The Message Of The Sphinx Part 9

Selim Ha.s.san actually calls the Duat 'the Kingdom of Osiris' and shows how 'Osiris is styled "Lord of the Duat" and the Osiris-King [i.e. the deceased Pharaoh] "a companion of Orion" ...'[325] He then provides a piece of incidental information which adds to our trail of clues when he points out, on the basis of careful textual a.n.a.lysis, that the Duat appears in some way to be linked to Rostau.[326]

38. The pa.s.sageways, chambers and corridors of the 'land of Sokar' in the Fifth Division of the Duat as depicted on tomb walls bear a close resemblance to the pa.s.sageways, chambers and corridors of the Great Pyramid. Could one of the functions of the Pyramid have been to serve as a kind of 'model' or simulation of the afterworld in which initiates underwent trials and ordeals?

Like other commentators, Ha.s.san acknowledges that 'the name of Rostau is applied to the Giza necropolis'.[327] But he also, at various points, defines Rostau as 'the Kingdom of Osiris in the tomb',[328] and as 'the Memphite Underworld'-i.e. the Memphite Duat.[329] In this context he examines the so-called twelve 'Divisions' (or 'Hours') of the Book of What is in the Duat and shows that references to the 'land of Sokar' appear in this text. Indeed, to be a little more specific, he draws our attention to a most intriguing fact. The land of Sokar occupies the Fifth Division of the Duat[330] and: 'The centre of the Fifth Division [is] called Rostau.'[331]

So Egyptologists do not dispute that we have a Rostau on the ground in the form of the Pyramid-field at Giza and a Rostau in the sky in the form of the Fifth Division of the Duat-a place, as the reader will recall, that was not seen as an 'Underworld' by the ancient Egyptians but rather as a specific celestial location in Orion.

Furthermore, as we noted in pa.s.sing in Part I, the pa.s.sageways, chambers and corridors of the land of Sokar-amply portrayed on tomb walls in surviving depictions of the Fifth Division of the Duat-uncannily resemble the pa.s.sageways, chambers and corridors of the Great Pyramid of Giza. Indeed the resemblance is so close that it is permissible to wonder whether one of the functions of the Pyramid may have been to serve as a kind of model or 'simulation' of the afterworld in which initiates underwent trials and ordeals intended to prepare them intellectually and spiritually for the terrifying experiences and judgements that the soul was believed to confront after death.

Here, perhaps, was the testing ground for the ancient Egyptian 'science of immortality' elaborated in every utterance and vignette of the princ.i.p.al funerary and rebirth texts-the purpose of which was to facilitate the journey of the soul through the daunting traps and pitfalls of the Duat.

Additional food for thought in this regard is provided by Selim Ha.s.san who does not neglect to mention that one of the distinguis.h.i.+ng features of the Fifth Division of the Duat is the presence there of a giant 'double-lion' Sphinx-G.o.d named Aker, who seemingly protects the 'Kingdom of Sokar'.[332] Ha.s.san also points out that 'above Aker in this scene is a large Pyramid'.[333] He says that this symbolism, when put in 'conjunction with Aker in Sphinx form and the name of Rostau', suggests that 'the Fifth Division was originally a [complete] version of the Duat and had its geographical counterpart in the Giza necropolis'.[334]

39. The Fifth Division of the Duat features a gigantic 'double-lion' Sphinx-G.o.d and a large Pyramid. Compare this symbolic imagery with the Great Sphinx and Great Pyramid seen in profile from the south-east.

In support of this idea, Ha.s.san then refers us to another of the ancient Egyptian funerary texts, the so-called Book of Two Ways, where mention is made of 'the Highland of Aker, which is the Dwelling Place of Osiris' and also of 'Osiris who is in the Highland of Aker'.[335] Ha.s.san suggests that 'highland of Aker' may be a reference to the Giza plateau, 'where is the earthly Rostau'.[336] Exactly the same idea occurred to the American Egyptologist Mark Lehner in his 1974 pamphlet, The Egyptian Heritage.[337] Here, after completing a study of Rostau, he wrote: 'it is tempting to see the lion figures of Aker as a representation of the Sphinx at Giza.'[338]

Roads of Rostau

The Book of Two Ways is a text that was copied onto the floors and sides of coffins over a 250-year span (2050-1800 bc) during the Middle Kingdom. According to the archaeo-astronomer Jane B. Sellers it was designed 'to aid the soul of the deceased to pa.s.s along the roads to Rostau, the Gate in the necropolis which gives access to the "Pa.s.sages of the Netherworld" ...'[339]

The related Coffin Texts (2134-1783 bc) shed further light on the matter when they state: I have pa.s.sed over the paths of Rostau, whether on water or on land, and these are the paths of Osiris, they are [also] in the limit of the sky ...[340]

I am Osiris; I have come to Rostau to know the secrets of the Duat ...[341]

I shall not be turned back at the gates of the Duat; I ascend to the sky with Orion ... I am one who collects his efflux in front of Rostau ...[342]

As Sellers points out, many ancient Egyptian texts insist 'that the topography of Rostau, though in the sky, is on water and on land.'[343] She also proposes that 'the paths by way of water' could have been in that area of the sky that 'we know as the Milky Way'.[344] This idea seems highly plausible when we remember that the 'cosmic address' of the Duat is the 'Kingdom of Osiris in Orion' on the right bank of the Milky Way. The logic of ancient Egyptian duality therefore suggests that 'the paths by way of land' should be found at the earthly Rostau.

The earthly Rostau is the Giza necropolis,[345] site of the three Pyramids and the Sphinx-so with all this talk of sky-ground dualities it would be almost perverse to ignore the four narrow 'star-shafts' which emanate skywards from the King's and Queen's Chambers inside the Great Pyramid.

The reader will recall that the southern shaft of the King's Chamber was directed at around 2500 bc to the centre of the constellation of Orion-i.e. to Orion's belt at its 'culmination' or 'meridian transit' 45 degrees above the horizon. Strangely, at the crucial observational moment in the predawn on the summer solstice-crucial, at any rate, to the ancient Egyptians of the Pyramid Age-computer simulations indicate that Orion was seen not at the meridian but in the south-east, i.e. far to the left of the point in the sky targeted by the southern shaft of the King's Chamber.

40. Summer solstice in the epoch of 2500 bc: the Duat region. Note that Orion's belt at this crucial observational moment was nut at the meridian but in the south-east and thus far to the left of the point in the sky targeted by the southern shaft of the King's Chamber. The sky seems somehow out of kilter and one has the uncomfortable feeling that the belt stars need to be drawn round to the south, and specifically to the meridian, so that they can interlock with the shaft that targets them.

Looking at the simulation, everything seems out of kilter-dislocated-and one has the uncomfortable feeling that the stars of Orion's belt need somehow to be drawn round to the south, and specifically to the meridian, so that they can interlock with the shaft that targets them.

We suspect that for the ancient Egyptians this curious and unsettling 'dislocation' of the sky served as the stimulus for an esoteric journey which was undertaken on the ground by the Pharaohs themselves following celestial clues.

As we shall see in subsequent chapters their quest may have been for something of immense importance. But in order to understand why, we must first find out who the Sphinx is.

Chapter 9.

The Sphinx and its Horizons 'The Sphinx has a Genesis, and that was the lion ...'

Egyptologist Selim Ha.s.san, The Sphinx, Cairo 1949 '[The constellation of] Leo resembles the animal after which it is named. A right triangle of stars outline the back legs ... the front of the constellation, like a giant backward question mark, defines the head, mane, and front legs. At the base of the question mark is Regulus, the heart of the lion ...'

Nancy Hathaway, Friendly Guide to the Universe, NY 1994 Even a casual review of the religious texts of the ancient Egyptians leaves no doubt that they regarded their earthly environment as a sacred landscape which they had inherited from the G.o.ds. It was their absolute conviction that in the remote golden age called the 'First Time' Osiris had established a sort of 'cosmic kingdom' in the Memphite region which had been pa.s.sed on to his son Horus and thence through him, down the cycles of the epochs, to subsequent generations of human 'Horus-Kings'-i.e. to the living Pharaohs of Egypt.

We have seen that the essence of this sacred 'Kingdom of Osiris' was the peculiar dualism with which it was connected to an area of the sky known as the Duat, close to Orion and Sirius on the western side of the Milky Way. We have also seen how the centre of the Duat was called Rostau and how Rostau, too, existed in both cosmic and terrestrial realms: in the heavens it was characterized by the three stars of Orion's belt and on earth by the three great Pyramids of Giza. Last but not least, we have seen how the ancient Egyptians of the Pyramid Age particularly observed the Duat as it lay along the eastern horizon in the pre-dawn at the time of the summer solstice.

The important word here is 'horizon'. It will prove to be the key to the mystery of who-or what-the Great Sphinx really represents.

Celestial reflections

With the aid of computer simulations, and a little imagination, let us journey to the epoch of 2500 bc, when the Pyramid Texts were compiled, and set our location at Heliopolis on the observatory platform of the astronomer priests. The time of year is the summer solstice, the moment of observation is the pre-dawn, and we are looking in the general direction of the eastern horizon. This means that we have our backs turned to the Giza Pyramids which lie across the Nile some twelve miles to our west.

Looking east also means that we are looking at the Duat. And as our computer reconstructs the skies our eyes are drawn to that region of the Duat known as Rostau which manifests the celestial counterparts of the three great Pyramids-the three stars of Orion's belt glimmering in the pre-dawn.

Having registered this image we set our direction towards the west, towards the Pyramids. The bodies of the distant monuments are still cloaked in darkness but the first hint of the rising sun lights up their capstones with an astral glimmer ...

So we can see that there is a sense in which the Giza necropolis is itself a kind of 'horizon'-i.e. that its three pyramids form a reflection in the west of the three 'stars of Rostau' that observers in 2500 bc would have seen on the eastern horizon of Heliopolis in the pre-dawn at the summer solstice. Perhaps this is precisely what was meant by an otherwise cryptic inscription on the granite stela between the paws of the Sphinx which speaks of Giza not only as the 'Splendid Place of the "First Time" ' as we have seen, but also as the 'Horizon of Heliopolis in the West'.[346]

Astronomer-priests

When the Pyramid Texts were compiled in the epoch of 2500 bc, the religious centre of the Pharaonic state was at Heliopolis-the 'City of the Sun', called On or Innu by the ancients, which now lies completely buried under the Al Matareya suburb of modern Cairo.[347] Heliopolis was the earliest cult centre of the sun-G.o.d Re in his form as Atum, the 'Father of the G.o.ds'. The Heliopolitan priests were high initiates in the mysteries of the heavens and their dominant occupation was the observation and recording of the various motions of the sun and the moon, the planets and the stars.[348]

Much leads us to conclude that they benefited from a vast heritage of experience based on such observations, acc.u.mulated over enormously long periods of time. At any rate, the ancient Greek and Roman scholars-who were at least two millennia closer to the ancient Egyptians than we are today-were constantly in awe at the high knowledge and wisdom of the Heliopolitan and Memphite priests and especially of their astronomical science.

For example, as early as the fifth century bc, Herodotus (the so-called 'Father of History') displayed great reverence for the priests of Egypt and attributed to them the discovery of the solar year and the invention of the twelve signs of the zodiac-which he says the Greeks later borrowed. 'In my opinion,' he wrote, 'their method of calculation is better than that of the Greeks.'[349]

In the fourth century bc the learned Aristotle-who was tutor to Alexander the Great-similarly recognized that the Egyptians were advanced astronomers 'whose observations have been kept for very many years past, and from whom much of our evidence about particular stars is derived'.[350]

Plato, too, relates how the Egyptian priests observed the stars 'for 10,000 years or, so to speak, for an infinite time'.[351] Likewise Diodorus of Sicily, who visited Egypt in 60 bc, insisted that 'the disposition of the stars as well as their movements have always been the subject of careful observations among the Egyptians' and that 'they have preserved to this day records concerning each of these stars over an incredible number of years ...[352]

Perhaps most significantly of all, the Lycian Neoplatonist, Proclus, who studied at Alexandria in the fifth century ad, confirmed that it was not the Greeks but the Egyptians who discovered the phenomenon of Precession: 'Let those, who believe in observations, cause the stars to move around the poles of the zodiac by one degree in one hundred years [meaning the Precession rate] towards the east, as Ptolemy and Hipparchus did before him know ... that the Egyptians had already taught Plato about the movement of the fixed stars ...'[353]

Modern historians and Egyptologists, who are unanimous in the view that the Egyptians were poor astronomers,[354] choose to discount such statements as frivolous outcries by misinformed Greeks and Romans. These same scholars all do accept, however, that the priestly centre at Heliopolis was already remotely ancient at the dawn of the Pyramid Age and that it had been sacred since time immemorial to the supreme deity named Atum, the 'Self-Created'.[355]

So who or what exactly was Atum?

Living image of Atum

Addressing the first annual meeting of the prestigious Egypt Exploration Fund on 3 July 1883, the eminent Swiss Egyptologist Edouard Naville had this to say about Atum: 'there can be no doubt that the lion or the sphinx is a form of Atum ...'[356]

Naville went on to cite what he considered as sufficient evidence for such a conclusion: I will cite only one proof, this is the deity Nefer-Atum. This deity can be represented with the head of a lion ... normally he has a human form, and wears on his head a lotus from which emerge two straight plumes. Sometimes the two emblems [lion and human] are united and between the head of the lion and the plume there is the bird [hawk] of Horus.[357]

Though initially a confusing element, we shall see that the hawk symbolism of Horus crops up frequently in connection with this mystery and gradually begins to take its place in the overall pattern that will emerge. Meanwhile, much else confirms that Atum, the primordial creator G.o.d, was regarded by the ancient Egyptians as being primarily leonine or sphinx-like in form.

In the Pyramid Texts, for example, we frequently encounter the designation Rwty, normally translated as the 'double-lion'[358] because the hieroglyphic sign shows two lions either side by side or one above the other.[359] It is generally accepted, however, that a finer meaning for the term is 'the creature who has the form of a lion' or 'he who resembles the lion', and that the significance of the double-lion hieroglyph is that it emphasizes the dual and cosmic nature of Rwty.[360] The Egyptologist Le Page Renouf wrote that Rwty represents 'a single G.o.d with a lion's face or form'.[361] And for Selim Ha.s.san 'Rwty was a G.o.d in the form of a lion'. In Ha.s.san's view the choice of the double-lion hieroglyph was very probably linked in some way to the fact that: 'sphinxes are always found in pairs when guarding temple door-ways, and the function of Rwty is also that of a guardian.'[362]

Moreover, in line 2032 of the Pyramid Texts, as Ha.s.san points out: 'it is said of the King: "He is taken to Rwty and presented to Atum" ... [and] in the so-called Book of the Dead ... it says (Ch. 3, line 1): "O Atum, who appears as master of the lake, who s.h.i.+nes as Rwty" ...'[363]

Indeed, there are many such places in the texts where Rwty and Atum are linked. One typical pa.s.sage states: 'O Atum, spiritualize me in the presence of Rwty ...'[364] And elsewhere we read: 'Lift up this king's double to the G.o.d, lead him to Rwty, cause him to mount up to Atum ... The King's rank is high in the Mansion of Rwty.'[365]

Such syncretism with Rwty strongly supports a 'lion-like' or 'sphinx-like' appearance for Atum. We should therefore not be surprised to discover that in ancient Egyptian religious art Atum is often depicted as a sphinx wearing the characteristic headgear of this G.o.d-a tall crown with a plume and lotus.[366] From such depictions many leading Egyptologists have concluded that the Great Sphinx at Giza, though allegedly bearing the face of Khafre, may also have been regarded as an image of Atum.[367] Indeed, as we saw in Part I, one of the most enduring of the many t.i.tles by which the Sphinx was known to the ancient Egyptians was Sh.e.s.h.ep-ankh Atum (literally 'living image of Atum')[368]-so we need be in little doubt about this identification.

Atum, Re and Horakhti

Despite all of Atum's well-known Lion-Sphinx characteristics, modern Egyptologists have a tendency to ignore his intense leonine symbolism when discussing his cosmic attributes. More often than not they confine themselves to dis.h.i.+ng out certain vague generalities to the effect that Atum was the 'sun-G.o.d and creator of the universe', and that his name: '... carries the idea of "totality" in the sense of an ultimate and unalterable state of perfection. Atum is frequently called "The Lord of Heliopolis", the major centre of sun wors.h.i.+p. The presence of another solar deity on this site, Re, leads to a coalescence of the two G.o.ds into Re-Atum ...'[369]

Egyptologist Rosalie David informs us that at the opening of the Pyramid Age 'the G.o.d Re [or Ra] had taken over the cult of an earlier G.o.d Atum ... [thus] Re-Atum was now wors.h.i.+pped as the creator of the world according to the Heliopolitan theology, and his priests sought to distinguish his various characteristics'.[370]

One of these important characteristics, Davies adds, was Re's manifestation as 'Re-Horakhti'.[371] Since the literal meaning of Horakhti is "Horus-of-the-Horizon",[372] it would seem that what we are to envisage in this latest piece of ancient Egyptian syncretism is a coalescence of the sun's disc with such a deity. Furthermore, as astronomers and astrologers are well aware, the disc of the sun does, in fact, 'coalesce' with (or 'enter the house' of) certain star groups-the twelve constellations of the zodiac-at regular intervals throughout the year. So it is reasonable to wonder whether 'Horus-of-the-Horizon' i.e. Horakhti, could in fact be one of these zodiacal constellations.

The Egyptologist Hermann Kees also gave consideration to the subjects of Heliopolis and Horakhti. In the light of what is about to follow, his remarks are extremely relevant: 'The particular wors.h.i.+p peculiar to Heliopolis was that of the stars. From the wors.h.i.+p of the stars evolved the wors.h.i.+p of Re in the form of 'Horus-of-the-Horizon ...'[373]

We suggest that this conclusion is in the main correct, though not quite in the manner Kees saw it. We believe that it was not merely from a general 'wors.h.i.+p of the stars' but rather from an ancient stellar image-that of a specific zodiacal constellation-that the composite deity Re-Horakhti was derived.

Horakhti is represented in ancient Egyptian reliefs as a man with a hawk's head, on top of which rests the solar disc.[374] In this way both the G.o.d Horus (symbolized by the hawk) and the sun in the 'horizon' are identified with the Pharaoh-King-regarded as the living embodiment of Horus.[375] The Orientalist Lewis Spence noted additionally that the lion 'was identified to the solar deities, with the sun-G.o.d Horus [and] Re'.[376] Frequently, too, we find composite lion-hawk representations of the King in ancient depictions. For example, there is a relief from the sun-temple of Pharaoh Sahure at Abusir (Fifth Dynasty, circa 2350 bc) which shows the King as a winged lion and also as a lion with a hawk's head.[377]

41. The path of the sun (the ecliptic) pa.s.sing through the twelve zodiacal constellations as they are depicted in the famous Denderah Zodiac from Upper Egypt. The sun's disc 'coalesces' with (and is said to be 'housed by') each of these constellations, one after the other, month by month, during the course of the solar year.

42. Horakhti, 'Horus-of-the-Horizon', was frequently depicted in ancient Egyptian reliefs as a man with a hawk's head on top of which rests the solar disc.

In summary, therefore, we seem to be looking at the various symbolic expressions of a lengthy process: in prehistoric times a primordial G.o.d, Atum, whose form was the lion or the Sphinx, was wors.h.i.+pped by the Heliopolitan priests; then, in the Pyramid Age, Atum was 'coalesced' with Re, whose form was the sun's disc, and finally with Hawk-headed Horakhti-Horus-of-the-Horizon-symbolizing the Horus-King.

The result was the syncretized deity Atum-Re-Horakhti whose combined symbolism originated from the leonine or Sphinx-like image of Atum. Somehow this composite or 'coalesced' image was then made manifest in the 'Horizon' in the early Pyramid Age.

In that epoch, as the reader will recall, the focus of the astronomer-priests was on the summer solstice, when the Duat was active in the eastern sky. In what zodiacal sign, seen on the eastern horizon, did this all important 'coalescence' take place?

Horus, Dweller-in-the-Horizon

When Edouard Naville was excavating certain New Kingdom remains in Egypt's delta region north of Cairo in 1882-3, he was struck by the fact that a large number of the monuments he uncovered were dedicated to a composite deity he called 'Atum-Harmarchis'. a.s.sociated with these monuments there would always be a naos, or sanctuary, containing 'a sphinx with a human head' which Naville states was 'a well-known form of the G.o.d Harmarchis'.[378]

We are by now familiar with Atum. But who is this 'Harmarchis'? Naville noted that in addition to his Sphinx form he was often represented as 'a G.o.d with a hawk's head, or as a hawk with a solar disc'-symbols with which we are also familiar-and that 'Atum-Harmarchis was the G.o.d of Heliopolis, the most ancient city of Egypt'.[379]

'Harmarchis' is a Graecianized rendering of the ancient Egyptian name, Hor-em-Akhet, which means 'Horus-in-the-Horizon' or 'Horus-Dweller-in-the-Horizon'.[380] In other words, as should be obvious by now, it is a concept that is extremely close to Horakhti, or 'Horus-of-the Horizon'-as close, at any rate, as the nuance between 'of on the one hand and 'in' on the other ...

Both deities are called horizon-dwellers. Both are sometimes depicted as a man with the head of a hawk. Both have a solar disc on their heads.[381] Indeed there is no real difference between them at all except, as we shall see, in the nature of the 'Horizon' in which they are said to dwell.

There is one other thing about Hor-em-Akhet and Horakhti, however, that we need to take account of first. The names of these curiously composite and syncretized lion-hawk-solar deities were both frequently, directly and interchangeably applied to the Great Sphinx at Giza.

The 'Two Horizons' of Heliopolis