Egyptian Myths And Legend. Donald Mackenzie
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wait . . . and I turn cold, I sigh and sigh; He comes not nigh.
My sole possession is his love All sweet and dear to me; And ever may my lips confess
My heart, nor silent be. I sigh and sigh; He comes not nigh.
But now . . . a messenger in haste My watching eyes behold . . . He went as swiftly as he came.
"I am delayed", he told. I sigh and sigh; He comes not nigh.
Alas! confess that thou hast found One fairer far than me. O thou so false, why break my heart
With infidelity? I sigh and sigh; He'll ne'er come nigh.
Oh! fair are the flowers, my beloved, And fairest of any I wait. A garden art thou, all fragrant and dear, Thy heart, O mine own, is the gate.
The canal of my love I have fashioned, And through thee, my garden, it flows. Dip in its waters refreshing and sweet, When cool from the north the wind blows.
In our beauteous haunt we will linger, Thy strong hand reposing in mine. Then deep be my thoughts and deeper my joy, Because, O my love, I am thine.
Oh! thy voice is bewitching, beloved, This wound of my heart it makes whole. Ah! when thou art coming, and thee I behold, Thou'rt bread and thou'rt wine to my soul.
With sickness faint and weary All day in bed I'll lie; My friends will gather near me And she'll with them come nigh. She'll put to shame the doctors
Who'll ponder over me, For she alone, my loved one, Knows well my malady.
Chapter V. Racial Myths In Egypt And Europe
ONE of the most interesting phases of Nilotic religion was the worship of animals. Juvenal ridiculed the Egyptians for this particular practice in one of his satires, and the early fathers of the Church regarded it as proof of the folly of pagan religious ideas. Some modern−day apologists, on the other hand, have leapt to the other extreme by suggesting that the ancient philosophers were imbued with a religious respect for life in every form, and professed a pantheistic creed. Our task here, however, is to investigate rather than to justify or condemn ancient Egyptian beliefs. We desire to get, if possible, at the Egyptian point of view. That being so, we must recognize at the outset that we are dealing with a confused mass of religious practices and conceptions of Egyptian and non−Egyptian origin, which accumulated during a vast period of time and were perpetuated as much by custom as by conviction. The average Egyptian of the later Dynasties might have been as little able to account for his superstitious regard for the crocodile or the serpentas is the society lady of to−day to explain her dread of being one of a dinner party of thirteen, or of spilling salt at table; he worshipped animals because they had always been worshipped, and, although originally only certain representatives of a species were held to be sacred, he was not unwilling to show reverence for the species as a whole.
We obtain a clue which helps to explain the origin of animal worship in Egypt in an interesting Nineteenth−Dynasty papyrus preserved in the British Museum. This document contains a calendar in which lucky and unlucky days are detailed in accordance with the ideas of ancient seers. Good luck, we gather, comes from the beneficent deities, and bad luck is caused by the operations of evil spirits. On a particular date demons are let loose, and the peasant is warned not to lead an ox with a rope at any time during the day, lest one of them should enter the animal and cause it to gore him. An animal, therefore, was not feared or worshipped for its own sake, but because it was liable to be possessed by a good or evil spirit.
The difference between good and evil spirits was that the former could be propitiated or bargained with, so that benefits might be obtained, while the latter ever remained insatiable and unwilling to be reconciled. This primitive conception is clearly set forth by Isocrates, the Greek orator, who said: "Those of the gods who are the sources to us of good things have the title of Olympians; those whose department is that of calamities and punishments have harsher titles. To the first class both private persons and states erect altars and temples; the second is not worshipped either with prayers or burnt sacrifices, but in their case we perform ceremonies of riddance".
"Ceremonies" of riddance are, of course, magicalceremonies. It was by magic that the Egyptians warded off the attacks of evil spirits. Ra's journey in the sun bark through the perilous hour−divisions of night was accomplished by the aid of spells which thwarted the demons of evil and darkness in animal or reptile form.
In Egypt both gods and demons might possess the same species of animals or reptiles. The ox might be an incarnation of the friendly Isis, or of the demon which gored the peasant. Serpents and crocodiles were at once the protectors and the enemies of mankind. The dreaded Apep serpent symbolized everything that was evil and antagonistic to human welfare; but the beneficent mother goddess Uazit of Buto, who shielded Horus, was also a serpent, and serpents were worshipped as defenders of households; images of them were hung up for "luck" or protection, as horseshoes are in our own country even at the present day; the serpent amulet was likewise a protective agency., like the serpent stone of the Gauls and the familiar "lucky pig"which is still worn as a charm.
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