CRITERIOS DE EVALUACIÓN

The Akh usually rendered 'glorious one", "illuminated one", and the illusive "transfigured ancestral spirit” of Assmann. The hieroglyphs of the word akh have mostly constituted the signs . The sign of crested ibis is known. The other sign must not be taken as the rays of sun, rather it means the rays of God that is: the invisible God's enlightenment of the inner self; the soul. "Thou causest me to see a darkness of thy making; lighten me, that I may see thee." Earlier, we discussed the circumstantiation of God's enlightenment of the soul. The Akh ought to be interpreted as "the enlightened soul" and the verb akhify as "enlighten." We move on in our investigation of the essence of the akh.

Let the path be thrown open to thy Genius (Ka) and to thy Soul (Ba), Glorified one (akhifyed one), who art provided with those who conduct thee; sit thou at the head of the Great ones in thy place; thou shalt not be imprisoned by those who are attached to the person of Osiris and who have the custody of Souls and Spirits and who shut up the Shades of the Dead. It is Heaven that shall hold thee. (122) Grant that I may attain to the Heaven of eternity and the abode of thy servants; let me be united with the venerable and mighty Akhs of the Netherworld; let me come forth with them to see thy glories, as thou shines at the gloaming, when thy mother Nut enfolded thee. Glorify (enlighten) thou the Osiris N in the Netherworld, grant that he may come into Amenta without defect and free from wrong, and set him among the faithful and venerable ones. Let him be united with the souls (Bas) in the Netherworld,

119. Death and Salvation in Ancient Egypt, 2005, By Jan Assmann, translated by David Lorton, p. 97 120. Ibid. p. 98

121. Ibid p. 99

122. The Egyptian Book of the Dead, 1904, Renouf, Chapter XCII. p. 160-161

let him sail about in the country of Aarru after a joyful journey. See thou Horus at the Look- out of the ship, and at his sides Thoth and Maat. All the gods are in exultation when they behold Ra coming in peace to give new life to the hearts of the Akhs, and here is the Osiris N along with them.(123)

These two chapters from the Egyptian Book of the Dead represent a revelation. Neither there is perplexity nor indefiniteness at coming upon the Ka and the Ba in a single phrase or paragraph. Both are the same single soul under particular requisiteness. The akhifyed one; that is the Akh, is the manifestation of the Ba in her experience of God's enlightenment.

Hear this which the gods have said! The Sun (Re the God) says he will akhify (enlighten) this Pepi so that he might receive his status as an akh at the god's fore as Horus, Osiris's son, giving him his status as an akh as one of the watchers of Pe, and privileging him as a god as one of the watchers of Nekhen.(124) Ho, Pepi! You have gone away that you might live; you have not gone away that you might die. You have gone away that you might become akh at the fore of the akhs, take control at the fore of the living, become ba and be ba, become esteemed and be esteemed. (125) This Pepi shall become clean. Pepi shall receive his oar and occupy this seat: this Pepi shall sit in the nose of the Dual Ennead's boat. Pepi shall row the Sun to the west, and he will establish this Pepi's seat at the head of the owners of kas and inscribe this Pepi at the head of the living. (126)When Pepi died his ka gained control of him. (127)

Thus, you shall put this Pepi as the greatest official of the akhs, the northern Imperishable Stars of the sky, who rule contentment, guard deposited offerings, and let those (benefits) descend to those at the fore of the kas in the sky. (128) These utterances from the Pyramid Texts of Pepi I, discourse the Akh, the Ba, and the Ka as one and the same soul of Pepi I, whilst revealing God's enlightenment of the soul.

Sun Atum, this Unis has come to you—an imperishable akh, lord of the property of the place of the four papyrus-columns. Your son has come to you, this Unis has come to you. You shall both traverse the above, after gathering in the netherworld, and rise from the Akhet, from the place in which you have both become akh. Thoth, go, announce to the gods of the West as well as their akhs: "This Unis has come, an imperishable akh."(129)

Behold (the manner of) your going, Pepi Neferkare, which Horus described to his father Osiris, through which he became ba, through which he became akh, through which he became esteemed. Ho, Pepi Neferkare! Come, that I may do it for you, father Pepi Neferkare, and you may become ba through it, become akh through it, and become esteemed through it—that you may become ba through it and take control through it. Father Pepi Neferkare, you have become ba, akh and esteemed. You have your ba around you, you have your akh within you, and you have your heart of your body. (130) Ho, Neith! You have your akh within you, you have your ba around you, you have your heart for your body.(131)

123. The Egyptian Book of the Dead, 1904, Renouf, Chapter XV, Hymn I, pp. 24-25

124. The Ancient Egyptian Pyramid Texts, 2005, By James P. Allen, Pepi I Utterance31, p. 105

125. Ibid. Pepi I Utterance 44, p. 107 126. Ibid. Pepi I Utterance 319b, p. 124

127. Ibid. Pepi I Utterance 373, p. 143 128. Ibid. Pepi I Utterance 467, p. 161 129. Ibid. Unis Utterance 150, p. 33

130. The Ancient Egyptian Pyramid Texts, 2005, By James P. Allen,Pepi II Utterance 67, p. 247 131. Ibid. Neith Utterance 241b, p. 323

Hey, Father! Hey, Sun (Re)! Now, that which you said—"Oh, for a son, akh, manifest, ba, esteemed, and in control, with long arms and wide stride"—here am I: I am your son; here am I: I am Neith. I have become akh, manifest, ba, esteemed, and in control, my arms long and my stride wide.(132)

From the chronicles of the Akh, we positively notice that the texts are definite and unburdened by metaphor or equivocation. The Akh is the Ba-soul; enlightened by the grace of God. The censorious study of the Ka and the Ba and the Akh demonstrates to what extent the Egyptologists have been chasing a fata morgana.

Chapter V

The Primogenial Soul-Tet

Our investigation of the Divine Drama of the Soul leads to unanticipated culmination. The hieroglyphic trio-signs of the same and single soul - Ka , Ba , and Akh - are manifestations of the primogenial form of the soul that never been psyched by scholars or even dreamt of her existence. The instructive hieroglyphic sign of the primogenial soul has been ideographically extant and waiting for our contemplation. The single lead in our investigation is the two well-known amulets: the Djed of Osiris and the Knot of Isis.

The Djed and the Knot

The writings of Egyptologists present a portrayal of the contrastive hypothesis of the origin of the hieroglyph that is termed Djed or Djed-pillar or Djed-column and in earlier translations: Tet, Zad, Tat, and djet.

Budge: The tet was in very primitive times the symbol of a god to which human sacrifices were offered, and the ground in front of it was "watered" with the blood of human beings. The victims were sometimes foreigners, and sometimes warriors who had been taken prisoner alive. The centre of the cult of the tet was the town in Lower Egypt, which was in Pharaonic times known as Tetu, or Busiris. By some means or other the cult of Osiris was established at Tetu, and little by little it supplanted that of the tet, and Osiris absorbed many of the attributes of the god Tet.(1)Various theories have been enunciated about the tet. It has been described as the roof-tree of a house, the four bars representing four branches that stretch out from the trunk, one to the south, one to the north, one to the west, and one to the east. Some have said that it represents a mason's table, and others have called it the " key of the Nile," but the most probable explanation of all is that it represents some part of the body of Osiris. Many peoples and tribes in Africa have been in the habit of preserving carefully a bone belonging to the body of some great or beloved ancestor, and there can be little doubt that the tet is a conventional representation of a part of the backbone of Osiris, namely, the sacrum bone, which, on account of its proximity to the sperm bag, was regarded as the most important member of his body. The oldest forms of this bone are and . Now if we set this sign upon a stand we have which was modified later into . In the period when the Theban Recension of the Book of the Dead was made, the tet may have represented the whole of the backbone of Osiris. The tet bone or bones came to be regarded as a very powerful amulet at a very early period, and under the Middle and New Empires models of it were made of gold, glass, faience, and sometimes of lapis lazuli, and of wood, painted black. Large wooden models of the tet are often found in the wooden hands that lie on the breasts of anthropoid coffins, and under the later dynasties large figures of the tet were painted on the bottoms of coffins, either inside or out. These are sometimes between five and six feet long.(2)

Ackerman: The hypothesis of a belief in a life power being operative in late palaeolithic practices is reasonably verified. But since the Power sought was correlated with life, this 1. The Book of the Dead: The Papyrus of Ani, Volume I, 1913, E. A. Wallis Budge p. 263

earliest proto-religion might better be called, not "Dynamism", but "Vitalism". The Vitalistic hypothesis also explains other late palaeolithic cultural phenomena, which further strengthens the hypothesis. A seventh type of vitalistic symbol (not noted, however, in any Palaeolithic remains) demonstrates its Power by survival: notably evergreen trees which persist through adverse winter conditions. The Egyptian cultic stylized tree, the "djed" column, is an explicit representation of this idea since "djed" means "endurance."(3)

James: While the Djed-column unquestionably was a very ancient symbol of Osiris before it was identified with Ptah at Memphis, it may originally have been a tree with the branches lopped off, and its ceremonial raising up may have indicated his restoration from the grave as the culmination of the autumnal festival. In Egypt Osiris was always the dead king, the role of the reinvigorated god being reserved for Horus. Nevertheless, if Sethe is correct in thinking that the Memphite Festival of Sokaris commemorated the accession of Menes, the traditional founder of Memphis and of the unified 'Two Lands', the Feast of Khoiak was considered to be the right and proper occasion for the Pharaoh to ascend the throne. Indeed, all the gods connected with vegetation and fertilization were identified with him and he with them, as were all those associated with the dead, while his Djed-column became increasingly sacred until at length at Memphis it was deified and transferred to Ptah, the head of the Memphite pantheon. Inherent in the Osirian cultus, be it in the form of mortuary, vegetation or mystery rites and festivals, was the death, burial, resurrection and triumph of the cultic hero. This was most apparent in those performed in the month of Khoiak, in which his interment and raising from the tomb were dramatically enacted and inscribed on the walls of the temple of Denderah. But so numerous were the Osirian festivals that they were celebrated throughout the seasons of the agricultural year at a great many places, notably at Abydos and Busiris, his two principal centres.(4)

Stevens: Isis goes to Phoenicia and recovers the body of Osiris. To deceive Set, she hides it in the swamp of the Nile Delta. But there it is discovered by Set one night when he is outhunting by moonlight. Set attacks the body with his knife, dismembering it into fourteen pieces, which he then scatters far and wide. Not to be outwitted, Isis seeks out the precious fragments and collects them together, except for one very important part: the phallus. She reassembles the pieces and, for the first time in history, performs the rites of embalmment, which restore the murdered god to eternal life. The phallus is replaced by the Djed pillar, symbol of eternal generativity.(5)

Hall: The origin of the Egyptian djed pillar is uncertain but may have been connected with prehistoric harvest rites. In funerary painting at Saqqara (3rd Dynasty) they support the heavens, marking the limits of the pharaoh's earthly realm beneath. In the New Kingdom the djed became a symbol of Osiris. It was used in his rites and was called his 'backbone'.(6)

Knapp: Why did a tree, referred to as the djed ("stability," "durability") pillar, play such a significant role in the Isis/Osiris myth? Associated in many religions with the tree of life or the world axis, trees, unlike vegetation, represent duration. In contrast to inorganic stone, wood typifies organic living matter. In a semiotic humanization of the tree, outspread

3. Forgotten Religions: Including Some Living Primitive Religions, 1950. Chapter: The Dawn of religions, Phyllis Ackerman pp. 4-5

4. The Ancient Gods: The History and Diffusion of Religion in the Ancient Near East and the Eastern Mediterranean, 1960. E. O. James, pp.137-138

5. The Two Million-Year-Old Self, Texas 1993, by Anthony Stevens, p. 47

branches function as head and arms, the phallic trunk as sacrum, or seat of virility. Osiris's djed pillar was unusual, however, in that the representation of the phallus was not in the trunk but on the lop or head of the tree, implying a new understanding of a desexualized generative force. The phallus has now been awarded a "higher" and more spiritual or sublimated status. Horizontal and vertical symbolism also apply to the djed pillar: lying on the ground, it represented the physically dead or unconscious Osiris; raised, it stood for the "higher" or "head" phallus, the resurrected lord: the "everlasting begetter."(7)

Wilkinson: It may be significant that two ivory objects in the form of the djed pillar, later one of the emblems associated with Osiris, were found amongst the grave goods in a First Dynasty tomb at Helwan (Saad 1947:27, pl. XIV.b). (8)The djed pillar is an ancient fetish of unknown origin, associated with the god Ptah and, later, with Osiris, god of the dead; used as the hieroglyphic sign for 'stability', the symbol may represent a leafless tree or a notched stick; sometimes called the 'backbone of Osiris'.(9)

Najovits: The djed was associated with prehistoric tree worship as the trunk of a tree and perhaps with the grain harvest. It seems to have been linked to Seker, an earth/fertility god and later the Memphite mummified death god, then to the crafts and creation god Ptah; finally was linked to Osiris' spinal column and stability, strength and permanency. Tree worship was particularly strong in early Egypt. The raising, draping and anointing of a tree stump in many ritual variants common to many societies with totemistic and shamanistic religion influences. In Egypt, this type of tree ritual seems to have been used in ceremonies in Memphis right from the beginning of the Old Kingdom (c. 2686 BC), as the ceremony of the raising of a djed pillar, dedicated to Ptah-Seker-Osiris, was a key element in the pharaoh's heb sed , jubilee, ritual. In its Osirian variant, a huge sculpture of a djed was hoisted upright with ropes and stood there like a great tree symbolizing Osiris' spinal column, resurrection, the afterlife and endlessness. The djed was one of Egypt's main ritual emblems and djed figurines in faience were among the most popular personal amulets for use both in life and on mummies. Given the Djed's attributes, it is easy enough to understand why it was so popular, but its very aspect also had (and continue to have!) considerable impact. The djed seems to mysteriously project austere, elegant massiveness, strength, eternity and stability, just as a healthy tree or spinal column does and just as a massive stone column projects something which time least alters. It seems to eminently combine qualities which amulets, in Egypt and elsewhere, must possess – protection and welfare and healing, meket and wedja.(10)

Winterbourne: The Egyptian word for enduring time is Djet (sometimes Djed). The hieroglyph (determinative) for all abstract words in Middle Egyptian relating to the idea of enduring time is that of a "bundle of reeds" known as the djet-pillar. In the examples found where the djet-pillar retains its original colors, there is usually a green upper part above some differently colored lower part--suggesting that this is both a plant and/or a tree symbol. The djet-pillar is occasionally given as "two-armed," these two outstretched arm-wings extending as a sign of protection. Sometimes this form is depicted with the addition of ankh signs suspended from each arm; the ankh is the sign of life, so this graphic juxtaposition may signify the dependence of life on eternity. This armed form may in turn be related to that of

7. Symposium, Volume: 50. Issue: 1, 1996. Article: The Archetypal Woman Fulfilled: Isis, Harmony of Flesh/Spirit/Logos. Bettina Knapp, pp. 32-33

8. Early Dynastic Egypt, London 1999. Toby A. H. Wilkinson. p. 292 9. Ibid. p. 369

the winged axis—a form of the winged-oak of Zeus—that is the cosmic-tree. Since the concept of fate as understood in Germanic paganism has a less dominant role to play in Egyptian religion—the god fate and the goddess Fortune first assumed prominence in the Empire Dynasties, (1580-1150 B.C.), although an element of voluntarism also had a place in Egyptian ethical life-we would expect this pillar-cum-cosmic-tree to resonate with ideas rather of rebirth and regeneration in the religion of Osiris. Apart from the god Ptah being depicted sometimes as a pillar extending from the lowest to the highest heaven, the djet-pillar is constantly mentioned in the Book of the Dead in direct relationship with the cult of Osiris.(11)

Mehmet-Ali:An analogy from ancient Egypt, the motif of the djed pillar, helps to supply a

wider framework. This is a hieroglyphic and iconographic entity in ancient Egyptian visual