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Notes from Byron E. Shafer (ed) Religion in Ancient Egypt
This book's available at Google Books!
http://books.google.com.au/books?id=kK1iuqphAKoC
Shafer opens by describing the Egyptian's complicated and sophisticated concept of the divine, including the "identifications and interrelations" between the various gods. "It is not possible simply to label one deity a god of one thing and another the god of something else." (p 7) Egyptian religious ideas were "fluid", always evolving, with no single "sacred book" (p 12). (Having grown up with kid's books which always gave the Heliopolitan cosmogony - that is, Osiris' family tree - I've been surprised to learn how many different creation stories they Egyptians had.)
Similarly, their gods were more fluid in their roles than the gods of Greece and Rome (p 23). For example, Set was a fratricide, Re's ally against Apophis, Horus's enemy, and then Horus's former enemy; he was esteemed in the Early Dynastic Period, and again in Ramesside Period (p 40-1), representing "the brute force and destructiveness that exist within creation", rather than the uncreated chaos outside it; but in the first millenium BCE Seth began to be seen as an enemy (p 124).
The interrelationships between gods were also complex. Shafer mentions familiar triads like Amun, Mut, and Khonsu at Thebes, but also notes that Hathor of Denderah was the consort of Horus of Edfu, even though each god "inhabited" their own temple (p 41).
A few quick notes. Seshat was Thoth's consort, and they were portrayed together in coronation scenes (p 42). Ma'at, unlike any of the gods other than the Aten, was "tolerated" thoughout the Amarna period (p 82). There are two records from the New Kingdom in which Hathor appeared to people in their dreams (p 172), one of which inspired the location of a man's tomb (p 185).
More notes to come, on sacred animals, personal piety, and theodicy.
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Shafer, Byron E. (ed). Religion in Ancient Egypt: Gods, Myths, and Personal Practice. Cornell University Press, Ithaca NY, 2001.
http://books.google.com.au/books?id=kK1iuqphAKoC
Shafer opens by describing the Egyptian's complicated and sophisticated concept of the divine, including the "identifications and interrelations" between the various gods. "It is not possible simply to label one deity a god of one thing and another the god of something else." (p 7) Egyptian religious ideas were "fluid", always evolving, with no single "sacred book" (p 12). (Having grown up with kid's books which always gave the Heliopolitan cosmogony - that is, Osiris' family tree - I've been surprised to learn how many different creation stories they Egyptians had.)
Similarly, their gods were more fluid in their roles than the gods of Greece and Rome (p 23). For example, Set was a fratricide, Re's ally against Apophis, Horus's enemy, and then Horus's former enemy; he was esteemed in the Early Dynastic Period, and again in Ramesside Period (p 40-1), representing "the brute force and destructiveness that exist within creation", rather than the uncreated chaos outside it; but in the first millenium BCE Seth began to be seen as an enemy (p 124).
The interrelationships between gods were also complex. Shafer mentions familiar triads like Amun, Mut, and Khonsu at Thebes, but also notes that Hathor of Denderah was the consort of Horus of Edfu, even though each god "inhabited" their own temple (p 41).
A few quick notes. Seshat was Thoth's consort, and they were portrayed together in coronation scenes (p 42). Ma'at, unlike any of the gods other than the Aten, was "tolerated" thoughout the Amarna period (p 82). There are two records from the New Kingdom in which Hathor appeared to people in their dreams (p 172), one of which inspired the location of a man's tomb (p 185).
More notes to come, on sacred animals, personal piety, and theodicy.
__
Shafer, Byron E. (ed). Religion in Ancient Egypt: Gods, Myths, and Personal Practice. Cornell University Press, Ithaca NY, 2001.