Egyptian mythology gods. Features of Egyptian mythology

Egyptian mythology is one of the most ancient. It began to form around 5 thousand years BC, long before the emergence of a developed civilization. Each region developed its own pantheon of goddesses and gods, its own myths.

IN Egyptian mythology The cult of the dead and the other world played a huge role. The Book of the Dead tells about the afterlife, which was written from the period of the New Kingdom to the end of the history of Ancient Egypt.

A characteristic feature of Egyptian mythology is the deification of animals. Many goddesses and gods appear either as an animal or as a human being with the head of an animal or bird. This feature indicates the deep archaism of mythology ancient egypt, since it goes back to primitive totemism - the belief that people (or different tribes) descended from certain animals or birds.

Egyptian Mythology: The god Ra sails through the underworld, Egyptian mythology has changed over time. The dynasties that ruled the country played a large role in the changes. They brought to the forefront the deity who patronized their family. The pharaohs of the 5th dynasty of the Old Kingdom brought Ra, the sun god, to the first place, since they came from Heliopolis (the “solar city”).

During the Middle Kingdom, the main god was Amun from the city of Thebes. From the end of the 3rd millennium BC. Osiris, the god of the dead, plays a special role.

Myths of ancient Egypt

Egyptian Mythology: Goddess Isis According to ancient Egyptian mythology, the world from the very beginning was a bottomless abyss of water called Nun. From the primordial chaos, gods emerged who created the earth, sky, people, plants and animals. The sun god Ra was born from a lotus flower and illuminated the earth with his light.

The first nine gods became the rulers of Egypt - the pharaohs. People understood summer heat and drought as the wrath of the solar deity, who punishes people for deviating from traditions.

The struggle between light and darkness in Egyptian mythology

A large cycle of myths of ancient Egypt is dedicated to the struggle of the Sun with the forces of darkness. The most terrible enemy of the gods is the monstrous serpent Apep, who reigns in the underworld. The sun god Ra goes to the underworld along the waters of the “underground Nile” and defeats the serpent.

The son of the god Ra, Horus, in the form of a falcon, defeats not only all enemies who take the form of crocodiles and hippos, but also the leader of evil forces - the demon Set.

Myths about Osiris

Egyptian Mythology: Osiris one of the most famous gods of ancient Egyptian mythology is Osiris. Osiris was considered the god of agriculture, wine, grapes, as well as all the life-giving forces of nature.

Osiris was one of the “dying and rising” gods who personify the change of seasons, as well as the grains that, when germinating, give life to ears of corn and a new harvest.

At first Osiris ruled over all of Egypt, and the times of his reign were abundant and fertile. But his treacherous younger brother, Set, planned to kill him and take away his power.

The sister (and at the same time wife) of Osiris, Isis, searches for the body of her murdered husband for a long time, after which she gives birth to his son, Horus. When Horus grows up, he defeats Set and brings his father back to life. However, Osiris, after returning to the world of people, does not want to remain in it. Instead, he chooses the afterlife, in which he becomes the ruler and judge, weighing on the scales the sins that people committed during life.

The Egyptians believed that if the funeral ritual was strictly observed, then later they, like Osiris, could be reborn for eternal life.

Nile - the pearl of Egypt

Egyptian mythology: god HorusIt is impossible to imagine Egypt without myths about the Nile, because this river gave rise to one of the most ancient human civilizations. It was thanks to the Nile that the Egyptians managed to build a developed agricultural society.

The Nile in ancient Egyptian mythology flowed not only through the Earth - the world of people - but also through Heaven and the underworld. The Egyptians imagined the “earthly” Nile in the form of the god Hapi, who with his floods saturated the soil with fertile silt and fed people.

The river was inhabited by good and evil spirits who took the form of animals: crocodiles, hippos, frogs, snakes, scorpions.

Myths of Egypt in neighboring countries

The myths of ancient Egypt widely penetrated into neighboring countries, including Ancient Rome, where Isis was especially revered. In Isis, many Romans saw the Great Goddess - the mother of all things. At the same time, this image evoked conflicting feelings - the Roman authorities tried to fight the dominance of “alien” deities, whose cults began to supplant the ancient Roman deities themselves.

In our time, Egyptian mythology, along with Greco-Roman mythology, serves as a rich source for literature and painting. Filmmakers have repeatedly approached her. The famous director Roland Emmerich's film "Stargate" and the science fiction television series of the same name, which was released during
ten years.

edited news Desmond Miles - 9-04-2011, 00:01

A figurine of Anubis in the form of a man with the head of a wild dog. OK. 600 BC e. (XXVI Dynasty)

Figurines of Thoth in the form of a baboon and an ibis. OK. 600 BC e. (XXVI Dynasty)

Palette of King Narmer. OK. 3100 BC e. (0 dynasty)

Abydos: Temple of Seti I, relief depicting the king in front of the statue of Amun. OK. 1285 BC e.

The birth of the sun from a lotus flower.

God Amun-Ra

Heaven in the form of a cow

He lures Tefnut to Egypt

Ra in the form of a cat kills the serpent Apep

Cult figurine of a deity in the form of a falcon. OK. 500 BC e. (XXVII Dynasty)

Horus Bekhdetsky killing a crocodile

The priest waters the seedlings that have sprouted from the image of Osiris

Pharaoh cuts the first sheaf at the Harvest Festival

Tomb of Inherkau (TT 359): II burial chamber, the deceased worships a snake. OK. 1140 BC e.

Figurine of the god Thoth in the form of a baboon. 1st millennium BC e.

The sources for studying the mythology of Ancient Egypt are characterized by incomplete and unsystematic presentation. The nature and origin of many myths are reconstructed on the basis of later texts. The main monuments that reflected the mythological ideas of the Egyptians are various religious texts: hymns and prayers to the gods, records of funeral rites on the walls of tombs. The most significant of them are the “Pyramid Texts” - the oldest texts of funeral royal rituals, carved on the walls of the interior of the pyramids of the pharaohs of the V and VI dynasties of the Old Kingdom (26-23 centuries BC); “Texts of sarcophagi”, preserved on sarcophagi from the Middle Kingdom era (21-18 centuries BC), “Book of the Dead” (see figure) - compiled from the period of the New Kingdom to the end of the history of Ancient Egypt (see. Fig.), collections of funeral texts. Mythological ideas are also reflected in such texts as “The Book of the Cow”, “The Book of Vigil Hours”, “Books of the Underworld”, “The Book of Breathing”, “Amduat”, etc. Significant material is provided by records of dramatic mysteries, which were performed during religious holidays and coronation celebrations of the pharaohs by priests, and in some cases by the pharaoh himself, who delivered recorded speeches on behalf of the gods. Of great interest are magical texts, conspiracies and spells, which are often based on episodes from legends about the gods, inscriptions on statues, steles, etc., and iconographic material. The source of information about Egyptian mythology is also the works of ancient authors: Herodotus, who visited Egypt in the 5th century. BC e., Plutarch (1st-2nd centuries AD), who left a detailed work “On Isis and Osiris”, etc.

E. m. began to form in the 6th-4th millennium BC. e., long before the emergence of class society (see map). Each region (nome) develops its own pantheon and cult of gods, embodied in heavenly bodies, stones, trees, animals, birds, snakes, etc. The nome itself is also personified in the image of a special deity; for example, the goddess of the Hermopolis nome was considered to be Unut, who was revered in the form of a hare. Later, local deities were usually grouped in the form of a triad led by the demiurge god, the patron of nome, around whom cycles of mythological legends were created (for example, the Theban triad - the sun god Amon, his wife Mut - the goddess of the sky, their son Khonsu - the god of the moon; the Memphian - Ptah, his wife Sekhmet - the goddess of war, their son Nefertum - the god of vegetation, etc.). Female deities, as a rule, had the functions of a mother goddess (especially Mut, Isis). The firmament was usually represented in the form of a cow with a body covered with stars, but sometimes it was personified in the image of a woman - the goddess Nut, who, bent in an arc, touches the ground with the ends of her fingers and toes. “Mighty is your heart, O Great One, who has become the sky. You fill every place with your beauty. The whole earth lies before you - you have embraced it, you have surrounded the earth and all things with your hands,” says the “Pyramid Texts.” There were ideas according to which the sky is a water surface, the heavenly Nile, along which the sun flows around the earth during the day. There is also the Nile underground, along which the sun, having descended beyond the horizon, floats at night. The embodiment of the earth in some nomes was the god Geb, in others - Aker. The Nile, which flowed on earth, was personified in the image of the god Hapi, who contributed to the harvest with his beneficial floods. The Nile itself was also inhabited by good and evil deities in the form of animals: crocodiles, hippopotamuses, frogs, scorpions, snakes, etc. The fertility of the fields was controlled by the goddess - the mistress of bins and barns, Renenutet, revered in the form of a snake that appears on the field during the harvest, ensuring the thoroughness of harvesting. The grape harvest depended on the vine god Shai.

An important role in E. m. was played by the idea of the afterlife as a direct continuation of the earthly one, but only in the grave. Her the necessary conditions- preserving the body of the deceased (hence the custom of mummifying corpses), providing housing for him (tomb), food (funeral gifts and sacrifices brought by the living). Later, ideas arise that the dead (that is, their ba, soul) go out during the day sunlight, fly up to heaven to the gods, wander through the underworld (duat). The essence of man was thought of in the inextricable unity of his body, souls (there were believed to be several of them: ka, ba; the Russian word “soul,” however, is not an exact correspondence to the Egyptian concept), name, shadow. A soul wandering through the underworld is in wait for all sorts of monsters, from which you can escape with the help of special spells and prayers. Osiris, together with other gods, administers the afterlife judgment over the deceased (the 125th chapter of the “Book of the Dead” is specially dedicated to him). In the face of Osiris, psychostasia occurs: the weighing of the heart of the deceased on scales balanced by truth (the image of the goddess Maat or her symbols). The sinner was devoured by the terrible monster Amt (a lion with the head of a crocodile), the righteous man came to life for happy life in the fields of Iaru. He could have been acquitted at the trial of Osiris, according to the so-called. “Negative Confession”, contained in the 125th chapter of the “Book of the Dead” (a list of sins that the deceased did not commit), only the submissive and patient in earthly life, the one who did not steal, did not encroach on temple property, did not rebel, did not speak evil against the king, etc., as well as “pure in heart” (“I am pure, pure, pure,” the deceased claims at the trial).

The most characteristic feature of E. m. is the deification of animals, which arose in ancient times and especially intensified in later periods history of Egypt. Deities embodied in animals were initially generally considered patrons of hunting; with the domestication of animals, some became deities of pastoralists. The most revered animals - incarnations of various deities included the bull (Apis, Mnevis, Buhis, Bata) and cow (Hathor, Isis), ram (Amon and Khnum), snake, crocodile (Sebek), cat (Bast), lion (incarnation many gods: Tefnut, Sekhmet, Hathor, etc.), jackal (Anubis (see figure)), falcon (Horus), ibis (Thoth; the arrival of the ibis-Thoth in Egypt was associated with the floods of the Nile), etc. Later, anthropomorphization took place pantheon, however, zoomorphic features in the appearance of deities were not completely supplanted and were usually combined with anthropomorphic ones. For example, Bast was depicted as a woman with a cat’s head, Thoth as a man with the head of an ibis, etc. (see figure)

Gods in the forms of bulls and cows were revered in many nomes. One demotic papyrus records the myth that at first all the gods and goddesses were bulls and cows with wool of different colors. Then, at the behest of the supreme god, all the bulls were incarnated into one black bull, and all the cows - into one black cow. The cult of the bull, which in ancient times was probably associated with the veneration of the tribal leader, with the emergence of the ancient Egyptian state began to move closer to the cult of the pharaoh. In early texts the king was called a "calf". On the palette of King Narmer (Menes?) (c. 3000 BC) (see picture) the pharaoh in the form of a bull destroys the fortress of the enemy (Lower Egypt). During the festival of Heb-sed (the thirtieth anniversary of the pharaoh), a bull's tail was tied to the back of the king's clothes. In Memphis, and then throughout Egypt, a black bull with white markings was considered the incarnation of the god Apis. Both good and evil deities were embodied in the form of snakes. Ra was considered the head of all enemies of the sun huge snake Apep, personifying darkness and evil. At the same time, the goddess of fertility Renenutet, the goddess - the guardian of the cemeteries Meritseger, Isis and Nephthys - the protectors of Osiris and, therefore, any deceased, the goddess Uto - the patroness of Lower Egypt, the guardian of Ra and the pharaoh, etc., were revered in the form of a snake.

With the development of the ancient Egyptian state, mythological ideas changed. The cults of numerous local deities retained their importance, but the veneration of some of them spread beyond the boundaries of individual nomes and even acquired general Egyptian significance. With the establishment of the Fifth Dynasty of the Old Kingdom, which originated from the city of Heliopolis, the center of the veneration of Ra, he became the main deity of Egypt. During the era of the Middle Kingdom and especially since the reign of the XVIII (Theban) dynasty of the New Kingdom, another sun god, the Theban Amon, was established as the main god (the pharaohs of the Middle and New Kingdoms came from Thebes). Osiris, as the god of the dead, displaces from the end of the 3rd millennium BC. e. ancient god- the patron of the dead Anubis - the jackal always scurrying around the cemetery (who turned into a god - the guardian of the necropolis and the protector of Osiris in the mysteries dedicated to him), as well as the Abydos god of the dead Khentiamenti, having adopted the epithet “first in the West” (that is, “first of the dead”). The rise of new religious and political centers and the development of theological thought were accompanied by a process of fusion and syncretization of gods. For example, Ra, Montu, Ptah, Horus are identified with Amon; with Ra - Atum, Horus, Amon, Osiris, Ptah, etc. (see figure)

The most significant cycles of myths of Ancient Egypt are the myths about the creation of the world, about the solar deities and about Osiris. Initially, it was believed that the world was chaos, a primordial abyss of water - Nun. Out of chaos came the gods who created the earth, sky, people, animals and plants. The first god was the sun, usually acting as a demiurge. One of the myths says that a hill emerged from the waters, on which a lotus flower blossomed (see figure), and from there a child (the sun - Ra) appeared (see figure), “illuminating the earth that was in darkness.” In other myths, the appearance of the sun is associated with an egg laid on a hill that rose from chaos by the bird “the great Gogotun.” There was a myth according to which the sun was born in the form of a calf by a huge cow - the sky. (The Pyramid Texts speak of Ra, the “golden calf born of heaven.” See figure). Along with this, there were ideas about the goddess of the sky - a woman who gives birth to the sun in the morning, swallows it in the evening - as a result, night comes - and the next morning gives birth to it again. (Remnants of the idea that conception occurs from swallowing have also been preserved by folklore: in “The Tale of Two Brothers,” Bata’s unfaithful wife conceived by accidentally swallowing a wood chip). In some myths, male deities are the ancestors. In the Heliopolis myth, the god Atum, identified with the sun - Ra, who emerged from chaos - Nuna (“who created himself”), fertilized himself by swallowing his own seed, and gave birth, spitting out of his mouth, the first gods, a pair of Shu and Tefnut (the god of air and goddess of moisture). They, in turn, produced a second couple: the earth god Heb and the sky goddess Nut, who gave birth to Isis and Nephthys, Osiris and Set. These gods make up the famous Heliopolitan "nine" - the Ennead, revered throughout Egypt and invariably present in religious texts. The gods of the Ennead were considered the first kings of Egypt. In the Memphis myth of the creation of the world, dating back to the Old Kingdom, the local god Ptah is the demiurge. Unlike Atum, Ptah, who created the first eight gods, first conceived creation in his heart (the heart is the “seat of thought”) and called their names with his tongue (Ptah created with “tongue and heart,” that is, thought and word). In the same way, he created the whole world: earth and sky, people, animals, plants, cities, temples, crafts and arts, and established the cults of the gods. In this myth, Ptah is endowed with all the attributes of a king. During the period of the New Kingdom with the rise of the XVIII (Theban) dynasty (16-14 centuries BC), the Theban god Amon, identified with Ratheban, was established as the demiurge, who is called the king of all gods: “Father of fathers and all gods, who raised the sky and who established the land. People came out of his eyes, gods became gods from his mouth. King, may he live, may he live, may he be prosperous, the head of all gods,” says the “Great Hymn to Amon.” The pharaoh, called his son, is identified with Amon. Is another myth sanctifying the divinely approved power of the king, which is given in the political treatise - the teaching of the Heracleopolis king Akhtoy to his son Merikara (X Dynasty, 22nd century BC) also characteristic of the developed Egyptian society? It says that people - “the flock of God” - originated from the body of the creator god (whose name is not mentioned) as his exact likeness. For them, he created heaven and earth out of chaos, air for breathing, animals, birds and fish for food. According to other myths (apparently later), people arose from the tears of Ra or were sculpted on a potter's wheel by Khnum.

The myths about the solar gods are closely related to the myths about the creation of the world. Solar myths reflect two groups of ideas: about the change of seasons (the more ancient ones) and about the struggle of the sun with darkness and evil, personified in the images of monsters and various terrible animals, especially snakes. The myth of the return of the sun's eye, Ra's daughter Tefnut, is associated with the cessation of the sultry wind of the Khamsin desert, which brings drought, and the revival of vegetation. Tefnut (sometimes also called Hathor), having quarreled with Ra, who reigned in Egypt, in the form of a lioness retired to Nubia, to the region of Bugem (apparently, in the minds of the Egyptians, her departure caused the onset of drought). In order for her to return to Egypt, Ra sends Shu and Thoth, who have taken the form of baboons, for her to Nubia. They must return Tefnut to her father, enticing her with singing and dancing (see picture). In an earlier version of the myth, she is lured to Egypt by the hunting god Onuris. Returning, Tefnut marries his brother Shu, which foreshadows the birth of new rich fruits by nature. The holiday of the return of Ra's beloved daughter was also celebrated in historical period. In Egyptian calendars it was called “the day of the vine and the fullness of the Nile.” The population of Egypt greeted the goddess with songs and dances. “Dendera is filled with intoxicating drink, wonderful wine. Thebes is filled with rejoicing, and all Egypt rejoices. Hathor goes to his house. Oh how sweet it is when she comes!” says the hymn.

At the hottest time of the year, the sun was believed to burn with anger at people. Associated with this idea is the myth of the punishment of people for their sins by order of Ra. When Ra grew old (“his bones were made of silver, his flesh of gold, his hair of pure lapis lazuli”), people ceased to revere the god-king and even “plotted evil deeds against him.” Then Ra gathered a council of the oldest gods, led by the progenitor Nun (or Atum), at which it was decided to punish the people. The sun's eye, the beloved daughter of Ra, called Sekhmet or Hathor in myth, was cast upon them. The goddess in the form of a lioness began to kill and devour people, their destruction took such proportions that Ra decided to stop her. However, the goddess, enraged by the taste of blood, did not calm down. Then they cunningly gave her red beer, and she, drunk, fell asleep and forgot about revenge. Ra, having proclaimed Hebe as his deputy on earth, climbed onto the back of a heavenly cow and from there continued to rule the world.

A myth is associated with the period when the heat of the sun weakens, in which Ra is bitten by a snake sent by Isis, who wanted to know his secret name (the Egyptians believed that knowledge of the name gives power over its bearer). Only Isis, “great of enchantment,” “mistress of sorcery,” who knows a conspiracy against a snake bite, can heal Ra. As a reward, she demands that Ra tell her his secret name. Ra fulfills the condition, and Isis heals him.

The struggle of the sun with the forces of darkness is reflected in many myths. One of the most terrible enemies of Ra is their ruler underworld the huge serpent Apep. The myth tells that during the day, Ra sails, illuminating the earth, along the heavenly Nile in the barge Manjet, in the evening he sails to the gates of the underworld, and, having boarded the night barge Mesektet, sails with his retinue along the underground Nile. However, Apep, wanting to prevent Ra's voyage and destroy him, drinks the water of the Nile. A struggle begins between Ra and his entourage and Apep, victory in which invariably remains with Ra: Apep has to spew out the water back. Ra continues on his way so that in the morning he will again appear on the heavenly Nile. There was also a myth according to which Pa-sun in the form of a red cat under the sacred sycamore tree of the city of Heliopolis defeated a huge serpent (Apopos) and cut off his head (see figure).

One of the most striking and fully preserved myths about the struggle of the sun with enemies is the myth of Mount Bekhdet. Horus of Bekhdet, considered the son of Ra, was himself revered as a solar deity, embodied in the image of a falcon (see figure). In this myth, Horus acts not only as the son of Ra, but also as Ra himself, merging with him into one syncretic deity Ra-Garahuti (Garahuti means “Horus of both horizons”). The myth tells how Horus, accompanying the boat of Ra sailing along the Nile, defeats all the enemies of the great god, who turned into crocodiles and hippopotamuses (see figure). Horus, the son of Isis, joins Horus of Bekhdet, and together they pursue the fleeing enemies. The leader of the enemies, Seth, personifying all monsters, is also destroyed. The origin of the myth dates back to the beginning of copper processing in Egypt (according to one of the texts, Horus struck a crocodile with a harpoon made from an ingot of copper given to him by Isis). During the formation of the ancient Egyptian state, the victory of Horus was interpreted as the victory of Upper Egypt in the struggle for the unification of the country, and Horus began to be revered as the patron god of royal power.

The third main cycle of myths of Ancient Egypt is associated with Osiris. The cult of Osiris is associated with the spread of agriculture in Egypt. He is the god of the productive forces of nature (in the Book of the Dead he is called grain, in the Pyramid Texts he is the god of the vine), withering and resurrecting vegetation. So, sowing was considered the funeral of the grain - Osiris, the emergence of shoots was perceived as his rebirth, and the cutting of ears during the harvest was perceived as the killing of God. These functions of Osiris are reflected in an extremely widespread legend describing his death and rebirth. Osiris, who reigned happily in Egypt, was treacherously killed by his younger brother, the evil Set. Osiris’s sisters Isis (who is also his wife) and Nephthys search for the body of the murdered man for a long time, and when they find it, they mourn. Isis conceives a son, Horus, from her dead husband. Having matured, Horus enters into a fight with Set; at the court of the gods, with the help of Isis, he achieves recognition of himself as the only rightful heir of Osiris. Having defeated Set, Horus resurrects his father. However, Osiris, not wanting to stay on earth, becomes the king of the underworld and the supreme judge of the dead. The throne of Osiris on earth passes to Horus. (In another version of the myth, the resurrection of Osiris is associated with the annual floods of the Nile, which are explained by the fact that Isis, mourning Osiris, after the “night of tears” fills the river with her tears.) Already in the era of the Old Kingdom, living pharaohs are considered as “servants of Horus” (which is intertwined with ideas about Mount Bekhdet) and the successor to his power, and the dead are identified with Osiris. The pharaoh, thanks to a magical funeral rite, comes to life after death in the same way as Osiris came to life. Since the era of the Middle Kingdom, not only the pharaoh, but also every deceased Egyptian has been identified with Osiris, and in funeral texts the name “Osiris” must be placed before the name of the deceased. This “democratization” of ideas about Osiris after the fall of the Old Kingdom is associated with the strengthening of the nobility and the emergence of a layer of wealthy commoners in the end. 3rd millennium BC e. The cult of Osiris becomes the center of all funeral beliefs. It was believed that every Egyptian, like Osiris, would be reborn to an eternal afterlife if all funeral rituals were followed.

Myths associated with Osiris are reflected in numerous rituals. At the end of the last winter month "Khoyak" - the beginning of the first month of spring "Tibi" the mysteries of Osiris were performed, during which the main episodes of the myth about him were reproduced in dramatic form. Priestesses in the images of Isis and Nephthys depicted the search, mourning and burial of the god. Then the “great battle” took place between Horus and Set. The drama ended with the erection of the “djed” pillar dedicated to Osiris, symbolizing the rebirth of God and, indirectly, of all nature. In the predynastic period, the holiday ended with a struggle between two groups of mystery participants: one of them represented summer, and the other winter. Summer always won (the resurrection of nature). After the unification of the country under the rule of the rulers of Upper Egypt, the nature of the mysteries changes. Now two groups are fighting, one of which is in the clothes of Upper Egypt, and the other - of Lower Egypt. Victory, naturally, remains with the group symbolizing Upper Egypt. During the days of the Mysteries of Osiris, dramatized rites of coronation of the pharaohs were also celebrated. During the mystery, the young pharaoh acted as Horus, the son of Isis, and the deceased king was portrayed as Osiris sitting on the throne.

The character of Osiris as the god of vegetation was reflected in another cycle of rituals. In a special room of the temple, a clay likeness of the figure of Osiris was erected, which was sown with grain. For the holiday of Osiris, his image was covered with green shoots, which symbolized the rebirth of the god. In the drawings, the mummy of Osiris is often seen with shoots sprouted from it, which are watered by the priest (see figure).

The idea of Osiris as the god of fertility was also transferred to the pharaoh, who was considered the magical focus of the country’s fertility and therefore participated in all the main rituals of an agricultural nature: with the onset of the rise of the Nile, he threw a scroll into the river - a decree that the beginning of the flood had arrived; the first to solemnly begin preparing the soil for sowing (the mace of the beginning of the Old Kingdom with the image of a pharaoh loosening the ground with a hoe has been preserved); cut the first sheaf at the harvest festival (see picture); for the whole country he made a thanksgiving sacrifice to the goddess of the harvest Renenutet and the statues of the dead pharaohs after completing field work.

The wide spread of the cult of Osiris was also reflected in ideas about Isis. Revered as the loving sister and selflessly devoted wife of Osiris, caring mother baby Horus and at the same time a great sorceress (the myth of Ra and the snake, versions of the myth according to which Osiris was revived by Isis herself, etc.), in the Greco-Roman era she turned into the pan-Egyptian great mother goddess, and her cult spread far beyond the borders of Egypt (see picture).

R. I. Rubinstein

Many of the characters of E. M. were revered in neighboring countries, in particular in Kush (Ancient Nubia), which was under Egyptian rule for a long time. The state god of Kush was Amun, his oracles elected the king. The cult of Horus developed in numerous local forms, penetrating Kush back in the era of the Old Kingdom. The myths about Isis, Osiris and Horus were popular, and Isis was considered the patroness of royal power (the queen mother was compared and identified with her); the place of Osiris was often taken by local deities (Apedemak, Arensnupis, Dedun, Mandulis, Sebuimeker). Ra, Onuris, Thoth (see figure), Ptah, Khnum, Hapi, Hathor were also revered in Kush (in the myth about her journey to Nubia, the god who returned her to Egypt was identified with Shu Arensnupis). The inhabitants of Kush also adopted many of the Egyptian ideas about the afterlife and the judgment that Osiris administers over the dead.

E. E. Kormysheva (Minkovskaya)

The mythological views of Ancient Egypt were widely reflected in architecture, art, and literature. In and around Egyptian temples there were sculptural images of deities, thought of as “bodies” in which these deities were embodied. The idea that the dead should have a home led to the construction of special tombs: mastabas, pyramids, rock crypts. Tombs and temples were decorated with reliefs and paintings on mythological themes. In case of damage or destruction of the mummified body of the deceased, a portrait statue of him (along with the mummy, intended to be a receptacle for his ba and ka) was placed in the tomb. Paintings and reliefs in tombs were supposed to be created for the deceased familiar surroundings: they depicted his house, family members, festivals, servants and slaves in the fields and in workshops, etc. Figurines of servants engaged in various types of agricultural, craft work, and servicing the deceased were also placed in the tombs. In the burials of the New Kingdom era in large quantities the so-called Ushabti, special figurines, usually in the form of a swaddled mummy. It was believed that the deceased magic spells He will revive them and they will work for him in the afterlife.

Religious and magical literature, which depicted many of the mythological ideas of the Egyptians, had high literary merits. Mythological subjects are widely reflected in fairy tales. For example, in the fairy tale “Snake Island” (“Shipwrecked”) there is a huge snake that can incinerate a person with its breath, but can also save him and predict the future. This image arose under the influence of ideas about snake gods. In another tale, the god Ra appears to Reddedet, the wife of the priest Rauser, in the form of her husband, and from this marriage three twins are born - children of the sun, the founders of a new dynasty of pharaohs. Under the influence of the myth of Osiris, a fairy tale was created about two brothers Bata and Anubis, in which the falsely accused Bata dies and then comes to life again with the help of Anubis (the features of the god Bata, the bull, are also preserved in the image of Bata). In the fairy tale “On Falsehood and Truth,” the younger brother blinds the elder (whose name is Osiris) and takes possession of his goods, but Osiris’s son Horus avenges his father and restores justice. The tale of the wise young man Sa-Osiris (his name means “Son of Osiris”) describes the afterlife, where he leads his father, and the judgment of the dead.

Lit.: Korostovtsev M. A., Religion of Ancient Egypt, M., 1976, Mathieu M. E., Ancient Egyptian myths. [Research and translations of texts with commentary], M., 1956; Frantsov G.P., Scientific atheism, Izbr. works, M., 1972; Bonnet H., Reallexikon der dgyptischen Rehgionsgeschichte, B., 1952; Kees H., Der Götterglaube im Alten Agypten, 2 Aufl., B., 1956; his, Totenglauben und Jenseitsvorstellungen der alten Agypter, B., 1956; Erman A., Die Religion der Agypter, B., 1934; Cerny J., Ancient Egyptian religion, L., ; Vandier J., La religion égyptienne, P., 1949; Drioton E., La religion йgyptienne, in: Histoire des religions, t. 3, pt. l, P, 1955; Morenz S., Dgyptische Religion, Stuttg., ; Breasted J. H., Development of religion and thought in ancient Egypt, N. Y., 1912.

Three “stones of fate” - the Nile, the Sun and the posthumous cult - became, like three whales, a pillar of inviolability Egyptian mythology. It is not only one of the most striking mythological systems created by the civilizations of Mesopotamia, Ancient Egypt, the Aegean, China, India, America and others, but also ranks first with Sumer in its antiquity. The birthplace of the civilization that created the amazing world of divine anthropomorphic images with animal heads is the African continent. Since the essence of any mythological-religious system cannot be understood without knowledge about the origin of its creators, geographical, climatic and social conditions, in which it was created and developed, references to them are also contained in this brief overview of the history of the emergence and development of Egyptian mythology.

In ancient times, Egypt was the name given to the narrow valley of the Nile River, starting from its first threshold, and the vast delta that flows into the Mediterranean Sea in seven channels. The ancient Egyptians associated the concept of top with the south, and bottom with the north, so the Nile Valley, the headwaters of which were in the south, was called Upper Egypt, and the delta - Lower. The Egyptians gave their country the name Kemet - “Black”, based on the color of the soil moistened by the waters of the Nile, and the surrounding hot sands - “Red Country”. The Greeks called this country Egypt after the name of its ancient capital - Hi-kupta (White Wall), founded by the unifier of Egypt Menes (in Greek vowel - Egypt). Subsequently, this city received the name Memphis. The Arabs called this country Masr, the Syrians and Assyrians called it Musri, and the Jews called it Mizraim. The Egyptian preposition "m" means "from", and Asra, Asar or Usir is the name of the great god of fertility and the underworld Osiris in Greek vowel. Thus, the Arabic "el-Masri" can be translated as "descended from Osiris."

The Nile rolled its waters through the hot desert, which knew neither rain nor snow, did not hear the rumble of thunder and did not see the brilliance of lightning. The river, fed by lakes and rains in tropical Sudan, at certain times of the year flooded the land that had dried out under the scorching rays of the sun and, retreating, left fertile silt on it. Where there had previously been water, shoots of flax, barley, and wheat appeared, giving the inhabitants of the country abundant harvests, which were collected through a system of dams and canals built over time that directed the destructive force of the spill in the right direction. "This granary" ancient world forced Rome to starve when in one year or another the Nile water was either too low or too high.”

Having traveled to Egypt, the great ancient historian Herodotus briefly and expressively called Egypt “the gift of the Nile.” The second chapter of the author's historical work is entirely devoted to a description of the geographical, climatic and economic conditions of this country, and the religious and scientific achievements of its inhabitants. According to the priests who introduced Herodotus to Egyptian history and customs, the Egyptians were the first “who established the length of the year, dividing it into twelve parts,” the first who named twelve gods, whose names were later borrowed by the Hellenes, the first “who began to erect altars to the gods , statues and temples and carve images in stone.” Herodotus agreed with the priests, but the antiquity of Egypt surpassed the most daring attempts of antiquity to peer into its past. K. Keram, in his fascinating book “Gods, Tombs, Scientists,” writes that Egypt “was already old when the first meetings on the Capitol laid the foundation for the policy of the Roman power. It was ancient and covered by sands already in those days when the Germans and Celts hunted bears in the forests of Northern Europe. Its remarkable culture already existed when the first Egyptian dynasty was just beginning to rule - from that time we can talk about the beginning of the reliable history of Egypt, and when the twenty-sixth dynasty died out, there was still half a millennium left before the beginning of our era.”

No written evidence of the predynastic culture of Egypt has reached our time. The most ancient inscriptions carved on stone date back to the period when the lands of Upper and Lower Egypt were united into a single state with centralized power. However, the oldest settled population appeared in the Nile Valley already at the end of the 6th millennium BC. e. It was represented by people from the tribes of the Sahara, the Libyan Desert and areas of modern Ethiopia. From the fusion of these ethnic groups, the Egyptian nation gradually took shape. The oldest known settlements of Neolithic farmers and pastoralists in the Nile Valley can be dated back to the turn of the 6th-5th millennia BC. e. The only traces by which one can get an idea of the development of mythological and religious views of these ancient times are preserved in the form of meager and often incomprehensible lines of written monuments, in elements of already modified rituals, similar to the rituals of the peoples of the African continent.

The Nile floods cut off one ancient Egyptian settlement from another for several months. Each settlement of that time was organized as a mini-state: with its own economy, its own leader, its own cult, its own idea of deity. Traces of this original pattern of settlement in Egypt were preserved in the new structure of a united Egypt, where the nome acted as a territorial unit of the country. Since the most ancient period of the development of human society is characterized by belief in supernatural descent from an animal, bird, tree, flower, etc., that is, in descent from a totem ancestor, it is not surprising that each nome continued to maintain the cult of its sacred animal and its sacred tree or plants. For example, Esne, the capital of the 3rd nome of Upper Egypt, was called Latopolis by the Greeks, since the inhabitants of these places worshiped the sacred fish Lato, numerous mummies of which were found there. The city of Kasa of the 17th nome was called by the Greeks Kinopolis - “the city of the dog”, because its inhabitants worshiped Anubis, etc.

Written monuments that help to understand the essence of the mythological and religious views of the ancient Egyptians are preserved in the form of inscriptions on the internal walls of pyramids, obelisks, temples in grottoes and caves, on countless statues, sarcophagi, columns, reliefs and paintings. When the secret of the hieroglyphs was revealed by J.-F. Champollion, the world got the opportunity to get acquainted with the culture and religion of Ancient Egypt. The remains of the oldest chronicle on the so-called Palermo Stone gave a brief listing of the reigning pharaohs from the predynastic period to the V dynasty. The largest military campaigns and catastrophic floods of the Nile were also mentioned there. In the IV-III centuries BC. e. The Egyptian priest Mer-ne-Thuti (Manetho) wrote the essay “Egyptica,” which outlines the history of Ancient Egypt from ancient times. Interesting evidence was obtained from various private and public archives, of which especially noteworthy is the rich archive from El Amarna, the capital of Pharaoh Akhenaten.

One of the main sources of information about the mythological and religious ideas of the ancient Egyptians are the so-called “Pyramid Texts”, consisting of inscriptions inscribed inside the pyramids of the 5th and 6th dynasties at Saqqara, and there are indisputable signs that they were copied from even older documents, not that have survived to our time. The first writing on the walls was made at the behest of the last pharaoh of the 5th dynasty, Unas, which marked the beginning of a tradition that continued under the pharaohs of the 6th dynasty. Based on some signs, we can conclude that Unas already felt signs of the beginning of the collapse of the centralized monarchy of the Old Kingdom and could begin to doubt the reliability of the funeral cult of the kings, which the priests carried out by reading magical formulas and text from a papyrus scroll. The inscriptions on the walls inside the pyramids were supposed to ensure the preservation of the funerary cult. The Memphis Theological Treatise, which tells about the creation of the world by the god Ptah through the utterance of words, also dates back to the era of the Old Kingdom. The myth of the creation of the world by the god Ra is recorded in the Bremner-Reed Papyrus, but scientists believe that the first version of the creation myth arose before the unification of Egypt. According to this version, the sun was born from the union of earth and sky. The images of the progenitors of the sun in the person of Geb and Nut, who produces the sun every morning and hides it in her womb at night, have been preserved in religion throughout history.

Due to the collapse of the Old Kingdom, decentralization political power and the subsequent democratization of the funeral cult, inscriptions appeared on the walls of stone or wooden sarcophagi of nobles - “Texts of sarcophagi.” They contained some excerpts from the Pyramid Texts, but basically these inscriptions were the result of the theological creativity of the priests. “Texts of the Pyramids” and “Texts of Sarcophagi” served as the basis for compiling a collection of funeral texts of the New Kingdom - “Book of the Dead”, written on papyrus scrolls and containing a description of numerous rituals, spells and prayers that allow the deceased to pass all the tests in the afterlife and achieve eternal bliss in the "fields of Ialu". The texts of the “Book of the Dead” were gradually replaced by new funeral compositions, such as: “Book of Amduat”, “Book of Gates”, “Book of Kerert”, “Book of the Day”, “Book of the Night”, “Litanies of the Sun”. All of them are inscribed on the walls of the rock tombs of a number of pharaohs of the 17th and 19th dynasties. In the tomb of the New Kingdom pharaohs Seti I and Ramesses III, the text of the legend “The Extermination of People” is carved, which accompanies the image of a large celestial cow. For this reason, the given text is called the “Book of the Cow.” Such papyri as “Carlsbad”, “Turin”, papyrus of Jumillac, Ebers, Edwin Smith, mathematical papyri, etc. allow us to imagine what the religious and scientific life of the ancient Egyptians was like.

As already mentioned, the roots of Egyptian mythological and religious ideas go back to ancient times. In this regard, the main leitmotif that runs through everything that was created by Ancient Egypt throughout history is of particular interest: the belief in eternal life beyond the grave. Herodotus wrote: “On Egypt my remarks will be very long, because no country possesses so many wonders and no one has so many works that are difficult to describe.” The purpose of all miracles - stone and written monuments, mysteries and funeral rites - was to help a person overcome the fear of death and convince him of the continuation of posthumous existence. It appears that the Egyptian belief in eternal life was based on a more ancient belief in the cycle of posthumous reincarnation. A trace of this belief is found in a number of chapters of the Book of the Dead, which tell of the transformation of the deceased into deified animals or plants. Reading these chapters was supposed to ensure that the deceased would transform after death into a golden falcon, lotus flower, phoenix, crane, ram, and crocodile. Such ideas are consonant with the ideas of some African peoples about the transmigration of the souls of the dead, for example, into lions or snakes. The South African Hottentot tribe has preserved the final result of such a transformation: the creator-ancestor after death turns into grass and returns to life in the form of a bull when a cow eats this grass, and in a variant - in the form of a person when a girl eats this grass. The reason for replacing the idea of cyclical reincarnation leading to rebirth after death in the earthly world with the idea of eternal life in the afterlife probably lies in the efforts of the priesthood to provide itself with an inexhaustible source of reward, since ensuring this posthumous eternity required constant repetition of the corresponding priestly rites.

The ancient Egyptians’ veneration of deified animals, in which the features of a totemic ancestor were discernible, was based on similar ideas about the afterlife. The cult of animals, reptiles, birds and plants manifested itself in the form of worship of an image of a deified animal or an anthropomorphic deity with a part of the animal’s body. Some animals were worshiped throughout Egypt, others in individual nomes, and others only in one area. Menes, the powerful ruler of Upper Egypt and the probable unifier of both kingdoms, was called the “Scorpion King,” which suggests the worship of the sacred scorpion by the people he led, possibly warriors. The ancient Egyptian goddess Selket is famous, depicted with a scorpion on her head. Her images were painted on the walls of the sarcophagus, protecting the deceased. Dead animals were embalmed and buried in specially designated necropolises. Thus, in the Serapeum near Memphis, the burial of 64 Apis bulls was discovered, each of which was considered the soul and oracle of the god Ptah. Burials of dead and embalmed crocodiles - personifications of the god Sebek - have been discovered. A cemetery of sacred ibises was discovered in Abydos, along with which mummified falcons, shrews and ichneumons were buried. Dead cats, personifying the goddess Bastet, were taken from all over Egypt to the city of the goddess Bubast, embalmed and buried. Each Egyptian nome had its own sacred animal and its own sacred tree. Killing any of the deified animals and birds was punishable by death.

Legends about the violent death of the first Egyptian kings date back to ancient times. They find confirmation in the customs of African tribes to put their leaders to ritual death in the event of a decline in their vitality or natural disasters that befell the country, since the responsibility for the well-being of the people was believed to be borne by its ruler. “So, in Meroe, the custom of suicide of kings on the orders of priests persisted until the 3rd century. n. e. ...". It is appropriate to remember here that life in Egypt depended on the Nile floods: a catastrophic flood had no less destructive consequences than its absence. Destruction and famine at times fell with all their destructive force on the inhabitants of Egypt. Surviving references to the fact that the death of Menes after a 60-year reign is associated with a hippopotamus, and Akha (Akhtoya) with a crocodile, perhaps indicate the custom of ritual drowning of kings. Let us remember that, according to the myth, Osiris was drowned, and his body was carried out on its back by a crocodile. Until the later times of the New Kingdom, the jubilee holiday of Heb-sed (lit. “Feast of the Tail”) was preserved in Egypt, celebrated by the living pharaoh on the new moon after 30 years of reign and then repeated every three years. According to the conclusion of M. Mathieu, “the significance of heb-sed as a ritual that replaced the ritual murder of the king can be considered established.” The connection between the name of the anniversary holiday and the tail, which has been preserved for centuries, has baffled Egyptologists, since the royal attribute - the bull's tail, although it was hung on the pharaoh during the performance of the ritual, was not believed to play “a special role in this holiday.” However, it is precisely this detail that allows us to draw a parallel with a similar custom among the Garamantes and confirm the conclusion of M. Mathieu that heb-sed was a reproduction of the ritual death of the king with subsequent “revival,” accession to the throne with renewed strength and the return to him of “magical power over nature." Here is what A. Gaudio reports about the Garamantes, whose distant descendants are the modern Tuaregs: “In the kingdom of the Garamantes, in some Negroid tribes that lived in caves, old people were allowed to live only up to sixty years of age. When this time came, the person had to hang himself with a bull's tail. If he himself did not have enough courage, his fellow tribesmen strangled him amid cheerful cries and laughter.”

All the examples given indicate the African roots of ancient Egyptian culture. However, foreign peoples also contributed to its development. A group of deities of foreign origin was added to the local gods. If at the first stages of its history Egypt was somewhat geographically isolated due to the difficult rapids of the Nile, the swampy Delta and the hot sands of the Arabian desert, then as the state strengthened and the economy developed, Egypt’s connections with neighboring countries were established and reached in Western Asia to Syria, and in the Mediterranean Sea - to Cyprus and Crete. Intensive contacts with Western Asia explain the appearance in the Nile Valley in the second half of the 5th (first half of the 4th) millennium BC. e. flax (Fayum A) and dwarf wheat (Merimde), as well as goats and sheep in an even more distant era (oases of Nabta Playa and Kharga). However, these contacts extended much further - into ancient Sumer and Elam, as evidenced by the results of archaeological excavations carried out under the leadership of the leading Egyptologist Petrie and his colleague Quibell.

On the western bank of the Nile near the village of Nakada, a huge necropolis was discovered, in which 200 burials dating back to the era of the First Dynasty were excavated in just one season. Earlier burials in the necropolis were made in oval pits dug directly into the sand and covered with palm leaves. Later burials presented a sharp contrast to the first: they were rectangular, the walls were lined with brick. Objects, particularly lapis lazuli, found in these later burials indicate connections with ancient Sumer and Elam. Lapis lazuli was especially highly valued in ancient Sumer. According to scientists, the only known source of lapis lazuli was from mines in the Badakhshan mountains in Afghanistan. D. Rohl writes that lapis lazuli "was imported by the ancient Sumerians from Meluhha (Indus Valley) via Dilmun." No matter where this stone of the color of heavenly blue came from, “products made of lapis lazuli first appeared in Sumer and Susiana, and only then came to Egypt.” In the burials of warriors, pear-shaped maces were found, while in the burials of an earlier period the maces were disc-shaped. Ceramic vessels with ears found in burials are characteristic of Sumer, and cylinder seals, which first appear at the same time as lapis lazuli and the pear-shaped mace, were also a purely Sumerian invention. It has already been said (see Lotus) about the heraldic symbol of Upper Egypt - the lily, a flower whose homeland is Elamite Susiana. The cut on the ivory handle of a flint knife found in the Egyptian Jebel el-Arak depicts a bearded man in a robe flowing to his knees, belted and clutching two huge lions with long flowing manes by the throat in his outstretched hands. A similar motif also arose in the lands of Sumer. and Susiana. Along with the above, innovations in architectural decoration and anthropological measurements indicate that there was a migration to Egypt of the so-called Followers or Servants of Horus, who laid the foundation for the first dynasty of Egypt and the construction of pyramids, which, both in size and in the mystery of their purpose (pyramid of Khufu, Greek Cheops ) continue to amaze the imagination. According to D. Rohl, “there is no doubt that the emergence of this great civilization in Egypt was facilitated by some powerful external impulse that took place at the end of the Predynastic era...”. The author considers the bearer of this impulse to be the Followers of Horus (Egyptian: Shemsu-Hor), the direct ancestors of the first pharaohs, “an elite of foreign origin,” whose “characteristic Armenoid features” indicate that its representatives “were immigrants from the Zagros highlands.” Since the arrival of foreigners and their establishment of the first royal dynasty, the name of Horus the Falcon became an integral part of the title of the pharaohs.

The Egyptian language also contains some borrowings from ancient Semitic languages - the result of cultural and political contacts between Egypt and Palestine, Phenicia and Syria. Over its many-thousand-year history, Egypt was repeatedly attacked from outside, the pharaohs carried out military campaigns, violent changes of power took place in the life of the country - all this was reflected in numerous myths about Horus the Falcon, the great warrior who suppressed unrest in the provinces and strengthened the power of the pharaoh, about Osiris, the god of fertility and judge of the afterlife, about his faithful wife Isis, about Seth’s persecution of Osiris, about the great sun god with whom the soul of the deceased pharaoh was united, about the origin of the world and man, etc. The consequence of the conquest of Egypt by the Hyksos was the replenishment of the pantheon of gods with such deities, like Anat, Astarte, Bel and Reshef. Short review the origin and formation of the ancient Egyptian religion still allows us to see what a complex phenomenon the Egyptian religion was, representing, in the words of M. Korostovtsev, “a combination of often contradictory, and sometimes mutually exclusive beliefs that arose in different times and in different parts of the country." In the course of history, some local gods came to the fore and became common Egyptian deities, and religious ideas associated with them became the property of the entire country. In each nome, God was revered as supreme, and the priests took a lot of effort to unite them under one name. The gods, as a result of their efforts, acquired “families”, uniting into triads: god, goddess, their son. Various versions of the origin of the world were created: the Heliopolis legend, the Hermopolis legend, the Herakleopolis legend, the Memphis legend, and the Theban legend. Theological speculations and compilations of priests led to the creation of myths known to us today, reflecting the entire mixed and intricate history of the development of religious ideas of Ancient Egypt

Type: polytheism
Peculiarities: deification of animals, developed funeral cult
Cycle of myths: creation of the world, punishment of people for sins, the struggle of the sun god Ra with Apep, death and resurrection of Osiris

Ancient Egyptian religion - religious beliefs and rituals practiced in ancient Egypt from the pre-dynastic period until the adoption of Christianity. Over its many-thousand-year history, the ancient Egyptian religion went through various stages of development: from the Ancient, Middle and New Kingdoms to the Late and Greco-Roman periods.

Early beliefs

Prehistoric tribes of the Nile Valley, like representatives of other primitive cultures, in all the diverse objects and natural phenomena inaccessible to their understanding, they saw manifestations of powerful mysterious forces. A typical form of early religion for them was fetishism and totemism, which experienced various changes under the influence of the population's transition from nomadism to a sedentary lifestyle. The most famous ancient Egyptian fetishes: Imiut, Ben-Ben stone, Iunu pillar, Djed pillar; The common Egyptian religious symbols also originate from ancient fetishes: Ankh, Wadjet, Was.

To a large extent, the beliefs of the primitive Egyptians, as well as their entire lives, were influenced by the Nile, the annual flood of which deposited fertile soil on the banks, which made it possible to collect good harvests (the personification of beneficial forces), but sometimes it caused significant disasters - floods (the personification of destructive forces for humans). The periodicity of the river flood and observation of the starry sky made it possible to create the ancient Egyptian calendar with sufficient accuracy; thanks to this, the Egyptians early mastered the basics of astronomy, which also affected their beliefs. In the first settlements-cities of the Egyptians that emerged, there were various deities, specific for each individual locality, usually in the form of a material fetish, but much more often in the form of an animal - a totem.

Animal cult

The deification of animals in dynastic Egypt took place over the centuries, going back to prehistoric totemism, with which in a number of cases it was very close, actually constituting phenomena of the same order. Nomes and cities were often compared and were associated with their animal gods, which was reflected in their names (see list of nomes of Ancient Egypt), and many hieroglyphs of Egyptian writing were symbols of animals, birds, reptiles, fish and insects, which were ideograms denoting which -or deities.

Pantheon of Gods of Egypt

The ancient Egyptian religion, with all its inherent diversity of gods, was the result of a merger of independent tribal cults.

Appearance

Egyptian gods have an unusual, sometimes very bizarre appearance. This is due to the fact that the religion of Egypt consisted of many local beliefs. Over time, some gods acquired aspects, and some merged with each other, for example, Amun and Ra formed the single god Amun-Ra. In total, Egyptian mythology has about 700 gods, although most of them were revered only in certain areas.

Most gods are a hybrid of man and animal, although for some only decorations remind of their nature, like the scorpion on the head of the goddess Selket. Several gods are represented by abstractions: Amun, Aten, Nun, Bekhdeti, Kuk, Niau, Heh, Gerech, Tenemu.

Deities of Ancient Egypt

God Ptah.

Ptah or Ptah, is one of the names of the Creator God in the ancient Egyptian religious tradition.

God Atum.

Atum (Jtm) is the god of creation in ancient Egyptian mythology. It symbolized the original and eternal unity of all things.

Geb and Nut. (Here the goddess of the cosmos is depicted as a woman, she is curved in the form of a dome, has exorbitantly long arms and legs (supports) and only touches the ground (depicted as a man) with the tips of her fingers and toes. Shu, who separates this pair, also does not look tense under the weight "celestial body")

Geb - Ancient Egyptian god of the earth, son of Shu and Tefnut, brother and husband of Nut and father of Osiris, Isis, Set and Nephthys.

Chickpeas (Well, Nuit) is the ancient Egyptian goddess of the Sky, daughter of Shu and Tefnut, sister and wife of Geb and mother of Osiris, Isis, Set and Nephthys. In the ancient beliefs of the Egyptians, Nut was a heavenly cow who gave birth to the sun and all the gods.

God Shu wearing an elaborate crown with four feathers

Shu - Egyptian deity of air, son of Atum, brother and husband of Tefnut. After the identification of Atum with Ra, he was considered the son of Ra. The veneration of Shu was especially expressive in Letopolis in the delta.

Tefnut , also Tefnet, laudatory name Nubian cat - goddess of moisture in Egyptian mythology. She is also the eye of Ra, in this capacity Tefnut shines with a fiery eye in his forehead and burns the enemies of the great god. In this capacity, Tefnut was identified with the goddess Uto (Uraeus).

God Amon

Amon (Amen, Amun, Imen) - the ancient Egyptian god of the Sun, king of the gods (nsw nTrw) and patron of the power of the pharaohs.
Amun is the god of the sun in Egyptian mythology.

Goddess Mut

Mut , Egyptian goddess (actually “mother”) is an ancient Egyptian goddess, queen of heaven, second member of the Theban triad (Amun-Mut-Khonsu), mother goddess and patroness of motherhood.

God Montu

Montu (mnṯw) - the ancient god of the city of Ermont, in the region of which Thebes rose and became the capital of Egypt, which also revered Montu, hence his traditional epithet - “lord of Thebes”.

God Khonsu

Khonsou - an Egyptian god, revered in Thebes as the son of Amun and Mut, with whom he formed the Theban triad of gods, the deity of the moon. The latter brought him closer to Thoth already during the Middle Kingdom, when he was sometimes called the scribe of truth.

God Ra

Ra(ancient Greek Ρα; lat. Ra) - the ancient Egyptian sun god, the supreme deity of the ancient Egyptians. His name means "Sun". The center of the cult was Heliopolis.

God Osiris.

Osiris (Osiris) (Egyptian wsjr, ancient Greek Ὄσιρις, lat. Osiris) - god of rebirth, king of the underworld in ancient Egyptian mythology.

Goddess Isis.

Isis (Isis) (Egyptian js.t, ancient Greek Ἶσις, lat. Isis) is one of the greatest goddesses of antiquity, who became a model for understanding the Egyptian ideal of femininity and motherhood. She was revered as the sister and wife of Osiris, the mother of Horus, and, accordingly, the Egyptian kings, who were originally considered the earthly incarnations of the falcon-headed god.
Being very ancient, the cult of Isis probably originated from the Nile Delta. Here was one of the most ancient cult centers of the goddess, Hebet, called Iseion by the Greeks.

God Horus

Choir , Horus (ḥr - “height”, “sky”) - the god of the sky, royalty and sun; the living ancient Egyptian king was represented as the incarnation of the god Horus.

Goddess Nephthys.

Nephthys (Greek), Nebetkhet (ancient Egyptian “Lady of the monastery”). Its essence is almost not revealed in Egyptian religious literature. Nephthys was often depicted together with Isis as her opposite and at the same time as her complement, symbolizing inferiority, passivity, and infertile lands.
Nephthys, whose name is pronounced Nebethet in Egyptian, was considered by some authors as the goddess of death, and by others as an aspect of Black Isis. Plutarch described Nephthys as “the mistress of all that is unmanifest and immaterial, while Isis rules over all that is manifest and material.” Despite the connection with the Lower World, Nephthys bore the title of “Goddess of creation who lives in everything.”

Heh in the image of the primordial ocean.

Heh or Huh - an abstract deity of Egyptian mythology, associated with the constancy of time and eternity, the personification of infinity, endless space.

Nun (Ancient Egyptian “nwn” - “water”, “aquatic”) - in ancient Egyptian mythology - the primordial ocean that existed at the beginning of time, from which Ra emerged and Atum began the creation of the world.

God Khnum.

Khnum - creator god, creating man on a pottery disk, guardian of the Nile; a man with the head of a ram with spirally twisted horns.
“Khnum is the god of fertility in ancient Egyptian mythology, the demiurge god who created the world on a potter’s wheel.

God Anubis.

Anubis (Greek), Inpu (ancient Egyptian) - the deity of Ancient Egypt with the head of a jackal and the body of a man, a guide for the dead to the afterlife.

God Set

Set (Seth, Sutekh, Suta, Seti Egyptian. Stẖ) - in ancient Egyptian mythology, the god of rage, sandstorms, destruction, chaos, war and death. However, initially he was revered as the “protector of the sun-Ra”, the patron of royal power, his name was included in the titles and names of a number of pharaohs.

Goddess Hathor

Hathor , or Hathor (“house of Horus”, that is, “sky”) - in Egyptian mythology, the goddess of the sky, love, femininity, beauty, fun and dancing.

Bogiga Bast

Bast or Bastet - in Ancient Egypt, the goddess of joy, fun and love, female beauty, fertility and home, who was depicted as a cat or a woman with the head of a cat. During the early dynasties, before the domestication of the cat, it was depicted as a lioness.

Goddess Sekhmet

Sekhmet (Sokhmet) - patron goddess of Memphis, wife of Ptah. The goddess of war and the scorching sun, the formidable eye of the sun god Ra, a healer who had the magical power to induce diseases and cure them, patronized doctors who were considered her priests. Guarded the pharaoh.

Goddess Neith

Nate - Egyptian goddess of hunting and war, patroness of Sais in the Western Delta. Possibly Neith corresponds to the Carthaginian and Berber goddess Tanit. The cult of Neith was also widespread among the Libyans. Her hieroglyph was one of the signs of their tattoo. Sebek's mother.

God Sebek

Sebek (Sobek, Sobk, Sokhet, Sobki, Soknopais, in Greek Sukhos (Greek Σοῦχος)) - the ancient Egyptian god of water and the flood of the Nile, depicted with the head of a crocodile; it is believed that he scares away the forces of darkness and is the protector of gods and people. Sebek was the patron saint of crocodiles.

God Thoth

That (otherwise Teut, Tut, Tuut, Tout, Tehuti, other Greek Θώθ, Θόουτ from Egyptian ḏḥwty, possibly pronounced ḏiḥautī) - the ancient Egyptian god of wisdom and knowledge.

Goddess Maat

Maat (Ammaat) is an ancient Egyptian goddess who personifies truth, justice, universal harmony, divine institution and ethical norms.

The goddess Isis seated on a throne, bas-relief on the sarcophagus of Ramesses II

About Egyptian mythology

Egyptian mythology began to take shape in the 6th - 4th millennia BC, long before the emergence of class society. Each region (nome) develops its own pantheon and cult of gods, embodied in heavenly bodies, stones, trees, birds, snakes, etc.

The significance of Egyptian myths is invaluable; they provide valuable material for the comparative study of religious ideas in Ancient East, and for the study of the ideology of the Greco-Roman world, and for the history of the emergence and development of Christianity.

Cosmogonic myths

Judging by archaeological data, in the most ancient period of Egyptian history there were no cosmic gods who were credited with the creation of the world. Scholars believe that the first version of this myth arose shortly before the unification of Egypt. According to this version, the sun was born from the union of earth and sky. This personification is undoubtedly older than the cosmogonic ideas of the priests from major religious centers. As usual, the already existing myth was not abandoned, and the images of Geb (god of the earth) and Nut (goddess of the sky) as the parents of the sun god Ra have been preserved in religion throughout ancient history. Every morning Nut gives birth to the sun and every evening hides it in her womb for the night.

Ancient temple on the banks of the Nile

Theological systems that proposed a different version of the creation of the world probably arose at the same time in several major cult centers: Heliopolis, Hermopolis and Memphis. Each of these centers declared its main god to be the creator of the world, who was, in turn, the father of other gods who united around him.
Common to all cosmogonic concepts was the idea that the creation of the world was preceded by the chaos of water immersed in eternal darkness. The beginning of the exit from chaos was associated with the emergence of light, the embodiment of which was the sun. The idea of an expanse of water, from which a small hill appears at first, is closely related to Egyptian realities: it almost exactly corresponds to the annual flood of the Nile, the muddy waters of which covered the entire valley, and then, receding, gradually opened up the land, ready for plowing. In this sense, the act of creating the world was repeated annually.

Egyptian myths about the beginning of the world do not represent a single, coherent story. Often the same mythological events are depicted in different ways, and the gods appear in them in different guises. It is curious that with many cosmogonic plots explaining the creation of the world, extremely little space is devoted to the creation of man. It seemed to the ancient Egyptians that the gods created the world for people. In the written literary heritage of Egypt there are very few direct indications of the creation of the human race; such indications are the exception. Basically, the Egyptians limited themselves to the belief that a person owes his existence to the gods, who expect gratitude from him for this, understood very simply: a person must worship the gods, build and maintain temples, and regularly make sacrifices.

Atum with double crown

The priests of Heliopolis created their own version of the origin of the world, declaring him the creator of the sun god Ra, identified with other gods - creators Atum and Khepri (“Atum” means “Perfect”, the name “Khepri” can be translated as “The One who arises” or “The One who who brings it into existence"). Atum was usually depicted in the form of a man, Khepri in the form of a scarab, which means that his cult dates back to the time when the gods were given the form of animals. It is curious that Khepri never had her own place of worship. Like an avatar rising sun, he was identical to Atum - the setting sun and Ra - shining during the day. The appearance of a scarab given to it was associated with the belief that this beetle is capable of reproducing on its own, hence its divine creative power. And the sight of a scarab pushing its ball suggested to the Egyptians the image of a god rolling the sun across the sky.

The myth of the creation of the world by Atum, Ra and Khepri is recorded in the Pyramid Texts, and by the time its text was first carved in stone, it had probably been around for a long time and was widely known.

Statue of Ramses II in the Temple of Ptah in Memphis

According to the Pyramid Texts, Ra - Atum - Khepri created himself, emerging from chaos called Nun. Nun, or the Prime Ocean, was usually depicted as an immense primordial expanse of water. Atum, emerging from it, did not find a place where he could stay. That's why he created Ben-ben Hill in the first place. Standing on this island of solid soil, Ra-Atum-Khepri began to create other cosmic gods. Since he was alone, he had to give birth to the first pair of gods himself. From the union of this first couple other gods arose, thus, according to the Heliopolitan myth, the earth and the deities that ruled it appeared. In the ongoing act of creation, from the first pair of gods - Shu (Air) and Tefnut (Moisture) - Geb (Earth) and Nut (Sky) were born. They in turn gave birth to two gods and two goddesses: Osiris, Set, Isis and Nephthys. This is how the Great Nine of Gods arose - the Heliopolis Ennead. This version of the creation of the world was not the only one in Egyptian mythology. According to one legend, the creator of people was, for example, a potter - the god Khnum, who appeared in the guise of a ram - who sculpted them from clay.

Memphis today

The theologians of Memphis, the largest political and religious center of Ancient Egypt, one of its capitals, included in their myth about the creation of the world many gods belonging to different religious centers, and subordinated them to Ptah as the creator of everything. The Memphis version of cosmogony, compared to the Heliopolitan one, is much more abstract: the world and the gods were created not through a physical act - as in the process of creation by Atum - but exclusively through thought and word.
Sometimes the firmament was represented in the form of a cow with a body covered with stars, but there were also ideas according to which the sky is a water surface, the heavenly Nile, along which the sun flows around the earth during the day. There is also the Nile underground, along which the sun, having descended beyond the horizon, floats at night. The Nile, flowing through the earth, was personified in the image of the god Hapi, who contributed to the harvest with his beneficial floods. The Nile itself was also inhabited by good and evil deities in the form of animals: crocodiles, hippopotamuses, frogs, scorpions, snakes, etc. The fertility of the fields was controlled by the goddess - the mistress of bins and barns, Renenutet, revered in the form of a snake that appears on the field during the harvest, ensuring the thoroughness of harvesting. The grape harvest depended on the vine god Shai.

Anubis in the form of a dog. Figurine from the tomb of Tutankhamun

Anubis with a mummy. Painting on the wall of Sennejem's tomb

Myths of the mortuary cult

An important role in Egyptian mythology was played by ideas about the afterlife as a direct continuation of the earthly one, but only in the grave. Its necessary conditions are the preservation of the body of the deceased (hence the custom of mummifying corpses), the provision of housing for him (tomb), food (mortuary gifts and sacrifices brought by the living). Later, ideas arise that the dead (that is, their ba, soul) go out into the sunlight during the day, fly up to heaven to the gods, and wander through the underworld (duat). The essence of man was thought of in the inextricable unity of his body, souls (there were believed to be several of them: ka, ba; the Russian word “soul,” however, is not an exact correspondence to the Egyptian concept), name, shadow. A soul wandering through the underworld is in wait for all sorts of monsters, from which you can escape with the help of special spells and prayers. Osiris, together with other gods, administers the afterlife judgment over the deceased (the 125th chapter of the “Book of the Dead” is specially dedicated to him). In the face of Osiris, psychostasia occurs: the weighing of the heart of the deceased on scales balanced by truth (the image of the goddess Maat or her symbols). The sinner was devoured by the terrible monster Amt (a lion with the head of a crocodile), the righteous man came to life for a happy life in the fields of Iaru. Only those who were submissive and patient in earthly life could be justified at the trial of Osiris, the one who did not steal, did not encroach on temple property, did not rebel, did not speak evil against the king, etc., as well as “pure in heart” (“I am pure , clean, clean,” the deceased asserts in court).

Goddess Isis with wings

Agricultural myths

God Osiris. Painting of the tomb of Sennejem, 13th century BC

God Osiris. Painting, 8th century BC

The character of Osiris as the god of vegetation was reflected in another cycle of rituals. In a special room of the temple, a clay likeness of the figure of Osiris was erected, which was sown with grain. For the holiday of Osiris, his image was covered with green shoots, which symbolized the rebirth of the god. In the drawings one often sees the mummy of Osiris with shoots sprouted from it, which are watered by the priest.

The idea of Osiris as the god of fertility was also transferred to the pharaoh, who was considered the magical focus of the country’s fertility and therefore participated in all the main rituals of an agricultural nature: with the onset of the rise of the Nile, he threw a scroll into the river - a decree that the beginning of the flood had come; the first solemnly began preparing the soil for sowing; cut the first sheaf at the harvest festival, and for the whole country made a thanksgiving sacrifice to the harvest goddess Renenutet and to the statues of the dead pharaohs after completing field work.

Bastet cat

The cult of animals, widespread in all periods of Egyptian history, left a clear mark on Egyptian mythology. Gods in the form of animals, with the heads of birds and animals, scorpion gods, and snake gods act in Egyptian myths along with deities in human form. The more powerful a god was considered, the more cult animals were attributed to him, in the form of which he could appear to people.

Egyptian myths reflect the peculiarities of the worldview of the inhabitants of the Nile Valley, their ideas about the origin of the world and its structure, which have developed over thousands of years and go back to primitive times. Here are attempts to find the origins of being in the biological act of creation of the gods, the search for the original substance personified by divine couples - the embryo of later teachings about the primary elements of the world, and, finally, as one of the highest achievements of Egyptian theological thought - the desire to explain the origins of the world, people and all culture as a result of the creative power embodied in the word of God.

Records of funeral rites on the walls of tombs. The most significant of them are the “Pyramid Texts” - the oldest texts of funeral royal rituals, carved on the walls of the interior of the pyramids of the pharaohs of the V and VI dynasties of the Old Kingdom (26-23 centuries BC); “Texts of sarcophagi”, preserved on sarcophagi from the era of the Middle Kingdom (21-18 centuries BC), “Book of the Dead” (see Fig. 1) - compiled from the period of the New Kingdom to the end of the history of Ancient Egypt (see . Fig. 2), collections of funeral texts. Mythological ideas are also reflected in such texts as “The Book of the Cow”, “The Book of Vigil Hours”, “Books about the Underworld”, “The Book of Breathing”, “Amduat”, etc.

Significant material is provided by recordings of dramatic mysteries that were performed during religious holidays and coronation celebrations of the pharaohs by priests, and in some cases by the pharaoh himself, who delivered recorded speeches on behalf of the gods.

Of great interest are magical texts, conspiracies and spells, which are often based on episodes from legends about the gods, inscriptions on statues, steles, etc., and iconographic material. The source of information about Egyptian mythology is also the works of ancient authors: Herodotus, who visited Egypt in the 5th century. BC, Plutarch (1st-2nd centuries AD), who left a detailed work “On Osiris”, etc.

An important role in E. m. was played by the idea of the afterlife as a direct continuation of the earthly, but only in the grave. Its necessary conditions are the preservation of the body of the deceased (hence the custom of mummifying corpses), the provision of housing for him (tomb), food (mortuary gifts and sacrifices brought by the living). Later, ideas arise that the dead (i.e., them) go out into the sunlight during the day, fly up to heaven to the gods, and wander through the underworld ().

The essence of man was thought of in the inextricable unity of his body, souls (there were believed to be several of them: , ba; the Russian word “soul,” however, is not an exact correspondence to the Egyptian concept), name, shadow.

A soul wandering through the underworld is in wait for all sorts of monsters, from which you can escape with the help of special spells and prayers. The afterlife rules over the deceased, together with other gods (the 125th chapter of the “Book of the Dead” is specially dedicated to him).

In the face of Osiris, psychostasia occurs: the heart of the deceased is weighed on scales balanced by truth (the image of the goddess or its symbols).

The sinner was devoured by the terrible monster Amt (with the head of a crocodile), the righteous man came to life for a happy life in the fields. He could have been acquitted at the trial of Osiris, according to the so-called. “Negative Confession”, contained in the 125th chapter of the “Book of the Dead” (a list of sins that the deceased did not commit), only the submissive and patient in earthly life, the one who did not steal, did not encroach on temple property, did not rebel, did not speak evil against, etc., as well as “pure in heart” (“I am pure, pure, pure,” states the deceased at the trial).

The most characteristic feature of E. m. is the deification of animals, which arose in ancient times and especially intensified in the later periods of Egyptian history. Deities embodied in animals were initially generally considered patrons of hunting; with the domestication of animals, some became deities of pastoralists.

The most revered animals - incarnations of various deities included (,) and a cow (, Isis), a ram (Amon and), a snake, a crocodile (), a cat (), a lion (the incarnation of many gods:, Sekhmet, Hathor, etc.) , jackal (Anubis (see Fig. 3)), falcon (), ibis (Thoth; the arrival of the ibis-Thoth in Egypt was associated with the Nile floods), etc.

Later, the pantheon was anthropomorphized, but zoomorphic features in the appearance of deities were not completely supplanted and were usually combined with anthropomorphic ones. For example, Bast was depicted as a woman with a cat's head, Thoth as a man with the head of an ibis, etc. (see Fig. 4)

In early texts the king was called a "calf". On the palette of King Narmer (Menes?) (c. 3000 BC) (see Fig. 5) the pharaoh in the form of a bull destroys the fortress of the enemy (Lower Egypt). During "Heb-sed" (the thirtieth anniversary of the pharaoh), an ox's tail was tied to the back of the king's robe. In Memphis, and then throughout Egypt, a black bull with white markings was considered the incarnation of the god Apis.

Both good and evil deities were embodied in the form of snakes. The head of all the enemies of the sun - was considered a huge snake , personifying darkness and evil. At the same time, the goddess of fertility Renenutet, the goddess - guardian of cemeteries, was revered in the form of a snake., Isis and - protector of Osiris and, therefore, any deceased, goddess - patroness of Lower Egypt, guardian of Ra and Pharaoh, etc.

During the era of the Middle Kingdom and especially since the reign of the XVIII (Theban) dynasty of the New Kingdom, another sun god, the Theban Amon, was established as the main god (the pharaohs of the Middle and New Kingdoms came from Thebes). Osiris as the god of the dead displaces from the end of the 3rd millennium BC. the ancient god - patron of the dead Anubis - a jackal always scurrying around the cemetery (who turned into the god - guardian of the necropolis and protector of Osiris in the mysteries dedicated to him), as well as the Abydos god of the dead , adopting the epithet “first in the West” (i.e. “first of the dead”). The rise of new religious and political centers and the development of theological thought were accompanied by a process of fusion and syncretization of gods. For example, Ra is identified with Amon,, Ptah, , with Ra - , Horus, Amon, Osiris, Ptah, etc.

The first god was the sun, usually playing the role of. One of the myths says that a hill emerged from the waters, on which a flower blossomed (see Fig. 7), and from there appeared (the sun - Ra), (see Fig. 8), “illuminating the earth, which was in darkness.”

In other myths, the appearance of the sun is associated with an egg laid on a hill that rose from chaos by the bird “the great Gogotun.” There was a myth according to which the sun was born in the form of a calf by a huge cow - the sky. (The Pyramid Texts speak about Ra, the “golden calf born of heaven.” See Fig. 9). Along with this, there were ideas about the goddess of the sky - a woman who gives birth to the sun in the morning, swallows it in the evening - as a result, night comes - and the next morning gives birth to it again. (Remnants of the idea that conception occurs from swallowing have also been preserved by folklore: in “The Tale of Two Brothers,” Bata’s unfaithful wife conceived by accidentally swallowing a wood chip).

In some myths, male deities are the ancestors. In the Heliopolitan myth, the god Atum, identified with the sun - Ra, who emerged from chaos - Nuna (“who created himself”), fertilized himself by swallowing his own seed, and gave birth, spitting out of his mouth, the first gods, a pair and Tefnut (god and goddess of moisture). They, in turn, produced a second pair: the god of the earth and the sky goddess Nut, who gave birth to Isis and Nephthys, Osiris and Set. These gods make up the famous Heliopolitan "nine" - the Ennead, revered throughout Egypt and invariably present in religious texts. Gods considered the first kings of Egypt.

In the Memphis myth of the creation of the world, dating back to the Old Kingdom, the local god Ptah is the demiurge. Unlike Atum, Ptah, who created the first eight gods, first conceived creation in his heart (the heart is the “seat of thought”) and called them his tongue (Ptah created with “tongue and heart,” i.e., thought and word).

In the same way, he created the whole world: earth and sky, people, animals, plants, cities, temples, crafts and arts, and established the cults of the gods. In this myth, Ptah is endowed with all the attributes of a king.

During the period of the New Kingdom with the rise of the XVIII (Theban) dynasty (16-14 centuries BC), the Theban god Amon, identified with Ratheban, was established as the demiurge, who is called the king of all gods: “Father of fathers and all gods, who raised the sky and who established the land.

So, sowing was considered the funeral of the grain - Osiris, the emergence of shoots was perceived as his rebirth, and the cutting of ears during the harvest was perceived as the killing of God. These functions of Osiris are reflected in an extremely widespread legend describing him and his rebirth. Osiris, who reigned happily in Egypt, was treacherously killed by his younger brother, the evil Set. Osiris’s sisters Isis (who is also his wife) and Nephthys search for the body of the murdered man for a long time, and when they find it, they mourn.

Isis conceives a son, Horus, from her dead husband. Having matured, Horus enters into a fight with Set; at the court of the gods, with the help of Isis, he achieves recognition of himself as the only rightful heir of Osiris. Having defeated Set, Horus resurrects his father. However, Osiris, not wanting to remain on earth, becomes king and supreme judge over the dead. The throne of Osiris on earth passes to Horus. (In a version of the myth, the resurrection of Osiris is associated with the annual floods of the Nile, which are explained by the fact that Isis, mourning Osiris, after the “night of tears” fills the river with her tears.)

Already in the era of the Old Kingdom, living pharaohs are considered as “servants of Horus” (which is intertwined with ideas about Horus of Bekhdet) and the successor of his power, and the dead are identified with Osiris. The pharaoh, thanks to a magical funeral rite, comes to life after death in the same way as Osiris came to life. Since the era of the Middle Kingdom, not only the pharaoh, but also every deceased Egyptian has been identified with Osiris, and in funeral texts the name “Osiris” must be placed before the name of the deceased.

This “democratization” of ideas about Osiris after the fall of the Old Kingdom is associated with the strengthening of the nobility and the emergence of a layer of rich commoners in the. 3rd millennium BC The cult of Osiris becomes the center of all funeral beliefs. It was believed that every Egyptian, like Osiris, would be reborn to an eternal afterlife if all funeral rituals were followed.

The drama ended with the erection of the “djed” pillar dedicated to Osiris, symbolizing the rebirth of God and, indirectly, of all nature. In the predynastic period, the holiday ended with the struggle of two groups of participants in the mysteries: one of them represented winter, and the other. Summer always won (the resurrection of nature).

After the unification of the country under the rule of the rulers of Upper Egypt, the nature of the mysteries changes. Now two groups are fighting, one of which is in the clothes of Upper Egypt, and the other - of Lower Egypt. Victory, naturally, remains with the group symbolizing Upper Egypt. During the days of the Mysteries of Osiris, dramatized rites of coronation of the pharaohs were also celebrated. During the mystery, the young pharaoh acted as Horus, the son of Isis, and the deceased king was portrayed as Osiris sitting on the throne.

The idea of Osiris as the god of fertility was also transferred to the pharaoh, who was considered the magical focus of the country’s fertility and therefore participated in all the main rituals of an agricultural nature: with the onset of the rise of the Nile, he threw a scroll into the river - a decree that the beginning of the flood had arrived; the first to solemnly begin preparing the soil for sowing (the mace of the beginning of the Old Kingdom with the image of a pharaoh loosening the ground with a hoe has been preserved); cut the first sheaf at the harvest festival (see Fig. 15); for the whole country he made a thanksgiving sacrifice to the goddess of the harvest Renenutet and the statues of the dead pharaohs after completing field work.

The wide spread of the cult of Osiris was also reflected in ideas about Isis.

Revered as a loving sister and selflessly devoted wife of Osiris, a caring mother of the baby Horus and at the same time a great sorceress (the myth of Ra and the snake, versions of the myth according to which Osiris was revived by Isis herself, etc.), in the Greco-Roman era she turned into an all-Egyptian great mother goddess, and her cult spread far beyond Egypt (see Fig. 16). R. I. Rubinstein

Ra, Onuris, Thoth (see Fig. 17), Ptah, Khnum, Hapi, Hathor were also revered in Kush (in the myth about her journey to Nubia, the god who returned her to Egypt was identified with Shu Arensnupis). The inhabitants of Kush also adopted many of the Egyptian ideas about the afterlife and the judgment that Osir would execute on the dead.

E. E. Kormysheva (Minkovskaya)

The paintings and reliefs in the tombs were supposed to create a familiar environment for the deceased: they depicted his home, family members, festivals, servants and slaves in the fields and in workshops, etc. The tombs also contained figurines of servants engaged in various types of agricultural and craft work, and servicing the deceased. In the burials of the New Kingdom era, the so-called. Ushabti, special figurines, usually in the form of a swaddled mummy. It was believed that the deceased would revive them with the power of magical spells and they would work for him in the afterlife.

In another tale, the god Ra appears to Reddedet, the wife of the priest Rauser, in the form of her husband, and from this marriage three twins are born - children of the sun, the founders of a new dynasty of pharaohs. Under the influence of the myth of Osiris, a fairy tale was created about two brothers Bata and Anubis, in which the falsely accused Bata dies and then comes to life again with the help of Anubis (the features of the god Bata, the bull, are also preserved in the image of Bata). In the fairy tale “On Falsehood and Truth,” the younger brother blinds the elder (whose name is Osiris) and takes possession of his goods, but Osiris’s son Horus avenges his father and restores justice. The tale of the wise young man Sa-Osiris (his name means “Son of Osiris”) describes the afterlife, where he leads his father, and the judgment of the dead.

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