Chapter 43 (part 43)

au am-nef saa en neter neb ahau pa neheh t'er-f He[4] hath eaten the knowledge of god every, [his] existence is for all eternity pa t'etta em sah-f pen en merer-f ari-f mest'et'-f and to everlasting in his sah [5] this; what he willeth he doeth, [what] he hateth an ari-nef not doth he do.[6] [1. Recueil Travaux , t. iii., p. 208 (ll. 232, 233). 2. Recueil de Travaux , t. iii., p. 209 (l. 240) 3. Ibid. , t. iv., p. 50 (l. 445). The allusion here is to the setting of the sun. 4. I.e. , Unas. 5. See page lix. 6. Recueil de Travaux , t. iv., p. 61 (ll. 520, 521).] {p. lvii} 6. anx anx an mit-k Live life, not shalt thou die.[1] The doctrine of eternal life in the XVIIIth dynasty. In the papyrus of Ani the deceased is represented as having come to a place remote and far away, where there is neither air to breathe nor water to drink, but where he holds converse with Tmu. In answer to his question, "How long have I to live?"[2], the great god of Annu answers:-- auk er heh en heh aha en heh Thou shalt exist for millions of millions of years, a period of millions of years. In the LXXXIVth Chapter, as given in the same papyrus, the infinite duration of the past and future existence of the soul, as well as its divine nature, is proclaimed by Ani in the words:-- nuk Su paut ba-a pu neter ba-a pu heh I am Shu [the god] of unformed matter. My soul is God, my soul is eternity.[3] When the deceased identifies himself with Shu, he makes the period of his existence coeval with that of Tmu-Ra, i.e. , he existed before Osiris and the other gods of his company. These two passages prove the identity of the belief in eternal life in the XVIIIth dynasty with that in the Vth and VIth dynasties. But while we have this evidence of the Egyptian belief in eternal life, we are nowhere told that man's corruptible body will rise again; indeed, the following extracts show that the idea prevailed that the body lay in the earth while the soul or spirit lived in heaven. 1. ba ar pet sat ar ta Soul to heaven, body to earth.[4] (Vth dynasty.) [1. Recueil de Travaux , t. v., p. 170 (Pepi, 1. 85). 2. ###. Plate XIX., l. 16 (Book of the Dead, Chapter CLXXV.). 3. Plate XXVIII., 1. 15. 4 Recueil de Travaux , t. iv., p. 71 (l. 582).] {p. lvii} 2. mu-k er pet xa-k er ta Thy essence is in heaven, thy body to earth.[1] (VIth dynasty.) 3. pet xer ba-k ta xeri tut-k Heaven hath thy soul, earth hath thy body.[2] (Ptolemaic period.) Constancy in the belief in the resurrection. There is, however, no doubt that from first to last the Egyptians firmly believed that besides the soul there was some other element of the man that would rise again.