The Book of the Hidden Chamber [Amduat]
The upper register is associated with the mystery of time and with the birth of the hours. The double-headed Sungod is depicted as “Master of Time” gesturing to the two representations for time, Neheh and Djet. Beside this image, Atum holds the wings of a serpent with legs. The following serpent is depicted with stars around its head. The stars represent the night hours.
The middle register shows preparation for the upcoming sunrise. The “World-Encircler,” a giant serpent that is being carried before the solar barque by twelve deities. Isis and Nephthys are shown at the end of this register as Uraeus-serpents that carry the crowns to the Gate of Sais, the eastern gate. They are met by four figures of Neith, who was the goddess of the town of Sais.
The final register is used to prevent any threats that may attempt to stop the rising of the sun. Punishment is used against the condemned who may try to stop the sun from being reborn. They are shown in fiery pits, which are drawn like hills. Several goddesses armed with knives stand before these pits, spitting fire. Behind these pits, the “desert valley of those who are upside down” is shown. “They are decapitated and set on fire, their hearts are torn from their bodies, their heads placed at their feet, their bodies upside down.” [p 132, Abt & Hornung, Knowledge of the Afterlife.]
The Book of Gates
The Eleventh Hour shows A/pep in the upper register. It is bound, dismembered, and rendered completely harmless. The top which it is bound with includes its assistants, and is held by a giant fist. The central imagery of this hour depicts the face of Re as he enters a barque, allowing the deceased to gaze upon him. He is preceded by the stars. The final register both the oarsman of the sun god and the goddesses of time are shown. A few of these deities are already undertaking the job to announce the sun god’s appearance at the horizon in preparation for the next hour.
The Book of Night
The crocodile-headed god called “Gold is God” leads the solar barque through the eleventh hour gateway. This gateway is known as “She Who Protects Her Lord”. This hour is associated with the legs of Nut, and it is in this hour that rebirth truly begins.
At the bottom of this hour, all of the akhu who have been justified appear in their divinized state. Above the solar barque various deities stand guard, bearing names such as, “the One with the Holy Eye”, “the Brilliant One”, “Benben“, and “He Who Loves the Female Unique One”.
Through their service of Osiris the night travellers are now granted the supreme visiion of cosmic rebirth at the eleventh hour in ‘the following of this god’, seeing the radiance of Re and his uraeus companion shining at dawn. Towed by the ‘Unwearyin g Stars’ and guided by “Gold of the Gods’, those in the sun-boat come to see that nothing in the world dies, that death is not destruction but change and becoming, a transmutation of all beings in a recreated world.
Further Reading
- The Ancient Egyptian Books of the Afterlife by Erik Hornung
- Knowledge for the Afterlife by Theodor Abt and Erik Hornung
- My Heart, My Mother by Alison Roberts
Mystical Bewilderment 