|
|
The Psyche
in Psychology
Articles on Transpersonal, Humanistic, Existential
and Depth Psychology and Psychotherapy, Relationships, Trauma, Self Esteem,
Meditation, Spiritual Crisis, Spiritual and Religious Problems, Spiritual
Experiences, Spiritual Emergence/Emergency, Kundalini
Awakening and Exceptional Human Experience.
Egyptian Myth of the Weighing of the
Soul The Egyptian Book of the Dead, and
details the correct way to live in order to achieve immortality. This book
instructed the citizens of Only after
successfully passing these Judges, could the soul move into the second
chamber. Here waited Osiris, who was the "good one" waiting for his
earthly children to arrive, Maat, a goddess against
whom the person's heart was weighed, and beside her, ready to devour the
hearts of the guilty, was Amemait, the Devourer.
Over all this resided Toth the Moon god, the keeper
of all records. He is the ultimate judge. Toth was
possessed of complete knowledge and wisdom. He invented all the arts and
sciences: arithmetic, surveying, geometry, astronomy, magic, medicine,
surgery, music, drawing, and, most importantly, writing - so that all his
wisdom would not be lost. He was the Lord of the Holy Words, The Keeper of
the Divine Archives, and Patron of History. If the person's heart weighed in
at exactly the same weight as Maat, and Toth noted that there were no evil deeds written in the
book of their life, then and only then could the person enter into eternal
life, which would be spent in service to the gods. So the Book
of the Dead was the formula, containing precisely detailed prescriptions, for
how one could pass the Judgement awaiting after
death. There were no printing presses, so each copy of the book had to be
written by hand, either on the walls of tombs, or on papyrus scrolls. If
there were any mistakes in the copy from which any person learned their
lessons, and held in their hand at death, then they would probably be slain by
one of the forty two judges, or eaten by the Devourer. It was important that
the book was correct, and equally important that it was religiously adhered
to. It was the only path to eternal life. The God Atum, or Ra, Lord of the Universe, was the first of a
divine line that produced two couples: Osiris and Isis, and Seth and Nephthys. Isis and her brother-husband ruled Osiris’s
posthumous son, Horus, was hidden from Seth by Before
arriving at Amenthe, the soul must successfully
complete a perilous journey. The Book of the Dead, which relatives leave in
the tomb along with food and other necessities, will guide the soul and ward
off evil. With its help the deceased may elude demons and monstrous monkeys
that lie in wait with nets to catch traveling souls. The dead must cross
snake-infested plains and a body of water stretching to Amenthe.
To reach Amenthe she must ask the taciturn ferryman
Face-Behind (so called because he always faces backwards) to row her across
the water. At Amenthe’s gate sits a hybrid monster, part
crocodile, part lion, part hippopotamus, who warns that he will tear out the
heart of sinful travelers. Inside the gates, the soul wanders through
magnificent halls until it comes to a place where there are 42 assessors, who
initially hear its case. To them the soul must make the Declaration of
Innocence, saying, "I have not blasphemed, I have not killed a human, I
have not robed, I am pure," etc. Then comes the
awesome final trial in the Hall of the Two Truths (approving and condemning)
before Osiris and a tribunal of deities. Here three deities, Horus, Anubis,
and Thoth, supervise the weighing of the heart of the deceased on a scale
balanced against a feather, symbol of Maat, Goddess
of truth. Anubis adjusts the balance carefully while Thoth, inventor of
writing, sits ready to record the result. If the heart and Maat exactly balance, it proves the sincerity of the dead
person’s Declaration of Innocence. Thoth’s report is then given
to the divine tribunal, and the deceased advances to
the throne of Osiris to receive the verdict and sentence. If the soul
is condemned, it is either scourged back to earth to be reincarnated as a
vile animal or plunged into the tortures of fire and devils. Alternatively,
it might be driven up into the atmosphere to be tossed by violent storms
until its sins are expiated. The ruler of this zone is Pooh, overseer of
souls in penance. After their purgation in this region, the souls are granted
probation through another life in human form. The blessed
soul lives eternally with the Gods in Amenthe,
where it may encounter its parents, offspring, friends, and lovers. The
blessed hunts and fishes, plows and sows, reaps and
gathers in the Field of the Sun on the banks of the Heavenly Nile. She will
receive her reward in inexhaustible crops of beans and wheat, with bread from
divine granaries and figs and grapes to eat. The Ten
Commandments, at death the transgressor is judged harshly if she has
committed any of the great sins. The ancients believed that the deceased
would stand in the Hall of Judgment, before 42 judges, call their names and
profess innocence. His heart, or soul, as it was believed that the soul
resided in the heart, was weighed on a scale and balanced against the feather
of truth, or feather of Maat. Maat
was the goddess of truth and divine order. The mortuary god, Anubis,
administered the weighing. Many of the mortuary texts, papyrus making up the
Book of the Dead, detail prayers for the deceased that appeal to the gods
that their hearts not rise up and bear witness against them at this critical
moment. If their hearts failed them, they would be devoured by a fiendish
beast. To be saved
from this plight, would mean that the deceased could live in a land, parallel
to the natural world, with a secure bounty, that would rival anything that
they’d experienced on earth. Wheat would grow taller than a man,
there’d be no droughts, no blights, no
shortage of food, there would be peace, companionship, beauty, music and
revelry. They
believed in their enjoyment of life and focused on enjoying their life,
whether laborer or noble, they celebrated holidays set aside for the gods.
They believed that their lot was part of the ‘big picture’,
believed that preservation of the body after death was important and that
their fate in the afterlife, depended upon how they behaved in the land of
the living. There were
thieves, murderers and other wrongdoers in this society and they, not unlike
Christians confessing their sins, believed that they could appeal to the gods
and relieve themselves of some of the guilt. Wealth played a role in their judgment only so far
as, the deceased could afford to send along prayers and spells written on
fine papyrus, and be received into the afterlife from tombs that depicted
their good works, that their faces could be captured in their youth in a
golden mask, on the back of which, could be inscribed prayers, the identities
of the 42 judges, and the feats of the deceased. Ushabtis
or shabtis (doll-size representatives of the
deceased) could be taken along the final trek, when called upon to work, the deceased could send a proxy in the form of a Shabti to fulfill his duties in the divine fields. Much of our
knowledge of the Egyptian philosophy of death and the afterlife is derived
from The Egyptian Book of the Dead. From: http://www.webhotep.com/generic.jhtml?pid=37 From: http://www.planetsinternet.com/DECLARATIONS%20OF%20INNOCENCE.htm |
