CHAPTER XIV.
Project Gutenberg EPUB edition
Renouf, P. Le Page (Peter Le Page) and Naville, Edouard
Chapter for removing displeasure from the heart of the god against the deceased person.
Hail to thee, oh god who sendest forth(1) the Moment, who presidest over all the Secret things(2), and protectest the utterance of my words.
Here(3) is a god displeased against me; let wrong be overwhelmed and let it fall upon the hands of the Lord of Law. Remove(4) the impediments which are in me and the evil and the darkness(5), oh Lord of Law, and let that god be reconciled to me, removing that which detaineth me from thee.
Oh, lord of offerings in Kenu(6), let me offer to thee the propitiary offering by which thou livest, and let me live by it and be reconciled.
Let all the displeasure which is in thy heart against me be removed.
Notes.
There is a very great difference between the earlier and the later texts of this chapter. Former translators, having chiefly the Turin text before them, have understood the title of the chapter as intended “to remove the impurities from the heart of the deceased person.” The Turin text of the chapter is really unintelligible, and even in the earlier texts certain passages are so corrupt as to defy translation.
1. like the Latin ‘mittere’ has the sense of “let go, give free course, set at liberty.”
2., the secrets, here as elsewhere in the funereal texts, are those of the tomb and of the world beyond the grave.
3. The older texts have , the later, .
4. The Lord of Law is in the singular, but the imperative ‘remove’ is in the plural.
5. The word was a puzzle to the oldest transcribers. It is susceptible of different meanings. The Turin text ‘the god is joined with Law,’ which is supported by some of the older papyri, is intelligible in itself, but not in this context. I have understood , coming as it does after , in the sense of ‘deep darkness.’
6. The MSS. differ hopelessly on this proper name.