Our remarks on the beliefs and worship of the ancient Egyptians must be supplemented by a few words on their ideas regarding the future state. They held that when death came upon the body, the spirit lived on, being possessed of a distinct existence, and that at some future date it would ‘ return to the body. There was solid truth in much of their beliefs, but during the lapse of time the truth became so covered over with an abundance of the deposits of falsehood, that it was no longer practically valuable.
This familiar picture expresses their faith in the fact of the spirit of the person living after the body is dead. The body lies still in death, the spirit hovers over it. In either hand it holds an emblem of life the one a sail, betokening the life’s brevity, and the other the sacred figure of life in its perpetuity. The spirit is looking upon the body as if bidding it a farewell, and saying, “Whither shall I go; where shall I spend my future?”
Alas, the only answer the idolater could give to the first question was, “To judgment”; and to the second, “To the care of demons!”
They believed in the truth of a judgment to come – “after death the judgment.” They believed in the truth that man’s actions on this earth will be weighed, and the record of them presented to the divine judge. But the judges were to them the half animal half man gods they worshipped. What a picture is this! No language can express more forcibly the system of their belief. The deceased is being weighed, that is to say his heart is in the balance, for in one scale is a jar, containing the heart, the emblem of his motives.
Most excellent is this conception, for all are what their hearts are. In the other scale is a figure of truth. And most excellent is this also, for we shall all be weighed and judged according to truth. And Truth is holding in her hand the emblem of perpetual life, for truth lives forever, and never changes. But who judges? “God, the Judge of all?”, No, demons!
Anubis, who directs the weights, sees to the faithfulness of the scales; Thoth writes down the result, and Horus takes the record to Osiris, him whom we see in the following picture; the lord of the underworld. Upon his head is the crown, with the serpent form in front. He holds the scepter within his hands, as he sits upon his throne of state. To him man must give account. Before him stands the deceased. Step by step his life has proceeded up to this great event. The deceased, a mummied man, has scales poised evenly over his shoulders, for he has been weighed in the balances, and has not been found wanting. But let us suppose the case of one whose actions have not been upright, according to the standard of the truth and the justice of the underworld courts. Sentence must be passed upon him in that case, for he is not worthy of a place upon the sacred shores of Amenti.
The scales are not even. What was the offense of the particular transgressor in the picture on the next page is evident. He had been too fond of good he had been a glutton! Therefore his doom was to return to this earth and to expiate his sins. The glutton was sent back to the earth in the form of a pig, and, by over-eating, was to be purified from his greedy propensities. He was to pass into the purgatory of the body of the pig, and so to be purified!
In pig form he comes back to the world, and the figure with the ax cuts off his return to the sacred shores. Anubis, the director of the weights, looks on, to see all is done correctly, and, under the guardianship of two apes, the soul of the deceased, now within the pig’s body, comes back, eats, wallows in the mire, and is abhorred by all respectable Egyptians, and thus be comes pure.
The dogheaded ape was an important personage in Egyptian mythology. In “The Manifestation of Light,” the Book Revealing Light to the Soul (the Book of the Dead), the four apes around the lake of fire are thus addressed by the defunct –
“O these four apes residing on the prow of the Sun’s bark, who make Truth to arise before the Lord of All, judges of my misfortune and my victory, who appease the gods by the flame of your mouth... who live of the Truth; you nourished by Truth, exempt from fraud, abhorrent of evil, extract from me all stain, free me of all iniquity, so that I may not retain any blemish, and thus be able to cross over... and pass through the mysterious pylons of Amenti.”
And thus do the apes reply: – “Pass over, advance; we drive away thy faults, we annihilate the stains which wounded thee on earth, we dispel all the impurities which remain with thee, enter – pass through the mysterious pylons.”
(*See Paul Pierrot, “d’apres le papyrus de Turin,” Le Livre des Morts, ch. 126.)
Holiness derived from apes! Divinities propitiated by the flames of apes’ mouths! Apes giving entrance to the gates of the blessed! Such was the degradation into which the animal worshipping Egyptian had fallen.
A remarkable feature of their belief was the complacency and self-justification of the defunct. “I present myself,” says such an one, “before the Lord of Eternity. There is no evil in me.” Again, “I have neither done any sin, nor omitted any duty to man... I have not shortened the cubit... I have not falsified the weight of the balance... I have not netted the ducks (of the Nile) illegally; I have not been a glutton; I have not been a drunkard,” and so on. But in spite of the array of good works, the heart sometimes had its pangs, and very touching are the words, “My heart, which comes to me from my mother; my heart, necessary for my existence on earth, rise not against me, become not an adversary against me before the gods.”
Stripped of the fancies respecting the actual heart being separated from the body, and thus an eternal existence being doubtful, we read in these words the truth that man is the same today as he was in ancient Egypt, that he would fain justify himself before his Judge, and yet that his self-justification affords him no real rest.
The goddess Nut, who bore the title “Mother of the Gods,” had a special care over the departed. Her form is frequently to be found painted upon mummy cases. She appears at times, in her pictures, in a sacred tree, whence she pours forth for the soul – of course the justified soul – heavenly nectar, or water of life, for its nourishment, and she also gives of the fruit of the same tree to the deceased and his friends. This idea is very striking, and proves that the story of the tree of life in Paradise was in part enshrined in the legends of ancient Egypt. The first records in the Word of God should be carefully noted, for the beginnings and endings of the book are remarkably similar. The tree of life, with its fruits, and the water of life are mentioned in the closing chapter of Revelation. God’s purpose is unchanged, and though hidden during much of the time of man’s history, will be eventually made good. And the enemy’s purpose is apparent; he would introduce himself all through man’s history as man’s friend, whether for time or eternity. The teaching of the illustration also emphasizes the belief of those days in the separate existence of the spirit from the body, and its conscious bliss in a state separate from the body.
Nut is often represented as a woman whose form, spangled with stars, is bent over the earth, and thus she is the heavens. She was painted on the cover of the mummy case, and thereby protected the body within. On a papyrus in the Louvre, it is said to the deceased, “Thy mother Nut has received thee in peace. Every day she places her arms beneath thy head. She protects thee in thy coffin... She extends her protecting care over thy life, thy health, thy soundness.” The mummy in question was wrapped in its narrow bandages, on which, in red and black colors, Nut’s image was portrayed.
But the eminently business-like Egyptians did not rely solely on the attention of Nut. Talismans, amulets and charms were also employed to secure the defunct, and the sarcophagus was also inscribed with correct formulas, in order to preserve to the tenant within it, the pleasures of the world to come. It was held that the mummification of the body purified it, and rendered it fit for the eventual company of the purified soul, and thus the money spent in embalming was well laid out. It was further held that an impaired corpse stood doubt fully in view of its resurrection, and the soul is portrayed as visit ing it in the tomb, and seeing how it was preserved. In addition to these precautions, the princi pal intestines of the deceased – stomach, small intestines, lungs, heart and liver – were placed in jars, dedicated to four genii,** as portrayed opposite, who guarded them till the resurrection.
On its way in the underworld to the abode of bliss, the soul was supposed to encounter dangers and difficulties. But the priestly ingenuity which created these obstacles also found a way of escape from them. The soul had during lifetime on earth learned magic watchwords, and these on being uttered drove back the opposing genii below, and a chapter from the Book of the Dead, recited when in difficulty on the journey, smoothed the rough places, and if these various protections after all should fail, one final preservative remained. It was to be had for money. The priests would make all secure by an abundance of funereal rites.
Their ideas of a future state were as “earthly” as their conceptions respecting the resurrection of the body. The tomb was stored with edibles and pleasant things, and with articles for the toilet, and objects prized in lifetime, so that the soul, or that part of the human being which was supposed to visit the tomb, might have the enjoyment of them, or, failing the actual things, the pictures of them painted upon the walls of the tomb. No doubt these various articles were at one time regarded as of value to the defunct at the resurrection of his body, and to assist the defunct in the realms of bliss a variety of little figures were buried with him, who were supposed to respond to his call, and do him service. These were made of wax, porcelain, or wood, and other materials. Once upon a time these “answerers” were veritable slaves, who were slain when their lord died, and were buried with him, so that they might still be his slaves in the next world, but whether from motives of kindness or economy, as time rolled on, the “answerers” figures were used instead. In the row of them here given the variety of their countenances will attract attention, as each group of “answerers” has its own individuality. The Egyptians were a pastoral people, and the rich employed many slaves; they regarded the life to come as this present life lived over again, and their ideas of supreme happiness consisted in farms, cattle, fishes and ducks, very much in the same way as a North American Indian pictures the happy hunting grounds of the world to come. It would not have been felicity to the Egyptian gentleman to till his own land or herd his own cattle, so his Ushabitui, “Answerers,” replied to his bidding, with the hoe and other field labor, in the same way as the North American Indian expects his weapon and his steed to serve him in the hunting grounds. Man’s ideas of eternal felicity – unless he have a revelation from God – must be those of the same kind as his present pleasures.
Here is a part of a picture of a funeral procession. The mummy lies upon the sacred boat, which is being dragged by oxen to the mournful cry, “To the west, to the west “; mourners cast dust upon their heads, priests make oblations on the Nay, and the chief priest offers incense and water to the body. Presently the shore of the sacred lake or the river will be reached, and then the trust will be deposited in its grave fortress to rest secure from dishonorable hands!
Never did men bestow such care upon the safe-guarding of their dead bodies, never did men make such “eternal homes” for tombs as the Egyptians, and never were corpses hunted for as theirs, by robbers, traders, and “scientists,” even to this very day!’
(* The efforts “to make a sarcophagus as a remembrance for eternity” sometimes would employ ten thousand soldiers in addition to the workmen (W.M. Flinders, A History of Egypt, Petrie, pp. 131-132), and each tomb builder did his utmost to preserve his mummy and jewels entire for the resurrection day, yet from ancient down to modern times these tombs were the quarry for burglars. Thousands of years ago inspectors of royal tombs reported thus upon them, “It was found to have been pierced by the hands of thieves at the spot where the tablet of the monument is fixed. Examined on that day it was found entire, the thieves not having been able to penetrate into it.” (Ibid, p. 130; see also p. 135).
We must not omit to mention how it was that the fate of the deceased became known upon earth, and became such sure knowledge, that artists, sculptors, and architects could work together in depicting the whole procedure of the judgment and its results. Someone evidently had the key, someone knew the unknown and was in close touch with the creatures of the unseen world, and thus was able either to make public the exaltation or degradation of the deceased, to blazon his name on the calendar of saints, or to notify his departure to purgatory.
The priests promulgated the story of the judgment of the gods, of the virtues of the magic and the embalming; they arranged the whole matter, and by the power of this wisdom enriched themselves and made their religion great. In such matters our days are not, after all, so very different from those of the ancient Egyptians. Yet we may learn one lesson from these learned pagans, and wisely lay to heart their exhortation –
“Mind thee of the day, when thou, too, shall start for the land, To which one goeth to return not thence.”