The religions of ancient Egypt and Babylonia

by A. H. Sayce

Chapters xliv. to liii. are occupied in describing how the dead man is thus preserved from “the second death.” Illustrations are drawn both from the punishments undergone by the enemies of the sun-god in the story of his passage 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 constitutes 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 formulæ 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 [pg 190] 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-god or Ptaḥ, 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 god Ptaḥ 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.

From this point onwards the Book of the Dead is purely Osirian in character. But beliefs derived from the solar cult have been allowed to mingle with the Osirian elements; thus the bark of the sun-god has been identified with the bark which carried the Osirian dead to the fields of Alu, and Osiris is even permitted to assign a place to his faithful servants in the boat of Ra instead of in the paradise over which he himself rules. And the Osirian elements themselves belong to two different periods or two different schools of thought. In the earlier chapters the paradise of Osiris is gained like the paradise of Ra, by the magical power of the words of the ritual and the offerings made by the friends of the dead; from the 125th chapter onwards the test of righteousness is a moral one; the dead man has to be acquitted by his conscience and the tribunal of Osiris before he can enter into everlasting bliss.

The bark which carried the followers of Osiris has been explained by the Pyramid texts. When the dead man had ascended to heaven, either by the ladder which rose from the earth at Hermopolis or in some other way, he found his path barred by a deep lake or canal. According to one myth, he was carried across it on the wings of the ibis Thoth, but the more general belief provided for him the boat of the ferryman Nu-Urru,[158] the prototype of the Greek Charon. The fusion of the Osirian creed with the solar cult, however, caused the boat of Nu-Urru and the bark of the sun-god to be confounded together, and accordingly three chapters (c.-cii.) have been added to that in which the boat of the Egyptian Charon is referred to, “in order to teach the luminous spirit (khu) how to enter the bark among the servants of Ra.” In the next chapter, Hathor, “the lady of the west,” is the object of prayer.

Two chapters (cv. and cvi.) are now interpolated from the ritual of Ptaḥ. They take us back to the age when offerings were made to the ka of the dead and not to the gods, and declare that abundant food should be given it “each day in Memphis.” They have little to do with the destinies of the Osirian in the paradise of Alu. These are once more resumed in the 107th chapter: the fields of Alu are described, and the life led by those who enjoy them.

With the 125th chapter we enter the “Hall of the Two Truths,” where Osiris sits on his throne of judgment, and the soul is justified or condemned for the deeds it had done in the flesh. It is no longer ceremonial, but moral purity that is required: the follower of Osiris is [pg 192] to be saved not by the words and prayers of the ritual, however correctly they may be pronounced, but by his acts and conduct in this lower world. We are transported into a new atmosphere, in which religion and morality for the first time are united in one: the teaching of the prophet has taken the place of the teaching of the priest.

All the blessings promised to the disciples of other creeds than the Osirian are now granted to the soul who has passed unscathed through the hall of judgment. Not only the fields of Alu are his, but the solar bark as well, to which the school of Heliopolis looked forward; even the old belief which confined the Ka to the narrow precincts of the tomb was not forgotten, and the 132nd chapter instructs the Osirian how to “wander at will to see his house.” Like Osiris himself, he can take part in the festival of the dead, and share in the offerings that are presented at it. Free access is allowed him to all parts of the other world: whatever heaven or hell had been imagined in the local sanctuaries of Egypt was open to him to visit as he would.

The later chapters of the Book of the Dead take us back to the earth. They are concerned with the mummy and its resting-place, with the charms and amulets which preserved the body from decay, or enabled the soul to inspire it once more with life. They form a sort of appendix, dealing rather with the beliefs and superstitions of the people, than with the ideas of the theologians, about the gods and the future life.[159]