Story of Things: The Book of the Dead

The Book of the Dead – Papyrus is a few meters long with bright pictures and a set of spells – only wealthy people could afford. If you are one of them, then cook six donkeys or three cows – so much stands on average guide to the world of different. You know that this is a lot – not all peasants have such a number of pets in their farm, what to say about slaves. This means that the latter will remain without hope for the life of their soul – "Ba" – after death. This life is called "ahau", it is not eternal, but many millions of years last.

Photo: Sheila Terry / Science Photo Library / East News

Even if the poor led the righteous life, they will suffer the most terrible of all presenters: they are most likely to have a job in non-existence until the next space cycle of creation. After all, without a guide to that light they have almost no chance worthy to go through all the afterlocking tests – they simply do not know the necessary spells. A tricky peasant may except to afford a tiny piece of the book in the chapter – at least some chance for skipping into another world. It is believed that the possession of the sacred text gives privileges in the world.

The Book of the Dead – a collection of religious texts, placed in the tomb directly near the body. The first such collections appeared in ancient Egypt. Later, similar texts were distributed in India and on Tibet. The initial name of the ancient Egyptian book of the dead is translated as "Saying the release of the day". Sometimes instead of papyrus, texts and drawings were transferred to the funeral veil, in which the mummy wrapped.

Everyone has a book, and it is done individually: your name and genus of classes fits into it. To order it, you go to a special temple, which is called the pen anch, or a life house, to artists and writings. You know that the greatest number of chapters in the book – 160. Such a luxury Talmud can afford except the court pharaoh, because to create a similar papyrus – a large and time-consuming work. But the more details the book of the dead, the greater the chances to enter Ahau and settle after death in the paradise fields of Ialu, where the servants will work for you – the statues of the Ushebti (they are put in the tomb, and after the death of her owner they come to life), where barley grows four elbows in height (2 m), and the shelter snacks for ten elbows (4.5 m).

The Pharaohs themselves, unlike their wives, did not need the dead, as they were considered the "Small Sun" – the embodiment of God on Earth. Eternal life they got automatically. For them were made special "universal" texts: books of the sky, land, sacred gates. They described the walls of the tomb.

Therefore, you will have to choose only the most important heads of the guide in the afterlife. These are usually those parts that should help your soul find your body in a different world, reunite with the ancestors and secure the most terrible loss – your heart, "IB": containers of consciousness and acts of earthly life.

And here Papyrus is ready. It seems the pictures in it more than prayers. It is necessary to give the last more significance. You carefully learn the contents. After death, for a start, you will have to sing a lot of hymns to the God of the Sun of RA and the God of Renaissance and the afterlife of Osiris, and also to pronounce spells to force the figurines to have.

It is believed that it was the ancient Egyptian book of the dead with her fertile fields IALU influenced the idea of ​​Christian paradise.

Another prayer is devoted to learn to breathe air in the afterlife (it is called Dat): ". I open my mouth to eat life, I live air, I again live after death like RA every day. ".

If you correctly uttered all the prayers and passed the tests, you are waiting for the worst of them – 42 doors. Each guard is a huge and very disgusting scorpion. Behind each door – in God. All you have to do is open the doors and stubbornly deny our sins. Spells that you pronounce and are called: "Decitation of denying".

You are striking their beauty: "Oh, hugging a flame that came out of Heraha, I did not steal. Oh, the nosed, released from the Hermopol, I was not greedy. Oh, a fierce face that came out of Ra-Setau, I did not kill people. Oh, breaking the bones that came out of herakleopol, I did not say lies. Oh, a traitor to blood, who came out of the place of slaughter, I did not kill Divine cattle. Oh, who makes something, you want, who came out of Anteoplas, I did not cross the water "- and everything in such a spirit.

You need to be very convincing and in any case do not get confused in the gods, otherwise you will immediately burn the same scorpion.

You managed to deceive suspicious deities? Ahead is the main exam – the court of Osiris and the "Great Libra", on which the heart of the deceased is weighted. It is put on one cup of scales, and another – the feather of the goddess of the truth of Maat. If one of the bowls will translate (no matter what) – the chief body of the smoking immediately devour the terrible monster of ammat with the body of the hippopotum, mane and lion’s paws and the peeper of the crocodile. If the scales are equal to – the case is in the hat: you will find yourself in front of the gates of the sacred fields of Ialu, and your soul will gain almost eternal life.