NATURE 



437 



THURSDAY, MARCH 8, 1900. 



EGYPTIAN AND BABYLONIAN RELIGION 



AND MYTHOLOGY. 

 Books on E^ypt and Chaldaea. Egyptian Ideas of the 



Future Life ; Egyptian Magic. By E, A, Wallis 



Budge, M.A., Litt.D., D.Lit. 2 vols. 

 Uabylonian Religion and Mytholos^y. By L. W. King, 



M.A., F.S.A. I vol. (London : Kegan Paul, Trench, 



Triibner and Co., Ltd., 1899.) 



THE delightful certainty which characterises the 

 youth of an individual not infrequently finds its 

 analogue in the initial phases of a science. At the out- 

 set assertion is dogmatic inversely to the evidence, and 

 the flimsiest figments are made to serve as the basis of 

 the widest generalisations. Maturity brings with it a 

 curious restriction of certitude, but for this there is a 

 compensation in the knowledge that for the faith which 

 we do hold there is an adequate reason. Thus it has 

 long been the custom to regard the religion of ancient 

 Egypt as a tissue of the grossest idolatry, and this 

 amongst persons who were not, in general, ill-informed. 

 To such a view the education of the public school and 

 the university has largely contributed, and those who 

 were contented to mould their opinions upon classic 

 authorities would be apt to remember nothing more than 

 Juvenal's telling gibes, which practically epitomise the 

 creed as that of the ape and onion. Whatever the 

 poet's personal views may have been, those which the 

 exigencies of his satire led him to express are far re- 

 moved from the truth or, at least, they state it so partially 

 as to be wholly misleading ; and it may come as a 

 surprise to many to learn the magnitude of the libel. 

 As a matter of fact, the ideas and beliefs of the Egyptians 

 concerning God closely approximated to those of the 

 Hebrews, and of the Muhammadans at a later period ; 

 and they arrived at conceptions of man's immortality for 

 which we look in vain in the Jewish record, and which 

 we only re-encounter in the teachmg of the Christian 

 churches. 



Dr. Budge emphasises the fact that an exalted mono- 

 theism was the basis of the theology and religion of 

 ancient Egypt, and that it persisted throughout its 

 historic periods with a tendency ever increasingly as- 

 sertive. God was one, self-existent, immortal, invisible, 

 eternal, omniscient, almighty and inscrutable ; the creator 

 of the heavens, the earth, and of all things visible and in- 

 visible. But long as the period was during which this 

 noble creed was held, there was unquestionably a time 

 prior to its evolution when a more primitive conception 

 prevailed, and when the beliefs of the people were prob- 

 ably similar to those of existing savages : when family 

 and tribal gods were worshipped whose characteristics 

 were those of their adorers, and whom a victory or a 

 defeat raised to supremacy or relegated to oblivion. It 

 has been observed that three main elements may be 

 recognised in the Egyptian religion. A solar mono- 

 theism, or a god specially manifested in the sun ; the 

 worship of the regenerating powers of nature or the 

 adoration of ithyphallic deities ; and an anthropomorphic 

 divinity ; but the sequence in time of these phases of 

 NO. 1584, VOL. 61] 



faith is doubtful, and they ultimately became intermingled 

 in a most bewildering manner. Where such uncertainty 

 exists we must rest satisfied with a suspension of judg- 

 ment ; but it may be reasonable to assume that the less 

 exalted views were formulated before those of a higher 

 type ; that the earlier notions acquired from their 

 antiquity a sanctity which led to their retention ; and that 

 ecclesiastical conservatism was responsible for that gro- 

 tesque admixture of puerile superstitions, both in faith and 

 practice, which disfigured the higher faith to such an 

 extent as to cause strangers to regard it as the essential 

 element of that purer religion by which it had been 

 supplanted. This curious grafting of views has an apt 

 illustration in the picture symbol for the supreme being, 

 who is figured by a stone axe-head in a wooden handle, 

 a reminiscence of the time when their god was but a 

 magnified chief, and when the wielder of the biggest war- 

 axe being the person of prime consideration, an image of 

 the weapon was a recognised emblem of power and 

 sovereignty Apart from these survivals, the very piety 

 of the worshippers served to enhance the number of the 

 gods, for the sun-god, himself the type and symbol of 

 the supreme deity, found his every form, phase and attri- 

 bute deified, until so strangely complex a pantheon was 

 set up that the protogod was almost whelmed by the 

 sanctifications of himself 



In spite of this seeming multiplication of entities, the 

 unity of God is constantly reiterated ; and if, as may well 

 have been, this truth was hidden from the perception of 

 the vulgar crowd, we may believe that to the educated 

 layman, as well as to the priest, it was an ever-present 

 fact. The pure and unthinkable spirit which formed the 

 subject of their devout adoration dwelt originally in the 

 darkly-shrouded water of the primeval abyss. Thence, 

 by uttering his' own name, he evolved himself ; whilst 

 from the void, the world sprang into existence, after the 

 type which was pre-existent in the divine mind. Follow- 

 ing this creative act was the production of the germ from 

 which emerged that embodiment of the power of God, 

 the holy Ra, whose attributes were subsequently annexed 

 by that great Osiris, who for ages was the ensample and 

 comfort of aspirants to immortality. It is curious that no 

 comprehensive account of the career of Osiris has been 

 found in the Egyptian records, and that we depend upon 

 Plutarch for a connected history. This, as it is confirmed 

 by various Egyptian inscriptions, may be outlined as 

 follows :— Osiris was the offspring of Nut by Seb, and 

 was the husband of his sister Isis. As King of Egypt, 

 he advanced civilisation ; taught the art of agriculture ; 

 and exhorted men to worship the gods, both in his own 

 and other lands. On his return from foreign proselytising, 

 he was slain by the machinations of Set, who repossessed 

 himself of the body, after it had been obtained by Isis, 

 and tore it to pieces. The fragments, with a single ex- 

 ception, were recovered and buried by Isis, who instituted 

 a special festival in honour of the missing portion. By 

 divine assistance Isis obtained such a revivification of 

 Osiris that, by him, she became the mother of Horus, 

 who was, later, his father's avenger. Of the exact position 

 which in prehistoric days was occupied by Osiris we are 

 ignorant ; but, in all later times, he was regarded as a 

 being of divine origin, who was killed and mutilated by 



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