DENDERAH
Posted: 21 Jan 2025 17:47
https://973-eht-namuh-973.com/Alchemy/G ... LD%209.htm
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the Osirian temple at Denderah, an inscription (translated by Budge, Chapter XV, Osiris and the Egyptian Resurrection) describes in detail the making of wheat paste models of each dismembered piece of Osiris to be sent out to the town where each piece is discovered by Isis. At the temple of Mendes, figures of Osiris were made from wheat and paste placed in a trough on the day of the murder, then water was added for several days, until finally the mixture was kneaded into a mold of Osiris and taken to the temple to be buried (the sacred grain for these cakes were grown only in the temple fields). Molds were made from the wood of a red tree in the forms of the sixteen dismembered parts of Osiris, the cakes of 'divine' bread were made from each mold, placed in a silver chest and set near the head of the god with the inward parts of Osiris as described in the Book of the Dead (XVII).
On the first day of the Festival of Ploughing, where the goddess Isis appeared in her shrine where she was stripped naked, paste made from the grain were placed in her bed and moistened with water, representing the fecund earth. All of these sacred rituals were "climaxed by the eating of sacramental god, the eucharist by which the celebrants were transformed, in their persuasion, into replicas of their god-man" (Larson 20).
...
the darkness of the underworld could be dispelled by the light of the Sungod (Re), Who would unite with Osiris in the bottommost caverns of the underworld, and hence resurrect the dead god to life.
In ancient Egypt, then, all of the ancient mysteries seem to come together. We have the light-in-the-underworld motif (Re). We have the divine child motif (Horus). And we have the life after death, or rebirth, motif (Osiris).
Unfortunately, we also have once again the forbidden knowledge motif. .The secrets of Re, Osiris, Isis and Horus are mysteries which have - been preserved intact for thousands of years, and they are not going to yield their secrets easily. Isis, for example, was The goddess whose temple at Sais boasted the following enigmatic inscription:
I, Isis, am all that has been, that is, or shall be. No mortal man hath ever unveiled me.75
These words seem intended to be not so much a statement of historical fact, but rather a warning tb the initiated: "Will you dare to unveil my secrets?"
A similar theme involving Isis was picked up by a Hermetic text, which was written in Alexandria some two thousand years ago. The text, entitled The Virgin of the World, is a typical example of what we have to deal with - it is .full of metaphors, allegories and code-words. It states, for example, that the highest level of initiation into the Egyptian Mysteries was the 'Black Rite' of Isis, which was connected to a mysterious something called 'Night' - not night as in the mundane sense of the night sky, but rather to Night as a higher power, which moved in Heaven, and 'weaved her web with rapid light' .76 This Night, whatever it was, supposedly honoured Isis and. 'gave her perfection'.77
What could this mean? How could Night be associated with light? The text informs us that the 'rapid light' of Night was 'less than the Sun's', i.e. the light was not that of the Sun. One is reminded of the words of Robert Hewitt Brown cited earlier - the Sun was 'only a symbol of the great Creator'. This, he said, was the crowning secret, along with a knowledge of what the true God really was.
'Night', then, was a code-word. So was 'light'. And so was 'Sun'. The uninitiated were not supposed to know what any of this meant.
The mystery is summed up perfectly in one of the most famous passages of The Virgin of the World, where Horus was made to ask Isis about the secret of his divine birth:"
I
n
the Osirian temple at Denderah, an inscription (translated by Budge, Chapter XV, Osiris and the Egyptian Resurrection) describes in detail the making of wheat paste models of each dismembered piece of Osiris to be sent out to the town where each piece is discovered by Isis. At the temple of Mendes, figures of Osiris were made from wheat and paste placed in a trough on the day of the murder, then water was added for several days, until finally the mixture was kneaded into a mold of Osiris and taken to the temple to be buried (the sacred grain for these cakes were grown only in the temple fields). Molds were made from the wood of a red tree in the forms of the sixteen dismembered parts of Osiris, the cakes of 'divine' bread were made from each mold, placed in a silver chest and set near the head of the god with the inward parts of Osiris as described in the Book of the Dead (XVII).
On the first day of the Festival of Ploughing, where the goddess Isis appeared in her shrine where she was stripped naked, paste made from the grain were placed in her bed and moistened with water, representing the fecund earth. All of these sacred rituals were "climaxed by the eating of sacramental god, the eucharist by which the celebrants were transformed, in their persuasion, into replicas of their god-man" (Larson 20).
...
the darkness of the underworld could be dispelled by the light of the Sungod (Re), Who would unite with Osiris in the bottommost caverns of the underworld, and hence resurrect the dead god to life.
In ancient Egypt, then, all of the ancient mysteries seem to come together. We have the light-in-the-underworld motif (Re). We have the divine child motif (Horus). And we have the life after death, or rebirth, motif (Osiris).
Unfortunately, we also have once again the forbidden knowledge motif. .The secrets of Re, Osiris, Isis and Horus are mysteries which have - been preserved intact for thousands of years, and they are not going to yield their secrets easily. Isis, for example, was The goddess whose temple at Sais boasted the following enigmatic inscription:
I, Isis, am all that has been, that is, or shall be. No mortal man hath ever unveiled me.75
These words seem intended to be not so much a statement of historical fact, but rather a warning tb the initiated: "Will you dare to unveil my secrets?"
A similar theme involving Isis was picked up by a Hermetic text, which was written in Alexandria some two thousand years ago. The text, entitled The Virgin of the World, is a typical example of what we have to deal with - it is .full of metaphors, allegories and code-words. It states, for example, that the highest level of initiation into the Egyptian Mysteries was the 'Black Rite' of Isis, which was connected to a mysterious something called 'Night' - not night as in the mundane sense of the night sky, but rather to Night as a higher power, which moved in Heaven, and 'weaved her web with rapid light' .76 This Night, whatever it was, supposedly honoured Isis and. 'gave her perfection'.77
What could this mean? How could Night be associated with light? The text informs us that the 'rapid light' of Night was 'less than the Sun's', i.e. the light was not that of the Sun. One is reminded of the words of Robert Hewitt Brown cited earlier - the Sun was 'only a symbol of the great Creator'. This, he said, was the crowning secret, along with a knowledge of what the true God really was.
'Night', then, was a code-word. So was 'light'. And so was 'Sun'. The uninitiated were not supposed to know what any of this meant.
The mystery is summed up perfectly in one of the most famous passages of The Virgin of the World, where Horus was made to ask Isis about the secret of his divine birth:"
