Current Projects

This is more a reminder post for me than anything else, but I do think it can be interesting to see what other people in the faith are doing.

1. Besides being an active member in the HoN and KIN boards, I plan on trying to make a Kemetic Devotional based on everyday ways to live in Ma’at.  I’ve gotten the Karenga book on Ma’at as a moral ideal, and plan on studying it to find quotes or ideas on how to live in Ma’at and maybe from there find or write prompts to let other people in the Kemetic community contribute.  I would like to donate part of the proceeds to a charity, so that the act of buying the book itself is an act of Ma’at!  I know I’ve pretty much abandoned going over the purifications I started this blog with, but I wasn’t really feeling the setup.

2. As part of a work trade for the cost of my RPD since I’m currently jobless, I’ve been translating the Beginner’s Lessons of HoN into Spanish. This is quite the project and time consuming since I have my boyfriend go over the finished results and there is still a lot of correcting to do, but I’m happy this helps the community and also gives me a chance to work on my Spanish, even if I am basically fluent already.

3. I’ve recently gotten the book and card deck for the Anubis Oracle since I’ve had such good results with it, and I also just ordered the Shamanic Mysteries of Ancient Egypt book that contains meditations on the netjeru.  I hope to use the cards as a way to communicate with Akhu, or rather, have a more tangible way to communicate with them rather than just hunches.  I really look forward to getting into divination again.  I’ve dabbled with the Rider Waite and Osho Zen tarot decks but I never really resonated with them.  The artwork with the Anubis Oracle is pretty nice, and it’s good to have been able to find something that works within my own context (even if there is a bunch of shamanic concepts thrown in there, I’ll have to decide whether I want to incorporate that into my practice or not).

4. This is more a personal thing but I just started using Evernote and have put it on sharing to everyone.  I keep my Kemetic research notes on there.  Here are the links:

http://www.evernote.com/pub/bastemhet/maatethics

 http://www.evernote.com/pub/bastemhet/netjeriheka

http://www.evernote.com/pub/bastemhet/thenetjeru

http://www.evernote.com/pub/bastemhet/thesouls

http://www.evernote.com/pub/bastemhet/worshipdailylifeancientandmodern

5. Future projects include re-writing myths as children’s stories, and having my sister illustrate them.  This also helps her since it gives her something to put on her resume, and I would love to see more children’s lit. out there considering I want something to share with my daughter as well.

6. Upcoming posts include a massive link list to the best of the best in resources that I’ve come across so far.  I also plan on visiting my Akhu this weekend for the Wab festival, so I hope to write something up on that.

 

I’m currently in the U.S. visiting friends and family so I’m not sure how active I can be online, but I figured I might as well get this stuff down before I forget anything.  What are your projects?

SET’S FIERY BALLS, I’VE BEEN DIVINED!

Drumroll, please…

I’m a daughter of Bast, beloved of Seshat-Nit-Nebthet.

*clap track*

Is there anybody surprised?  No?  Didn’t think so.

I promise to make a more head-type post like I’m accustomed to (and we knew that that was coming too) but for now I’d just like to rejoice.

I also had some messages from my Akhu and there were generally good tidings.  I am happy to have some communication from them and look forward to developing my relationship with them more.  I’m also going to have to look into those other aspects of Seshat as I have no experience and little knowledge of these other netjeru.

NEKHTET!  Thank you to Rev. Siuda!

Monolatry: The Concept of the One

This should be the last in the series on monolatry that I’ve been writing.  I’ve learned, though, that given time, everyone’s beliefs evolve.  However an understanding of monolatry as part of KO dogma is the goal I’ve put to myself, and I believe I’ve accomplished it. 

In my last conversation with Rev. Siuda, I focused on the One concept and asked whether the universe was created by Netjer or a manifestation of Netjer.  I asked because this particular quote from Praise of Amun in the Decree for Nesikhonsu, 6, XXIst Dynasty (the "Credo of Amenism") made me wonder how much Netjer pervades in creation:

Every being came into being when His being began being. There is nothing outside Him.

Rev. Siuda replied saying that the Amun material comes from the Late Period, is almost pantheist, and is unique to that time period.  (I’ve seen other sources place this in the Third Intermediate Period but seeing as there is still some dissent as to what periods begin when, it’s not a big deal)  We should understand that at this point Kemet has undergone many invasions, and we must also contend with the increasing Hellenisation of that part of the world.  Kemetic religion itself was an evolving thing with different phases, and the danger of using information from so late is the influence from other cultures, philosophies and religions.  It is certainly a part of Kemetic history, but the degree of “how Kemetic” one’s practice is a personal decision.  I wouldn’t personally put this thread of thought into the Core Kemetic Beliefs, however.  What we do know is that there were no temples to Netjer-in-the-abstract, although in the Late Period there are occasional attempts to depict a “God of all Gods”, such as this image of the Metternich stela with a composite “Netjer” at the top:

We do know that Kemetic religion is not pantheist because the netjeru are not transcendent (except for an inclination towards this in the Amun text mentioned above). 

Now, I’ve seen Rev. Siuda refer to the abstract concept of Netjer as an All-God in the HoN forums, but I wasn’t quite sure what this meant.  She defined it for me as such:

What I mean when I say "all god" is not an "Allfather" like Odhin, i.e., a deity that is singular but has all the powers of all the other gods and/or is the boss of those gods, but an abstract conception of a singular "Godness" that comprises every single individual manifestation of divinity.

She then compared the concept with the closest concept she’s found religiously, which is the teachings from the Bhagavad-Gita, in which Krishna reveals himself to Arjuna in his true form:

A summary of that part of the Bhagavad-Gita can be found here.  Curiously, in Kemetic religion abstract(and sometime conflicting) concepts, instead of having written explanations, more often use symbols and pictures to explain.  And like Arjuna, we have one example of a story in which a man sees the true form of a netjer and is overwhelmed by a bright light, and begs that the netjer takes their typical form again.  We may see the netjeru in their true form after death, when we are more equipped to conceive of them in this form. (I believe I saw this in Hornung’s “Conceptions” book, and I’ll edit this later to cite a page once I have access to the book)

We can conceive of the netjeru as emanations, and this makes me think of how I conceive of netjer itself. I’ve seen netjer translated as "power," which would make sense if we look at what happens with statues. Some of the power of the netjer is invested into that statue, to make it partially "divine," which makes divinity not simply a status but also measurable. The netjeru would be more divine than netjeri, that we would translate to spirits (similar to devas or kami). The source of this power before it divided itself in Zep Tepi is Netjer (or the One).

I have seen Brahman described metaphorically as the ocean while each created thing are the drops that all together form that ocean, but separately are individual, even if made of this same essence.  Each manifestation of this essence is unique in its own right- to the water is added different herbs to make tea, or it freezes, or evaporates, etc.  The difference between Hinduism and Kemetism is that while Hinduism has settled on a singular Godhead (henotheism), Kemetism provides the shifting "Great God" of whoever is being worshipped at the moment- the refined, individual point of access to the All. (monolatry)

While it may be useful to consider Netjer in the abstract, it is not necessarily a definitive characteristic that allows us to get to know each manifestation in their uniqueness, nor is it often worshipped itself in KO dogma (it is much more common, and also historically accurate, to approach each netjer individually at the time of worship as mentioned in other posts).  We as humans share DNA, and this is part of what makes up humanity.  However we still have to build up a relationship with each individual person.  But taking into account all humans as a whole, we can abstractly talk about what we think we are capable of, and understand our history and motivations.  So too, when thinking of the netjeru, we can understand their relationships to each other and their shared history with one another by conceiving of how they’re connected to each other.

The Meddler

A friend of mine once told me, “There is a certain point where a confluence of coincidences turn into synchronicity,” and I couldn’t agree more.  I first thought that Djehuty had something to do with that calling I mentioned before.  I recently did a free oracle reading with the Anubis Oracle cards, and my question was whether I was on the right path.  One of the three cards told me I had some Cosmic Influences, namely Djehuty, Khephera and Ma’at, and that they are helping me to take the next step in the path of my destiny.  Trippy!  Especially since Helmsman of Yinepu wrote this little bit on Djehuty in the KIN forums soon after:

With Djehuty, I didn’t really connect with him until I got past the "Lord of Wisdom" aspects. He’s always meddling with things, trying to bring about balance. He’s the one who gambled with Khonsu to create the extra days so Nut could deliver her children. He’s the one who made a new eye for Heru, and new testicles for Set, and got them to stop fighting. Djehuty’s the one who went to talk to Het-hert when she was in the desert, and persuaded her to return to Kemet. He’s the one who sticks his beak into negative situations, sometimes at great personal risk, to fix things.
Thinking about that made all the difference for me. And I think the wisdom and Heka just flows out of that, naturally.

The other interesting thing I’ve run into is that he is sometimes described as the Son of Set and Heru. ( !!!!!!! ) Two male parents, but if Atum can create things all by himself by spitting, sneezing, and ejaculating, then why not? That brings a whole new dimension to the conflict between Set and Heru, doesn’t it?

That would make Djehuty the male equivalent of Ma’at. While Ma’at is the center of the balance, Djehuty is the balance of the two extremes, combined into one. That’s why he’s in the Hall of Double Ma’at!

I didn’t go into it much more than saying Djehuty intimidated me on the forums, but I will explain.  Djehuty to me is a sage, a master of knowledge.  He takes students when they’re ready for him.  Even though I’ve been researching and learning for years, I think my reactive attitude and natural skepticism had impeded me from learning more.  When I put aside my biases and gave KO a try, I ended up learning a lot more, and it has ended up adding some gushes water to some streams of thought that were starting to run dry.  I’m not saying that Djehuty favors KO, but I think he noticed that I pushed past my own blocks for the sake of pure knowledge itself, and he appreciates that.  This is why I thought he might have something to do with taking the next steps in my development, and I felt even to the point that he may be willing to take me on as a student now.  I have no idea if he will show up in my RPD lineup, but I have a feeling that I wouldn’t be too surprised if he is one of my beloveds.  Even if not, I plan on setting aside a special little treat for him next time I do Senut, as a thank you for guiding me.  Even just a little bit of nudging has led to a shift into a new cycle for me, and that is just how amazing he is.  Nekhtet!

Wep Ronpet: The year of change

Yesterday I did Senut for the first time, as well as the heka working of slaying Apep in the ceremony provided in the KO forums.  It went well, with an outpouring of the heart to Netjer (I had no idea I had so much to say) and spontaneous singing (can’t remember what lyrics I made up now).  It was good to be bathed in the presence of the divine, and something that I truly think I was lacking.

I think this is a good time to write about why I’ve decided to actively participate in HoN instead of only doing reconnaissance there.  It’s been almost a year and a half since I first took the beginner’s course and stayed on as a Remetj (back before the re-ordering of Year 19 and the definitions of what someone should believe to become a Remetj).  I was mainly only active at the Reformed Kemeticism SIG at the Cauldron, and that served its purpose for a while.  However most of my practice has only been research without actually doing anything.  I tend to get bogged down easily with Stuff I Have To Do, and becoming pregnant, being jobless, and being an American expat living in Spain has helped to add to that stress.  However I see this new Kemetic year as a chance to start afresh, to get rid of my lazyness and start doing.  I promised myself I would do Senut once a week, and I think I can do that, thanks to the support of my boyfriend.  It was thanks to him that even though we spent hours at his mother’s house celebrating her birthday last night that I ended up purifying myself and doing the celebration anyway from 1-2 AM.  I know it’s technically the next day but since the location is based in America, it was still Aug.3.  That might not sound too late but when you’re pregnant and used to sleeping at a certain time it can be very tough.

I have been examining a lot of my beliefs and found that what I believe is not so different from what KO dogma espouses.  And I think being a member of the new Kemetic Interfaith Network and the Kemetic SIG and the House forums will sate that craving I’ve had of community.  I hope to contribute to the community and also allow my practice to grow as I grow this baby. 

I also plan on doing Ritual Parent Divination.  Ironically, mine will be the first of the new year.  I have had to ask myself whether I can trust Rev. Siuda as a spiritual teacher, and the answer is yes.  And it has made me aware of who I am- I naturally don’t trust any authority figures simply for being authority figures.  I had to talk to her and explore her understandings to come to trust them.  But even more, I trust that the netjeru will communicate with me what they want to communicate no matter what the medium.  I have had a calling saying that doing this will be the next step in my spiritual evolution, and I’m excited to greet new netjeru as well as strengthen my prior personal devotion to Bast.  This is a formative time, especially since I’ve had to change to prepare myself to be a mother as well.  I ask the netjeru to give me their blessings, and I hope they give their blessings to all the children of the faith as well.

Reversion of Offerings

I was looking around the KIN forums and came across this quote by WebenBanu that I really liked and pretty much sums up perfectly why I think it’s inappropriate to take the food you’ve offered to netjeru and dispose of it by leaving it on the ground for wild animals.

I can see how it may seem strange the first time you come across the concept, but it’s actually really a beautiful part of the ceremony.

On one level, the bread and water are wonderful symbols of the relationship between the gods, men, and the land. Mythologically speaking, the grain was a gift from the gods. Drawing on the strength of the land, the grain grows and ripens. Through the craft and service of mankind, the grain is harvested, ground, and baked into bread, which is then offered back to the gods Who continue Their benevolence and presence among both mankind and the land. Water is the stuff of life, and without it nothing could thrive–enough said. The consumption of these offerings–after they have been presented to the gods–is symbolic of the cyclical nature of giving between the gods and men. We bake the bread and offer it to Them in an act of ma’at, and They return to us what we need to sustain our bodies.

Another way of looking at the concept is that the gods consume the spiritual aspect of the offering, and return the physical aspect to us in a kind of divine communion. There is no more primal and powerful way to form a bond than the sharing of a meal together. This is one of the gods’ great gifts to us.

The ceremony of the reversion of offerings is a standard, but fascinating part of both ancient Egyptian religion and modern Kemetic religion. On the surface it’s a very simple act, but deeper in there’s a great deal more to be seen.

Thanks Banu!

There’s a personal note I’d like to make in regards to offering: I remember worrying about how much to give.  Technically a spoonful of whatever you’re offering should be fine.  I think the act of offering is what contributes to Ma’at, not so much the quantity.  The netjeru appreciate our offerings but don’t need them to survive, so don’t overexert yourself and give them an entire bowl of chili- that’s chili you’ll have to eventually eat yourself!  Not exactly convenient when you’ve offered a bowl before dinner and had one at the same time, now you’re eating twice as much!

On kemet.org we’re given an idea of what to say after having offered the food, given the netjer time to eat, and before we take the food ourselves:

In Kemetic:
hotep Netjer em shabu en imenti her iabi
(ho-TEP net-JUR em shaBU en ih-MENTI hair ya-BI)

Or, in English:
May Netjer be satisfied with the repast to the right and to the left.

I believe there is another formula offered in Richard Reidy’s Eternal Egypt.

Monolatry is not monotheism

In my last post on monolatry I mentioned I would explore how monolatry is not a monotheism.  I think the information in the last post combined with this information from Wim van den Dungen’s article “On Henotheism.”  All quotes are from this article.

Ante-rational henotheism too, rooted in mythical notions and pre-rational pre-concepts, leaves the contradictions between the deities and the inconsistencies of the story-lines intact. There is no effort to elaborate an overarching theology, for the great questions of life are answered from multiple perspectives. The latter are not exclusive, but inclusive and complementary. The “great truth” is a mosaic of different answers, to be called in relative to the geosentimentality of the seeker and his or her point of view.

A notion of “one divine reality” is present, but not operationalized as such (cf. Hornung, 1986, 1999). It is difficult to distinguish ante-rational henotheism from monolatry. Each deity with its story is one representation of the whole by a part. Insofar as the answers given exceed the constituents of this part, other representations are called in. But various “great gods” continue to exist. There is no need to articulate one “grand story”, a single tale answering all questions. The need for completeness is not processed by the limbic brain, but in the pre-frontal lobe. Once the provisional nature of the “great god” is eliminated, a mature form of henotheism is possible.

Monolatry would become rational henotheism if its provisional nature of interchangeable Great Gods settles on one only, as the Theban priests attempted in the Late Ramesside Period with Amun-Re:

“Secret of manifestations and sparkling of shape.
Marvellous God, rich in forms.
All Gods boast of Him,
to magnify themselves in His beauty,
to the extent of His Divinity.”
Hymns to Amun, Leiden 350 I, chapter 200 – ca.1213 BCE.

Monolatry escapes the “One God” of rational henotheism and monotheism because the One Great God always changes, as mentioned in my last post.  (For a bit of background on the next quote, van den Dungen explored brain science to help explain how we understand mystic experience, and the pre-frontal lobe is the part of the brain that deals with critical thinking and higher brain functions)

The pre-frontal need to totalize all possibilities in one abstract thought is made possible by rational henotheism by accepting the rule that all Deities are epiphanies of the One God. I.e. the variety of Deities is not maintained ontologically, but only in terms of (a) emotional attachment to particular images, story-lines, family-constellations and ritual activities and (b) the operational effects of valid differentiations of the One God.

Monolatry does not have the feature of the One God like rational henotheism and monotheism do, but even those two differ in their conception of a One God, so one must not be mistaken for the other:

Fundamentally, rational henotheism differs with monotheism in terms of the mathematical definition of God. The Divine is not a singleton or finite set with only one number (the Divine = {“1″} = God), but the union of all possibilities (the empty set) and an organized (hierarchical) infinite set (the Divine = {Ø} U {1, 2, 3, 4, …. ∞} = God). In this infinite set of natural numbers, the first number still retains hierarchical firstness, and so the Divine still has “firstness” or “all-encompassing” features, namely insofar as “1″ and the presence of “1″ in all natural numbers is concerned (all natural numbers being additions of “1″). God is not only “1″ (monotheism), but en plus all possible extensions of firstness (henotheism).

The Deities are the case-laws of the statute-law of the One. If we think the Pantheon, we only conceptualize God, but if we approach the One, we only experience the Pantheon. The One God is therefore not experienced directly, and His essence remains ineffable, unknowable and remote (the retained core of truth of monotheism). The apophatic rule of monotheism is maintained, but the catapathic features are transferred to so many expressions of the One. Insofar as the overall architectonic plan goes, God is the Author. But as soon as a particular item or force within that plan is addressed, the Deities spring to the fore. God is the hidden eye, the Deities the visible eye. Henotheism does not foster consistency but coherence. Paradox is not avoided but made efficient, if possible …

So as you can see, monolatry is not monotheism, and they’re actually opposite.  One does not accept the multiplicity of the divine while the other does.  Neither is monolatry a henotheism like the Greeks’ religion because of the provisional/interchangeable nature of the Great God.

Monolatry as defined for Kemetic Orthodox practice by the Nisut of KO

For those who have been following the posts on this blog, you may have noticed that I have more than one post on how the netjeru were conceived by the Kemetic people, and how that works out for us modern practitioners today.  My view on this has evolved, starting with the essay I wrote on the Conceptions of God.  Then I looked into ante-rational henotheism in my post of the same name.  My last post was my attempt to try and understand monolatry and how it differs from henotheism, as well as how this played out in antiquity.  However it seemed that rational henotheism and monolatry seemed to be identical, and try as I might, I could not find anything on the internet to help with further understanding.  So, I asked Rev. Siuda on the HoN boards why she described the theology as monolatry and why as such instead of as henotheism.  Here is what she had to say:

It is my understanding that the terms differ generally not in theory (both are forms of polytheism, both acknowledge many gods despite the "mono-" at the beginning of monolatry that so many seem to see and run screaming from), but in the expression of the individual religious practice.

Ancient Greek religion is a good example of henotheism. There is a company of gods, the Olympians, who have a leader, Zeus. This god is *always* the head/leader of the pantheon, and while all of the gods exist, they (more or less) are considered to defer to the head/leader god. The gods tend to be approached in groups, whether small ones or all at a time, in prayer and worship, far more often than they are approached singly. At no time is any one deity considered to be able to merge functions or identities with any other of the deities. They are strictly separate beings, just like if you have a classroom containing 30 children: all 30 of the children are always different children, even if you can describe the entire group as a "class" – the class still contains 30 distinct individuals.

Kemetic religion is very much like Greek religion, except in some significant differences in practice:
- We can describe a number of gods as the head/leader god, depending on context, locality, and time period, and sometimes these gods themselves can merge to become other gods (e.g., Amun-Ra). At least one set of mythologies describes one of these "head" gods as being the source of all the other gods (e.g., "Tem Who Made Himself Millions."

I had read in separate readings that this is true- that the ancient Kemetics approached their deity as the Gread God, the Head God, even if in mythology that netjer does not have that kind of mythology to support it.  i.e. I could be praying to Bast, and consider her the greatest of all netjeru, the all powerful one, and in antiquity they did the same thing.  However once I finished worshipping her and addressed another netjeru, they too would take on this “Great God” status.  This I think would happen not only in temples but even in personal practice by laymen, seeing as how families each had their own deities that may not have matched up with those of their nome.

- Only in certain contexts do our gods "defer" to each other – most of the time, each is considered to have the characteristics of a head/leader god, and is approached in that way. Even in liturgical reference, what will change in the liturgy from temple to temple is not the content of the rites but the names – we worship the same "god" over and over and over, and just change the names at different locations, whereas in henotheism each unique deity has unique rites more often than universal rites with the names changed out.

- While we do occasionally refer to all the Kemetic deities (and I admit that I do it fairly often in our modern Kemetic Orthodox contexts), ANCIENT contexts rarely do so. About the only ways that gods are referenced in groups during liturgy are by familial relation (i.e., when praying to one god you might reference Their siblings, parents, or children, but you’re still praying to that one god). In Saqu, we have never once had more than one deity appear at the same time, despite the fact that we could invoke them all at one time, and in fact have attempted to do so on at least one occasion. There are no records of any ancient oracles or ceremonies that manifested simultaneous expressions of the deity/deities. We can get Them consecutively, one after another, but when They come, They come one at a time, and we acknowledge Them one at a time. This is the literal definition of monolatry – a polytheism that worships deities one at a time, and for the duration of that worship, only concerns itself with that deity, but does not deny the existence of any others.

I found this part to be very interesting.  Ancient practice (at some points in history) tells us that though we worship the netjeru separately, they collectively represent the combined power and creation of one creator netjer (I go into this more in the Conceptions of netjer post).  However I and many other people have only experienced the netjeru as singular, individual beings, even though we understand that sometimes through syncretism they become more than that.  I have also noticed that while many intellectually agree with the idea that all netjeru together express an abstract Netjerness, they only ever experience them as individuals, as a hard polytheism would. 

- Ancient syncretisms, aspecting, and liturgies that compare and combine the deities do so in a way that "hard polytheisms" do not, and that I’ve also never observed in religions that call themselves henotheisms. Our gods not only merge and unmerge with each other, sometimes They are discussed and approached in a singular über-deity form. However, at no time does Netjer in the abstract become a monotheist god – we always know and realize that the One is also Many at the same time.

- To use my school analogy, consider the teacher of my theoretical class. To the students, she is Mrs. Jones. To her husband, she is Mary Jones. To her mother, she is "my little girl." She can be addressed by many names depending on the context. She is not the only teacher in the universe, but she can also be understood to be a representative of Teacher in an abstract sense if someone needed to consider Teacher-as-symbol. The class might have substitute teachers, or graduate to another level and have a completely new teacher, but Mrs. Jones will always be a singular part of that larger structure of teaching. (You could also think about all the other roles and functions of the students, and still get the same idea – monolatry is defined just as much by what it looks at singularly as what it looks at in pluralities – it recognizes there are many things but addresses them one at a time).

I think at this point I am willing to say that I agree and think it was a monolatry, for the reasons that Rev. Siuda laid out that matched with what I had studied before.  I think they key to understanding was the fact that the Great God is interchangeable, and the ritual texts reflect this.  This interchangeability is what makes the theological understanding of the netjeru so fluid; although we experience netjeru as individual, we can understand that their interconnectedness and relationship as a whole leads us to the power of Netjer as abstract- who can also be interchangeable.  When I asked Rev. Siuda about her conception of this abstract Netjer, and whether it can be conceived as one of the netjeru (for example Amun, Tem, etc.; any of the creator deities), as an unnamed singular netjer, or as the totality of the collective “netjer-ness”/divine power of all the netjeru combined (something like Jan Assmann’s cosmotheism*), she answered:

I personally think of both Assmann’s cosmotheist approach and Tem as "Netjer," since Tem’s name means "The Complete One" and we have mythological/religious reference to He-She being Millions.** I recognize that not everyone here has the same belief, and I think ultimately since it’s monolatry that doesn’t matter – any god could potentially be the One that the Many manifest through/from; both are simultaneous and do not negate each other. In actual practice, being monolatrist, I don’t approach that abstract all that often; I tend to approach the Deities for that purpose, as They come to me or as I feel a need to go to Them.
**I’ve presented papers about this, as noted earlier in this thread, and I also was the student of Dr. Robert Ritner, who was himself one of Assmann’s proteges; we all work in that field.

Again, that interchangeability becomes key, and is also one of the unique features of Kemetic religion that sets it apart from the rest.

In the next post I’ll address some confusion as to monolatry and whether it’s a “masked monotheism” in the next post.

 

*You can read about cosmotheism here.

Kemetic Calendar

This post I intend to be a gigantic compendium of all the research I’ve done on the ancient Kemetic calendar.  By reading this one should be able to create their own calendar with accurate festival dates for their area, or configure a fixed, ideal calendar that will line up with our current Julian calendar. (note as of July 31: this is by no means complete information.  What I’m doing as of now is using the HoN calendar [which is a hybrid calendar and not the same as an ancient calendar] and one can calculate wep renpet in part III- this is convenient because they also calculate with leap year in mind, unfortunately it’s only available to members.  You can also use Kerry Wisner’s calendar for the same purpose.)

Table of Contents:

I. Special problems of the Kemetic calendar

II. Fixed ideal or unfixed traditional?

III. How to create your own traditional calendar with the wandering year

IV. How to create an ideal, fixed calendar

V. Festival dates and other helpful information

I. Special problems of the Kemetic calendar

One thing that you should know about the Kemetic calendar(s) is that there was more than one, and the dates are not fixed as they are in the Julian calendar. There was a solar calendar, which was also called the civil calendar, and would mark all days beginning with wp rnpt on the first day of the year. However the first day would change, unlike in our Julian calendar. The reason why this is is because the date of the new year (wp rnpt) is determined by calculating when the first time Sirius (Sopdet) is visible in the sky before the sun rises. To learn more about Sopdet’s role you can refer to Jeremy Naydler’s "Temple of the Cosmos" page 67-73. The lunar calendar was the religious calendar with all the festivals listed in it.  This calendar was rarely ever in synch with the solar calendar, because the lunar month cycle only lasted 354.7 days while the solar month cycle lasted about 365 days. (not 365 1/4 like in the Julian calendar)

There are other problems if you decide you want to research this yourself.  Some of the best Egyptological calendar studies are in German, so if you don’t speak that language you are limited in what’s available to you.  Also, besides there being two calendars, Egypt was a big place.  The new year started at different times depending on the visibility of the rise of Sothis, and so naturally the festival dates would occur at different times in different areas.  We also account for the difference in dates because sometimes festivals would include the travelling of the idol down the Nile by barque, and so the celebration of the festival would be on different days depending on when the idol arrives.  One example of a prolonged festival including the travelling of idols would be the Festival of the Beautiful Reunion. 

Also, not all the calendars are complete.  The one that is preserved the most is the calendar at Medinet Habu.  Some festivals appear on some temple calendars while they don’t appear on others.  There is no reliable, consistent data as far as modern temples go because there is no reliable, consistent source data.  If any temple tells you a festival is on a certain day, you should ask yourself, “Based on what festival calendar?  And based on what location for the rising of Sopdet?”  A modern temple should have well thought out answers to both questions, as both are up to personal decision.

There’s also the problem of the Kemetic calendar being based on a three season system while (at least in the U.S.) we are based on a four season system, and if it makes sense to have a harvesting festival when your current location is in winter.

For another explanation that mentions a lot of the things that I did, read this.

II. Fixed ideal or unfixed traditional?

You will have to figure out if you want to keep the flawed system of days so that the calendar would be off every by a day every 500 years.  If you do decide to make an "ideal year" calendar so that the year would be the same every time rather than depend on astronomical events, you will have to understand that the Egyptians probably would have seen this as absolutely wrong, and whether you are OK with that.  Each day in the lunar calendar was considered sacred, as we see in representations of the calendar with each month and day being depicted as a deity.  There must have been a reason to not change this for thousands of years. 

The years that include the 13th intercalary lunar month are called great years.  The great years fall on the 1st, 3rd, 6th, 9th, 12th, 14th, 17th, 20th, and 23rd year of each 25 year cycle. (this sequence based off of papyrus Carlsberg) The lunar calendar has a lag of .04769 day every 25 years.  In 500 years that would amount to one day.  In order to continue your calendar from the Kemetic one, you would need to figure out when the last time the 25 year cycle ended, and you would also need the astronomical data from the location in Kemet that you are working from.  This is assuming you’re basing it off of data from Kemet.  I can’t even figure out how you would need to adjust the data if you’re basing it off of a different location.  Let’s face it: I have no astronomical training and I was never that great at math.

There are reasons for either keeping it traditional (or at least, as traditional as possible) and reasons for creating an ideal calendar.  I’ve heard those that are up to the task of calculating every new year and every time an intercalary month would be needed explain it this way: adopting an ideal, fixed calendar would have to rely on Alexandrian modifications, and this is not in line with pharaohnic tradition. 

As for not calculating it every time, I think that while it might be wrong to alter the dates of the spiritual days as I’m sure they had spiritual significance to the ancients as they were (they did keep a semi-flawed system for thousands of years), I also consider this a small concession to the whole "reformed" aspect of my personal Kemetic practice.  Besides the relative ease of having to add only one day a year depending on if it was a leap year or not, the change has significance for me as well. For the ancient Kemetics, their Beloved Land had symbolic significance, as is described in Naydler’s "Temple of the Cosmos." The land of Kemet was also the place where Zep Tepi (the first time of creation) occurred. Kemet is the source from which the wisdom of the gods come, the place Ra first created, the place they chose to live above all other places. While I do love where I live, I have no such spiritual connection to it as I do to the land of our Kemetic akhu. This is why calibrating it to Cairo would be significant to me.

There are things that make sense for me that don’t for other people, and vice versa.  While I agree that both decisions have merit (and I surely give props to those who are willing to do the work of the calculations and staying on top of that), I think that I would rather have more people celebrating the holy days (even if they might be a week off) than be turned off by the whole "astronomical calculation" aspect and just give it up.  In the end, it’s up to you. 

III. How to create your own traditional calendar with the wandering year

 

The following information on how to calculate when the heliacal rise of Sopdet will be visible from your location is provided thanks to the Temple of Ra based in San Francisco, CA:

To figure out when Sopdet will rise before the sun, you will need the longitude and latitude of your location, and the number of hours east or west of your location from Greenwich. Make sure the number has not been adjusted for daylight savings time since you will be readjusting new year’s day every year, which discards the necessity of daylight savings time.

Enter in your information for the sun, as well as the dates between late July and mid-August, and copy and paste this with a word program on your computer. Then go back and enter the same information, but do it for Sirius. Put this information in the same area as the first information. Now you will want to look for the first time that Sirius rises before the sun, i.e. before civil twilight. This date will be the date of wp rnpt.

For the USA go to this website: http://www.usno.navy.mil/USNO/astronomical-applications/data-services/mrst-us

For all other areas go to this website: http://www.usno.navy.mil/USNO/astronomical-applications/data-services/mrst-world

Now that we have the date of the solar new year out of the way, we have to figure out when the lunar new year begins since it starts on a different day than the solar new year (remember the lunar month cycle is shorter than the year of 365 days). The following information on how to account for the new day of the lunar new year was taken from the INK Library, specifically from an article that Kerry Wisner wrote:

1. The lunar year begins with the first New Moon following the heliacal rising of Sirius (the first appearance of Sirius on the eastern horizon at sunrise).
2. Whenever Sirius rose helically in the last eleven days of the twelfth month of the previous lunar year an intercalary (additional) month was added to the new year. This thirteenth lunar month was called Djehuty (Greek name: Thoth) and was added at the beginning of the new year. This was done to avoid having the festival of Wep–renpet, "Opener of the Year" (the rising of Sirius) from falling into the first lunar month of the next year. This thirteenth month would need to be added approximately once every third year.
3. Whenever the first day of the lunar calendar would fall before the first day of the civil calendar, the intercalary (additional) month was added.
4. A lunar week consisted of the time between each of the four phases of the moon, approximately seven days. Each lunar month was named after a specific Egyptian Goddess or God to whom it was dedicated, or after a major festival that occurred during that month.

And here is some further information that I learned while reading The Calendars of Ancient Egypt by Richard A. Parker:

1. Any time the 1st day of lunar Thoth fell before the 1st day of civil Thoth, the month was intercalary.

2. The schematic year would be divided into 12 mos., 30 days each, with the extra five days being an abbreviated intercalary month that headed the lunar year whenever it occurred.

3. In order to keep the calendars at the same time, every second or third lunar year must have 13 mos.

IV. How to create an ideal, fixed calendar

The Coptic Orthodox Calendar is based on the ancient Kemetic calendar and they fixed the difference in dates by following the Alexandrian reform to add a 6th epagomenal day to ameliorate for the sliding calendar.

What this means for you: in Cairo Wp Rnpt is on July 25. Every time. No more calculating. Cairo is a good place to choose also because that’s where the Pesedjet with Ra as creator (the one we are probably most familiar with) was based in. This means the lunar new year starts on the first new moon after July 25, which will vary depending on the astronomical data of that year.

Since we already figure out the day of Wp Rnpt above, we can just add a sixth day upon the year at the end of the year to the calendar every four years, rather than having to calculate it every year. The next leap year (year in which there will be 6th epagomenal day) is in 2012.

Relatively simple, isn’t it?

V. Festival dates and other helpful information

There are many sources for festival calendars.  Here are a few I’ve seen mentioned:

• Eye of the Sun by Kerry Wisner, offered by the temple Akhet Hwt-Hrw.  The calendar is based of off a year that is 365 1/4 days, so be aware of this if you’re making your own calendar based on your location.  It does come with explanations of festivals and lots of other information.
• The Ancient Egyptian Prayerbook by Reverend Tamara Siuda.  The dates are based off of the temple’s location in Chicago, Illinois.  Apparently there is a discrepancy between what’s printed in the book and official temple calendars sent out by e-mail to those who have gone through the beginner’s course, as explained here.  There is also information on the KO way of celebrating festivals here, although do be careful since it’s a wiki and anyone can edit it.
• Temple Festival Calendars of Ancient Egypt by Sherif El-Sabban.  I have a copy of this, and much of the information is a lot of offering lists, while it doesn’t necessarily cover the meanings of every festival.  However we do get a good selection of temple festival calendars.  I plan to at some point make a list for this myself, and will post here once it’s ready.
• Ancient Egyptian Magic by Bob Brier.  I’ve heard this book recommended for its Cairo calendar, but not so much for the rest of its content.  (For a better, scholarly book on Egyptian magic that is free as a pdf, check out The Mechanics of Ancient Egyptian Magical Practice by R.K. Ritner, or Symbol and Magic in Egyptian Art by Richard H. Wilkinson)
• Feasts of Light: Celebrations for the Seasons of Life based on the Egyptian Goddess Mysteries by Normandi Ellis.  I haven’t read this but it was suggested by someone else.
• The Calendars of Ancient Egypt by Richard A. Parker.  This has proved to be one of the most helpful books on Egyptian calendars I’ve read, but it’s not for the weak.  It’s a scholarly publication with a lot of information, not all of it relevant to the modern day creation of calendars.  The link takes you to a free pdf copy.

There are other books I can think of but they’re out of print, academically dense, not necessarily in English, and extremely expensive. 

Websites:

• TourEgypt festival explanations
• Ancient Egyptian Calendar of www.philae.nu This gives a grid showing the seasons and how they’re divided, as well as their Kemetic, Coptic, and Greek names.  They also give a list of major festivals which you can find explained in other parts of the site.
• Festival Calendars at Akhet Hwt-Hrw give a list of month names, with a bit of information about the calendars and sources.

I hope this was helpful!  If you have any lingering questions, don’t hesitate to comment and I’ll do my best to help you find the answer.

 

Conceptions of netjer: One? Many? And more importantly, when?

While reviewing my post on ante-rational henotheism I realized that while there was a lot of dense information, it wasn’t necessarily formulated in a way that helped to explain clearly and to a well-formed conclusion.  There is also a discussion I had with a co-religionist in which speaking with him helped to formulate and coagulate my ideas and research on how the ancient Kemetics conceived of their own deities.  I’ll be summarizing my findings in this post in order to tie up any loose ends.

Since the KO ideology is popular and widespread, I think it’s important to differentiate between why I don’t think the word monolatry is viable as a description of ancient Kemetic practice itself.  Monolatry is defined as the recognition of many gods, but with the consistent worship of only one deity.  There are a couple of ways to understand this.  There can be many gods, and only one of them you worship.  Or, there can be many gods, but all of them are facets of a One source, and it is only this source that you worship.  I think this is an inaccurate description of the current practice since many people, whether they’ve gone through RPD or not, have their deities that they worship; and there is no general consensus on considering the creator god the sole receiver of worship.  I think what Rev. Siuda was getting at was rational henotheism, as described here:

On the one hand, rational henotheism does not accept numerical monotheism (there is only one, single deity). It proposes many deities. On the other hand, all deities are considered to be theophanies, expressions, attributes of One God(head), hidden, veiled and withdrawn ("Deus absconditus"). Hence, henotheism has left polytheism, which invokes entities as idols, i.e. as all-powerful, independent beings (a divine mob), but does not move towards monotheism, the exclusion of all deities, except one (cf. the first part of the Islamic "shahada" : "there is no god, but The God").

However, we do see evidence of this One source as a source for all the millions of deities in ancient practice.

The One and millions formula you can find in Papyrus Louvre (3292) which reads "Hail to you, who brought himself forth as one and who created millions in their abundance," in Papyrus Leiden (I 344), we find : "The one alone, whose body are millions."  You find this formula in Theban theology late in the game, in Ramesside theology.

For the idea that the netjeru are but manifestations of Amun-Re, see Leiden Papyrus 1 (near the end of the reign of Ramesses II, ca. 1213 BE):

II Text in English
Chapter 80
1     80th Chapter.
       The Eight were Your first manifestation,
       until You completed these, You being Single.
       Secret was Your body among the elders,
5     and You kept Yourself hidden as Amun,
       at the head of the gods.
       You made Your manifestations in Tatenen,
       to accompany the primeval ones in Your first primeval time.
       Your beauty arose as the Bull of His Mother .
       You withdrew as the one in the sky, enduring as Re.
10   You returned in fathers, maker of their sons,
        to make an excellent heritage for Your children.
        You began manifestation with nothing,
        without the world being empty of You on the first occasion.
        All gods came into existence after You … [remainder lost]

This of course would be a departure from the differentiated polytheism of the Old Kingdom, which looks like an effort to create unification of theologies.  There was more than one creation myth, and thus more than one theology of how the world came to be and who was responsible for it.  The other theologies were the Heliopolis theology, the Memphis theology, and the Hermopolis theology.  Depending on which priests had more power at the time, their theology would be considered the mainstream and religious tendencies would reflect this.  Do note that power and religion changed throughout the period of at least 4,000 years.  Speaking of the Theban understanding is but a snapshot of what Kemetic religious thought was like.  Regardless of what was going on in the temples away from common eyes, the domestic practice continued with family netjeru being first and foremost in the eyes of the practitioners, which is basically a polytheistic practice.

Two very prominent Egyptologists that I often use as scholarly reference do not agree with each other on whether we can consider Egyptian religion as either a henotheism or a panentheism.  (Or is it possible that one or the other was referring to a certain time period and not an overall tendency?)  Erik Hornung sees this "Oneness" as existing pre-temporally, before creation.  Only in the Nun (pre-existence/creation) divinity was absolute and not spatial/temporal/differentiated.  After creation there was the multitude of deities only connected in the sense that Amun made them; that the divine expressed itself as a multiplicity once time and space existed.  The Oneness ended once time and space began.  This would be considered ante-rational henotheism. 

However, Jan Assmann contends that the textual examples from the Ramesside period clearly point to an "aloneness" during the creation.

Amun-Re is also a "hidden power" or "hidden soul" in creation who is the source of the million-fold plurality in which he unfolds into the boundless. Not the world is "boundless", but Amun-Re himself, and this by virtue of the fact that Amun-Re transformed himself into the millions and the millions did not exhaust him nor did he cease to be One.

To Assmann the Oneness continued even in creation, which is affirmed by the One and Millions formula that there is ample evidence of.  The fact that the One has theophanies (a manifestation or appearance of god or a god to a person) makes it a henotheism, not a monotheism.  The difference is that Amun-Re is later on apprehended as transcendent:

He is the many in that mysterious way, hidden and present at the same time, which this theology is trying to grasp by means of the ba-concept. A common text even goes so far as to describe god as the ba of gods and humans, i.e. ‘the millions’. (…) By linking the ba concept and the theology of the hidden, it becomes clear in what respect this formula goes beyond the traditional creation theology of the opposition between unity and plurality. (…) In the context of this hymn, the concept of ‘all that is’ ntj nb / wnnt nbt  is then explained as the totality of living creation, from gods and humans to worms, fleas and mice.

In this sense Amun-Re becomes a supreme being that transcends all other beings, an all-pervasive, sacred unity behind all that is created.  Amun-Re manifests his creative energy as the various deities.  If we consider Amun-Re in this sense as analogous to the Stoics’ Logos, the "divine animating principle pervading the Universe," it becomes less difficult to accept that all is the differentiated, individual, manifestations of Amun-Re.  In pantheism God and his attributes are identical, and transcendence is undone.  Obviously this is not the case with Kemetic theology.  Amun-Re is both transcendent (existing in the pre-created) and immanent (existing behind all that’s created).  That would make this panentheist.  And here is the text to show it, in Praise of Amun in the Decree for Nesikhonsu, 6, XXIth Dynasty (the "Credo of Amenism"):

Every being came into being when His being began being.  There is nothing outside Him.

What I get from that quote is if there is nothing outside of him, then he is in everything.  Thus, the panentheism.

I want to note again that even in this point in time where it was becoming panentheistic, popular practice continued to manifest itself as a polytheism.  The new Theban theology is not likely to have had a popular following, nor was it generalized on all temple walls.  In hir own temple, each netjer remained supreme.*  Even if Amun-Re were recognized as the divine source, the local deity was just as important.  And no, this is not consistent, but that’s to be expected as we’re well acquainted with the peculiarities of Kemetic religion.

There have been many types of religion mentioned here.  We have differentiated polytheism from the Old to Middle Kingdom, and the development of the One and Millions formula began in Middle Kingdom and came to fruition near the end of the 19th Dynasty.  Right above we have a quote from the 21st Dynasty showing leanings toward panentheism.  How do we interpret this for our own personal practice?  One feature that was consistent in Kemetic practice is the value placed upon tradition.  Ancient Kemetics did not always seek to ameliorate inconsistencies and eliminate different theologies for the sake of simplicity.  Instead, they found that each theology was an expression of an underlying truth.  Whether you consider yourself a Kemetic hard polytheist or panentheist, the truth is not a one-dimensional thing.  I have a feeling that Djehuti, when advising a student, would say to hir, “Hm, you could also look at it that way.  Interesting.”

 

*Check my Conceptions of God post, specifically the Gods by hierarchy section for more details.

 

–

Update1:

I’ve found another definition for monolatry:

MONOLATRY : One Supreme Being exists, but reversibly so.

---

From the Greek "monos" and "latreia", service.
A "Most High" is acknowledged, but not universally or irreversibly. In Ancient Egypt, especially in the Old Kingdom, various Supreme Beings were called "the Great" ("wr" or "aA"), and worshipped as such : Atum-Re and Osiris are strong examples (but any "god of the city" was also "the Great"). Only in the New Kingdom is a New Solar Theology at work, focusing, in the Late Ramesside Era, on the Greatest God before and within all beings (Amun). Then the provisional nature of oneness and greatness looses ground (although, to the affects, it was never lost).

Still not what Rev. Siuda described, but in this case the idea that more than one deity can be considered supreme but at different times is consistent with early Kemetic religious features.  It’s also consistent with how worship took place in temples; each temple would belong to a netjer, but other (lesser) netjeru also called that temple home.  First the main netjeru would be worshipped and considered supreme in that sense, and afterward the other lesser netjeru were tended to.  I can’t tell you, though, if this was a feature consistent throughout the entire religion, or even if all temples contained more than one netjer.  For the latter, I want to say yes, but I’ll consider this one small loose end that I will hopefully encounter the information for later.

 

Update2:

This quote is taken from the HoN website definiting the term monolatry:

Monolatry is the belief that god (as the One) can manifest Itself into other aspects and manifestations (the Many) with Their own personalities and interactions between one another, without ever losing sight of the fact that They all spring forth from the initial One. To abbreviate it to four words: "One godhead, many gods and goddesses." The best example of this is to imagine the Nile and the branches it divides into as it nears the Delta region — many streams, each having their own name and location, but only one river. Monolatry is a form of polytheism, "many gods," but it also permits for a singular Godhead, so Kemetic religion as a monolatry is a modified or irregular polytheism. Sometimes monolatry is referred to as "henotheism," but as henotheism does not permit a singular Godhead behind many gods, it is not an entirely accurate definition.

Now, I may just be quibbling with words at this point, but it seems that they do not call it henotheism because it does not permit a singular Godhead, whereas in all the research I’ve done that’s exactly what it’s meant to mean.  I’ve also seen that monolatry and henotheism describe the same thing, whereas henotheism describes the belief while monolatry describes the worship.  Either way they’re probably too similar to meaningfully differentiate, considering they haven’t always been used consistently in academic writing.