The Ancient Egyptian Worldview

Because of our highly evolved capacity for self-awareness, we human beings are uniquely destined to ask “the big questions”. What’s happening in the universe at large? What’s our place in it? How should we live our lives? We have a profound need to orient ourselves within the larger scheme of things in a way that gives meaning and direction to our lives. So we create a worldview – an evolving set of answers to these questions that operates in us as a kind of orientation system.

For the ancient Egyptians, that orientation system or worldview was mythical. Lacking anything resembling a scientific method of inquiry or our concept of natural laws, what happens in this world, they believed, is governed by a pantheon of gods and goddesses whose activity was described in mythical stories. To ensure our survival and well-being, it is important that we align ourselves with these deities and avoid their displeasure in prescribed ways.

The most important myth undergirding their worldview was an account of how the world came into being. In the beginning there was only Nun – the dark lifeless waters of chaos. Out of this emerged a pyramid-shaped mound of land, still surrounded by the waters of chaos, on top of which stood Atum, the first god. Atum coughed and spat out Shu (god of the air) and Tefnut (goddess of moisture), who in turn had two children – Geb (god of the earth) and Nut (goddess of the sky). These in turn had four children – Osiris (king of the earth), Isis (his queen), Seth (the god of chaos), and Nephthys (a protective goddess of the dead). As the myth tells it, Seth, envious of his brother, one day murdered and dismembered him and declared himself to be king. Not to be overcome by chaos, however, Isis reassembled Osiris’ body, resurrected him, and proceeded to give birth to their only son, Horus, who became rightful heir to his father’s throne. The re-establishment of order over chaos is complete when Horus defeats Seth, regains the throne, and Osiris himself descends to the underworld to become king of the dead.

The death and resurrection of Osiris became linked both to the Egyptian agricultural cycle and to their belief in the resurrection of human souls after death, while the succession of Horus to the throne and his restoration of order provided the mythical basis for the succession of dynastic pharaohs and their role as upholders of order. Indeed, the importance of maintaining order over chaos was fundamental to the Egyptians. It was enshrined in their concept of ma’at  - the divine force which, at the time of creation, brought order out of chaos and on which the continued existence of the world depended. Because of ma’at, Egyptians could have confidence in the order and stability of their world – the daily progression of the sun across the sky, the annual flooding of the Nile, the cyclical seasons of seedtime and harvest, the rhythmic pattern of birth and death and rebirth. All this was guided by the gods. But it required human cooperation too. Ma’at was never guaranteed. The creation of the universe – this bringing order out of chaos – is ongoing and must constantly be renewed. To avert catastrophe, humans must align themselves with the cosmic order and govern their behaviour accordingly.

Key to upholding ma’at was the pharaoh. Though human and subject to human frailties, he embodied “kingship” – a divine power associated with the god Horus with whom the pharaoh was identified. Indeed, the pharaoh was known as “the living Horus”. So he ruled both for the gods and as a god to maintain order in human society (through good governance) and sustain ma’at on a cosmic level (by ensuring that the gods were served with temple rituals and offerings). As over the centuries the Egyptian pantheon of gods and goddesses became more elaborate, ma’at itself became deified as a goddess, daughter of the sun god Ra.

Important though the maintenance of order was, both in the nation and the cosmos, the Egyptians were less concerned with order or consistency in their own cosmology. The divine residents of their pantheon were constantly changing, with some key deities repeatedly rearranged in a variety of combinations. The sun god Ra is a case in point. Although nowhere mentioned in the original creation myth, he emerged as the major deity in a popular cult centred in Heliopolis – the same city where Atum (who had previously been the #1 god in the creation myth) was also a local sun god.  According to the cult, it was Ra, not Atum, who had created himself from a primeval mound and then created all the other gods. At some point the two were combined into Atum-Ra and worshiped as the original being and creator. Later Ra, who was clearly a survivor, became merged with Horus and was seen to rule all parts of the created world. Still later, the god Amun, who rose to prominence as the most powerful god during the New Kingdom, became fused with Ra and known as Amun-Ra. After pharaoh Akhenaten`s abortive effort to elevate Aten (another sun god) to the position of sole deity, Ra was restored to his place of pre-eminence and subsequently worshiped as the creator of all forms of life, including mankind.

The rise and fall of a particular deity depended in part on the region or city of which he was the patron. So Ptah (the god of craftsmen) gained power when his city of Memphis became the capital of Egypt. He was later eclipsed by Ra of Heliopolis, and then by Amun of Thebes. As a rule, whenever a new capital was founded, a new supreme deity was proclaimed. But even a god’s association with a particular locality could change. So Montu, originally a sun god associated with the city of Hermonthis, was exported to Thebes where for a while he gained the rank of state god, only to be subordinated later by Atum as “king of gods.” Still later, during the New Kingdom, Montu was venerated as a god of war, closely identified with the imperial reign of Rameses II, and borne as a strident spear-wielding figure aboard the warships of that time. Strangely, this same god of war was also cited in marriage documents as a protector of the happy home. Such were the vicissitudes of life for an Egyptian deity.

When Ra became merged with Horus, the combo was seen as father of the pharaoh, while several goddesses served as the pharaoh’s mother. Upon his death, the pharaoh became fully identified with Ra and worshiped as a deity in the many mortuary temples dedicated to him. During the day, Ra travelled across the sky in a barque, and during the night through the underworld where he was required to defeat a serpentine god of chaos named Apep. Having dispatched Apep, Ra could then meet with Osiris who, as god of resurrection, ensured his return at sunrise to the morning sky. Thus, day after day, night after night, the victory of order over chaos and the drama of rebirth were re-enacted. It is the theme that emerges repeatedly in Egyptian mythology. It matters little who the players are. They come and go. But the drama itself remains the same.

Although the true nature of the gods and goddesses always remained mysterious and unknown, they were often depicted as an animal – a ram, a hawk, a lion or lioness – to symbolize their role in nature. They were indeed not so much supernatural beings as the deification of natural forces. Each element of nature – the sun, the air, the earth, the Nile – was itself a divine force represented by one or several deities. Nature was not an inanimate “it”, but had a life and will of its own. And not only nature. The same was true of human functions such as writing, measurement, and embalming, and abstractions such as kingship, order, and justice. All of these had a vitality of their own, represented by one or other deity.

Because the forces of nature were capricious and the encroachment of chaos always a threat, it was critically important to appease the gods with offerings and prayers. Ordinary citizens worshiped private statues in their household shrines, but the priests alone had access to the temples where they performed prescribed rituals on the pharaoh’s behalf. The temple was the domain of a deity whose statue was housed in a shrine at the temple’s centre. Only on special feast days was it carried outside for public worship.  As the pharaoh’s power diminished in the latter centuries of the civilization, however, his role as spiritual intermediary was correspondingly de-emphasized, and religious practice shifted towards a more direct worship of the gods.

Another shift also took place over the centuries from an originally polytheistic to a more monotheistic worldview. Different gods or combinations of gods could, as we have noted, rise within the pantheon to become the greatest of all. During the New Kingdom, this position was occupied by Amun whose power filled the universe. His true identity, however, was thought to be concealed from the world, while the other gods, still with their individual identities, came to be seen as aspects of this single hidden force. It was as if an essential unity was becoming recognised behind what, on the surface, still looked like a polytheistic system. Somewhat later, Amun-Ra and then Ra held this position until, during the reign of Amenhotep IV (1353-1336 BCE), Ra came to be invoked as Aten – god of the Great Solar Disc that illuminated all beings. In homage to Aten, the pharaoh changed his name to Akhenaten (Glorious Spirit of the Aten), built and moved his capital to Akhetaten, abolished the worship of all other gods, smashed their images, emptied their temples, and impounded their revenues.  Then, in a move regarded by many as the first-ever introduction of monotheism, he suppressed any usage of the plural word for god.

Alas, worldviews do not change so easily, and Akhenaten’s monotheism (if that’s what it was) did not survive his death – at least not in Egypt. Indeed, his measures served only to enrage the populace who were not about to abandon their favourite deities so easily. In an effort to restore morale, his successor, Tutankhamen, appeased the offended gods, restored their temples, appointed new priests, had new images sculpted, and the people breathed a sigh of relief. They loved the old-time religion.

The legacy of Akhenaten, however, may not have died with him. Monotheism was in the air – and, through his presumed connection with Semitic peoples living in Egypt, Akhenaten may have influenced Moses and the emergence of Judaic monotheism. Sigmund Freud popularised the idea in his book Moses and Monotheism, arguing that Moses had been a priest of Aten who was forced to leave Egypt with his followers after Akhenaten’s death. And a contemporary Egyptian-born linguist, Ahmed Osman, contends that Moses was none other than Akhenaten himself. According to Osman, Akhenaten’s monotheism was so unpopular that he was forced to abdicate and flee Egypt, taking his followers with him in a grand exodus. While scarcely any scholars give credence to this theory, there is some evidence that the roots of Judaism are to be found in the Egypt of this time. What is thought to be the royal seal of the 8th century Judean Kingdom resembles the earlier image of Aten as a winged solar disc.  And, while there is no established link between them, the Great Hymn to Aten, attributed to Akhenaten, bears a remarkable similarity to Psalm 104 in the Hebrew Bible.

A distinctive feature of Egyptian religion was that anyone could share in an afterlife. Humans posses a ka (or life force) and a ba (or personality) which, after death, went to the Kingdom of the Dead.  There the deceased’s heart was weighed against the feather of truth and justice taken from the headdress of the goddess Ma’at. If the heart was heavier than the feather, the deceased was devoured by the demon Ammut. But if it was lighter, and providing other conditions were met – (the body must be properly mummified, food and drink must continue to be offered to the ka by those left behind, and the deceased must be able to recite appropriate spells from the Book of the Dead) – then immortality could be enjoyed in the Fields of Yalu, with the added bonus of accompanying the Sun on its daily journey across the sky.

And if all this sounds, as it does to me, like a big ask, then perhaps the heretical Akhenaten’s immortality is the only immortality that is assured. In truth it can be said that Akhenaten lives – in the monotheistic worldview that he inspired and that has prevailed in all the major Western religions to this day.