Summary

(Critical Survey of Literature for Students)

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The god Temu, the spirit of creation, manifests first as Ptah and then as the
word spoken by Ptah, which brings creation into existence. Ptah creates first
himself, then the other gods, and finally creates Egypt, by speaking the divine
words that make the gods aware of themselves; thus, all of creation exists as
different aspects, or faces, of Ptah, and of his words. Immediately after he
speaks these first powerful magic words, while the earth and the waters of
primordial chaos are still in the process of separating themselves, Ptah
promises eternity to the dead who are not yet born. On that same day, the god
Anubis, protector of the souls of the dead, allots to each person a destiny and
holds all these fates in readiness.
For mortals, the immediate earthly manifestation of Ptah is Ra, the sun, and it
is in this form that they most often contemplate the one God. Priests use
many names to refer to the different faces of God; these names vary from
place to place, but the names that the gods give themselves are hidden,
because in their names lies their essence, and so their power. By a stratagem,
Isis learns the hidden name of Ra and, with a power derived from his,
becomes queen of the goddesses. Her power is illustrated by the story of her
healing of her mate, the god Osiris.
Osiris is murdered by Set, his brother, who in his malice cuts the body of
Osiris into pieces and scatters them across northern Africa. Isis, weeping,
gathers these pieces together and rejoins them, and from the corpse
conceives Horus, their son. Then she brings Osiris back to life, leads him
before the gods, and brings him into new forms, with new powers. It is through
this rebirth that Osiris becomes the principle of birth and rebirth. He is the

fountainhead through which the earth receives life, from the first new life of
sprouting corn and all the life it brings in its turn, to the rebirth in the afterlife of
the pharaohs.
All the dead who receive the proper rites and who perform the sacred rituals
are reborn in the afterlife as new forms of Osiris and share his glory. Like him,
their bodies are made whole and perfect...

The Egyptian Book of the Dead

1240 BC
THE PAPYRUS OF ANI

Translated by E.A. Wallis Budge

The Book of the Dead is the common name for the ancient Egyptian funerary
texts known as The Book of Coming [or Going] Forth By Day. The name "Book
of the Dead" was the invention of the German Egyptologist Karl Richard
Lepsius, who published a selection of some texts in 1842.
Religion guided every aspect of Egyptian life. Egyptian religion was based on
polytheism, or the worship of many deities. The Egyptians had as many as
2000 gods and goddesses each representing characteristics of a
specific earthly force, combined with a heavenly power. Often gods and
goddesses were represented as part human and part animal.
They considered animals such as the bull, the cat, and the crocodile to
be holy. Their two chief gods were Amon-Ra and Osiris. Amon-Ra was
believed to be the sun god and the lord of the universe. Osiris was the
god of the underworld and was the god that made a peaceful afterlife
possible. The Egyptian "Book of the Dead" contains the major ideas and
beliefs in the ancient Egyptian religion. Because their religion stressed
an afterlife, Egyptians devoted much time and energy into preparing for
their journey to the "next world."

The text was initially carved on the exterior of the deceased person's
sarcophagus, but was later written on papyrus now known as scrolls
and buried inside the sarcophagus with the deceased, presumably so
that it would be both portable and close at hand. Other texts often
accompanied the primary texts including the hypocephalus (meaning
'under the head') which was a primer version of the full text.
Books of the Dead constituted as a collection of spells, charms,
passwords, numbers and magical formulas for the use of the deceased
in the afterlife. This described many of the basic tenets of Egyptian
mythology. They were intended to guide the dead through the various
trials that they would encounter before reaching the underworld.
Knowledge of the appropriate spells was considered essential to
achieving happiness after death. Spells or enchantments vary in
distinctive ways between the texts of differing "mummies" or sarcophagi,
depending on the prominence and other class factors of the deceased.
Books of the Dead were usually illustrated with pictures showing the
tests to which the deceased would be subjected. The most important
was the weighing of the heart of the dead person against Ma'at, or Truth
(carried out by Anubis). The heart of the dead was weighed against a
feather, and if the heart was not weighed down with sin (if it was lighter
than the feather) he was allowed to go on. The god Thoth would record
the results and the monster Ammit would wait nearby to eat the heart
should it prove unworthy.
The earliest known versions date from the 16th century BC during the
18th Dynasty (ca. 1580 BC1350 BC). It partly incorporated two
previous collections of Egyptian religious literature, known as the Coffin
Texts (ca. 2000 BC) and the Pyramid Texts (ca. 2600 BC-2300 BC),
both of which were eventually superseded by the Book of the Dead.
The text was often individualized for the deceased person - so no two
copies contain the same text - however, "book" versions are generally
categorized into four main divisions the Heliopolitan version, which
was edited by the priests of the college of Annu (used from the 5th to

the 11th dynasty and on walls of tombs until about 200); the Theban
version, which contained hieroglyphics only (20th to the 28th dynasty); a
hieroglyphic and hieratic character version, closely related to the
Theban version, which had no fixed order of chapters (used mainly in
the 20th dynasty); and the Saite version which has strict order (used
after the 26th dynasty).
It is notable, that the Book of the Dead for Scribe Ani, the Papyrus of
Ani, was originally 78 Ft, and was separated into 37 sheets at
appropriate chapter and topical divisions.