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Ancient Egypt Online: The Gods and Goddesses

Religion in Ancient Egypt: The Gods and Goddesses

There were an incredible number of Gods and Goddesses in Ancient Egypt, one for almost every situation and place. Many of the Gods began as local deities and were later organised and merged with others to form either a Triad or an Ennead (nine). There were several large schools of theological thought in Egypt, and each proclaimed its superiority over the others. A ruling dynasty would often promote their chief local god to the chief national god. For example, Amun (associated with Thebes) did not become a major deity until the shift of power to Thebes in the Middle Kingdom. Many of Ancient Egypt's Gods and Goddesses share characteristics and epithets at different times in history. For example, Sekhmet (the lion Goddess of Memphis), Mut, Tefnut and Hathor are all given the title 'the Eye of Ra' and given the task of protecting the sun god. There is often confusion about the different gods known as Horus. For example, Horus the elder was often thought to be the consort of Hathor, while Horus the younger was the son of Isis and Osiris. This is unsurprising given that the Egyptian civilisation survived for over three thousand years, and the religious system was constantly evolving. In pre-dynastic times, religion was largely animistic (they considered certain animals, plants and geographic features to be the homes of spirits). Many Ancient Egyptian gods are represented by totemic animals based on the ancient understanding of the role or characteristic of the animal. For example, Anubis (the Jackal) was associated with the dead and funeral arrangements because jackals were often seen on the edge of the desert where the Egyptians were buried. It was considered that the jackals guarded the souls of the deceased. As the Egyptians were dependent on the flooding of the life-giving Nile, it is hardly surprising that water deities (such as Hapi and Anuket) and agricultural deities (such as Osiris) would be popular. As their civilisation developed, the gods of Ancient Egypt took more human form and multiplied in number. Cosmological deities (such as the sun and moon) and gods of warfare and hunting soon followed. Even during the "Atenist heresy" of the Armarna period (when Akhenaten rejected the old gods in favour of the Aten disk) Egypt was not fully monotheistic. Akhenaten himself claimed he would maintain the cult of the Apis bull and representations of Bes (the god of childbirth) were found in his capital city. Furthermore, he and his queen, Nefertiti were often likened to Shu and Tefnut. However, it is clear that monotheistic Christianity adopted, modified and simplified many of the symbols and myths of the ancient polytheistic religions, in particular that of the Egyptians.

Osiris Osiris (Asir) was the first son of Geb and Nut and the brother of Set, Horus (the elder), Isis and Nephthys. He was one of the most prominent gods of the Heliopolitan Ennead, but his worship pre-dated the development of this fairly complex philosophy. Although Atum was installed as the head of the Ennead by the priests of Heliopolis, Osiris was considered to be the king of the underworld, and is the only deity who is referred to simply as "god". This gives us some indication of his prominence and popularity. The oldest religious texts known to us refer to him as the great god of the dead, who once possessed human form and lived upon earth. After his murder by Set he became the king of the underworld and

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presided over the judgment of dead souls. In order to enter his kingdom, the deceased had to undertake a perilous journey (aided by spells and amulets) to the hall of judgment where their heart was balanced against the feather of Ma´at (justice or balance). It is important to distinguish this from the Christian view of judgment. The ancient Egyptians were a pragmatic people. A person was not expected to be perfect, just balanced. An example of this is the "negative confession" (in which the deceased listed all of the evil things he had not done during his lifetime, i.e. "I never murdered anyone") which indicates that it was more a case of convincing Osiris that you deserved admission rather than passively awaiting judgment. As Osiris had been a good and beneficent ruler during his lifetime, his presence in the underworld no doubt gave the people great comfort. Furthermore, the only barriers to entrance were those relating to the journey to the hall of judgment and the preservation of the body (in which the Ba resided) and your name. The spells needed to pass through Duat (the underworld) were described in great detail in the pyramid and coffin texts, "the book of coming forth by day" (also known as "the book of the dead") and the "book of gates". A decent burial combined with these spells pretty much guaranteed you would be welcomed into a blissful existence which bore a striking similarity to the ancient Egyptian's everyday life (shorn of any problems). Osiris was also a god of agriculture. This may seem rather strange as he was dead, and technically infertile. However, it actually makes a lot of sense when you consider the death and rebirth inherent in the agricultural cycle of planting and harvesting grain. Every harvest, the god was symbolically killed and his body broken on the threshing room floor, but after the inundation life would return to the land and the crops would grow again. Legend held that the ancient Egyptians had been cannibals until Osiris developed agriculture and he and Isis persuaded them to cease that unpleasant habit. There is no evidence that the ancient peoples were in fact cannibals, but the myth underlined the notion that Osiris brought order from chaos and established the culture which formed the basis of their successful and durable civilisation. Osiris was usually depicted as a mummified king, complete with the ceremonial (curved) beard, crown, flail, and crozier. His skin is generally green or black, to represent the fact that he is dead. He usually wears the white crown of Upper Egypt (the south) or the Atef crown (the white crown with a plume of feathers on each side and a disc at the top). The feathers on the Atef crown are thought to represent Djedu (Busiris), the cult center of Osiris. His kind smile confirms that he is not a deity to be feared. In fact, Osiris represented the Egyptian belief in rebirth and their feeling that order and justice persevered beyond the grave. "Corn mummies" made of seeded dirt were molded to represent Osiris and interred with the deceased. They would germinate in the darkness of the tomb and illustrate the concept of life from death. Some fine examples made of barley and emmer were found in Tutankhamen's tomb. During the fourth month of the season of Akhet (emergence) a number of festivals were celebrated at all the chief sanctuaries of Osiris in Egypt, to commemorate the events of Osiris' life, death, and rebirth. Spectators took part in the "passion plays" and everyone seems to have had a great time. The many festivals are recorded on a stele established by Ikhernofret (a prince who acted as Senusert III's chief treasurer).

The Myth of Osiris and Isis Set had been jealous of his brother Osiris' power and popularity for some time, and he lusted after his brother's wife, Isis (Aset). When Osiris decided to travel the world to bring civilisation to its people, he made Isis Regent of Egypt instead of Set. This was the last straw. Set was strong and brave (he was not two-dimensionally "evil") but he had a terrible temper and he vowed to kill his brother and take the power he considered to be rightfully his. Set invited Osiris to a banquet and had a beautiful cedarwood and ebony chest made just for the occasion. He offered the chest to anyone who could fit into it. Just as Set planned, none of the other guests fitted the chest perfectly, the only person left to try was Osiris. When he

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lay down in the chest (which had been made to fit him), Set slammed on the lid and nailed it down. He sealed it with molten led and threw it in the Nile. The chest was swept out to sea and landed on the coast near Byblos. The instant it touched the land, a huge Tamarisk tree sprouted up to protect it. The tree grew so large that the king of Byblos trimmed it and set it up as a pillar in his palace. Isis tracked his body to Byblos and persuaded the king to give it to her (by saving a child from a snake bite - easy for the "queen of heaven"). She took her husband's corpse back to Egypt and used magic to concieve his child, Horus (other accounts suggest she was already pregnant when he died). However, Set found Osiris's body unattended while Isis took the infant Horus to be cared by Wadjet (or Udjat, "she who is green", the cobra goddess of Lower Egypt). He cut the corpse into fourteen (or sixteen) parts and distributed them around Egypt. Isis was distraught, and enlisted the help of her sister (and Set's wife) Nephthys. They found all but one of the pieces. The missing part was his penis (poor guy) which was apparently swallowed by a fish sacred to Set. Isis and Nephthys mourned over the dead body of their brother and Ra took pity on them. He sent Anubis to prepare Osiris for the first ever mummification, and instructed Thoth, Isis and Nephthys to piece the body back together. Isis transformed into a kite (common small bird) and breathed life into him, but it was not sufficient for him to take his place with the living. Instead he travelled to the underworld, a seemingly dark and desolate place. But Re reassured him that he would find peace and contentment as the king of the dead, and his son Horus would rule over the living until the time that Re chose to unmake his creation and return everything to the nothingness from whence it came.

Isis Isis was one of the oldest gods or goddesses of ancient Egypt but her origins are unclear. She is sometimes thought to have originated in the Sinai but is is also likely that she was first worshipped as a fetish in the Delta area of Lower Egypt around Busiris, the location of the oldest known cult center to Osiris. However, her cult was not limited to one area, but worshipped in every temple in the land. In fact, the first shrine dedicated specifically to her was built by Nectanebo II in Dynasty Thirty! The cult of Isis, the Egyptian goddess, was very popular throughout Egypt, and beyond and she became a goddess of almost limitless attributes. Isis was her Greek name, but she was known to the ancient Egyptians as Aset (or Ast, Iset, Uset), which is usually translated as "(female) of throne" or "Queen of the throne". Her original headdress was an empty throne and as the personification of the throne she was an important source of the Pharaoh's power (as descent was to some degree matrilineal). However, the exact meaning of her name is still disputed. Plutarch suggested that her name meant "knowledge" but another possible translation is "(female) of flesh", i.e. mortal, suggesting that although she was the Queen of the Gods, she had once been a mortal woman. This certainly fits with the mythology surrounding the Ennead which state that Isis and her husband, Osiris, had actually ruled Egypt before the time of the pharaohs. However, the Book of the Dead describes her as "She who gives birth to heaven and earth, knows the orphan, knows the widow, seeks justice for the poor, and shelter for the weak" suggesting that she was considered to be more than simply a mere mortal. Isis was known as "Hent" (Queen) in every Nome, but she was also known by a bewildering number of names and titles throughout ancient Egypt and took on the aspects of many other goddesses. This resulted in a fairly complex relationship with the other gods and goddesses. Isis was a member of the Helioploitan Ennead, as the daughter of Geb (Earth) and Nut (Sky) and the sister and wife of Osiris and the sister of Set, Nephthys and (sometimes) Horus the Elder. However, because of her association with the throne Isis was sometimes considered to be the wife of Horus the Elder- the patron of the living Pharaoh. Ra and Horus were closely associated during early Egyptian history, while Isis was closely associated with Hathor (who was described as the mother or the wife of Horus or Ra) and so Isis could also be considered to be the wife of Ra or Horus.

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However, when Ra and Atum (the Ennead of Helipolis) merged, Isis became both the daughter of Atum(- Ra) and the wife of (Atum-)Ra. This situation was clarified by crediting Isis as the granddaughter of Ra- Atum, the mother of Horus (the child) and the wife of Osiris. The adoption of the mythology of Heliopolis as the national religion promoted Osiris to the position of King of the Netherworld. However, this position was already held by Anubis. As a result, a myth developed that Nepthys became pregnant by Osiris and gave birth to Anubis. There are various versions of the tale, in some cases Osiris genuinely mistakes Nepthys for his wife Isis (the two were depicted as being very similar in appearance), in other cases Nepthys intentionally tricks Osiris. Either way, Isis adopted her husband's illegitimate child to protect her sister and the child from the rage of her brother Set and apparently was happy to forgive the adultery. The Egyptians highly valued family life and Isis was the paragon of motherly virtues. From the New Kingdom, Isis was considered to be the archetypal mother and was a patron goddess of childbirth and motherhood. As Horus was the patron of the living Pharaoh, Isis could be described as the mother of the Pharaoh. The image of Isis and the infant Horus was extremely popular in Egyptian art and it is generally accepted that they had a huge influence on the iconography of Mary and the infant Jesus Christ in the early Christian Church. However, while Mary is perhaps best described as a passive vessel who was not considered to have any power independent of her child, Isis was not only a mother, but a confident and skilled queen and a very powerful sorceress. Isis knew the secret name of Ra, which gave her an incredible amount of power. The Pyramid Texts imply that Isis prophesised the murder of Osiris (although she was unable to prevent it) and her power even extended beyond the grave. At her insistence Anubis and Thoth devised the first ritual of mummification to give Osiris life after death and she herself managed to magically concieve her son Horus by hovering over the body of her dead husband. She was one of the four protector goddesses (along with Bast, Nephthys, and Hathor, or Nephthys, Selket and Neith) who protected the sarcophagus and the Canopic jars (which contained the internal organs). It was thought that she helped the deceased on their difficult journey into the afterlife and she was sometimes named as one of the judges of the dead. Her priestesses were skilled healers and midwives, and were rumoured to have magical powers. Like the priestesses of Hathor the could interpret dreams, but they were also thought to be able to control the weather by braiding or combing their hair (a superstition which was common in many later seafaring cultures). During the Ptolemaic period she was linked with Astarte as the patron goddess of sailors as it was hoped that she would provide a favourable wind. Her loyalty to her murdered husband and infant child, her courage in defying Set and her warmth and compassion towards all people (even Set) made Isis one of the most beloved goddesses in Egypt, and indeed the ancient world. Isis was often represented as a goddess wearing a headdress representing a throne (which was one of the hieroglyphs in her name). She was also frequently depicted as a human queen wearing the vulture headdress with a royal serpent on the brow. In these two forms she occasionally carried a lotus bud or the glyph of the sycamore tree. She was also commonly depicted as a queen or goddess wearing the double crown of Upper and Lower Egypt along with the feather of Ma'at. There are also numerous representations of Isis with her son, Horus, which bear a marked similarity to later images of the virgin Mary with baby Jesus. Isis was also depicted as a winged goddess or a kite (one of her sacred animals). In this form her wings spread a heavenly scent across the land and brought fresh air into the underworld. From the New Kingdom she also adopted the vulture headdress with cow's horns on either side of a sun disk between them. Occasionally she was depicted as a cow or a woman with a cow's head. In her form of the snake goddess Thermouthis she was depicted as a cobra crowned with the throne headdress. The Tjet amulet was also known as the "Knot of Isis", "Buckle of Isis", or the "Blood of Isis". Although the meaning of the Tjet is fairly obscure, it is thought that it may have represented a woman's sanitary cloth (hence the connection with blood) or may relate to the magical power in a knot (again linking it with Isis

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the great magician). The Tjet was used in the funerary rites and seems to have been linked with the ideas of resurection and rebirth. She was sometimes associated with Khnum in representing Upper Egypt, just as Ptah-Tanen was associated with Nephthys in representing Lower Egypt.

Horus The name Horus is Greek. In Ancient Egypt he was known as "Heru" (sometimes Hor or Har), which is translated as "the distant one" or "the one on high"(from the preposition "hr" meaning "upon" or "above"). He was considered to be a celestial falcon, and so his name could be a specific reference to the flight of the falcon, but could also be seen as a more general solar reference. It is thought that the worship of Horus was brought into Egypt during the predynastic period. He seems to have begun as a god of war and a sky god who was married to Hathor, but soon became considered as the opponent of Set, the son of Ra, and later the son of Osiris. However, the situation is confused by the fact that there were many Hawk gods in ancient Egypt and a number of them shared the name Horus (or more specifically Har, Heru or Hor). Furthermore, the gods Ra, Montu and Sokar could all take the form of a falcon. Each "Horus" had his own cult center and mythology, but over time they merged and were absorbed by the most popular Horus, Horus Behedet (Horus of Edfu). He was the protector and patron of the pharaoh. As Horus was associated with Upper Egypt (as Heru-ur in Nekhen) and Lower Egypt (as Horus Behedet or Horus of Edfu) he was the perfect choice for a unified country and it seems that he was considered to be the royal god even before unification took place. The Pharaoh was often considered to be the embodiment of Horus while alive (and Osiris once he was deceased). The Turin Canon, describes the Predynastic rulers of Egypt as "the Followers of Horus", and the majority of Pharaohs had an image of Horus at the top of their serekh (a stylised palace facade in which one of the king´s names was written). However, Sekhemhib (Seth Peribsen) chose to place Horus´ opposite and enemy Set on his serekh while Khasekhemwy placed both Set and Horus above his serekh. As a result, some scholars argue that the mythical battle between Horus and Set was once a real battle between the followers of Set and the followers of Horus. If this was the case, it would seem that the followers of Horus won as Horus remained a popular emblem of kingship while Set was gradually transformed into a symbol of evil. The Pharaoh also had a name (known as the "Golden Horus" name) which was preceded by an image of a sacred hawk on the symbol for gold which specifically linked the Pharaoh to the god. However, it is interesting to note that Set was also known as he of Nubt (gold town), so the symbol for gold could in fact relate to him. Horus and Set were always placed in opposition to each other. However, the exact nature of their relationship changed somewhat over time. Set was the embodiment of disorder and chaos while Horus was the embodiment of order. Similarly, Horus represented the daytime sky while Set represented the night time sky. However, in early times the two were also seen as existing in a state of balance in which Horus and Set represented Upper and Lower Egypt respectively. They were often depicted together to indicate the union of Upper and Lower Egypt and there is even a composite deity named Horus-Set, who was depicted as a man with two heads (one of the hawk of Horus, the other of the Set animal). At this stage Horus was often considered to be Set's brother and equal and the fight between them was thought to be eternal. However, the rise in importance of the Ennead resulted in Horus being cast as the son of Osiris and thus the nephew of Set. This changed the nature of the conflict between them, as it was now possible for Set to be defeated and for Horus to claim the throne of Egypt as his own. The "Eye of Horus" was a powerful protective amulet and when it was broken into pieces (in reference to the time Set ripped out Horus' eye), the pieces were used to represent the six senses (including thought) and a series of fractions.

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Horus was also the patron of young men and was often described as the perfect example of the dutiful son who grows up to become a just man. However, this is perhaps debatable in the light of one of the stories concerning his fight with Set. The mother of Horus (Isis) was a great magician who most certainly had the power to destroy Set. However, when her chance came she could not take it. Set was, after all, her brother. This angered Horus so much that he chopped off his mother's head in a fit of rage! Thankfully, Isis was more than able to handle this insult and immediately caused a cow's head to grow from her neck to replace her head. Luckily for Horus, Isis was a compassionate and sympathetic goddess and she forgave her vengeful son his aggressive act. The Egyptian God Horus was usually depicted as a falcon, or a falcon-headed man. He often wore the Double Crown of Upper and Lower Egypt. In anthropomorphic form Horus appears as both an adult man and a child, wearing the sidelock of youth (as the son of Isis). There are also numerous depictions of a Horus the child hunting crocodiles and serpents and amulets known as "cippi" were inscribed with his image to ward off dangerous animals.