avoided direct statements about inauspicious events such as the death of a beneficial deity. Although these ends could be harmful to other people, no form of magic was considered inimical in itself. Each of them contained a subterranean burial chamber and a separate, above ground chapel for mortuary rituals. These forms include men and women (anthropomorphism), animals (zoomorphism), and, more rarely, inanimate objects. [52], The Egyptians produced numerous prayers and hymns, written in the form of poetry. [183] In literature, gods may appear to humans in a physical form, but in real life the Egyptians were limited to more indirect means of communication. For these reasons, scholars disagree about how genuinely most Egyptians believed the king to be a god. [133], Egyptian religion produced the temples and tombs which are ancient Egypt's most enduring monuments, but it also influenced other cultures. They were originally restricted to pharaonic tombs, but in the Third Intermediate Period they came to be used more widely. At the same time, animals were ritually buried, a practice which may reflect the development of zoomorphic deities like those found in the later religion. The first papyrus boats are estimated to have been made around 4000 BC. Rituals such as prayer and offerings were provided to the gods to gain their favor. [51] Except for the few deities who disrupted the divine order,[40] the gods' actions maintained maat and created and sustained all living things. Introduction § 1 In Ancient Egypt, rejuvenation (regeneration) is Osirian and Lunar, whereas illumination (rekindling) is Solar and linked with the Sungod Re-Atum, the self-created, fugal, interstitial, sole creator. Although many deities were connected with the Nile, no god personified it in the way that Ra personified the sun. [194] The exception was during festival processions, when the statue was carried out of the temple enclosed in a portable shrine,[195] which usually hid it from public view. [125], Before the Amarna Period, popular religion had trended toward more personal relationships between worshippers and their gods. [33], Most Egyptian deities represent natural or social phenomena. [39] They did this work using a force the Egyptians called heka, a term usually translated as "magic". [166] A few deities, such as Osiris, Ptah, and Min, have a "mummiform" appearance, with their limbs tightly swathed in cloth. [54] Most are structured according to a set literary formula, designed to expound on the nature, aspects, and mythological functions of a given deity. A god's connections and interactions with other deities helped define its character. [48] Yet even the most revered deities could sometimes exact vengeance on humans or each other, displaying a demon-like side to their character and blurring the boundaries between demons and gods. Evidence of personal piety is scant before the New Kingdom. While rulers often intermarried with daughters, granddaughters, sisters and brothers to keep the throne within the family the throne still … [Note 2] The most prominent ennead was the Ennead of Heliopolis, an extended family of deities descended from Atum, which incorporates many important gods. The theology of the period described in particular detail Amun's presence in and rule over all things, so that he, more than any other deity, embodied the all-encompassing power of the divine. [209] Beginning in the Middle Kingdom, several texts connected the issue of evil in the world with a myth in which the creator god fights a human rebellion against his rule and then withdraws from the earth. [111], During the Old Kingdom, the priesthoods of the major deities attempted to organize the complicated national pantheon into groups linked by their mythology and worshipped in a single cult center, such as the Ennead of Heliopolis, which linked important deities such as Atum, Ra, Osiris, and Set in a single creation myth. [105] Further protection was provided by funerary texts included in the burial. Due to continued interest in Egyptian beliefs, in the late 20th century, several new religious groups going under the blanket term of Kemetism have formed based on different reconstructions of ancient Egyptian religion. and 30 B.C. When kings from Thebes took control of the country at start of the Middle Kingdom (c. 2055–1650 BC), they elevated Thebes' patron gods—first the war god Montu and then Amun—to national prominence. The typical boat was long and thin and the ends came to a point that stuck out of the water. These practices continued into the latest periods of Egyptian history. Egyptian belief in the afterlife and the importance of funerary practices is evident in the great efforts made to ensure the survival of their souls after death – via the provision of tombs, grave goods and offerings to preserve the bodies and spirits of the deceased. Thus Isis, as the mother and protector of Horus, was a great healer as well as the patroness of kings. [106] Rulers in the late New Kingdom promoted a particularly important group of three gods above all others: Amun, Ra, and Ptah. [99] However, while the cult lasted, the living sometimes wrote letters asking deceased relatives for help, in the belief that the dead could affect the world of the living as the gods did. The official ancient Egyptian religion lasted from about 3110 bce to 550 ce. It equated the single deity with the sun and dismissed all other gods. "[3], Egyptian writings describe the gods' bodies in detail. It was the fixed, eternal order of the universe, both in the cosmos and in human society, and was often personified as a goddess. [44], Among the significant Egyptian myths were the creation myths. [197] Communities also built and managed small chapels for their own use, and some families had shrines inside their homes. There are depictions of them hunting crocodiles and hippopotamuses, swimming and playing boat … [76], In Egyptian belief, names express the fundamental nature of the things to which they refer. The Egyptians therefore believed that in death they would exist on the same level as the gods and understand their mysterious nature. 1850 B.C.) The Egyptians developed many types of boats. Such prayers are rare before the New Kingdom, indicating that in earlier periods such direct personal interaction with a deity was not believed possible, or at least was less likely to be expressed in writing. Ra and Apep, battling each other each night, continue this struggle into the present. These priests often worked outside their temples, hiring out their magical services to laymen. They emphasize humans' direct, personal relationships with deities and the gods' power to intervene in human events. [107] The evidence is less clear for gods in human form, and this type of deity may have emerged more slowly than those in animal shape. [87], The deities invoked in these situations differed somewhat from those at the center of state cults. [132] Local gods were linked with greater ones, and deities with similar functions were combined. [71] The temple staff also included many people other than priests, such as musicians and chanters in temple ceremonies. The means of discerning the god's will gave great influence to the priests who spoke and interpreted the god's message. The two were separated by Shu, the god of air. [9], The relationships between deities could also be expressed in the process of syncretism, in which two or more different gods were linked to form a composite deity. [60] Most myths lack highly developed characters and plots, because their symbolic meaning was more important than elaborate storytelling. The pharaoh was correspondingly more human and less divine. [21], The final step in the formation of Egyptian religion was the unification of Egypt, in which rulers from Upper Egypt made themselves pharaohs of the entire country. In this state, he was directly identified with Ra, and was also associated with Osiris, god of death and rebirth and the mythological father of Horus. [16], Predynastic Egypt originally consisted of small, independent villages. [127], Nationally important deities gave rise to local manifestations, which sometimes absorbed the characteristics of older regional gods. At various times, certain gods became preeminent over the others, including the sun god Ra, the creator god Amun, and the mother goddess Isis. The one god was believed to transcend the world and all the other deities, while at the same time, the multiple gods were aspects of the one. [25] Kings were said to be divine, although only a few continued to be worshipped long after their deaths. Some writings do accuse the deities of causing human misery, while others give theodicies in the gods' defense. [94] Therefore, magic frequently involved written or spoken incantations, although these were usually accompanied by ritual actions. They believed that humans possessed a ka, or life-force, which left the body at the point of death. The names of the sky goddess Nut and the earth god Geb do not resemble the Egyptian terms for sky and earth. [83] The host of divine names and titles expresses the gods' multifarious nature. To know the true name of a deity was to have power over it. [135], In the reign of Akhenaten (c. 1353–1336 BC) in the mid-New Kingdom, a single solar deity, the Aten, became the sole focus of the state religion. [128] Isis grew more popular as a goddess of protection, magic, and personal salvation, and became the most important goddess in Egypt. Some scholars have argued, based in part on Egyptian writings, that the Egyptians came to recognize a single divine power that lay behind all things and was present in all the other deities. [214] These offerings, in addition to maintaining maat for the gods, celebrated deities' life-giving generosity and encouraged them to remain benevolent rather than vengeful. The ancient Egyptian goddess of love, sexuality, fertility and war, Anat came from Canaan or Syria originally. Afterward, when the god had consumed the spiritual essence of the offerings, the items themselves were taken to be distributed among the priests. [53] Like ritual texts, they were written on papyri and on temple walls, and they were probably recited as part of the rituals they accompany in temple inscriptions. [95][96], The Egyptian conception of sexuality was heavily focused on heterosexual reproduction, and homosexual acts were usually viewed with disapproval. Often they prayed in person before temple statues or in shrines set aside for their use. Some of these cult animals retained their positions for the rest of their lives, as with the Apis bull worshipped in Memphis as a manifestation of Ptah. But many festivals and other traditions of modern Egyptians, both Christian and Muslim, resemble the worship of their ancestors' gods. [36] Major gods were often involved in several types of phenomena. The most important of these ceremonies were those surrounding death, because they ensured the soul's survival beyond it. Amun, the supreme god, was increasingly seen as the final arbiter of human destiny, the true ruler of Egypt. However, these associations changed over time, and they did not mean that the god associated with a place had originated there. [66], A recurring theme in these myths is the effort of the gods to maintain maat against the forces of disorder. [88], Sex and gender were closely tied to creation and thus rebirth. [31] Commoners' perceptions of the divine may have differed from those of the priests. at Dashur (Lipke 1984, 64; Steffy 1994, 25-27, 32-36, Patch and Haldane 1990). For these reasons, he oversaw all state religious activity. Ancient Egyptian religion was a complex system of polytheistic beliefs and rituals that formed an integral part of ancient Egyptian culture. Because the sun is essential to life on earth, the first rising of Ra marked the moment of this emergence. [196] People did have less direct means of interaction. [175] Pharaohs had their own mortuary temples where rituals were performed for them during their lives and after their deaths. They worked their way up the ranks as soldiers, and were promoted for their dedication and courage. 3) Some women in upper classes worked as doctors, government officials or priestesses. Sometimes this entailed casting the practitioner or subject of a ritual in the role of a character in mythology, thus inducing the god to act toward that person as it had in the myth. Many other names have no certain meaning, even when the gods who bear them are closely tied to a single role. [123] Thus, many probably continued to worship the traditional gods in private. [206] Both these types of intervention were eventually represented by deities: Shed, who emerged in the New Kingdom to represent divine rescue from harm,[207] and Petbe, an apotropaic god from the late eras of Egyptian history who was believed to avenge wrongdoing. Each gives a different perspective on the complex process by which the organized universe and its many deities emerged from undifferentiated chaos. [77] A passage in the Coffin Texts renders the name of the funerary god Sokar as sk r, meaning "cleaning of the mouth", to link his name with his role in the Opening of the Mouth ritual,[78] while one in the Pyramid Texts says the name is based on words shouted by Osiris in a moment of distress, connecting Sokar with the most important funerary deity. [201] Thus, the time and manner of death was the main meaning of the Egyptian concept of fate, although to some extent these deities governed other events in life as well. [54], Myths are metaphors for the gods' actions, which humans cannot fully understand. Pharaohs often expanded them as part of their obligation to honor the gods, so that many temples grew to enormous size. [34] The solar vision of the afterlife, in which the deceased soul traveled with Ra on his daily journey, was still primarily associated with royalty, but could extend to other people as well. People interacted with them in temples and unofficial shrines, for personal reasons as well as for larger goals of state rites. Hymns were written to praise particular deities. [202] Morality in ancient Egypt was based on the concept of maat, which, when applied to human society, meant that everyone should live in an orderly way that did not interfere with the well-being of other people. [60] In the New Kingdom, several new funerary texts emerged, of which the best-known is the Book of the Dead. The pattern they set grew more widespread over time, so that many deities in local cult centers, like Ptah, Sekhmet, and their child Nefertum at Memphis and the Theban Triad at Thebes, were assembled into family triads. Male priests were known as hem-netjer and females as hemet-netjer (servants of the god). The few women who made themselves pharaohs, such as Hatshepsut, connected themselves with these same goddesses while adopting much of the masculine imagery of kingship. Akhenaten's changes had reversed this trend, but once the traditional religion was restored, there was a backlash. Because of the gods' multiple and overlapping roles, deities can have many epithets—with more important gods accumulating more titles—and the same epithet can apply to many deities. Nevertheless, the myth makes it clear that Osiris is murdered, and other pieces of evidence like the appearance of divine corpses in the Duat indicate that other gods die as well. [248], "Gods of Egypt" redirects here. 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