The Egyptian Book of the dead

Lo, I collect[38] this my Word of Power from every quarter in which it is, in behalf of every person whom it concerneth, more persistently than hounds of chase and more swiftly than Light; the same(4) who create the gods out of Silence, or reduce them to inactivity; the same who impart warmth to the gods.

This is another of those chapters of which the antiquity is proved by the coffins of Horhotep and Queen Mentuhotep. And even in the early times to which these coffins belong it must have been extremely difficult to understand. In the translation here given I have adhered as closely as possible to the oldest texts, but these, as the variants show, are not entirely trustworthy.

1.Thigh. This is the usual translation, which accords with the frequent pictures of the goddess Nut, as the Sky, with the divine Scarab in the position described.[39] But signifies that which runs, from uār, run, fugere; and the noun (the runner) is often applied to running water. It is the geographical name of a river or canal. M. Naville has already pointed out that in the Book of the Dead it has for variants and , of which bath is a fair translation.

2. The names of these two animals (especially of the second) vary greatly in the texts. But if we wish rightly to understand the sense of the chapter, we must bear in mind that it is not the animals themselves that are meant, but the characteristics implied by the names of the animals. And as the Sanskrit vṛkas, the Greek λύκος, the old Slavonic vluku, the Gothic vulfs, and our own wolf, signify the robber, so does the Egyptian , whether signifying wolf, wolfhound, or bloodhound, indicate speed.

The names of the second animal in the earlier texts, whether they stand for hyænas , or for other animals of the chase (), imply either speed or ferocity. And what must we understand under the latter term? We must look to the context. It is of a god speaking of himself and of his attributes. He is proud of them, and certainly does not wish them to be taken in a bad sense. Nor is it necessary that we should do so. We have only to remember what we learnt at school.

3. The later texts read , but all the earlier ones give another word or . This is often used in a bad sense, when spoken of the enemy; but it merely implies tenacity, pertinacity, obstinacy, which are, of course, very bad things in opposition, but in themselves virtues of a high order.[40]

In addition to this interesting utterance of Egyptian theology, we have to note the idea of Silence as the origin of the gods, or powers of nature. The notion was also current in the Greek world. The writer of the Philosophumena (VI, 22) speaks of ἡ ὑμνουμένη ἐκείνη παρὰ τοῖς Ἕλλησι Ζιγή. It was from this source that the early Gnostic Valentinus borrowed this item of his system. St. Irenaeus (Haeres, II, 14) charges him with having taken it from the theogony of the comic poet Antiphanes.