The Egypt of the Hebrews and Herodotos

by A. H. Sayce

Here is Professor Erman's translation of the commencement of the tale:—

“Once upon a time there were two brothers, born of one mother and of one father; the elder was called Anup, the younger Bata. Now Anup possessed a house and had a wife, whilst his younger [pg 026] brother lived with him as a son. He it was who wove (?) for him, and drove his cattle to the fields, who ploughed and reaped; he it was who directed all the business of the farm for him. The younger brother was a good (farmer); the like of whom was not to be found throughout the country.” One day Anup sent Bata from the field to the house to fetch seed-corn. “And he sent his younger brother,[5] and said to him: Hasten and bring me seed-corn from the village. And his younger brother found the wife of his elder brother occupied in combing her hair. And he said to her: Rise up, give me seed-corn that I may return to the field, for thus has my elder brother enjoined me, to return without delaying. The woman said to him: Go in, open the chest, that thou mayst take what thine heart desires, for otherwise my locks will fall to the ground. And the youth went within into the stable, and took thereout a large vessel, for it was his will to carry out much seed-corn. And he loaded himself with wheat and dhurra and went out with it. Then she said to him: How great is the burden in thy arms? He said to her: Two measures of dhurra and three measures of wheat make together five measures which rest on my arms. Thus he spake to her. But she spake to [pg 027] the youth and said: How great is thy strength! Well have I remarked thy power many a time. And her heart knew him.... And she stood up and laid hold of him and said unto him: Come let us celebrate an hour's repose; the most beautiful things shall be thy portion, for I will prepare for thee festal garments. Then was the youth like unto the panther of the south for rage on account of the wicked word which she had spoken to him. But she was afraid beyond all measure. And he spoke to her and said: Thou, oh woman, hast been like a mother to me and thy husband like a father, for he is older than I, so that he might have been my begetter. Wherefore this great sin that thou hast spoken unto me? Say it not to me another time, then will I this time not tell it, and no word of it shall come out of my mouth to any man at all. And he loaded himself with his burden and went out into the field. And he went to his elder brother, and they completed their day's work. And when it was evening, the elder brother returned home to his house. And his younger brother followed behind his oxen, having laden himself with all the good things of the field, and he drove his oxen before him to bring them to the stable. And behold the wife of his elder brother was afraid because of the word which she had spoken, and she took a jar of fat [pg 028] and was like to one to whom an evil-doer had offered violence, since she wished to say to her husband: Thy younger brother has offered me violence. And her husband returned home at evening, according to his daily custom, and found his wife lying stretched out and suffering from injury. She poured no water over his hands, as was her custom; she had not lighted the lights for him, so that his house was in darkness, and she lay there ill. And her husband said to her: Who has had to do with thee? Lift thyself up! She said to him: No one has had to do with me except thy younger brother, since when he came to take seed-corn for thee, he found me sitting alone and said to me, ‘Come, let us make merry an hour and repose: let down thy hair!’ Thus he spake to me; but I did not listen to him (but said), ‘See! am I not thy mother, and is not thy elder brother like a father to thee?’ Thus I spoke to him, but he did not hearken to my speech, but used force with me that I might not tell thee. Now if thou allow him to live I will kill myself.

“Then the elder brother began to rage like a panther: he sharpened his knife and took it in his hand. And the elder brother stood behind the door of the stable in order to kill the youth when he came back in the evening to bring the oxen into the stable. Now when the sun was setting and he had laden [pg 029] himself with all the good things of the field, according to his custom, he returned (to the house). And his cow that first entered the stable said to him: Beware! there stands thy elder brother before thee with his knife in order to kill thee; run away from him! So he heard what the first cow said. Then the second entered and spake likewise. He looked under the door of the stable, and saw the feet of his brother, who was standing behind the door with his knife in his hand. He threw his burden on the ground and began to run away quickly. His elder brother ran after him with his knife in his hand.”

Ra, the sun-god, however, came to the help of the innocent youth, and interposed a river full of crocodiles between him and his pursuer. All night long the two brothers stood on either side of the water; in the morning Bata convinced his brother that he had done no wrong, and reproached him for having believed that he could be guilty. Then he added: “Go home now and see after thine oxen thyself, for I will no longer stay with thee, but will go to the acacia valley.” So Anup returned to his house, put his wife to death, and sat there in solitude and sadness.

Joseph, more fortunate than Bata, rose from his prison to the highest office of state. The dreams, through which this was accomplished, were in full [pg 030] keeping with the belief of the age. Dreams even to-day play an important part in the popular faith of Egypt. In the days of the Pharaohs it was the same. Thothmes iv. cleared away the sand that had overwhelmed the Sphinx, and built a temple between its paws, in consequence of a dream in which Ra-Harmakhis had appeared to him when, wearied with hunting, he had lain down to sleep under the shadow of the ancient monument. A thousand years later Nut-Amon of Ethiopia was summoned by a dream to march into Egypt. In Greek days, when the temple of Abydos had fallen into ruin, an oracle was established in one of its deserted chambers, and those who consulted it received their answers in the “true dreams” that came to them during the night. The dreams, however, needed at times an interpreter to explain them, and of such an interpreter mention is made in a Greek inscription from the Serapeum at Memphis. At other times the dreamer himself could interpret his vision by the help of the books in which the signification of dreams had been reduced to a science.

The dreams of Pharaoh and “his two eunuchs,” however, “the chief butler” and “the chief baker,” were of a strange and novel kind, and there were no books that could explain them. Even the “magicians” and “wise men” of Egypt failed to understand the dream [pg 031] of Pharaoh. And yet, when the Hebrew captive had pointed out its meaning, no doubt remained in the mind of Pharaoh and his servants that he was right. From time immemorial the Nile had been likened to a milch-cow, and the fertilising water which it spread over the soil to the milk that sustains human life. The cow-headed goddess Hathor or Isis watched over the fertility of Egypt. It was said of her that she “caused the Nile to overflow at his due time,” and the “seven great Hathors” were the seven forms under which she was worshipped. In the seven kine, accordingly, which stood “upon the bank of the river” the Egyptian readily saw the life-giving powers of the Nile.

It needed but the word of the Pharaoh to change the Hebrew slave into an Egyptian ruler, second only to the monarch itself. His very name ceased to be Semitic, and henceforth became Zaphnath-paaneah. He even allied himself with the exclusive priesthood of Heliopolis or On, marrying Asenath, the daughter of the priest of Ra. By name and marriage, as well as by position, he was thus adopted into the ranks of the native aristocracy.

Such changes of name are not unknown to the inscriptions. From time to time we meet with the records of foreigners who had settled down in the valley of the Nile and there received new names of [pg 032] Egyptian origin. Thus a monument found at Abydos tells us of a Canaanite from Bashan called Ben-Azan, who received in Egypt the new name of Yu-pa-â and was the father of a vizier of Meneptah, the Pharaoh of the Exodus. The Hittite wife of Ramses ii. similarly adopted an Egyptian name, and the tombstones of two Karians are preserved, in which the Karian names of the dead are written in the letters of the Karian alphabet, while a hieroglyphic text is attached which gives the Egyptian names they had borne in Egypt.

The exact transcription in hieroglyphics of the Egyptian name of Joseph is still doubtful. But it is plain that it contains the Egyptian words pa-ânkh, “the life,” or “the living one,” which seem to be preceded by the particle nti, “of.” The term pa-ânkh is sometimes applied to the Pharaoh, and since Kames, the last king of the seventeenth dynasty, assumed the title of Zaf-n-to, “nourisher of the land,” it is possible that in Zaphnath-paaneah we may see an Egyptian Zaf-nti-pa-ânkh, “nourisher of the Pharaoh.” But the final solution of the question must be left to future research.

It is now more easy to explain the cry which was raised before Joseph when he went forth from the presence of the Pharaoh with the golden chain around his neck and the royal signet upon his finger. [pg 033] “Abrêk!” they shouted before him, and an explanation of the word has been vainly sought in the Egyptian language. It really is of Babylonian origin. In the primitive non-Semitic language of Chaldæa abrik signified “a seer” or “soothsayer,” and the term was borrowed by the Semitic Babylonians under the two forms of abrikku and abarakku. Joseph was thus proclaimed a seer, and his exaltation was due to his power of foreseeing the future. It was as a divinely-inspired seer that the subjects of the Pharaoh were to reverence him.