The Egyptian Book of the Dead (Papyrus of Ani) · 177 of 357 · tr. E.A. Wallis Budge
Chapter 22 (part 1)
PLATE XIV.
§F.
Vignette: The gods Osiris, Isis, and Ap-uat, and the TET.
Text [CHAPTER XVIII.]: (1) The great godlike rulers who are in Abtu are Osiris, Isis, and Ap-uat.
"Hail, Thoth, who madest Osiris victorious (2) over his enemies, make thou the Osiris Ani, the scribe and teller of the sacred offerings of all the gods, to be victorious (3) over his enemies in the presence of the godlike rulers who judge the dead, on the night of (4) the condemnation of those who are to be blotted out." §G.
Vignette: The gods Thoth, Osiris, Anubis, and Astennu. Text: (1) The great godlike rulers in the judgment of the dead are Thoth, Osiris, Anubis, and Astennu.
Now (2) the "condemnation of those who are to be blotted out" is the withholding of that which is so needful to the souls of the children of impotent revolt.
"(3) Hail, Thoth, who madest Osiris victorious over his enemies, make thou the Osiris, the scribe Ani (triumphant!), to be victorious over his enemies in the [1.
Omitted on Plate XXIV.
2.
###, the capital of the eighth nome of Upper Egypt, situated near Abydos, and probably represented by the modem village of Kûm es-Sultân.
It is the ### of the Coptic writers.
See Brugsch, Dict.
Géog.
, p.
951; and Amélineau, La Géographie de l'Égypte , p.
500.] presence of the great godlike rulers, (4) on the festival of the breaking and turning up of the earth in Tattu, on the night of the breaking and turning up of the earth in their blood and of making Osiris to be victorious over his enemies." §H.
Vignette: The three gods of the festival of breaking up the earth in Tattu.
Text: (1) When the fiends of Set come and change themselves into beasts, the great godlike rulers, on the festival of the breaking and turning up of the earth in Tattu, (2) slay them in the presence of the gods therein, and their blood floweth among them as they are smitten down.
(3) These things are allowed to be done by them by the judgment of those who are in Tattu.
"Hail, Thoth, who madest Osiris victorious over his enemies, make thou the Osiris Ani to be victorious over his enemies in the presence of the godlike rulers (4) who are in Naarutef, on the night of him who concealeth himself in divers forms, even Osiris." §1.
Vignette: The gods Ra, Osiris, Shu, and Bebi, dog-headed.
Text: (1) The great godlike rulers who are in Naarutef are Ra, Osiris, Shu, and Bebi. Now the night of him who concealeth himself in divers forms, even Osiris," is when the thigh [and the head], and the heel, and the leg, are brought nigh unto the coffin of Osiris Un-nefer.
A non-physical dimension of reality, interpenetrating the physical world, populated by forces, beings, and forms ordinarily imperceptible to physical senses and instruments, that can affect embodied life without being seen — Dion Fortune's 'mind-side of nature,' the astral plane of Western esotericism broadly construed. Distinct from astral_light (a specific transmitting medium or fluid operating within this realm, not the realm itself), pleroma (the divine fullness at the summit of a cosmic hierarchy, not a parallel plane coextensive with ordinary life), and animism (particular indwelling spirits bound to specific natural objects, not the general unseen dimension itself).
The passage describes the non-physical realm of Abtu and Naarutef, populated by godlike rulers who judge the dead and are imperceptible to the living.
The Egyptian principle of truth, balance, and right order underlying both the cosmos and human conduct; the parallel to Zoroastrian asha and Greek dike.
The entire passage is structured around the judgment of the dead by godlike rulers, the condemnation of the wicked, and the maintenance of cosmic right order through the victory of Osiris over his enemies.
Form-mutability as a constitutional property of divine and preternatural beings — gods, heroes, spirits, and their human practitioners possessing inherent capacity to alter form across human, animal, plant, or elemental states. Loki and Odin's transformations in Norse, Math's pigs and Blodeuwedd's owl-shape and Pwyll's exchange with Arawn in the Mabinogion, the Greek Proteus, the Indian dasavatara, Vainamoinen's bird-flight in the Kalevala, Ovid's metamorphoses, the shamanic and witch's capacity for ritual form-change. Distinct from anthropomorphism (divine taking specific human form, single embodiment) in that anthropomorphism establishes a stable form whereas this concept establishes form's plurality and instability.
The fiends of Set 'change themselves into beasts' and Osiris is described as 'him who concealeth himself in divers forms,' both expressing form-mutability as a constitutional property of divine and preternatural beings.
The doctrine — central to Eastern Orthodox and Maximian theology — that the human person is progressively transformed into a partaker of the divine nature by grace, not merely justified or united in passing ecstasy.
The repeated formula 'make thou the Osiris Ani to be victorious' expresses the transformation of the deceased into a divine state, becoming one with Osiris in the afterlife.