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THE BULL OF MINOS
Leonard Cottrell 1953
THE QUEST CONTINUES
Furthermore, after he (Theseus) was arrived in Creta, he slew there the Minotaur (as the most part of ancient authors do write) by the means and help of Ariadne; who being fallen in fancy with him, did give him a clue of thread, by the help whereof she taught him, how he might easily wind out the turnings and cranks of the Labyrinth.
Plutarch
(North's translation).
Page 53
"GOLDEN MYCENAE"
"Watchman: I pray the gods a respite from these toils,
This long year's watch that, dog-like, I have kept,
High on the Atridan's * battlements, beholding
The nightly council of the stars, the circling
Of the celestial signs, and those bright regents,
High-swung in ether, that bring mortal men
Summer and winter. Here I watch the torch,
The appointed flame that wings a voice from Troy,
Telling of capture; thus I serve her hopes,
The masculine-minded who is sovereign here."
So begins Aeschylus' great tragedy Agamemnon-surely one of the most dramatic beginnings devised by any playwright. From his look-out point high above the citadel of Mycenae, the tired watchman gazes down the dark valley to the sea and the mountains beyond. From those distant peaks he waits for the gleam of beacon fires by which the Greeks had arranged to signal to their homelands the fall of far-off Troy.
Since the strong Atridan pair
Menelaus and Agamemnon,
Sceptred kings by Jove's high grace. . .
Sailed for Troy"
sing the Chorus. Then the beacon is seen shining, and the watchman hails it wildly:
"All hail, thou cresset of the dark! fair gleam
Of day through midnight shed, all hail I bright father
Of joy and dance in Argos, hail! all hail!"
* Agamemnon and Menelaus were the sons of Atreus, hence they were often called "the Atride". "The Atridan" here referred to is Agamemnon
THE BULL OF MINOS
Leonard Cottrell 1953
THE QUEST CONTINUES
Chapter VII
Page
90
"Out in the dark blue sea there lies a land called Crete,
a rich and lovely land, washed by the waves on every
side, densely peopled and boasting ninety cities. . . .
One of the ninety towns is a great city called Knossos,
and there, for nine years, King Minos ruled and en-
joyed the friendship of almighty Zeus."
So Homer makes Odysseus describe Crete, in that famous passage from the Odyssey in which the "Cunning One" pre- tends to Penelope that he is the grandson of Minos.
I dont know whether I am on the head or the heels said the scribe rocking gently, listening to the words of good brother John
CITY OF REVELATION
John Michell 1972
Page 62
HAMLET'S MILL
By
Giorgio De Santillana and Hertha Von Dechend
1969
Page 303
" 45 Omphalos belongs among the words which are easily said and hard to "imagine." Yet, during the Middle Ages, Jerusalem, with the Holy Sepulcher, was understood as the Omphalos of the earth and, moreover, the tomb of Adam lo-calized under the Cross in Golgatha, "in the middle of the earth." (See, for ex- ample, Vita Adae et Evae, in F. Kampers, Mittelalterliche Sagen vom Paradiese und vom Holze des Kreuzes Christi (1897), pp. 23, 106f.; W. H. Roscher, Omphalos (1913), pp. 24-28."
Page 303
"It well might be rewarding to look at the tombs of Anu and of Marduk, 43 to consider the fundamental role of the Abaton in Philae, tomb of Osiris, 44 and of divine sepulchers generally. The basic difficulty which has to be / Page 304 / overcome is our ignorance of the concrete meaning of the technical term "tomb," whether one has to do with the Omphalos of Delphi, grave of Python,45 with the "burial mound of dancing Myrina" (Iliad 2.814), with the burial mound of Lugh Lamhfada's foster mother, around which the Games of Taillte were performed, or with many others.
What is haunting is the suspicion that "Uruk" stands for a "new" realm of the dead, and that Gilgamesh is the one who was destined to "open the way" to this abode and to become its king, and the judge of the dead, like Osiris, and also Yama, of whom the Rigveda states (10.14.1-2): (I) "Him, who followed the course of the great rivers, and who discovered the way for many, the Son of Vivasvat, the gatherer of peoples-King Yama we honor with sacrifice. (2) Yama is the one who first discovered the way; this trodden path is not to be taken away from us; on that way that our forefathers travelled when they left us, on that way the later born follow each his trail."46
That neither Yama's nor Gilgamesh's "way" was, originally; meant to last forever and ever, goes without saying. Again and again the me must be brought from Eridu, the Depth of the Sea must be measured respectively, and again and again the sky has to be "suspended" by means of the "Line of the Seven Rishis"-the huge precessional clock does not stop. What has been stopped, in- stead, is the understanding among the heirs of the mythical language who, out of ignorance, failed to adapt this idiom to "preceded" situ-ations. Without thinking, they changed a movie into a set of stills, projected a complex motion into conventional posters, and de- / Page 305 / stroyed, by this measure, all the sense of a carefully considered system.47
This might be dismissed as a minor tragedy, but it is just one of those "progressive measures" which violently interrupt the con- tinuity of tradition. There must have been several such eruptive and reckless "corrections of style"-otherwise it would be utterly in- comprehensible that all our most ancient texts consist of "Scholia" interpreting one or the other "antediluvian" "Book with seven seals." In the case of that neglected tragedy just mentioned,48 a tragedy coming from absentmindedness, the final blow was dealt to the tradition that had established "us," mankind, as a unity. And if we did not have Plato's Timaeus, it would be a hopeless task altogether to understand the reason which made it obligatory in those "archaic" times to watch the immense cosmic clock most carefully. Plato himself, to be sure, started on the way of all intel-lect-moving from thought to literature, from literature into phi- lology, before flowing into nothing; but let us make it clear, this official "trend" is not going to detract us from our own uncondi- tional respect.
Note 47 In our most unheeding times, nobody will even notice when in the not too remote future Leo will be drowned in the sea when he arrives at the autumnal equinox: the constellation of Leo, undisputed "king" of the hot plains, was coined at a time when His Majesty of the Zodiac ruled the summer solstice, highest and hottest "point" of the sun's orbit; and who will care for pitiable Aquarius having no more water to shed from his jars, once he has arrived at the vernal equinox-but, after all, who has considered poor Pisces, lying "high and dry" since the times of Christ, the opener of the Age of Pisces? His title "Fish," i.e., Greek Ichthys, is officially explained as being the first letters of "Iesous Chreistos Theou Yios Soter"-Jesus Christ God's Son Savior.
48 Without going into details, we think it possible that it was this very change from "constellations" to "signs" and, more generally, the enthronement of that astronomical language which alone is recognized as "scientific" by contemporary historians, i.e., the terminology of "positional astronomy," which interrupted Ho- meric tradition; the Greeks quoted Homer all day long, they interpreted him, they broke their heads about the significance of details: his terminology had died long ago."
Page 303
" 45 Omphalos belongs among the words which are easily said and hard to "imagine." Yet, during the Middle Ages, Jerusalem, with the Holy Sepulcher, was understood as the Omphalos of the earth and, moreover, the tomb of Adam lo-calized under the Cross in Golgatha, "in the middle of the earth." (See, for ex- ample, Vita Adae et Evae, in F. Kampers, Mittelalterliche Sagen vom Paradiese und vom Holze des Kreuzes Christi (1897), pp. 23, 106f.; W. H. Roscher, Omphalos (1913), pp. 24-28".
46Cf. Atharva Veda 18.1.50 (Whitney trans.): "Yama first found for us a track, that is not a pasture to be borne away; where our former Fathers went forth, there (go) those born (of them), along their own roads."
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Alizzed
makes emphasis
CITY OF REVELATION
John Michell 1972
Page 27
"Of the Temple at Jerusalem, the mystical centre of the Jews, Dr Raphael Patai writes in his book Man and the Temple:
'Nor was the cosmic significance of the Temple exhausted with the light that emanated from it. In the middle of the Temple and con-stituting the floor of the Holy of Holies, was a huge native rock which was adorned by Jewish legends with the peculiar features of an Omphalos, a Navel of the Earth. This rock called in Hebrew Ebhen Shetiyyah, the Stone of Foundation, was the first solid thing created, and was placed by God amidst the as yet boundless fluid of the pri-meval waters. Legend has it that just as the body of an embryo is built up in its mother's womb from its navel, so God built up the earth concentrically around this Stone, the Navel of the Earth. And just as the body of the embryo recieves its nourishment from the navel.' so the whole earth too recieves the waters that nourish it from this navel.'
The invariable practice in antiquity of locating sacred buildings immediately above underground springs and watercourses, as at the Temple of Jerusalem, constitutes one of the greatest mysteries of the past, for evidently some principal was involved of which we are now totally unaware."
Robert Temple 1998
Page 381
HAMLET'S MILL
By
Giorgio De Santillana and Hertha Von Dechend
1969
Page 301
"...But before the Epic started (T abl. 1, 19), it was said that "the Seven Wise Ones" had laid the foundation of ramparted Uruk. So the ring has been closed.
But what does it mean? Why is Urshanabi, of all people, asked to survey U ruk, enclosed-according to the rule-by seven walls? And what have the Seven Sages to do with the foundation of Gilga-mesh's city?
To take the latter question first: the Seven Sages are the stars of the Big Dipper, the Indian Saptarshi, the Seven Rishis.37 The solstitial colure, called the "Line of the Seven Rishis," happened to run through one after the other of these' stars during several mil- lennia (starting with eta, around 4000 B.C.): and to establish this colure is "internationally" termed "to suspend the sky"-the Baby- lonians called the Big Dipper "bond of heaven," "mother bond of heaven," the Greeks spelled it "Omphaloessa."
Next, why is it the business of the boatman from the "confluence of the rivers" (that is what pi narati is) to check the measures of Uruk? It is established that the boatman's name was "servant (or priest) of 40 or of 2/3 ,"38 and that makes him a "piece," or what-
ever one prefers to designate it, of Enki-Ea, called Shanabi = 2/3 (of 60 = 40). Enki's residence is Eridu, at the confluence of the rivers, at mulNUNki = Canopus (alpha Carinae), the seat of the me, the norms and measures. From there these me have to be procured. Urshanabi, however, seems to be bound with close family ties to Enki-Ea, in fact to be his son-in-law, husband of Nanshe.39
Numerous texts and inscriptions show that Enki-Ea, Lord of the Apsu, was responsible for the ground plan of "temples," whether celestial or terrestrial ones. The one who actually drew up the plans, with the "holy stylus" of Eridu, was Nanshe, Enki's
37 And exactly as the Indian texts have a lot to say about the Seven Rishis with their sister (and wife) Arundati, so the Mesopotamian ones talk about the "Sebettu with their sister Narundi..."
The far yonder scribe lightens the dark of the me
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CITY OF REVELATION
John Michell 1972
Page 62
Page 62 continues
"The earth's diameter is 7920 miles and the moon's is 2160 miles, so the perimeters of the two squares are: terrestrial 31,680 miles, lunar 8640 miles. In terms of the convention ..." "...pi" = 22/7, the circle is here perfectly squared. The combined radii of the earth (3960) and the moon (1080) amount to 5040 miles, Plato's mystical number, so the circumference of a circle struck from the centre of the earth and passing through the centre of the moon measures 31,680 miles, which is also the perimeter of the square containing the earth.
The construction of this figure is simply achieved by means of a Pythagorean right-angle triangle with sides in the proportion 3, 4, 5, a triangle particularly appropriate to the New Jerusalem because 3 + 4 + 5 = 12. If the outer corner of the square 'Contain-ing the moon is joined to the corresponding corner of the square con-taining the earth, the triangle thus formed has sides of 2160, 2880 and 3600 miles; divided by their highest common factor, 720, these numbers become 3, 4 and 5. In this way, starting with the first Pythagorean triangle and using the actual proportions and dimen-sions of the solar system, the canonical figure of the 12-sided New Jerusalem is developed."
"...The construction of this figure is simply achieved by means of a Pythagorean right-angle triangle with sides in the proportion
a triangle particularly appropriate to the New Jerusalem because
3 + 4 + 5 = 12. "
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3 + 4 + 5
SUN MOON EARTH
19 1+9 1+0
azazazAZAZAZAZAZAZAZAZAZazazaz
CITY OF REVELATION
John Michell 1972
Page 62
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CITY OF REVELATION
John Michell 1972
Page 62
The complete scheme of the New Jerusalem, its twelve pearls and seven stars
The New Jerusalem is now revealed as St John described it in Revelation 21. Fig. 12 opposite is developed from the diagram of the terrestrial and lunar spheres shown in Fig.11 but measured in feet rather than miles. Round the circle of the earth, contained in the square, are placed twelve circles of the relative size of the moon. These are arranged like the signs of the zodiac in four groups of three, so that the circumference of each of the two outer circles in every group of three touches the point where the circle drawn through their centres meets the square of equal perimeter. The twelve circles are contained within a twelve-sided figure which, because the circles are not evenly spaced round the perimeter of the greater circle, is not quite a regular dodekagon; the four pairs of its sides that meet opposite the corners of the square are slightly drawn in towards the centre to bring them into contact with their respective / Page 63 / circles. It is difficult therefore to compute the exact distance round the twelve walls, but the average length of one side is certainly very close to 3264 feet or 1200 MY, and in this case the perimeter of the twelve sides is 14,400 MY, and the area of the whole figure 120 million square feet. All the principal dimensions of the Holy City are framed as multiples of 12, and with the exception of 12 itself they all reduce to 9."
Page 63
12,
and with the exception of
12
itself they all reduce to"
9
THE KORAN
EVERYMAN
Everyman I will go with thee and be thy guide
Translated from the Arabic by J. M. Rodwell The Oriental Institute, First published
1909
SURA I
MECCA - 7 VERSES
" In the Name of God, the Compassionate, the Merciful
Praise be to God, Lord of the worlds!
The compassionate, the merciful!
King on the day of reckoning!
Thee only do we worship, and to Thee do we cry for help.
Guide Thou us on the straight path,
The path of those to whom Thou hast been gracious; - with
whom thou art not angry, and who go not astray."
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THE KORAN
EVERYMAN
Everyman I will go with thee and be thy guide
Translated from the Arabic by J. M. Rodwell The Oriental Institute, First published
1909
Page xxii
17:87:
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THE KORAN
EVERYMAN
Everyman I will go with thee and be thy guide
Translated from the Arabic by J. M. Rodwell The Oriental Institute, First published
1909
INTRODUCTION
Alan Jones
Page xix
"...In the standard form in which we have it today, the Qur'an is divided into 114 chapters of very unequal length, called suras. The suras are the working units of the revelation. They are largely composite. All but one (sura 9, which may well be unfinished) begin with the formula bi-smi llahi l-rahmani l-rahimi 'in the Name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate'; and in 29 suras this formula is followed by a group of letters of the Arabic alphabet (e.g. alif, lam, mim, found at the beginning of suras 2, 3, 2.9, 30, 31 and 32), whose function is unknown but which seem to be of mystical import..."
Page xxii
"The central theme of the Qur'an is the belief in one God, the merciful God who is the Creator of Heaven and Earth and all things and beings therein and whose omnipotence is to be seen everywhere in His signs (ayat [as mentioned above, this word is also used to refer to individual verses of the Qur'an]). Dis-obedience will lead to an apocalypse, which will be the prelude to the Day of Judgement. At the Judgement each individual will be judged and the righteous conveyed to Heaven and the unrighteous to Hell. Righteousness requires both belief and general rectitude.
Along with the passages that tell of God and His signs, there are also stories of peoples and prophets. Some of the earliest of these refer to Arabian legends: the destruction of the tribes of cAd, Thamud and Madyan after they failed to respond to the messages of their prophets (Hud, Salih and Shu cayb respectively). These stories were later to be afforced by other disaster / punishment stories drawn from Old Testament material: Noah and the flood, Lot and his people, and Moses and the Egyptians. In fact, Old Testament stories, often in a guise'somewhat different from that in the Bible, dominate much of the narratives of the Qur'an. Among the best known are: Adam and Eve; the Fall; the / Page xxiii / disobedience of Satan; Cain and Abel; Abraham; Isaac and Ishmael; Jacob, Joseph and his brothers; Moses, Aaron and the Israelites; Solomon and David; Jonah and Job. By far the most important of these prophetic figures are Moses, the leader who freed the Israelites from the yoke of the Egyptians and led them to the promised land, and Abraham, who, having turned his back on idolatry, built with his son Ishmael the Ka cba as a shrine to the one God".
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" There is much less material from the New Testament and Christian apocryphal sources. Apart from the story of Zacharias and the birth of John the Baptist and some references to the disciples (who are treated as a group and not named individually), the references are to Mary and, above all, to Jesus. The miraculous birth of Jesus is one of the signs of God, and mention is made of his ability to perform miracles such as raising the dead and healing the leper. However, Jesus is basically treated as one in the series of God's prophets, his description as al-Masih 'the Messiah' apparently having little special force. The Qur'an specifically rejects the doctrine of the Trinity (see, in particular, 5: 17). It also denies the Crucifixion (4: 1 57) at the beginning of a passage that appears to imply the following sequence of events: apparent death of Jesus, Ascension, and then, at some later time, second coming, natural death and general Resurrection.
There are some parables, but they are of little significance in comparison with the narrative material. The majority are in effect extended similes very similar to a form used with great success in early Arabic poetry (see, for example, 2:17, 2:19,16:75,16:112, 18:45,24:35, 29:41, 30:28, 39:29, 66:10). For the rare longer parables see 14:24-7 (the good and bad trees); 18:32-44 (the two gardens); 36:13-32 (the unbelieving city); and 68:17-33 (the blighted garden).
In addition, Sura 18 includes two stories from the Christian periphery to the north of Arabia: the so-called legend of the Seven Sleepers and extracts from the Alexander romance. There is also material that looks like traditional wisdom literature (cf. the material about Luqman in Sura 31).
The narratives are crucial in underpinning two doctrines that evolved during the period of revelation: the first, that God had sent a series of believing prophets to their peoples over the ages, all conveying the same message; and the second, that Muhammad was the last in this series of prophets. Linked to this is the doctrine / Page xxiv that Muhammad is the prophet sent to the Arabs in particular and that his message is in Arabic lisan carabiyy mubin 'clear Arabic language' (16:103, 2.6:195), qur'an carabiyy 'an Arabic recita-tion' (12.:2., 2.0:113, 41:3, 42.:7, 43:3), lisan carabiyy 'Arabic language' (46:12.), hukm carabiyy 'an Arabic judgement' (13:37).
In addition to biblical stories, there are a number of passages that are obviously parallel. From the Old Testament one may cite Q. 2.4:50 and Deut. 2.6:17; Q. 53:45 and 49 and I Sam. 2.:6-7; Q. 53,39-42. and Ezek. 18:2.0"; and, at greater length, Q. 17:2.3-40 and Ex. 2.0:2.-17/Deut. 5: 6-2.1. There are slightly more passages where the parallel is with the New Testament. See, for example, Q. 2.:2.74 and Matth. 6:3-4; Q. 2.1:2.0 and Rev. 4:8; Q. 36: 5 3 and I Thess. 4: 16; Q. 48:2.9 and Mark 4:2.9; and, at greater length, Q. 2.:49-64 and Acts 7:36-53. However, in none of these passages is there a close verbal relationship. There is more of that in such Semitic sayings as 'an eye for an eye' etc. (Q. 5:45 and Ex. 2.1:2.3-7) and 'before the camel will pass through the eye of a needle' (Q. 7:38 and Matth. 19:2.4); but it is only in Q. 2.1:105
'And now, since the Law was given, have we written in the Psalms that "my servants, the righteous, shall inherit the earth" , that we have a close parallel: Psalms 37:2.9 reads 'The righteous shall inherit the land and shall dwell therein for ever'. Remarkably the previous verse (Q. 2.1: 104) 'On that day we will roll up the heaven as one rolleth up written scrolls' is a fairly close approximation to part of a quite separate verse (Isaiah 34:4) 'and the heavens shall be rolled together as a scroll'. However, by far the most interesting and instructive parallel is between Sura 12. and Genesis 37-47: the story of Joseph. The Quranic narrative, which includes details from the Midrash as well as Genesis, may at first seem rather sketchy, but in Arabic terms it is beautifully judged and effective. It is, incidentally, the only longish sura to be devoted to the telling of a single story.
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JOSEPH AND HIS BROTHERS
Thomas Mann 1933
JOSEPH THE PROVIDER
Page 888
"The story in all its shockingness did not lack popular appeal; one might even say that it had a ritual character, seeming as it did like the repetition in the present of events whose foundation lay far back in the past.
To put it bluntly, somebody had been conspiring against Pharaoh's life - this although the days of the majesty of that elderly god were well known to be numbered anyhow, and it is common knowledge that their inclination to unite again with the sun could not be arrested either by the advice of the magicians and physicians of the book- house or even by the mediation of Ishtar of the Way, which His Majesty's brother and father-in-law of the Euphrates, Tushratta, King over Khanigalbat or Mitanniland, had solicitously sent to him. But that the Great House, Si-Re, Son of the Sun and Lord of the Two Crowns, Neb-ma-Re-Amenhotpe, was old and ailing and could scarcely breathe was no reason at all why he should not be conspired against; indeed, if you liked, it was a very good reason why he should, however dreadful, of course, such an enterprise remained.
It was a universally known fact that Re himself, the sun-god, had originally been King of the two lands, or rather ruler on earth over all men; and had ruled them with majestic brilliance and blessing so long as his years were still young, mature, or middle-aged, and even for some considerable period of time into his beginning and increas-ing age. But when he had got very old, and painful infirmities and frailties, though of course splendid in their form, approached the majesty of this god, he had found it good to withdraw from the earth and retire into the upper regions. For his bones gradually turned to silver, his flesh to gold, and his hair to genuine lapis lazuli, a very beautiful form of senescence, yet attended with all sorts of ailments and pains, for which the gods themselves had sought a thousand rem- edies but all in vain, since no herb that grows can avail against the diseases of gilding and silvering and lapidification, those troubles of advanced old age. Yet even under these circumstances the old Re had always clung to his earthly sovereignty although he must have seen that owing to his own weakness it had begun to relax, that he had ceased to be feared and even to be respected.
Now Isis, the Great One of the Island, Eset, a millionfold fertile in guile, felt that her moment was come. Her wisdom embraced heaven and earth, like that of the superannuated old Re himself. But there was one thing she did not know or command, and the lack of it / Page 889 / hampered her: she did not know the last, most secret name of Re, his very final one, knowledge of which would give power over him. Re had very many names, each one more secret than the one before, yet not utterly hopeless to find out, save one, the very last and might-iest. That he still withheld; whoso could make him name it, he could compel him and outdistance him and put him under his feet.
Therefore Eset conceived and devised a serpent, which should sting Re in his golden flesh. Then the intolerable pain of the sting, which only great Eset could cure who made the worm, would force Re to tell her his name. Now as she contrived it, so was it fulfilled. The old Re was stung, and in torments was forced to come out with one of his secret names after another, always hoping that the goddess would be satisfied before they got to the last one. But she kept on to the uttermost, until he had named her the very most secret of all, and the power of her knowledge over him was absolute. After that it cost her nothing to heal his wound; but he only got a little better, within the wretched limits in which so old a creature can; and soon thereafter he gave up and joined the great majority.
Thus tradition, known by heart to every child of Keme. It did sug-gest that Pharaoh had had something done to him; since he gradually got worse until his condition was so like that of the old god that one tended to mix them up. But there had been one particular individual who had taken the ancient tradition quite peculiarly to heart: a cer-tain inmate of Pharaoh's house of women, the private and well- guarded pavilion of the greatest elegance adjoining the palace Meri- mat; whither Pharaoh still had himself carried now and then, of course only to chuck one or other of their graces under the chin, perhaps to defeat her on the board of thirty fields, and at the same time to enjoy the lute-playing, dancing, and singing of the rest of the sweet- scented troop. Often, indeed, he played a game with that very female who took so seriously the old legend of Isis and Re that she yielded to the temptation to re-enact it. Nobody, however well versed in the finer points of this story, can tell this woman's name. It has been obliterated from tradition, the night of everlasting forgetfulness shrouds it. And yet the woman had been in her time a favourite con-cubine of Pharaoh, and twelve or thirteen years before, when he still condescended to beget a child, she had borne him a son, Noferka- Ptah - this name is preserved - who as a scion of the godlike seed received a special education, and on whose account she, a concubine, was privileged to wear the vulture head-dress. It was not quite so elaborate a one as that worn by Tiy, the great royal consort herself, but none the less a gold vulture cap. This cap, and her maternal weak-ness for Noferka-Ptah, went to the woman's head and were fatal to her. For the head-dress incited her to confuse herself with the wily Eset and to cherish ambitions hallowed by tradition and mixed up / Page 890 / with her doting fondness for her little half-breed. The ancient records dazed her small and scheming brain, so that she made up her mind to have Pharaoh stung by a serpent, to instigate a palace revolt and set on the throne of the two lands not Horus-Arnenhotep, the rightful heir, who was sickly anyhow, but the fruit of her own womb, Noferka-Ptah."
"The first steps toward the goal of overturning the dynasty, bring- ing in a new time and elevating the nameless near-favourite to the rank of goddess-mother had been successfully taken. The plot was hatched in Pharaoh's house of women; but through certain officials of the harem and certain officers of the guard who had been eager for new things, connections had been established, on the one hand with the palace itself, where a number of friends, some of them highly placed - a head charioteer. of the god, the chief of gens-d'armes, the steward of the fruit stores, the overseer of the King's herds of oxen, the head keeper of the King's ointments, and certain others - were won over for the enterprise; and on the other hand they got in touch with the outer world of the residential city, where through the offi- cers' wives the male kindred of Pharaoh's graces were drawn in and engaged to stir up Wese's population with evil talk against the old Re, who by now was nothing at all but gold and silver and lapis lazuli.
In all there were two-and-seventy conspirators privy to the plot. It was a proper and a pregnant number, for there had been just sev- enty-two when red Set lured Usir into the chest. And these seventy- two in their turn had had good cosmic ground to be no more and no less than that number. For it is just that number of groups of five weeks which make up the three hundred and sixty days of the year, not counting the odd days; and there are just seventy-two days in the dry -fifth of the year, when the gauge shows that the Nourisher has :reached his lowest ebb, and the god sinks into his grave. So where there is conspiracy anywhere in the world it is requisite and custom-ary for the number of conspirators to be seventy-two. And if the plot fail, the failure shows that if this number had not been adhered to it would have failed even worse.
Now the present plot did fail, although it had had the benefit of the best models and all the preliminary steps had been taken with the greatest care. The head keeper of unguents had even succeeded in purloining a magic script out of Pharaoh's book-house and, follow-ing its instructions, had shaped certain little wax images; these were smuggled about here and there and were calculated to produce by magic a mental confusion and bewitchment such as must assure the success of the undertaking. It was decided to put poison in Pharaoh's bread or his wine or in both; and to use the ensuing confusion for a palace coup. Combined with a rising in the upper city, this was to have led to the proclamation of a new era and the elevation of the / Page 891 / young bastard Noferka-Ptah to the throne of the two lands. And then all at once the lid blew off. Possibly at the last minute one of the seventy-two decided that by choosing the loyal part he would do better for his career and for the beauty and interest of the wall-paint- . ings in. his tomb. Or perhaps a police decoy had wormed himself into the councils from the start. Anyhow, a list had been put into Phar-aoh's hands. It was painful enough reading, containing as it did the names of a number of really close friends of the god and visitors at his levee. The list was on the whole correct, though not quite free from errors and mistaken identities; and the prosecutions had been swift, quiet, and thorough. The Isis of the women's house was straightway strangled by eunuchs, her little son was sent into outer- most Nubia and a secret commission met to investigate the whole-scheme and each particular guilt. Meanwhile the persons thus exposed! were labelled in one common epithet: "Abhorred of the two lands"; while cruel distortions were made of their personal ones, under which! they disappeared into various custodies to await their fate in circum-stances quite. foreign to their usual habits
And thus It was that Pharaoh's chief baker and chief butler had come down to the prison where Joseph lay."
HURRAH FOR RA
CASSELL'S ENGLISH DICTIONARY 1974
"hurrah, hurray (hu ra', -rl') [earlier HUZZA (cp. Swed., Dan., and G. hurra)], into An exclamation of joy, welcome, applause, etc. v.i. To utter hurrahs. v.t. To salute with hurrahs. n. A shout of hurrahs."
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A BUDDHIST BIBLE
Edited by
Dwight Goddard 1969
THE DIAMOND SUTRA
Page 93
"What think you Subhuti? Suppose a disciple has attained the degree of Arahat (Fully enlightened), could he entertain within his mind any such arbitrary conception as, 'I have be-come an Arahat'?
No, Honored of the worlds! Because speaking truly, there is no such thing as a fully enlightened one. Should a disciple who has attained such a degree of enlightenment, cherish with- in his mind such an arbitrary conception as, 'I have become an Arahat,' he would soon be grasping after such things as his own selfhood, other selves, living beings and a universal self. O Blessed Lord! Thou hast said that I have attained the samadhi of 'non-assertion' and, therefore, have reached the climax of human attainment and, because of it, am an Arahat. If I had cherished within my mind the thought, 'I am an Arahat free from all desire'! my Lord could not have declared that Subhuti delights himself in the practice of silence and tranquillity. But, speaking truly, I have cherished no suc:h arbitrary thought, so my Lord could truly say, 'Subhuti delights himself in the prac-tice of silence and tranquillity.' "
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THE TIBETAN BOOK OF THE DEAD
Edited By W. Y. Evans-Wentz
Page 41
Nowhere, to our knowledge, are there nowadays-as there are said to have been in Buddhaghosa's time-yogis among Southern Buddhists who have carried this practice to a suc-cessful issue. It is only among Northern Buddhists (as among Hindus) that such yoga a seems to be, according to trustworthy evidence from well-informed Tibetans and Indians, a practically applied science even until now, producing modern saints, some few of whom are believed worthy to be called perfected saints, or Arhants.
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THE CODE BOOK
The Science of Secrecy from Ancient Egypt to Quantum Cryptography
Simon Singh
1999
Page 215
"Champollion concentrated on a cartouche con- taining just four hieroglyphs: "(diagram omitted) "The first two symbols were unknown, but the repeated pair at the end, " (diagram omitted) "were known from the car- touche of Alexander (alksentrs) to both represent the letter s. This meant that the cartouche represented (?-?-s-s). At this point, Champollion brought to bear his vast linguistic knowledge. Although Coptic, the direct descendant of the ancient Egyptian language, had ceased to be a living lan- guage in the eleventh century AD, it still existed in a fossilised form in the liturgy of the Christian Coptic Church. Champollion had learnt Coptic as a teenager, and was so fluent that he used it to record entries in his journal. However, until this moment, he had never considered that Coptic might also be the language of hieroglyphics.
Champollion wondered whether the first sign in the cartouche," (diagram omitted) "might be a semagram representing the sun, i.e. a picture of the sun was the symbol for the word 'sun'. Then, in an act of intuitive genius, he assumed the sound value of the semagram to be that of the Coptic word for sun, ra. This gave him the sequence (ra-?-s-s). Only one pharaonic name seemed to fit. Allowing for the irritating omission of vowels, and assuming that the missing letter was m, then surely this had to be the name of Rameses, one of the greatest pharaohs, and one of the most ancient. The spell was broken. Even ancient traditional names were pho-netically spelt. Champollion dashed into his brother's office and proclaimed 'Je tiens l'affaire!' ('I've got it!'), but once again his intense passion for hieroglyphics got the better of him. He promptly collapsed, and was bedridden for the next five days.
Champollion had demonstrated that the scribes sometimes exploited the rebus principle. In a rebus, still found in children's puzzles, long words are broken into their phonetic components, which are then represented by semagrams. For example, the word 'belief can be broken down into two syllables, be-lief, which can then be rewritten as bee-leaf. Instead of writing the word alphabetically, it can be represented by the image of a bee fol-lowed by the image of a leaf In the example discovered by Champollion, only the first syllable (ra) is represented by a rebus image, a picture of the sun, while the remainder of the word is spelt more conventionally.
The significance of the sun semagram in the Rameses cartouche is enormous, because it clearly restricts the possibilities for the language/ Page 216 / spoken by the scribes. For example, the scribes could not have spoken Greek, because this would have meant that the cartouche would be pronounced 'helios-meses'. The cartouche makes sense only if the scribes spoke a form of Coptic, because the cartouche would then be pro-nounced 'ra-meses'.
Although this was just one more cartouche, its decipherment clearly demonstrated the four fundamental principles of hieroglyphics. First, the language of the script is at least related to Coptic, and, indeed, examina- tion of other hieroglyphics showed that it was Coptic pure and simple. Second, semagrams are used to represent some words, e.g., the word 'sun' is represented by a simple picture of the sun. Third, some long words are built wholly or partly using the rebus principle. Finally, for most of their writing, the ancient scribes relied on using a relatively conventional phonetic alphabet. This final point is the most important one, and Champollion called phonetics the 'soul' of hieroglyphics..."
Page 215
"..Then, in an act of intuitive genius, he assumed the sound value of the semagram to be that of the Coptic word for sun, ra. This gave him the sequence (ra-?-s-s). Only one pharaonic name seemed to fit. Allowing for the irritating omission of vowels, and assuming that the missing letter was m, then surely this had to be the name of Rameses, one of the greatest pharaohs, and one of the most ancient..."
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"The significance of the sun semagram in the Rameses cartouche is enormous, because it clearly restricts the possibilities for the language/ Page 216 / spoken by the scribes. For example, the scribes could not have spoken Greek, because this would have meant that the cartouche would be pronounced 'helios-meses'. The cartouche makes sense only if the scribes spoke a form of Coptic, because the cartouche would then be pro-nounced 'ra-meses'."
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RAMESSES
Egypt's Greatest Pharaoh
Joyce Tyldesley 2000
Page xxvi
"Recently a more insidious form of bias has crept into the Egyptological record; the deliberate selection of information to promote a cause. Traditionally, the Egyptologist gathers his or her facts and then uses them to build a theory. Occasionally this process maybe reversed; the theoretical model is developed and then tested against all the available evidence. Now there is a growing tendency for this procedure to be distorted with some 'authorities' first developing a spectacular thesis and then seeking out the evidence to prove it. Deliberately or not, evidence which contradicts the theory is conveniently ignored.
Who can blame the authors? The results of their biased research can prove both popular and lucrative. Who can blame the publishers? They know that a sensational new work of 'history' will always outsell a more rigorously argued thesis. And, above all, who can blame the readers who buy the books? Professionally presented these works of semi-scholarship can prove beguiling. Almost every year our bookshops are blessed with a new bestseller claiming on the most flimsy of evidence to reveal at least one of the mysteries of the ancient world. Those who criticize, no matter how well-armed with facts, are generally dismissed as being over-cautious, fuddy-duddy or lacking in imagination. Needless to say, this book will take a traditional approach to the presentation of facts. The history of Ramesses II is a fascinating story in its own right and needs no artificial enhancement to make it acceptable to the modem reader.
The Egyptians wrote their hieroglyphic texts without vowels, using consonants not found in our modem alphabet. In consequence, although we can read and understand the ancient writings we cannot be certain of the correct pronunciation of any word or name. This explains why different authors refer to the same individual by seemingly different names. Ramesses II, for example, variously appears in print as Ramesses, Ramses, Ramesse and Remeses while Queen Nefertari occasionally occurs as Nofretari. Throughout this book the most simple and widely accepted version of each proper name has been used with Ramesses preferred to the increasingly popular Ramses as the former most accurately represents the original Egyptian name. I follow current convention in using the words king and pharaoh interchangeably..."
TUTANKHAMEN
Christiane Desroches-Noblecourt
1963
Page 42
3
THE TOMB
PRELUDE TO THE DISCOVERY
During the winter of 1906 Theodore Davis, who was excavating in the Valley of the Kings, discovered in a cache near Carter's future working site a blue-varnished pitcher with the name of Tutankhamen upon it. The following year he entered a subterranean chamber, more than seven yards below ground, also in the Valley of the Kings and situated to the north of Horemheb's tomb. Torrential floods had filled this room with mud, which had since dried up, and from it the diggers extracted a broken wooden casket containing several leaves of embossed gold upon which, among others, were the silhouettes of Tutankhamen, his wife Ankhesenamun and the "Divine Father" Ay. Some days later these two discoveries were complemented by finding a number of pieces of pottery in a well-shaft some hundred yards to the south of the tomb; among them was a very elegant long-necked wine bottle, now in the Metropolitan Museum. Some of the pots were still stoppered with lids bearing the seal of the necropolis (Anubis, the dog, watching over nine prisoners) and the name of Tutankhamen, "beloved" of various gods, including Ptah and Khnum. One container was wrapped in a piece of cloth dated year 6 ofTutankhamen. Small bags-the contents of which had turned to dust-were found next to a heap of linen which had probably been used for embalming and wrapping the mummy. Re-markable among these were three semicircular handkerchiefs or wig cover of sorts, and fifty mummification bandages, not cut from a large piece of material, but especially woven with selvedges for the purpose.
Davis and his colleagues were then convinced that they had found all that remained of Tutankhamen's tomb. It seemed to them that it must have been pin.aged like so many others such as Horemheb's which Davis was to find the following year, 1908. Shortly after he abandoned the search, during which, between 1903 and 1909, he had unearthed seven tombs with inscriptions, and nine others without, in the Valley of the Kings. The preface of the book describing his last excavations ends with this phrase: "I fear that the Valley of the Kings is now exhausted."
Maspero was less convinced; he thought that Tutankhamen's tomb must originally have been in the western branch of the Valley of the / Page 43 / Kings, not far from the syrinx of Amenophis III. Sacked by King Horemheb at the time of his first attacks upon the memory of his pre-decessors, its scattered elements must have been collected by the faithful and buried in the hiding places discovered by the American archaeolo-gist. Indeed, the objects Davis found did resemble the type of equip-ment used for the special rites of Tutankhamen's burial and for the banquet served in or near his tomb. Everything connected with the corpse and all the utensils and linen used during this banquet had been carefully concealed there. Davis even found three great floral necklaces of cornflowers and blue lotuses interlaced upon a ground of olive leaves and mingled with blue varnished beads, which had been worn by the guests during the funeral meal.
Theodore Davis's investigations seemed to confirm that that area of the Valley of the Kings contained caches or graves dating from the end of the XVlllth Dynasty and belonging to those who had taken part in the religious revolution at Tell el Amarna. In I907,i n that same region, he had also found fragments of a canopy in the name of Queen Tiye, mother of Amenophis IV and wife of Amenophis III-as well as canopic urns, a sarcophagus containing the mummy (as he thought) of the heretical king Amenophis IV -Akhenaten-all assembled without order in a hiding place rather than a tomb (Tomb No. 55). / Page 44 /
Page 44
4 NOVEMBER 1922 AT THE ENTRANCE TO THE TOMB
All these clues incited Carter to search the area between the tombs of Ramesses IX and Ramesses VI. When he arrived at the site on the morning of 4 November 1922, the whole atmosphere of the dig was totally different from that of the preceding days. He was awaited in an impressive silence, and understood that his workmen had reached the goal of the search. A step carved in the rock below the tomb of Ramesses VI (2r), and until then entirely covered by rubble, had been cleared. After this fifteen more were exposed, forming a stairway 5 ft 3 in. wide by 13ft 2 in. long leading to a door, a rectangular opening with a heavy timber lintel and entirely blocked up with stones which had beenplastered over (3 ft 1/2 in. thick and 5 ft wide). The side facing the archaeologists bore traces of seals. On the upper part of the wall they were all seals of the royal necropolis: a scroll framing Anubis the dog dominating nine crouching figures with their hands tied behind their backs the nine imprisoned enemies of Egypt. On the lower part of the wall were other seals containing the coronation name of Tutankhamen: Page 45 / Nebkheprure. It was clear, too, that the tomb had been pillaged, for there were visible traces of two successive openings which had been replastered. The archaeologist's apprehensions were thus confirmed, for when the rubble was being cleared from the stairway, he had noticed that a tunnel large enough for a medium-sized man had been dug and later refilled with stone chips and rubble darker in colour than the sur-rounding material.
On 25 November the door was completely pulled down; behind it, beyond the sixteenth step, was a passage twenty-five feet long hewn in the rock and also filled with rubble. Here, too, debris of blackish stone indicated clandestine penetration. The passage led to a second door-that of the antechamber of the tomb-of the same type as the first; it also had been opened, reblocked, and resealed.
When this second door was opened on 29 November it revealed the most unimaginable accumulation of extraordinary and unexpected objects, and the diggers at first believed that they had stumbled upon an apparently almost inviolate storehouse of the royal funeral cult. The most hopeless disorder reigned in the chamber. A striking feature of the unique display was the mixture of objects apparently of both daily and religious usage: boxes of preserved food for funeral purposes (pieces of beef, mummified ducks, etc.), also bunches of flowers, a golden throne inlaid with coloured glass-paste, great beds in fantastic animal shapes, dismembered gold-plated chariots, an armless dummy of a young man wearing a royal head-dress, and alabaster vases of unfamiliar design.
THE ANTECHAMBER OR SOUTH ROOM
This first room was some twenty-six feet long by twelve feet wide, with bare white-washed walls. Looking like a typical storeroom, it resembled the cache where Theodore, Davis had found the canopy with Queen Tiye's name and the mummy-shaped sarcophagus in which he thought he recognized the body of Amenophis IV. The tomb itself was oriented on a south-north axis perpendicular to the eastward-opening corridor.
It is not possible here to describe in detail everything that was found in the tomb. Several authors have already done so, especially Carter, who published three volumes, the fruit of ten years' work, on the young king's treasure. Moreover, to provide exhaustive information on each object would require as many monographs as there are items. How-ever, one would wish to convey to the reader some idea of the atmo-sphere in which twentieth-century men were first privileged to see a royal burial ensemble almost completely as it was left in the dark ages at the end of the XVIIIth Dynasty, in the fourteenth century B.C. We shall return to the main elements of the treasure when we study the king's life and especially the ceremonies surrounding his death.
Page 46
The floor of the antechamber was strewn with rubble, fragments, pottery shards and vegetable matter from the bouquets and scattered baskets. The thieves who had apparently twice broken into the tomb had displaced a number of pieces, burst open chests and coffers, and removed the precious oils from the vases; stoppers of unbaked clay wrapped in fine linen littered the ground. But nearly everything was still there, and it was an unbelievable sight. Carter's working diary informs us that this first room alone contained one hundred and seventy-one different objects and pieces of furniture, but among these one must include chests and coffers which in turn contained many other items. Far from being a jumbled mass of unconnected objects, as seemed likely from remains found in the rubble in the corridor, the tessons- certain fragments of containers with the names of Amenophis III, Smenkhkare, Tutankhamen, and Amenophis IV -Akhenaten, and even a scarab of Tuthmosis III-suggested at one point that this might be a storehouse.
Most. of these objects in the antechamber were marked with Tut-ankhamen's name, and many of them had obviously been displaced by the grave-robbers. It is impossible, for instance, to determine the original position of the lotus-shaped alabaster cup with its lateral bouquets crowned with crouching spirits. From the threshold it seemed to greet the diggers, for upon its rim, after the formal titles of Tut-ankhamen, was the wish:
Page 47
seated with thy face turned to the north wind and thine eyes contemplating felicity!"
Alizzed and the scribe sought always
THAT
which was infinitely more precious
TUTANKHAMEN
Christiane Desroches-Noblecourt 1963
Page 42
"...Some of the pots were still stoppered with lids bearing the seal of the necropolis (Anubis, the dog, watching over nine prisoners) and the name of Tutankhamen, "beloved" of various gods, including Ptah and Khnum..."
GODDOG
"Anubis, the dog, watching over
nine
prisoners) and the name of Tutankhamen, "beloved" of various gods, including Ptah and Khnum"
Page 42
seven tombs with inscriptions, and nine
others without, in the Valley of the Kings..."
Page 44
nine crouching figures with their hands tied behind their backs the nine
imprisoned enemies of Egypt."
Page 66
Page 51
Page 70
"One of the vases with a fretted decora-tion had the outer shape of a situla (or libation bowl with a handle). Others, with very long necks, had rings of floral decorations inlaid with coloured paste. The most astonishing was shaped like a lion rampant, its head, with a tall flowered head-dress, forming the neck of the vessel. One forepaw was raised and the other rested upon a hieroglyph, a magic sign of protection. Of alabaster with ivory inlays and coloured pigments, it bore the names of Tutankhamen and his wife and rested on a fretted support. Another "bottle" represented a small ibex, recum- bent and bleating-or at least showing its tongue. One lid, separated from its vessel, consisted of a flat alabaster disc on to which was fixed a cup forming a nest for a tiny, open-beaked fledgeling; it was spreading its small wings, and was surrounded by four eggs.
In addition, there were a hundred and sixteen baskets, chiefly con- taining dried fruits and seeds; there were mandragora, grapes, doom- nuts, melon seeds, and so on. These baskets were all of types still in current use, and one of them, which was bottle-shaped, still held dried raisins. Traces in the antechamber show that the original stores were even more abundant.
Finally, there were three dozen wine jars, large amphorae of almost primordial historical importance, owing to the hieratic inscriptions upon their "shoulders". Most were of pottery and of classical Egyptian design, tall-shouldered, with two small handles and a pointed base. Their unbaked clay stoppers, which were still intact, yielded, in their inscriptions, still more important information about the history of the Amarnan period. For instance, they revealed that the most recent year of Tutankhamen's reign was the year 9."
Page 70
9."
Page 42
seven tombs with inscriptions, and nine
others without, in the Valley of the Kings..."
THE SPLENDOUR THAT WAS
EGYPT
Margaret A. M Murray
Page 101
seven or nine
or multiples of those numbers
THE MAGIC MOUNTAIN
JOSEPH AND HIS BROTHERS
Thomas Mann 1933
TUTANKHAMEN
Christiane Desroches-Noblecourt
1963
Page 94
" Such a reform could obviously only succeed if a general consensus of opinion was in its favour and if the elite was convinced of its necessity. The innovations of Akhenaten, who has been described as the "greatest mystic of antiquity", brought in their wake profound modifications at every level of Egyptian society. To simplify a theology inaccessible 'to the masses; to reconcile people and god by showing the latter as the orb shining impartially upon all; to proclaim what the priests had known "ever since the time of the gods": that men were born equal and that only their "wickedness differentiated them"; to unite mankind by bringing it close to all other life, and reminding it of the intimate relationship between all mineral, vegetable, animal and human elements; and to suppress the practice of magic which could only paralyse moral progress-such were the leading ideas of Amenophis IV's great design.
By the same token he set out to liberate the townsmen from a stifling tradition, to broaden their vision and even force them to look beyond the rigid formulas which had governed their thoughts for centuries. During the first three years of his co-regency the prince and his sup-porters made a determined attack upon set ways and ideas. The most immediate and tangible result, apart from the new art forms, was the adoption of the spoken language for official documents, hitherto pro- hibited by religious and civil authority. Such radical changes must certainly have encountered major obstacles and objections. Indeed, the / Page 95 / experiment could only have been attempted during a co-regency, with the elder king remaining in his Theban capital and continuing to control the affairs of state through his senior officials. This allowed the younger king, with the support of his family and faithful friends, to establish a new city and, in virgin soil, to sow the seeds of his whole reform. The new spirit prevailed more slowly at Thebes, but Ramose, the vizier of the south, had his tomb decorated in both classical and modern style (53,54). Elegant and stylized reliefs and paintings shared the walls of his burial chapel with the almost aggressively realistic double portrait of the young royal couple at their palace window.
For his experiment Amenophis IV selected the region near Hermo-polis, the city of Thoth, god of thought, in the XVth nome of Upper Egypt. This area on the eastern bank of the Nile, for a length of about six and a half miles, is protected by the Arabic Chain at a point where it forms an immense circle. Within a few years he turned this barren site into.' a dream-city of palaces and small houses, nearly all surrounded by superb gardens. He named it Akhetaten, or "the horizon of the globe". Today it is known as Tell el Amarna, a contraction of two names: that of the modern village to the north, el Till, and that of the tribe of the Bern Amran who inhabited the region. Fourteen majestic steles hewn out of the cliff-sides defined the boundaries of the new capital. Eleven of them marked the rock on the right bank, and three others, against the numulithic limestone of the Libyan Chain to the west, defined the cultivable area intended to supply the temple, palaces and private dwellings.
The three first frontier-steles (one at the extreme north of the town and the two others to the south) date from the fourth year of the co- regency. Upon them, Amenophis IV formally declared that he had vowed never to go beyond "this pure place", neither to the north nor to the south. He swore that no one, not even the queen, could induce him to seek elsewhere a more propitious place for the veneration of Aten. He proposed to erect. five sanctuaries and two main palaces, one for Pharaoh and one for the queen. He also proposed to have a tomb built for himself in the eastern mountain, one for Nefertiti and one for the princess Meritaten, adding that if one or the other of them should die in another Egyptian city they must be brought back to Akhetaten for burial. He also ordered the preparation of a tomb for the sacred bull Mnevis, one for the high priest, and others for members of Aten's clergy, high officials and other subjects.
All this was on the eastern side of the town, certainly a deliberate reversal of the centuries-old placing of necropolises on the west bank of the Nile, where the sun disappears with the dead who, thanks to the Osirian ritual, are reborn after slow and mysterious transformations. The heretical king vigorously opposed practices he considered as / Page 96 / magical; according to him, after sunset nothing survived and every thing slumbered in a kind of cosmic sleep, the "breath of life" barely' reaching the nostrils.
This new dogma was linked with a new conception of the goddess Maet, daughter of Re. She was the very quintessence of the Egyptian pantheon protecting the crown, and represented law and order. An; attempt to weaken her attributes could undermine the very foundations of monarchy. Some authors regard this revolutionary interferencl with the goddess as one of the greatest dangers ever to have threatened Egypt and the Empire. But Amenophis IV was bound to make thc attempt, for above all it was essential for him to bring outdated concepts into line with the new spirit of the times.
Maet was not only law and order-as Re's daughter, an emanation of the sun, she was also the breath of life, and perhaps even light itself. Amenophis III, in his coronation name and in the names of several of his temples, had already tried to stress the importance of this aspect oj the goddess by using the formula Khaemmaet which means "appearing (or rising) at the same time as Maet". In other words, the king and this celestial force of which he was both the guarantor and the proof, were but one.
To be convinced that, initially, Amenophis IV was content to follow the lead given in his father's reign, we need only enter once more the funerary chapel of the Theban vizier Ramose, where the wall illus-trations convey a single idea presented in two styles. First, one sees Amenophis IV in traditional regalia, seated upon a platform beside the goddess Maet, who wears an immense ostrich plume on her head, shaped in the hieroglyph of her name but also, by the faint movement of its feathers, suggesting the movement of the breath of life. In front of the king two hieroglyphic emblems always held by the gods at all periods of pharaonic Egypt, those of life (ankh) and divine power ( ouas), represent flail-holders, with the feathers of the flails pointing at the king and symbolically directing the flow of divine current towards him. The inscriptions call him "he who lives by Maet" (53). In contrast, another scene, a little further on, shows the co-regent at the window of his palace, with Nefertiti; both of them are portrayed in the new manner, the chief preoccupation of which seems to be absolutely accurate delineation of expression and features. The Amarnan globe shines over the couple, with its rays ending in tiny hands, those nearest the royal face holding the hieroglyphs of life and divine power which in the other group represented flail-holders. Light, the dispenser of life, from the globe, is thus transmitted to them (54).
Page 96
"Maet was not only law and order-as Re's daughter, an emanation of the sun, she was also the breath of life, and perhaps even light itself."
MARY Y RAM MARY MARY Y RAM
Page101
"...before the end of year 35 of Amenophis III, the Great Royal Spouse Tiye gave birth to her last child, Tutankhaten, in the harem at Mal-kata. Egyptian custom decreed that the child's birth name should be chosen by his mother from words she had uttered when she was delivered-in the case of a prince destined for the throne this name was used until his coronation. Later a second name was added to his style. When he uttered his first cry and the "breath of life" entered into him, Tutankhaten was stamped with the mark of the Atenist heresy, and his young sister, born a year or two earlier, had also been dedicated to the Globe, ruler of Akhetaten, the capital where they were both soon to be taken to live with their young nieces.
Since an element of doubt is always dominant in this strange period, it is not surprising to learn that scientific circles still disagree about the meaning of the young prince's name. For all Egyptian names were short sentences, intended to place the newly born under the protection of a god. Only the seven fairies of Hathor who welcomed the infant into the world could tell us what Tiye really meant by the words which, more than 3,000 years later, everyone knows. Some say the meaning is "powerful is the life of Aten" or "gracious of life is Aten"; yet others say "living image of Aten" and finally, a recent theory suggests "all life is in the hands of Aten". Thus philological opinion remains divided upon the name which the Egyptians ceased to use from the day of the young king's coronation as Nebkheprure."
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THE KORAN
EVERYMAN
Everyman I will go with thee and be thy guide
Translated from the Arabic by J. M. Rodwell The Oriental Institute, First published
1909
Page xix
"In the standard form in which we have it today, the Qur'an is divided into 114 chapters of very unequal length, called suras. The suras are the working units of the revelation. They are largely composite. All but one (sura 9, which may well be unfinished) begin with the formula bi-smi llahi l-rahmani l-ra-himi 'in the Name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate'; and in 29 suras this formula is followed by a group of letters of the Arabic alphabet (e.g. alif, lam, mtm, found at the beginning of suras 2, 3, 2.9,30,31 and 32), whose function is unknown but which seem to be of mystical import.
"All but one (sura 9, which may well be unfinished) begin with the formula bi-smi llahi l-rahmani l-ra-himi 'in the Name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate'; and in 29 suras this formula is followed by a group of letters of the Arabic alphabet (e.g. alif, lam, mtm, found at the beginning of suras 2, 3, 2.9,30,31 and 32), whose function is unknown but which seem to be of mystical import."
"All but one (sura 9,"
(e.g. alif, lam, mtm, found at the beginning of suras 2, 3, 2.9,30,31 and 32), whose function is unknown but which seem to be of mystical import."
Page xxiv "...However, by far the most interesting and instructive parallel is between Sura 12 and Genesis 37-47: the story of Joseph. The Quranic narrative, which includes details from the Midrash as well as Genesis, may at first seem rather sketchy, but in Arabic terms it is beautifully judged and effective. It is, incidentally, the only longish sura to be devoted to the telling of a single story."
Page xxiii / "...In addition, Sura 18 includes two stories from the Christian periphery to the north of Arabia: the so-called legend of the Seven Sleepers and extracts from the Alexander romance."
THE MAGIC MOUNTAIN
Thomas Mann 1875 - 1955
THE THUNDERBOLT
Page 711
" These were the mo-ments when the "Seven-Sleeper," not knowing what had hap-pened, was slowly stirring himself in the grass, before he sat up. rubbed his eyes - yes, let us carry the figure to the end, in order to do justice to the movement of our hero's mind: he drew up his legs, stood up, looked about him. He saw himself released. freed from enchantment - not of his own motion; he was fain to confess, but by the operation of exterior powers, of whose activities his own liberation was a minor incident indeed! Yet though his tiny: destiny fainted to nothing in the face of the gen-eral, was there not some hint of a personal mercy and grace for him, a manifestation of divine goodness and justice? Would Life receive again her erring and " delicate" child - not by a cheap and easy slipping back to her arms, but sternly, solemnly, pem-tentially - perhaps not even among the living, but only with three salvoes fired over the grave of him a sinner? Thus might he retum. He sank on his knees. raising face and hands to a heaven that howsoever dark and sulphurous was no longer the gloomy grotto of his state of sin."
Page 712
"What is it? Where are we? Whither has the dream snatched us? Twilight, rain, filth. Fiery glow of the overcast sky, ceaseless booming of heavy thunder; the moist air rent by a sharp singing whine,a raging, swelling howl as of some hound of hell, that ends its course in a splitting, a splintering and sprinkling, a crackling, a coruscation; by groans and shrieks. by trumpets blowing fit to / Page 713 / burst, by the beat of a drum coming faster, faster- There is a wood, discharging drab hordes, that come on, fall, spring up ,again, come on. - Beyond, a line of hill stands out against the fiery sky, whose glow turns now and again to blowing flames. About us is rolling plough-land, all upheaved and trodden into mud; athwart it a bemired high road, disguised with broken branches and from it again a deeply furrowed, boggy field-path leading off in curves toward the distant hills. Nude, branchless trunks of trees meet the eye, a 'cold rain falls. Ah, a signpost! Useless, though, to question it, even despite the half-dark, for it is shattered, illegible. East, west? It is the flat-land, it is the war. And we are shrinking shadows by the way-side, shamed by the security of our shadowdom, and noways minded to indulge in any rodomontade; merely led hither by the spirit of our nar- rative, merely to see again, among those running, stumbling, drum-mustered grey comrades that swarm out of yonder wood, one we know; merely to look once more in the simple face of our one-time fellow of so many years, the genial sinner whose voice we know so well, before we lose him from our sight.
They haye been brought forward, these comrades, for a final thrust in a fight that has already lasted all day long, whose ob- jective is the retaking of the hill position and the burning villages beyond, lost two days since to the enemy. It.is a volunteer regi- ment, fresh young blood and mostly students, not long in the field. They were roused in the riight, brought up in trains to morning, then marched in the rain on wretched roads - on no roads at all, for the roads were blocked, and they went over moor and ploughed land with full kit for seven hours, their coats, sodden. It was no pleasure excursion. If one did not care to lose one's boots, one stooped at every second step; clutched with one's fingers into the straps and pulled them out of the quaking ..mire. It took an hour of such work to cover one meadow. But at last they have reached the appointed spot, exhausted, on edge, yet the reserve strength of their youthful bodIes has kept them tense, they crave neither the sleep nor the food they have been denied. Their wet, mud-bespattered faces, framed between strap and grey-covered helmet, are flushed with exertion - perhaps too with the sight of the losses they suffered on their march through that boggy wood. For the enemy, aware of their advance, have concentrated a barrage of shrapnel and large-calibre grenades upon .the way they must come; it crashed among them in the wood, and howling, flaming, splashing, lashed the wide ploughed land.
They must get through, these three thousand ardent youths; / Page 714 / they must reinforce with their bayonets the attack on the burn-ing villages, and the trenches in front of and behind the line of hills; they must help to advance their line to a point indicated in the dispatch their leader has in his pocket. They are three thou-sand, that they may be two thousand when the hills, the village are reached; that is the meaning of their number. They are a body of troops calculated as sufficient, even after great losses, to attack and carry a position and greet their triumph with a thou-sand-voiced huzza - not counting the stragglers that fall out by the way. Many a one has thus fallen out on the forced march, for which he proved too young and weak; paler he grew, stag-gered, set his teeth, drove himself on -and after all he could do fell out notwithstanding. Awhile he .dragged himself in the rear of the marching column, overtaken and passed by company after company; at length he remained on the ground, lying where it was not good to lie. Then came the shattering wood. But there are so many of them, swarming on - they can survive a blood- letting and still come on in hosts. They have already overflowed the level, rain-lashed land; the high road, the field road, the boggy ploughed land; we shadows stand amid and among them. At the edge of the wood they fix their bayonets, with the practised grips; the horns enforce them, the drums roll deepest bass, and forward they stumble, as best they can, with shrill cries; night- marishly, for clods of earth cling to their heavy boots and fetter them.
They fling themselves down before the projectiles that come howling on, then they leap up again and hurry forward; they exult, in their young, breaking voices as they run, to discover themselves still unhit. Or they are hit, they fall, fighting the air with their arms, shot through the forehead, the heart, the belly. They lie, their faces in the mire, and are motionless. They lie, their backs elevated by the knapsack, the crowns of their heads pressed into the mud, and clutch and claw in the air. But the wood emits new swarms, who fling themselves down, who spring up, who, shrieking or silent, blunder forward over the fallen.
Ah, this young blood, with its knapsacks and bayonets, its mud-befouled boots and clothing! We look at it, our humanistic- resthetic eye pictures it among Scenes far other than these: we see these youths watering horses on a sunny arm of the sea; roving with the beloved one along the strand, the lover's lips to the ear of the yielding bride; in happiest rivalry bending the bow. Alas, no, here they lie! their noses in fiery filth: They are glad to be here - albeit with boundless anguish, with unspeakable / Page 715 / sickness for home; and this, of itself, is a noble and a shaming thing - but no good reason for bringing them to such a pass;
There is our friend, there is Hans Castorp! We recognize him at a distance, by the little beard he assumed while sitting at the "bad" Russian table. Like all the others, he is wet through and glowing. He is running, his feet heavy with mould, the bayonet swinging in his hand. Look! He treads on the hand of a fallen comrade; with his hobnailed boot he treads the hand deep into the branch-strewn ground. But it is he. What, singing? As one sings, unaware, staring stark ahead, yes, thus. he spends his hurrying breath, to sing half soundlessly:
"And loving words I've carven
Upon its branches fair - "
He stumbles, No, he has flung himself down, a hell-hound is coming howling, a huge explosive shell, a disgusting sugar-loaf from the infernal regions. He lies with his face in the cool mire, legs sprawled out, feet twisted, heels turned down. The product of a perverted science, laden with death, slopes earthward thirty paces in front of him. and buries its nose in the ground;. explodes mside there, with hideous expense of power, and raises up a fountain high as a house, of mud, fire, iron, molten metal; scattered fragments of humanity. Where it fell, two youths had lain, friends who in their need flung themselves down together-now they are scattered, commingled and gone.
Shame of our shadow-safety! Away! No more! -But our friend? Was he hit? He thought so, for the moment. A great clod of earth struck him on the shin, it hurt, but he smiles at it. Up he gets, and staggers on, limping on his earth-bound feet, all un~ consciously singing:
"Its waving branches whi - ispered
A mess - age in my ear - "
and thus, in the tumult, in the rain, in the dusk, vanishes out of our sight.
Farewell, honest Hans Castorp, farewell, Life's delicate child! Your tale is told. We have told it to the end, and it was neither short nor long, but hermetic. We have told it for its own sake, not for yours, for you were simple. But after all, it was your story, it befell you, you must have more in you than we thought; we will not disclaim the pedagogic weakness we conceived for / Page 716 / you in the telling; which could even lead us to press a finger deli-cately to our eyes at the thought that we shall see you no more, hear you no more for ever.
Farewell-and if thou livest or diest! Thy prospects are poor. The desperate dance, in which thy fortunes are caught up, will last yet many a sinful year; we should not care to set a high stake on thy life by the time it ends. We even confess that it is without great concern we leave the question open. Adventures of the flesh and in the spirit, while enhancing thy simplicity, granted thee to know in the spirit what in the flesh thou scarcely couldst have done. Moments there were, when out of death, and the rebellion of the flesh, there came to thee, as thou tookest stock of thyself, a dream of love. Out of this universal feast of death, out of this extremity of fever, kindling the rain-washed evening sky to a fiery glow, may it be that Love one day shall mount?
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ADDED TO ALL MINUS NONE SHARED BY EVERYBODY MULTIPLIED IN ABUNDANCE.
AZAZAZAZAZAZAZAZAZ
THE
NEW
ELIZABETHAN
REFERENCE DICTIONARY
NEWNES
Page 682
" heaven (hevn) [A.-S. heofon, hefon (etyro. doubtful)], n. The sky, the firmament (often in pl.); the atmosphere enveloping the earth regarded as the region in which the clouds float, the winds blow, etc.; the abode of God and the blessed; the place of supreme felicity; God, providence; *the pagan divinities or their abode; (Anc. Cosmog.) one of several revolving spheres in which the heavenly bodies were carried round the earth. Good beavens! An ex - clamation. heaven of heavens, seventh heaven: The highest of the seven heavens believed by the later Hebrews and the Mohammedans to be the dwelling-place of God. in the seventh heaven: In a state of supreme felicity. heaven-banished, a Banished from heaven. heaven-born. a. Derived from heaven; inspired. heaven-bred, a. Of divine origin. heaven-directed, a. Pointing towards the sky; directed hy heaven. heaven-fallen, a. Fallen or driven from heaven. heaven-gifted, a. Bestowed by heaven. .heaven-hued, a. Blue, azure. heavenly, a. Pertaining to the heavens, celestial; inhabiting heaven; situated in the heavens (as the planets, stars, etc.); divine; superhuman; supremely blest or excellent; (colloq.) highly pleasing, delicious; * adv. In the manner of heaven; divinely, celestially. heavenly body [BODY]. heavenly minded, a. Having the affections set on heaven and heavenly things; pure, holy, pious. heavenly mindedness, n. heavenli-ness, n. heavenward, a. and adv. heaven - wards, adv."
CASSELL'S ENGLISH DICTIONARY
1974
Page 548
"hermaphrodite (her maf' ro dit} [L. Hermaphrodi'- tus, Gr. -ditos (Hermes, Aphrodite), son of Hermes and Aphrodite, who grew together with the nymph Salmacis]. n. A human being or an animal combin-ing in itself both male and female organs; one in which the organs of both sexes are normally com-bined in the same individual; a plant having the stamens and pistils in the same floral envelope; (fig.) a person or thing in which opposite qualities are embodied; (Naut.) a vessel having the special rig of two kinds of craft, esp. an hermaphrodite brig. a. Possessing to a greater or less extent the char- acteristics of both sexes, or other opposite attributes, in a single individual. hermaphrodite brig: (Naut.) A vessel square-rigged on the foremast and schooner-rigged on the mainmast. herma-phroditic, -a1 (-dit' ik, -al), a. hermaphroditism (her mar' ro di tizm), n.
hermeneutic (her me nu' tik) [Gr. hermeneutikos, from hermeneute., hermeneus, interpreter]. a. Inter - preting, explaining, explanatory. n.pl. The art or science of Interpretation, esp. of Scripture. her- meneutical, a. hermeneutically, adv. her- meneutist, n.
Hermes (her' mez) (pl. -mae, -mai, -mi) (Gr. Mythol.) The son of Zeus and Maia, messenger of the gods of Olympus, god of science, commerce, etc., identified by the Romans with Mer~ [cp, HERMA]. the Egyptian god Thoth, identified with Hermes, called by the Neo-Platonists Hermes Trismegistus or Thrice-great, and supposed to be the originator of art, magic, religion, etc.
hermetic (her met' ik) [low L. hermeticus, from HERMES Trismegistus]. a. Of or belonging to al-chemy; fitting by or as by fusion so as to be air- tight. n.pl. Alchemy, chemistry. hermetic art, n. Alchemy; chemistry. hermetlsm (her' me tizm), n. hermetist, n. hermetically, adv.
hermit (her' mit) [F. hermite, L. her-eremita, Gr. eremites, from eremos, deserted], n. A person who retires from society to live in sohtary contemplation or devotion, esp. an early Christian anchorite; *a beadsman. hermit-crab, -lobster, n. The genus Pagurus, esp. P. Bernhardus, from their living in abandoned univalve shells. hermitage (I), n. The cell or habitation of a hermit. hermitess, n. A female hermit. hermitical (h~ mit' i kal), a."
. . . -
SURA 18 - THE CAVE
MECCA - 110 VERSES
In the Name of God, the Compassionate, the Merciful
"Praise be to God, who hath sent down the Book to his servant, and hath not made it tortuous 1
But direct; that it may warn of a grievous woe from him, and announce to the faithful who do the things that are right, that a goodly reward, wherein they shall abide for ever, awaiteth them;
And that it may warn those who say, 'God hath begotten a Son.'
No knowledge of this have either they or their fathers! A grievous saying to come out of their mouths! They speak no other than a lie!
And haply, if they believe not in this new revelation, thou wilt slay thyself, on their very footsteps, out of vexation.
Verily, we have made all that is on earth as its adornment, that we might make trial who among mankind would excel in works:
But we are surely about to reduce all that is thereon to dust! Hast thou reflected that the Inmates of THE CAVE and of Al
Rakim 2 were one of our wondrous signs?
When the youths betook them to the cave they said, 'O our Lord! grant us mercy from before thee, and order for us our affair aright.'
10. Then struck we upon their ears with deafness in the cave for many a year:
Then we awaked them that we might know which of the two parties could best reckon the space of their abiding.
We will relate to thee their tale with truth. They were youths who had believed in their Lord, and in guidance had we increased them;
And we had made them stout of heart, when they stood up and said, 'Our Lord is Lord of the Heavens and of the Earth: we will call on no other God than him; for in that case we had said a thing outrageous.
These our people have taken other gods beside Him, though / Page 190 / they bring no clear proof for them; but, who more iniquitous than he who forgeth a lie of God?
So when ye shall have separated you from them and from that which they worship beside God, then betake you to the cave: Your Lord will unfold his mercy to you, and will order your affairs for you for the best.'
And thou mightest have seen the sun when it arose, pass on the right of their cave, and when it set, leave them on the left, while they were in its spacious chamber. This is one of the signs of God. Guided indeed is he whom God guideth; but for him whom He misleadeth, thou shalt by no means find a patron, director.
And thou wouldst have deemed them awake,3 though they were sleeping: and we turned them to the right and to the left. And in the entry lay their dog with paws outstretched.4 Hadst thou come suddenly upon them, thou wouldst surely have turned thy back on them in flight, and have been filled with fear at them.
So we awaked them that they might question one another. Said one of them, 'How long have ye tarried here?' They said, 'We have tarried a day or part of a day.' They said, 'Your Lord knoweth best how long ye have tarried: Send now one of you with this your coin into the city, and let him mark who therein hath purest food, and from him let him bring you a supply: and let him be courteous, and not discover you to anyone.
For they, if they find you out, will stone you or turn you back to their faith, and in that case it will fare ill with you for ever.'
20. And thus made we their adventure known to their fellow citizens, that they might learn that the promise of God is true, and that as to 'the Hour' there is no doubt of its coming. When they disputed among themselves concerning what had befallen them, some said, 'Build a building over them; their Lord knoweth best about them.' Those who prevailed in the matter said,' A place of worship will we surely raise over them.'
Some say, 'They were three; their dog the fourth:' others say, 'Five; their dog the sixth,' guessing at the secret: others say, 'Seven; and their dog the eighth.' SA Y: My Lord best knoweth the number: none, save a few, shall know them.
Therefore be clear in thy discussions about them, 5 and ask not any Christian concerning them.
Say not thou of a thing, 'I will surely do it to-morrow;' / Page 191 / without, 'If God will.,6 And when thou hast forgotten, call thy Lord to mind; and say, 'Haply my Lord will guide me, that I may come near to the truth of this story with correctness.'
And they tarried in their cave 300 years, and 9 years over.7 SA Y: God best knoweth how long they tarried: With Him are the secrets of the Heavens and of the Earth: Look thou and hearken unto Him alone.8 Man hath no guardian but Him, and none may bear part in his judgments:-
And publish what hath been revealed to thee of the Book of thy Lord - none may change his words, - and thou shalt find no refuge beside Him.
Be patient with those who call upon their Lord at morn and even, seeking his face: and let not thine eyes be turned away from them in quest of the pomp of this life; 9 neither obey him 10 whose heart we have made careless of the remembrance of Us, and who followeth his own lusts, and whose ways are unbridled.
And SAY: the truth is from your Lord: let him then who will, believe; and let him who will, be an infidel. But for the offenders we have got ready the fire whose smoke shall enwrap them: and if they implore help, helped shall they be with water like molten brass which shall scald their faces. Wretched the drink! and an unhappy couch!
But as to those who have believed and done the things that are right, - Verily we will not suffer the reward of him whose works were good, to perish!
30. For them, the gardens of Eden, under whose shades shall rivers flow: decked shall they be therein with bracelets of gold, and green robes of silk and rich brocade shall they wear, reclining them therein on thrones. Blissful the reward! and a pleasant couch! 11
And set forth to them as a parable two men; on one of whom we bestowed two gardens of grape vines, and surrounded both with palm-trees, and placed corn fields between them: Each of the gardens did yield its fruit, and failed not thereof at all:
And we caused a river to flow in their midst: And this man received his fruit, and said, disputing with him, to his com- panion, 'More have I than thou of wealth, and my family is mightier.'
And he went into his garden - to his own soul unjust. He said, 'I do not think that this will ever perish:
Page 192
And I do not think that "the Hour" will come: and even if I be taken back to my Lord, I shall surely find a better than it in exchange.'
His fellow said to him, disputing with him, 'What! hast thou no belief in him who created thee of the dust, then of the germs of life,12 then fashioned thee a perfect man?
But God is my Lord; and no other being will I associate with my Lord.
And why didst thou not say when thou enteredst thy garden, 'What God willeth! There is no power but in God.' Though thou seest that I have less than thou of wealth and children,
Yet haply my Lord may bestow on me better than thy garden, and may send his bolts upon it out of Heaven, so that the next dawn shall find it barren dust;
Or its water become deep sunk, so that thou art unable to find it.'
40. And his fruits were encompassed by destruction. Then began he to turn down the palms of his hands at what he had spent on it; for its vines were falling down on their trellises, and he said, 'Oh that I had not joined any other god to my Lord!'
And he had no host to help him instead of God, neither was he able to help himself.
Protection in such a case is of God - the Truth: He is the best rewarder, and He bringeth to the best issue.
And set before them a similitude of the present life. It is as water which we send down from Heaven, and the herb of the Earth is mingled with it, and on the morrow it becometh dry stubble which the winds scatter: for God hath power over all things.
Wealth and children are the adornment of this present life: but good works, which are lasting, are better in the sight of thy Lord as to recompense, and better as to hope.
And call to mind the day when we will cause the mountains to pass away,13 and thou shalt see the earth a levelled plain, and we will gather mankind together, and not leave of them any one.
And they shall be set before thy Lord in ranks: - 'Now are ye come unto us as we created you at first: but ye thought that we should not make good to you the promise.'
And each shall have his book put into his hand: and thou shalt see the wicked in alarm at that which is therein: and they / Page 193 / shall say, 'O woe to us! what meaneth this Book? It leaveth neither small nor great unnoted down!' And they shall find all that they have wrought present to them, and thy Lord will not deal unjustly with anyone.
When we said to the angels, 'Prostrate yourselves before Adam,' they all prostrated them save Eblis, who was of the Djinn,14 and revolted from his Lord's behest. - What! will ye then take him and his offspring as patrons rather than Me? and they your enemies? Sad exchange for the ungodly!
I made them not witnesses of the creation of the Heavens and of the Earth, nor of their own creation, neither did I take seducers as my helpers.
50. On a certain day, God shall say, 'Call ye on the companions ye joined with me, deeming them to be gods:' and they shall call on them, but they shall not answer them: then will we place a valley of perdition between them:
And the wicked shall see the fire, and shall have a foreboding that they shall be flung into it, and they shall find no escape from it.
And now in this Koran we have presented to man similitudes of every kind: but, at most things is man a caviller.
And what, now that guidance is come to them, letteth men from believing and from asking forgiveness of their Lord - unless they wait till that the doom of the ancients overtake them, or the chastisement come upon them in the sight of the universe?
We send not our Sent Ones but to announce and to warn: but the infidels cavil with vain words in order to refute the truth; and they treat my signs and their own warnings with scorn.
But who is worse than he who when told of the signs of his Lord turneth him away and forgetteth what in time past his hands have wrought? Truly we have thrown veils over their hearts lest they should understand this Koran, and into their ears a heaviness:
And if thou bid them to 'the guidance' yet will they not even then be guided ever.
The gracious one, full of compassion, is thy Lord! if he would have chastised them for their demerits he would have hastened their chastisement. But they have a time fixed for the accomp- lishment of our menaces: and beside God they shall find no refuge.
Page 194
And those cities did we destroy when they became impious; and of their coming destruction we gave them warning.
Remember when Moses said to his servant, 'I will not stop till I reach the confluence of the two seas,15 or for years will I journey on.'
60. But when they reached their confluence, they forgot their fish, and it took its way in the sea at will. And when they had passed on, said Moses to his servant, 'Bring us our morning meal; for now have we incurred weariness from this journey.'
He said, 'What thinkest thou? When we repaired to the rock for rest I forgot the fish; and none but Satan made me forget it, so as not to mention it; and it hath taken its way in the sea in a wondrous sort.'
He said, 'It is this we were in quest of.,16 And they both went back retracing their footsteps.
Then found they one of our servants to whom we had vouchsafed our mercy, and whom we had instructed with our knowledge.
And Moses said to him, 'Shall I follow thee that thou teach me, for guidance, of that which thou too hast been taught?'
He said, 'Verily, thou canst not have patience with me; How canst thou be patient in matters whose meaning thou
comprehendest not?'
He said, 'Thou shalt find me patient if God please, nor will I disobey thy bidding.'
He said, 'Then, if thou follow me, ask me not of aught until I have given thee an account thereof.'
70. So they both went on, till they embarked in a ship, and he - the unknown - staved it in. 'What!' said Moses, 'hast thou staved it in that thou mayest drown its crew? a strange thing now hast thou done!'
He said, 'Did I not tell thee that thou couldst not have patience with me?'
He said, 'Chide me not that I forgat, nor lay on me a hard command.'
Then went they on till they met a youth, and he slew him. Said Moses, 'Hast thou slain him who is free from guilt of blood? Now hast thou wrought a grievous thing!'
He said, 'Did I not tell thee that thou couldst not have patience with me?'
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Moses said, 'If after this I ask thee aught, then let me be thy comrade no longer; but now hast thou my excuse.'
They went on till they came to the people of a city. Of this people they asked food, but they refused them for guests. And they found in it a wall that was about to fall, and he set it upright. Said Moses, 'If thou hadst wished, for this thou mightest have obtained pay.'
He said, 'This is the parting point between me and thee. But I will first tell thee the meaning of that which thou couldst not await with patience.
As to the vessel, it belonged to poor men who toiled upon the sea, and I was minded to damage it, for in their rear was a king who seized every ship by force.
As to the youth his parents were believers, and we feared lest he should trouble them by error and infidelity.
80. And we desired that their Lord might give them in his place a child, better than he in virtue, and nearer to filial piety.
And as to the wall, it belonged to two orphan youths in the city, and beneath it was their treasure: and their father was a righteous man: and thy Lord desired that they should reach the age of strength, and take forth their treasure through the mercy of thy Lord. And not of mine own will have I done this. This is the interpretation of that which thou couldst not bear with patience.'
They will ask thee of Dhoulkarnain [the two-horned 17]. SAY: I will recite to you an account of him.
We stablished his power upon the earth, and made for him a way to everything. And a route he followed,
Until when he reached the setting of the sun, he found it to set in a miry fount; and hard by he found a people.
We said, 'O Dhoulkarnain! either chastise or treat them generously. '
'The impious,' said he, 'will we surely chastise;' then shall he be taken back to his Lord, and he will chastise him with a grievous chastisement.
But as to him who believeth and doeth that which is right, he shall have a generous recompense, and we will lay on them our easy behests.
Then followed he a route
Until when he reached the rising of the sun he found it to rise on a people to whom we had given no shelter from it.
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90. Thus it was. And we had full knowledge of the forces that were with him.
Then followed he a route.
Until he came between the two mountains, beneath which he found a people who scarce understood a language.
They said, 'O Dhoulkarnain! verily, Gog and Magog18 waste this land; shall we then pay thee tribute, so thou build a rampart 19 between us and them?'
He said, 'Better than your tribute is the might wherewith my Lord hath strengthened me; but help me strenuously, and I will set a barrier between you and them.
Bring me blocks of iron,' - until when it filled the space between the mountain sides - 'Ply,' said he, 'your bellows,'- until when he had made it red with heat (fire), he said, - 'Bring me molten brass that I may pour upon it.'
And Gog and Magog were not able to scale it, neither were they able to dig through it.
This,' said he, 'is a mercy from my Lord:
But when the promise of my Lord shall come to pass, he will turn it to dust; and the promise of my Lord is true.'
On that day we will let them dash like billows one over another; and there shall be a blast on the trumpet, and we will gather them together in a body.
100. And we will set Hell on that day close before the infidels, Whose eyes were veiled from my warning, and who had no power to hear.
What! do the infidels think that they can take my servants as their patrons, beside Me? Verily, we have got Hell ready as the abode of the infidels.
SA Y: Shall we tell you who they are that have lost their labour most?
Whose aim in the present life hath been mistaken, and who deem that what they do is right?
They are those who believe not in the signs of the Lord, or that they shall ever meet him. Vain, therefore, are their works; and no weight will we allow them on the day of resurrection.
This shall be their reward - Hell! 2O Because they were unbelievers, and treated my signs and my Apostles with scorn.
But as for those who believe and do the things that are right, they shall have the gardens of Paradise21 for their abode:
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They shall remain therein for ever: they shall wish for no change from it.
SAY: Should the sea become ink, to write the words of my Lord, the sea would surely fail ere the words of my Lord would fail, though we brought its like in aid.
110. SAY: In sooth I am only a man like you. It hath been revealed to me that your God is one only God: let him then who hopeth to meet his Lord work a righteous work: nor let him give any other creature a share in the worship of his Lord.
SURA 191 - MARY
MECCA - 98 VERSES
In the Name of God, the Compassionate, the Merciful
Kaf. Ha. Ya. Ain. Sad! A recital of thy Lord's mercy to his servant Zachariah;
When he called upon his Lord with secret calling,
And said: '0 Lord, verily my bones are weakened, and the hoar hairs glisten on my head,
And never, Lord, have I prayed to thee with ill success.
But now I have fears for my kindred after me;] and my wife is barren:
Give me, then, a successor as thy special gift, who shall be my heir and an heir of the family of Jacob: and make him, Lord, well pleasing to thee.'
'O Zachariah! verily we announce to thee a son, - his name John:
That name We have given to none before him.4
He said: 'O my Lord! how when my wife is barren shall I have a son, and when I have now reached old age, failing in my powers?'
10 He said: So shall it be. Thy Lord hath said, Easy is this to me, for I created thee aforetime when thou wast nothing.'
He said: 'Vouchsafe me, 0 my Lord! a sign.' He said: 'Thy sign shall be that for three nights, though sound in health, thou speakest not to man.'
Page 198 And he came forth from the sanctuary to his people, and made signs to them to sing praises morn and even.
We said: .'0 John! receive the Book with purpose of heart: , 5 - and We bestowed on him wisdom while yet a child;
And mercifulness from Ourself, and purity; and pious was he, and duteous to his parents; and not proud, rebellious.
And peace was on him on the day he was born, and the day of his death, and shall be on the day when he shall be raised to life!
And make mention in the Book, of Mary, when she went apart from her family, eastward,6
And took a veil to shroud herself from them: and we sent our spirit? to her, and he took before her the form of a perfect man.8
She said: 'I fly for refuge from thee to the God of Mercy! If thou fearest Him, begone from me.'
He said: 'I am only a messenger of thy Lord, that I may bestow on thee a holy son.'
2.0 She said: 'How shall I have a son, when man hath never touched me? and I am not unchaste.'
He said: 'So shall it be. Thy Lord hath said: "Easy is this with me;" and we will make him a sign to mankind, and a mercy from us. For it is a thing decreed.'
And she conceived him,9 and retired with him to a far-off place.
And the throes came upon herlo by the trunk of a palm. She said: 'Oh, would that I had died ere this, and been a thing forgotten, forgotten quite!'
And one cried to her from below her: II 'Grieve not thou, thy Lord hath provided a streamlet at thy feet:-
And shake the trunk of the palm-tree towards thee: 12 it will drop fresh ripe dates upon thee.
Eat then and drink, and be of cheerful eye: 13 and shouldst thou see a man,
Say,- Verily, I have vowed abstinence to the God of mercy.- To no one will I speak this day.'
Then came she with the babe to her people, bearing him. They said, '0 Mary! now hast thou done a strange thing!
0 sister of Aaron!14 Thy father was not a man of wickedness, nor unchaste thy mother.'
30 And she made a sign to them, pointing towards the babe. They said, 'How shall we speak with him who is in the cradle, an infant?'
Page 199 / It said,15 'Verily, I am the servant of God; He hath given me the Book, and He hath made me a prophet;
And He hath made me blessed wherever I may be, and hath enjoined me prayer and almsgiving so long as I shall live;
And to be duteous to her that bare me: and he hath not made me proud, depraved.
And the peace of God was on me the day I was born, and will be the day I shall die, and the day I shall be raised to life.'
This is Jesus, the son of Mary; this is a statement of the truth concerning which they doubt.
It beseemeth not God to beget a son. Glory be to Him! when he decreeth a thing, He only saith to it, Be, and it Is.
And verily, God is my Lord and your Lord; adore Him then. This is the right way.
But the Sects have fallen to variance among themselves about Jesus: but woe, because of the assembly of a great day, to those who believe not! .
Make them hear, make them behold the day when they shall come before us! But the offenders this day are in a manifest error.
40 Warn them of the day of sighing when the decree shall be accomplished, while they are sunk in heedlessness and while they believe not.
Verily, we will inherit the earth and all who are upon it. To us shall they be brought back.
Make mention also in the Book of Abraham; for he was a man of truth, a Prophet.16
When he said to his Father, '0 my Father! why dost thou worship that which neither seeth nor heareth, nor profiteth thee aught?
0 my Father! verily now hath knowledge come to me which hath not come to thee. Follow me therefore - I will guide thee into an even path.
0 my Father! worship not Satan, for Satan is a rebel against the God of Mercy.
0 my Father! indeed I fear lest a chastisement from the God of Mercy light upon thee, and thou become Satan's vassal.'
He said, 'Castest thou off my Gods, 0 Abraham? If thou forbear not, I will surely stone thee. Begone from me for a length of time.' "
Page 200 He said, 'Peace be on thee! I will pray my Lord for thy forgiveness, for he is gracious to me:
But I will separate myself from you, and the gods ye call on beside God, and on my Lord will I call. Haply, my prayers to my Lord will not be with ill success.'
50 And when he had separated himself from them and that which they worshipped beside God, we bestowed on him Isaac and Jacob, and each of them We made a prophet:
And we bestowed gifts on them in our mercy, and gave them the lofty tongue of truth.,l7
And commemorate Moses in 'the Book;' for he was a man of purity: moreover he was an Apostle, a Prophet:
From the right side of the mountain we called to him, and caused him to draw nigh to us for secret converse:
And we bestowed on him in our mercy his brother Aaron, a Prophet.
And commemorate Ismael in 'the Book;' for he was true to his promise, and was an Apostle, a Prophet;
And he enjoined prayer and almsgiving on his people, and was well pleasing to his Lord.
And commemorate Edris 18 in 'the Book;' for he was a man of truth, a Prophet:
And we uplifted him to a place on high.19
These are they among the prophets of the posterity of Adam, and among those whom we bare with Noah, and among the posterity of Abraham and Israel, and among those whom we have guided and chosen, to whom God hath shewed favour. When the signs of the God of Mercy were rehearsed to them, they bowed them down worshipping and weeping.
60 But others have come in their place after them: they have made an end of prayer, and have gone after their own lusts; and in the end they shall meet with evil:-
Save those who turn and believe and do that which is right, these shall enter the Garden, and in nought shall they be wronged:
The Garden of Eden, which the God of Mercy hath promised to his servants, though yet unseen:20 for his promise shall come to pass:
No vain discourse shall they hear therein, but only 'Peace;' and their food shall be given them at mom and even:
This is the Paradise which we will make the heritage of those our servants who fear us.
200
He said, 'Peace be on thee! I will pray my Lord for thy forgiveness, for he is gracious to me:
But I will separate myself from you, and the gods ye call on beside God, and on my Lord will I call. Haply, my prayers to my Lord will not be with ill success.'
50 And when he had separated himself from them and that which they worshipped beside God, we bestowed on him Isaac and Jacob, and each of them We made a prophet:
And we bestowed gifts on them in our mercy, and gave them the lofty tongue of truth.,l?
And commemorate Moses in 'the Book;' for he was a man of purity: moreover he was an Apostle, a Prophet:
From the right side of the mountain we called to him, and caused him to draw nigh to us for secret converse:
And we bestowed on him in our mercy his brother Aaron, a
Prophet.
And commemorate Ismael in 'the Book;' for he was true to his promise, and was an Apostle, a Prophet;
And he enjoined prayer and almsgiving on his people, and was well pleasing to his Lord.
And commemorate Edris IS in 'the Book;' for he was a man of
truth, a Prophet:
And we uplifted him to a place on high.19
These are they among the prophets of the posterity of Adam, and among those whom we bare with Noah, and among the posterity of Abraham and Israel, and among those whom we have guided and chosen, to whom God hath shewed favour. When the signs of the God of Mercy were rehearsed to them, they bowed them down worshipping and weeping.
60 But others have come in their place after them: they have made an end of prayer, and have gone after their own lusts; and in the end they shall meet with evil:-
Save those who turn and believe and do that which is right, these shall enter the Garden, and in nought shall they be wronged:
The Garden of Eden, which the God of Mercy hath promised to his servants, though yet unseen:20 for his promise shall come to pass:
No vain discourse shall they hear therein, but only 'Peace;' and their food shall be given them at mom and even:
This is the Paradise which we will make the heritage of those
our servants who fear us.
Page 201 We 21 come not down from Heaven but by thy Lord's command. His, whatever is before us and whatever is behind us, and whatever is between the two! And thy Lord is not
forgetful, -
Lord of the Heavens and of the Earth, and of all that is between them! Worship Him, then, and abide thou steadfast in his worship. Knowest thou any other of the same name?22
Man saith: 'What! after 1 am dead, shall 1 in the end be brought forth alive?'
Doth not man bear in mind that we made him at first, when he was nought?
And 1 swear by thy Lord, we will surely gather together them and the Satans: then will we set them on their knees round Hell:
70 Then will we take forth from each band those of them who have been stoutest in rebellion against the God of Mercy:
Then shall we know right well to whom its burning is most due:
No one is there of you who shall not go down unto it23 - This
is a settled decree with thy Lord -
Then will we deliver those who had the fear of God, and the wicked will we leave in it on their knees.
And when our clear signs are rehearsed to them, the infidels say to those who believe: 'Which of the two parties24 is in the best plight? and which is the most goodly company?'
But how many generations have we brought to ruin before them, who surpassed them in riches and in splendour!
SAY: As to those who are in error, the God of Mercy will lengthen out to them a length of days
Until they see that with which they are threatened, whether it be some present chastisement, or whether it be 'the Hour,' and they shall then know which is in the worse state, and which the more weak in forces:
But God will increase the guidance of the already guided. And good works which abide, are in thy Lord's sight better in
respect of guerdon, and better in the issue than all worldly good.
80 Hast thou marked him who believeth not in our signs, and saith, 'I shall surely have riches and children bestowed upon me?'
Hath he mounted up into the secrets of God? Hath he made a compact with the God of Mercy?
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No! we will certainly write down what he saith, and will lengthen the length of his chastisement:
And We will inherit what he spake of, and he shall come before us all alone.
They have taken other gods beside God to be their help 25
But it shall not be. Those gods will disavow their worship and will become their enemies.
Seest thou not that we send the Satans against the Infidels to urge them into sin?
Wherefore be not thou in haste with them;26 for a small number of days do we number to them.
One day we will gather the God-fearing before the God of Mercy with honours due:27
But the sinners will we drive unto Hell, like flocks driven to the watering.
90 None shall have power to intercede, save he who hath received permission at the hands of the God of Mercy.
They say: 'The God of Mercy hath gotten offspring.' Now have ye done a monstrous thing!
Almost might the very Heavens be rent thereat, and the Earth cleave asunder, and the mountains fall down in fragments,
That they ascribe a son to the God of Mercy, when it beseemeth not the God of Mercy to beget a son!
Verily there is none in the Heavens and in the Earth but shall approach the God of Mercy as a servant. He hath taken note of them, and numbered them with exact numbering:
And each of them shall come to Him, on the day of Resurrection, singly:
But love will the God of Mercy vouchsafe to those who believe and do the things that be right.
Verily we have made this Koran easy and in thine own tongue, that thou mayest announce glad tidings by it to the God-fearing, and that thou mayest warn the contentious by it.
How many generations have we destroyed before them! Canst thou search out one of them? or canst thou hear a whisper from them?
HOURS HORUS HOURS
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