Book of the Dead

The name given to *Pert em hru* which may be translated, "coming forth by day," or "manifested in the light." It has also been called the "Funeral Ritual," and more fancifully and ignorantly, the Egyptian Bible. It has been found in many papyri, and chapters from it are inscribed on the walls of tombs and pyramids, and on sarcophagi and mummy wrappings. No one copy contains all the chapters (about 200), and in no case is the same sequence observed all through. The chapters "are as independent of one another as the Hebrew Psalms," and like them, were composed at different times. The longest known copy is in a Turin papyrus, which contains 165 chapters. The difficulties of translating the work are immense, for even in the early times the text had become corrupt, and the constant copying of it by the uninitiated had rendered it most obscure. This is increased by the fact that the work is mythological throughout, and a umes the knowledge of all current myths on the part of the reader. The lofty ideas set forth in some chapters seem to stand out in great contrast with the apparently gro conceptions found in others; but in the latter case some esoteric meaning may be imagined, of which the key is lost. "The Beatification of the Dead is the main subject of every chapter." The deceased was supposed to recite the chapters in order that he might gain power and enjoy the privileges of his new life. His desire was to have all the powers he had lost at death restored to him. Of punishment almost nothing is said. The highest bli was to be identified with the gods, and to have the power of transforming himself into anything he pleased. Among the principal gods mentioned are Ra, Seb, Nut, Osiris, Isis, Horus, Set, Nephthys, Ptah, Thoth, Khnemu, and Tum. The Theban gods are conspicuous by their absence. The oldest papyrus copy of the work is of the XVIIIth Dynasty. The earlier copies are not so copiously illustrated as later ones, the vignettes gradually becoming of more and more importance. They are in many cases brilliantly coloured. Most of the versions agree in saying that the oldest chapter is the sixty-fourth, the Turin papyrus adding that it was discovered by a son of Khufu, of the IVth Dynasty; another text ascribes it to the 1st Dynasty. It is called "The chapter of coming forth by day in the underworld." Other chapters are called, "of coming forth by day and living after death"; "of driving away shame from the heart of the deceased"; "a hymn of praise to Ra when he setteth in the land of life;" "of bringing words of magical power to the deceased in the underworld"; "of not dying a second time"; "of giving air in the underworld"; "of changing into whatsoever form he pleaseth"; "of making the soul to be united to its body"; "of knowing the souls of the west"; "of making a mango into heaven to the side of Ra." There are directions that certain chapters shall be written on certain amulets. The most valuable English translations are those by Sir P. le P. Renouf, in the Proceedings of the Society of Biblical Archaeology, vols. xiv, xv., xvi., ., and by E. W. Budge.