176 
Egypt, owing to the immense power it attained when 
blended with that of Amen of Thebes, and administered 
by the most powerful priesthood the ancient world ever 
produced. Dr. Budge, however, very clearly demon- 
strates its position as the religion of the court and 
aristocracy of Egypt, as that of Osiris was the creed 
of the people. From an early period there was a 
fusion of the two creeds, and with the Theban school 
this was carried to the extreme, where Amen Ra 
assumes the function of Osiris and all the other gods 
as well, but with the fall of the ambitious hierarchy 
the old creeds once more asserted their power. This 
portion of the book is a most interesting and valuable 
account of one of the greatest religious movements of 
aticient times. 
The revival of the Heliopolitan ritual, and especially 
the teaching as to the Heaven of the victorious Osirian, 
is very fully described, and there is here matter of 
immense value. Here the deceased who has become 
justified ‘‘ becomes god the son of god,’’ he takes 
his seat by the side of God, and eats of the Tree of 
Life, which is in the midst of the Field of Peace. 
He lives on light, becomes a being of light, and, 
as Dr. Budge points out and we must add very 
quietly, that as this cult was known among the 
people of Lower Egypt until two centuries after the 
Christian era, we have here the source from which 
the writer of the Apocalypse drew his description of 
the life of the Christian who had ‘‘ overcome ”’ the 
world. There is material under the study of the 
important mother goddess cults which should 
certainly attract attention from the New Testament 
critics, for here we have the basis of the Theotokos 
controversy. This is not the place to discuss 
theology, so wé pass to the more interesting subject 
of the worship of Horus Behutet, the opponent of 
Set, with his curious guild of ‘* Blacksmiths.’’ Dr. 
Budge’s remarks on this subject are of importance, 
as they show how often history is found interwoven 
with myth. Essentially a solar myth, there is inter- 
woven with it the story of the invasion of Egypt 
from the south by a superior race who used iron or 
metal weapons against the flint weapons of the 
aborigines. To quote Dr. Budge :— 
“Tt is of course impossible to say who were the 
blacksmiths that swept over Egypt from South to 
North, but the writer believes that they represent 
the invaders in predynastic times who made their 
way from a country in the East, by way of the Red 
Sea, by some road across the eastern desert. They 
brought with them the knowledge of working in 
metals and of brickmaking, and having conquered 
the indigenous people of the South, that is those 
around Edfu, made that city the centre of their 
civilisation.”’ 
In later times the material conflict was blended with 
the mythic, and hence the confused legend of 
Ptolemaic times. Sufficient has been said to show 
the rich material Dr. Budge has collected in these two 
great volumes, but we can only dip into them in this 
review. The valuable analysis which Dr. Budge gives 
of those strange works the ‘‘ Book of the Tuat’’ and 
the ‘* Book of the Pylons ’’ will be welcome, for hither- 
t> no authoritative English description of these works 
has been accessible. The curious illustrations of the 
journey of the sun through the night hours, which are 
found on the sarcophagus of Seti I. in the Sloane 
Museum and in the royal tombs of the nineteenth 
and twentieth dynasties, certainly depict all the horrors | 
of hell to the simple and uninitiated. The works 
were, however, essentially sacerdotal, and inscribed in 
places not accessible to the people, so whatever their 
teaching might be, it did not affect the popular religion. 
Dr. Budge is probably right.in denying the theory that | 
NO. 1782, VOL. 69] 
NAT ORE 
Fic. 1.—Horus of Behutet Armed (Edfu). 
| Walwyn, M.A., F.Z.S., F.E.S. 
[DECEMBER 24, 1903 
the Eoyptians believed in eternal punishment, but they 
supplied all the material for a most elaborate illustrated 
edition of the Egyptian inferno to those who held that 
doctrine. Hence we find the early Christians giving 
such vivid descriptions of the fate of the damned. 
There are some points on which, however, we 
must differ from the author. After the very lucid 
description which he gives of the Egyptian Tuat or 
Land of Night, he gives us a most valuable excursus 
on the Hebrew Gehenna and the Babylonian Hell, 
and would attribute the Rabbinical ideas to Egyptian 
influence. Great as was the influence of Egyptian 
theology on early Christianity, the Apocalypse and 
Coptic writings, it is very doubtful if it attracted the 
Jewish mind. The Seven-headed Serpent of Revela- 
tion is the Serpent of the Week of the Babylonians 
with seven heads and tails—certainly not the seven- 
headed serpent of the Egyptians. 
In conclusion, we must give a high word of praise 
to the preparation of the work; the beautiful plates 
and illustrations, the various tables and indices, render 
From ‘‘ Gods of the Egyptians.”) 
it a work that should win the gratitude of all Egypt- 
ologists, and add still more to the writer’s reputation 
as an indefatigable worker and a painstaking scholar. 
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