Chapter 3
Ritual and Worship in Ancient Egypt
Characteristics of Egyptian Religion
Ancient Egyptian culture was suffused with religion. Religious beliefs were responsible for architectural forms (temples and tombs), the writing system (“hieroglyphs” or sacred signs) was thought to have been devised by the gods, statues were created specifically for the funerary cult, small objects and jewelry had amuletic value, and gods’ names were commonly incorporated into personal names.
The religion that spawned this culture was non-canonical. There was no book or single body of received knowledge that formed a unified theology. As a result, there was enormous diversity and variety of religious practice both geographically and diachronically, so much so that Egyptian religion has been viewed by outsiders, both ancient and modern, as a series of confused, immature, or esoteric cult actions.
Egyptian beliefs may be said to be organic in their lack of standard practice, but more so because the belief system and its manifestations were derived from the environment of the Nile Valley. The Egyptians of the dynastic period were not philosophers—they were observers who incorporated features of the natural world into their beliefs. They explained and understood phenomena, such as the circuit of the sun across the sky, or death and resurrection, in concrete terms, as a series of equivalencies. The sun’s passage across the sky was equated with the observable event of the scarab beetle rolling a ball of dung (food for its offspring). It was believed that beetles were born from the ball of dung, hence a pattern for self-generation, just as the sun was recreated each day.
Explaining natural phenomena by equating each with known, observable, features of the world was also applied to one of the greatest unknowns—the potentially terrifying mystery of death and whether there was any form of existence, positive or not, after death. In a stunningly simple series of analogies, the routines of daily life were adopted as the pattern for the conception of life after death, a brilliant solution that reduced the fear of the unknown.
There is no known tradition of orators, speakers, or theologians who shared their speculations about the universe and the place of the Egyptians in it; no tradition of proselytizers or converts; no fasting or self-mortification. For most of the 3,000 years of ancient Egyptian history, one’s salvation through identification with the god Osiris and rebirth in the afterlife was dependent on an individual’s own actions during life, as well as on the post-mortem profession before a tribunal of the gods that she or he had not transgressed against the gods or society and hence was worthy of being transformed into a “justified being,” enabling him or her to live eternally as a transfigured spirit.
The transmission of religious knowledge was in the hands of priests, and a lesser number of priestesses, the great majority of them hereditary holders of their office who received their training from their parents. In the 1st millennium bc and early Roman era, the institution “the House of Life” served as a local priestly scriptorium, and the “House of Documents” as the local priestly archive, both of which must have facilitated the retention and transmission of religious rituals and texts (Gardiner, 157–179). Nonpriests, especially the non-literate majority of the population, were familiar with religious imagery on the walls of tombs that they could visit, and they would have witnessed processions that informed them about the formal aspects of Egyptian rituals and belief.
The Egyptian Pantheon
The Egyptians worshipped hundreds of different gods and goddesses that were represented in anthropoid, zoomorphic, and hybrid animal/human forms. A single god might have multiple aspects, for example, there are many forms of Amun known at Thebes, each differentiated by his epithet. The number of gods was also increased through syncretistic combinations of deities, yielding deities such as Ptah-Sokar-Osiris, who was worshipped along with each individual god’s independent identity. These syncretistic gods have been interpreted as being a trend toward monotheism—as one omnipresent, all-powerful super deity that subsumed others (Assmann 2001, 13, 234–244.). This interpretation is based on a limited number of texts (including the Hymn to Amun) that relate, in part:
Re himself is mingled in his bodily form, and he is the Fashioner dwelling in Heliopolis. Whatever is said of Tatenen is referring to him, and Amun, who came forth from chaos–that is God’s image above. Another of his forms is the Eight Great Gods; he engendered the primeval gods, brought forth Re, completed himself as Atum, was one flesh with him; he is Lord of All, who began existence. (translation: Foster 1995, 76–77)
Yet each of the gods, as indicated by a singular pronoun, retained his individual identity, leading Erik Hornung to argue that this grouping of gods was a “counter current” to monotheism (Hornung 1982, 98–99).
Religion of the Amarna Period (reign of king Amenhotep IV, who assumed the name Akhenaten [ca. 1352–1336 bce]), has often been cited as a precursor of monotheism. In this era, the worship of the many gods was discouraged through economic sanctions in favor of the veneration of a single god, the globe of the sun known as the Aten. This extended to an official iconoclasm, with the images and even written references to the other gods being chiseled from the walls of temples. Indeed, there are notable similarities between Amarna religion and the monotheism of the Old Testament in that the doctrine of the Aten was revealed, but in the case of Egypt, only to the king who was the sole offspring of the god. This has motivated many comparisons of Amarna religion with the Old Testament, especially whether “the development of Yahwism was influenced directly by Atenism,” and specifically whether Akhenaten’s Hymn to the Aten, in which he explicated his new religion/philosophy, was the inspiration for Psalm 104. Most recently, James Hoffmeier has concluded, “it seems inconceivable that the Hebrews and the development of Yahwism were influenced directly by Atenism” (Hoffmeier 2015, 244, 251–255).
Indeed, looking at Aten religion from an Egyptian perspective, the changes in the doctrine appear to be more politically and philosophically inspired as a way of elevating the status of the king (and his queen) to that of co-gods with the Aten rather than a way of creating a single, supreme god. The name of the Aten appears enclosed within cartouches (name rings) that traditionally encircle the name of the king or queen. The rays of the sun illuminate only the king, the queen, and their daughters. Further, according to the tenets of Atenism, an individual’s fate was determined not by the individual’s deeds, as was the tradition, but by a decision of the king, as expressed in a text in a courtier’s tomb: “My Lord [the king], who makes a good fate for his favorite…the god who gives life” (after Murnane 1995, 112). Worship of the gods had been replaced by adoration of the king, although veneration of the other gods continued in a subdued form even in Akhenaten’s capital city. The importance of Akhenaten himself in this new religion is evident in the lack of adherents and followers who might have spread his doctrine. Atenism died with Akhenaten, and his successors rapidly returned to traditional polytheism.
Ritual and Worship
The goals of Egyptian ritual were two-fold. The first was to avoid the state of non-existence; to attain the status of a transfigured spirit (akh) that would dwell eternally in the afterlife and who was reborn eternally each day with the rising sun. This was manifested in the elaborate funerary cult that was intended to perpetuate the memory of the deceased, whether king or commoner, through rituals and also through imperishable stone statues, the process of mummification, and images of the deceased—all of which served to evoke the deceased in the memories of the living, for to be remembered by the living was to defeat the forces of non-existence. These rituals also ensured that the reborn deceased could receive offerings that sustained it in the afterlife.
Closely related to this was the role of ritual in the maintenance of the cosmos. Opposing pairs were essential components that organized Egyptian thought and beliefs. The cosmos was considered to be in a constant state of tension between order (maat) and chaos (isfet), and one of the king’s primary duties was to uphold, preserve and maintain maat against the forces of chaos. From the 15th century bce onward, rituals appear that specifically stress the kings’ role in maintaining maat. Many kings’ names were compounded with the word maat, indicating that he was imbued with truth, symbolizing his personal responsibility for upholding just rule over the land and its people. This was vividly portrayed in the walls of temples in scenes where the king was shown presenting a tiny female figure of the goddess Maat, the personification of truth, to the gods (Figure 3.1).
Figure 3.1 King Ramesses II presenting a figure of Maat, the personification of truth and cosmic order, to the god Amun. Luxor, Temple of Amun at Karnak, reign of Ramesses II (ca. 1250 bce). Photograph by Emily Teeter.
Offering texts from the late 2nd millennium bc equate all offerings that the king gives the gods with maat (Teeter 2011, 82). In this role, the king was the chief ritualist, the supreme defender of maat, and through that action he expressed his authority and legitimacy. But while it is extremely rare that nonroyal individuals were shown presenting maat, autobiographic texts are rife with references to truth, for the burden of supporting maat over isfet fell upon every Egyptian. Correct personal behavior that expressed the tenets of maat—truthfulness, loyalty, and respect—was part of a communal responsibility to safeguard maat. In memorial texts, people professed being “knowers and doers of maat” (Lichtheim 1997, 11), the ultimate expression that they were moral beings, that they understood the difference between good and evil, and that they bore the responsibility to do good for the greater community and world (Lichtheim 1997, 54). This “connective justice” (Assmann 2002, 127) created a morally interconnected society of both commoners and the elite that created a sense of social cohesiveness.
Worship in ancient Egypt primarily took the form of offering rituals to the gods, to the king, and to the spirits of the dead. Offering to the god or the king was believed to secure protection for the donor and/or to influence the recipient to act on behalf of the donor. The cult of the king was also intended to commemorate and preserve his name and deeds before the gods (Haeny 1997, 124). Offering food and goods to the spirit of the deceased was thought to sustain him or her in the afterlife, while reciting the personal name of the deceased was thought to ensure immortality because the individual was not forgotten by the living.
The transactional nature of Egyptian worship is rooted in the belief that the gods and deceased individuals had the same material requirements as did living people—food, beverages, clothing, and finer things of life like perfumes, incense, fabrics, and jewelry. Many rituals, such as festivals and the daily offering to the god, were composed of a set series of ritual actions that are preserved on papyri and on temple walls, most of which date to the mid-2nd millennium bce and later. Offering rituals were generally not distinctive to a particular god, and similar cult actions were enacted before different deities. In contrast, many festivals were unique to the god being honored. For example, the festival of Min featured a palanquin and pole-climbing ritual, and the highlight of the festival of Osiris was the ritual enactment of the murder of the god by his brother Seth.
The Hierarchy of Offering Rituals
During the 3rd and 2nd millenniums bce, generally, the king was exclusively the donor of offerings to the gods. In turn, the king received life and an “eternity of rule” from the gods and offerings from his subjects, a reflection of his semi-divine status and his role as an intermediary with the gods. By about 1200 bce, the sense of decorum changed, giving individuals more access to the gods. This can be documented by many stelae that show a development in iconography from the traditional scenes of the king offering to the gods to those that depict him offering to the gods with individuals in a separate lower register, and later to individuals offering directly to the god without the mediation of the king. In the mortuary sphere, people are shown offering to the dead, be they relatives, acquaintances, rulers, gods, or semi-deified individuals who were thought to assist the living.
Creating a Sacred Space
Ready access to building material (sandstone, limestone, granite, and other hard stones, as well as earth and water for mud brick) facilitated the development of elaborate settings for rituals. For the cult of the gods, it was usually a temple dedicated to the resident deity. Referred to as the “mansion” (hat) or “house” (per) of the god, its center was the sanctuary, called the djeser-djeseru (“The Holy of the Holies”) that served as the dwelling place of the deity. The god, in the form of a statue, some of which were fashioned of precious materials, was housed there in a stone or wood naos (temple) with doors. The walls of the sanctuary, as of most of the temple, were usually decorated with offering scenes, some of which actions were probably enacted in that space. Temples varied in shape and size, but most had an open court or a series of courts, a hypostyle hall that accommodated processions, and numerous storage areas for the cult equipment and offerings, each area usually separated by tall pylon gates. Each of these architectural elements represented a part of the cosmos: the pylons replicated the horizon; the hypostyle halls were the primordial swamp of papyrus plants from which creation emerged; obelisks represented the benben, the mound upon which creation took place. Temples grew outward from the core—the sanctuary, which was the darkest and least accessible part of the temple.
The cult of the king was celebrated in his memorial temple (also referred to as a “funerary temple”), which was patterned closely on temples to the gods. A memorial temple was usually near the ruler’s tomb, although additional memorial temples could be located elsewhere in the Nile Valley, each dedicated to the memory of the king.
The cult of the dead was celebrated in a tomb constructed by the tomb owner prior to his or her death. Called a “house of eternity” (per djet), early examples imitated features of functional residences, thus expressing the notion that the realm of the dead imitated daily life. The form of tombs changed over the millennia, but some basic features remained—a subterranean burial chamber where the mummy was sealed off after its deposition and accessible ground-level offering chambers whose walls were usually decorated with scenes of processions, offering rituals, allegorical scenes (fishing and fowling that symbolize the victory of order over chaos), images of activities of “daily life,” and images of food that the deceased desired in the afterlife.
Development of Rituals of the Funerary Cult
A major focus of Egyptian ritual was the act of provisioning the deceased through offerings. These activities are documented already in the Predynastic Period (ca. 5000 bce) by graves in which vessels, stone palettes for grinding cosmetics, and other objects were deposited to accompany the deceased for eternity. By about 2700 bce, written records give us a better understanding of the theology of private mortuary cult offerings. These texts appear on stone stelae placed in private tombs at Helwan (ca. 2700 bce) and Giza (ca. 2565 bce) that list the provisions desired by the deceased. They give the name of the deceased, his or her administrative and priestly titles, and lists of food, other provisions, and especially linen that they desired (der Manuelian 2003, 153). Because some of the owners of tombs claimed that their tombs were a gift of the king, and many of the owners of tombs at Giza are members of the royal family, it is assumed that the king was the source of the offerings, or in practical terms, that the offerings were provided by the state, probably supplemented by goods brought by family.
Shortly after the time of the Giza stelae, we can see a realignment of the role of the king and the gods in offering rituals for the deceased. What became the standard funerary offering formula (hetep di nsw “a gift that the king gives…”) appears in the 4th Dynasty (ca. 2550 bce; Leprohon 2001, 569) calling first upon the king, and then upon the god(s) to (probably jointly) give offerings to the deceased, signaling the dominant role of the semi-divine king in providing offerings, but also a newly documented involvement of the gods. This pattern of the king and the gods jointly providing for the deceased continued to be the norm throughout the pharaonic period.
Worshipping the Gods and the King
Evidence for worship of the god(s) and the semidivine king cannot be documented much before 3700 bce. Among the earliest evidence of divine cults are pottery vessels painted with images of emblem-topped standards associated with deities. These standards appear in processions in which the king played the dominant role.
The cult of the king, as opposed to the cult of the gods, cannot be clearly differentiated in the earliest periods because the king was a divine or semi-divine being. As Stephen Quirke has noted, “at all periods all royal cults involve the gods, but equally…all cults of the gods involve the king—in Egypt, all cult is royal cult” (Quirke 1997, 46). The divine nature of the ruler is indicated by the earliest written records in which he is called “Horus,” marking him as the incarnation of the solar god shown in the form of a falcon. The king had a symbiotic relationship with the gods. Deities were thought to give life to the king, as indicated by a seal from the reign of Narmer, the first king of Egypt (ca. 3050 bce), that shows a bird (Horus himself) holding the hieroglyph for “life” as it hovers above the king (O’Connor and Silverman 151, fig. 3.6). The king possessed a dual nature—part divine, part mortal—which allowed him to act as the intermediary between the gods and mankind.
This lack of differentiation of royal and divine cult is documented by a very early (ca. 3100 bce) cult center at Hierakonpolis consisting of the traces of a reed structure that stood upon a “revetted mound” (mounds continued to be a feature of cult buildings for millennia). The structure has been interpreted as an “arena for rituals of kingship” that the gods attended (McNamara 2008, 928). Evidence from decorated ceremonial mace heads suggests that the early rituals consisted of processions on land and on the Nile. The king may be shown seated in a raised kiosk or processing with retainers who hold the standards associated with deities. The king may enact rituals such as hacking the earth with an adze, standing with his mace raised to smite enemies or slay wild animals, or receiving foreign captives. Elaborate rituals (the jubilee) celebrated the strength of the king and his ability to rule. The king dedicated temples in honor of the gods, and commissioned statues of the deities to stand in temples and shrines.
From that time onward, a steady growth in the cults and worship of the gods can be documented, most clearly by the proliferation of attestations of men and women who held priestly titles associated with the service of the cults of Hathor, Anubis, Neith, Horus, and other deities. By about 2400 bce, the king is shown offering to the god(s). Such scenes appear innumerable times on the walls of every Egyptian temple through the Roman era, and this genre of representation comprises the vast majority of ritual scenes in temples.
Rituals Associated with the Divine Cult
As previously noted, the act of offering to the gods was motivated by the desire to maintain cosmic order, to seek protection, and also to influence the deities to act on behalf of the petitioner. On the most basic level, the gods were thought to have the same physical needs as humans, and so offerings to the god were primarily practical: foodstuffs and objects that the deity was thought to need.
Offerings to the gods in the formal temple cult were presented in an elaborate multi-stage ritual that began with the purification of the priest. He then broke the seals of the naos, opened the doors to reveal the statue of the god, purified the image, removed it from the naos and placed it on clean sand, undressed and eventually redressed it, adorned it with jewelry and crowns, and presented incense and food. At the end of the ritual, the statue was returned to the naos, the doors were bolted, and the priest withdrew, sweeping his footprints from the sanctuary.
Although these rituals were part of the practical care and feeding of the deity, most of the actions were equated with mythological events. For example, the act of drawing the bolts of the doors of the god’s shrine was equated with withdrawing the finger of Seth from the eye of Horus (a reference to the mythical battles of Horus and Seth), and the ointment with which the god was anointed was equated with fluid from the eye of Horus.
In theory, this ritual, in shorter or longer iterations, was enacted three times daily in imitation of mealtimes in every temple in Egypt. According to the pictorial record, it was the king who made the offering, and the endless scenes of offering rituals shown on temple walls throughout Egypt show the king before the god as the officiant, stressing the role of the ruler as the unique intermediary between the gods and humans. But in practice, the king, as the highest priest in the land, delegated his role as officiant to a priest who, as part of the liturgy, intoned: “It is the king who commanded me to see the god,” thereby reinforcing the unique authority of the king (David 1973, 63–64).
These elaborate rituals were intended to care for and placate the gods. Generally, the Egyptian gods were not threatening, but rather sympathetic and willing to come to the assistance of those who called upon them. However, the potentially dangerous side of deities was expressed, especially in myths such as “The Destruction of Mankind” or the related story, “The Distant Goddess,” which stressed the ambivalent nature of some deities (especially Sekhmet). In contrast, some of the underworld deities known primarily from the mid-2nd millennium bce funerary compositions, sought to destroy the deceased as he or she travelled through the dark hours of the night. Unlike the major gods who were the subject of offering cults, the chthonic deities were defeated not through offerings, but through the deceased’s knowledge of their names, wisdom that neutralized them.
Offerings to the gods also were thought to create a means of communication, initially between the king and the god(s), and later, in the 1st millennium bce, when individuals are shown directly praying to the god(s), between the gods and private individuals (Figure 3.2). As summed up by Hornung (Hornung 1982, 215):
The gods…need human response to their existence; they want to be experienced in the hearts of men, for only then does their work of creation acquire its lasting significance. Lack of response and silence are characteristics of the nonexistent; within the existent world there is the lively, uninterrupted dialogue between god and man, which is contained within the polarity of love and fear.
Figure 3.2 King Ramesses IV presenting flowers to the god Khonsu. Luxor, Temple of Khonsu, reign of Ramesses IV (ca. 1140 bce). Photograph by Emily Teeter.
Scenes of offering rituals showing the king offering to the god help clarify the underlying theology of divine offerings. These scenes, which appear with great consistency, are usually narrated by brief captions that indicate the sequence of the acts that comprise the ritual and the relationship of those acts. Most temple offering scenes show the king before a deity. The ruler is shown elevating or handing over the offering, whereas the divine recipient is immobile. The caption for the god is phrased in the past tense, indicating that the god was believed to have acted prior to the king’s offering. The typical boon from the god to the king is the gift of life, dominion, health, or an “eternity of kingship.” As a result, the donor is capable of interacting with the god, and he (or she) offers material objects (food, fabric, perfumes, etc.) to the deity for its daily maintenance. This act is narrated in the infinitive: “giving bread to his father.”1 The third act is a formula stating that the ruler has been given the state of “given life” by the deity. This completes the relationship between the king and god, establishing that the deity will protect the ruler and the office of pharaoh, hence the land and people of Egypt for whom he was responsible. These offering scenes are reciprocal, do et des, transactional actions for the two actors’ mutual benefit.
Cult activities within temples were not restricted to the daily offering rituals. Individuals sought the blessings of the gods and to partake of the rituals that were enacted in the temple. This was achieved by placing a statue—ideally of imperishable stone—of oneself, incised with the personal name, in the temple where it would serve as an eternal surrogate for the individual. The function of these statues is made quite clear by inscriptions upon some of them. One, recovered from the Karnak temple and dating to about 1200 bce bears the text:
Oh my likeness, may you be firm for my name, the favorite of everyone, so that people will stretch out their hands to you bearing splendid bouquets, that you may be given libations as the reminder of your lord, and then my ba [a part of the soul] will come fluttering so that he may receive offering with you for the ka [spirit] of…the royal scribe…Panehasy.”
(Frood 2007, 169)
Texts on some New Kingdom and Third Intermediate period statues (ca. 1500–664 bce) instruct people who come into the temple to speak the name of the dedicator, to wipe dust from the statue with a cloth, and to remove old offerings before they decay: “May you speak my name when you bring water, may you remove any corruption, dirt or refuse(?) from me. May you take away all that is dirty from me that may come for me for eternity” (after Rizzo 2004, 517).
The practice of establishing a statue of oneself in the temple is first attested in the late Old Kingdom (ca. 2250 bce), and it became exceedingly common in the 1st millennium bce. The most vivid proof of its popularity is indicated by the spectacular find in 1903 of the “Cachette,” at the Karnak Temple, a pit in which more than 17,000 statues that once stood in the temple were buried, probably in the 2nd century bce (Coulon 2016).
Closely related to statue cults is the commissioning of hundreds of small cenotaphs and stelae on the “Terrace of the Great God” at Abydos, a major cult center for Osiris, the god of the afterlife who was believed to be buried in Abydos. Although people who commissioned the monuments were buried elsewhere, the stone monument ensured that he or she would eternally be in the presence of Osiris, especially during the annual feast and procession of the god during which the murder of Osiris by his brother Seth was reenacted as an ancient passion play. Again, there is no ambiguity about the function of these monuments, for some are inscribed: “I made this offering chapel at the Terrace of the Great God so that I might be in his [Osiris’s] company” (Simpson 1974, 13).
Festivals and Rituals for the Deities
Festivals provided an opportunity for the elite and common people to worship the gods. The calendar was studded with festivals. In New Kingdom Thebes, 60 of the 365 days of the year were festival days (Schott 90). Some celebrations occurred at regular and frequent intervals (such as the Decade Festival celebrated every ten days); others semi-annually; and many occurred once a year (Opet, Feast of the Valley, New Year, Khoiak). Festivals were more inclusive—they involved the temple staff who performed the rituals that comprised the festival, but also members of the local population who watched and could, to some extent, participate. A major feature of festivals was the direct participation of the deity(s), for, during these feasts, the statue that dwelled in the temple sanctuary was removed from the naos and placed in a portable shrine that was placed on a boat. The boat was placed on carrying poles supported on the shoulders of a file of priests. When the divine procession left the temple the deity was accessible to the local population. Some processions circumambulated the temple. In others, the procession went from one temple to another. For example, in Thebes, during the Opet Festival, the god travelled between the Karnak and Luxor temples. In the Decade Festival, the deity left Luxor, crossed the Nile to Medinet Habu and then returned to Luxor. In the annual Sacred Marriage, the barque of Hathor travelled about 175 kilometers from her cult center at Dendera to the temple of her husband Horus at Edfu. Members of the community followed the divine procession; scenes of the festivals and texts relate that people jubilated, sang, played music, and danced in the presence of the god. On some processional routes, open-ended shrines allowed the priests to rest the boat on a pedestal. Some shrines had large openings in their walls to allow the crowd to see the god.
These processions were the most common setting for another form of interaction between the people and their gods—oracular decisions. A member of the community could approach the god with a written or oral question or plea. The god’s decision was manifested by movement of the boat while on the shoulders of the priests. The texts refer to the god “nodding,”—the bow of the barque dipping down in a gesture indicating assent, because, according to the texts, the god became “heavy” (Blackman 1925, 250). When annoyed, the god could become “wroth,” the barque shuddering and shaking. The types of questions put to the god during these encounters seem astounding in their banality: who stole this donkey or those linen shirts? Should I hire this maidservant or not? Delphi this was not.
According to oracular texts of the late-second and 1st millennia bce when they are best attested, these were important interactions between people and the gods. Although some of these encounters seem to have the crispness of an inquiry, they were an important part of ritual and worship, as indicated by the plea of the petitioner “Help [me] Amun of Pe-Khenty, my good and beloved lord!” going on to describe the circumstances of the loss, ending with “My good and beloved lord, will you give me back their theft?” (after Blackman 1925, 250). These texts document a very close relationship with the gods, unencumbered by the setting of temples, shrines, or intercessors.
Social and Economic Impact of Worship
The economic and social impact of these forms of worship in the society cannot be overstated. There were innumerable temples in Egypt (and in Egyptian-controlled territory outside the Nile Valley) dedicated to many different gods. A single god might have several temples in a single city.
Huge numbers of priests worked in the temples to serve the gods. For example, it has been estimated that 150 to 160 priests worked at the royal temple of Ramesses III (ca. 1170 bce)—just one of many temples in western Thebes (Haring 1997, 79). There were many different types and ranks of priests, from the low-level wab (“pure one”), up through the ranks of the fourth, third, second, and first priest of a god. Many priests served part-time while others were full-time employees of the temple. Although the exact duties of some ranks of priests are unknown (for example, what differentiated the duties of the fourth, third and second priests of Amun), others, such as ka servants, sem priests (who officiated at funerary rituals and administered temple lands and personnel) and lectors had specific duties (carrying offerings, officiating at the Opening of the Mouth ritual, and reciting rituals, respectively). Many men (and women) became priests early in life, presenting a contrast to the general image of priests in the Old Testament tradition having specialized duties and being older members of the community.
Little is known about the training of priests in Egypt, although many held the same position as one of their parents, suggesting that the requisite knowledge and skills were handed down in families. Some ranks, such as the sem, the lector priest, and the upper levels of the clergy probably had to be able to read in order to recite texts, and in some depictions, they are shown carrying a papyrus or a papyrus case as an emblem of their literacy. However, a great many priests seem to have been engaged in carrying or presenting offerings, keeping account of what was to be laid on the offering tables, receiving supplies for the temples, and other administrative duties. Indeed, some priests in ancient Egypt appear to be as concerned with the administration of temple activities as with theological matters.
Offering rituals had tremendous impact on the economy because they demanded and consumed enormous amounts of food and other goods. Detailed lists of requirements for the daily offering and for festival offerings are recorded. For example, a list at Medinet Habu in western Thebes (ca. 1170 bce) specified that the daily offering required about 2,345 liters of grain, 30 birds, 10 baskets of fruit, 100 bundles of vegetables, 20 bulbs of onions, liters of honey and fat, and other foods (Haring 1997, 76). A small sample of the food was placed before the statue of the god in the sanctuary and after the god was sated, it was removed, and then all the food was distributed among the temple staff as their wages (referred to as “reversion offerings” because the food reverted to the temple staff). In Egypt, there was no tradition of a ritual communal meal because the food was taken to the priests’ homes where it was consumed by the family or bartered for other desired goods or services.
Informal Worship
For much of Egyptian history, the gods were accessible to all, regardless of priestly status. However, entry to the inner areas of temples was restricted to priests who had a requisite level of purity that was, it is assumed, based on rank, ritual bathing, grooming, and clothing. Those who were not allowed into the temple had other avenues for worshipping and petitioning the god. Many large temples have a small chapel (referred to as “contra-temple”) on their back exterior wall that was accessible to anyone. Some of these are expressly referred to as “places of hearing petitions” or “chapels of the hearing ear” a reference to the ear of the deity (often carved on the wall) who was addressed there through prayer. Informal worship could also take place outside the context of the temple and the gods, in shrines established in rocky outcroppings, the walls of which might be carved with scenes of the gods and inked with graffiti from the people who worshipped there.
These informal cults have left a rich material legacy. Votive objects offered to the gods have been discovered at shrines as well as in temple and domestic settings. Among the most common are inexpensive molded baked clay figurines, often in the form of a naked adult female, which seems to be a generalized symbol of fertility and birth, and by extension, rebirth. Clay or wood phalluses and ears, often deposited in great numbers, allude to fertility and communication with the deities. The function of animal figurines (gods, cows, horses, cats, birds, hippos) is less clear, although some of them are associated with gods or festivals such as the New Year.
Some forms of worship focused on deceased members of the community rather than the gods or the king. From the mid-2nd millennium bce to the advent of Christianity, certain dead people were considered to be intermediaries who could effectively forward pleas to the god(s). Foremost among these “saints” were Imhotep and Amunhotep Son of Hapu, both deified architects. Imhotep’s cult was celebrated throughout Egypt, while that of Amunhotep was centered in Thebes (Wildung 1977, Saints and Imhotep). Nearly life-size statues of Amunhotep were positioned by the southern gate of the Karnak Temple where they were visited by the community. Other less august members of the community were also considered to be intermediaries. Referred to as “Effective Spirits of the God Re,” they are known from busts and stelae, most of which were originally located in houses where they were the focus of an offering cult that placated the spirit and encouraged it to be an intermediary for the family (Demaree 1983).
Animal cults were another form of popular worship. Appearing in the early 1st millennium bce and continuing into the Roman era, such cults were based on the belief that animals represented the soul (ba) of the god and that the animal served as an intermediary between the deity and the devotee. As a result, animals associated with a particular god—falcons with Horus, crocodiles with Sobek, baboons with Thoth—were raised by the temple staff, killed, mummified and wrapped and sold to pilgrims who, in turn, demonstrated their piety by donating the mummy to the temple. This was an incredibly popular practice—it has been estimated that the falcon catacomb at North Saqqara contained more than four million birds, and it is just one of many such sites in Egypt. The intent of the donor is made clear by brief texts that appear on some of the animal coffins calling upon the god to give the devotee life, prosperity, and the lifetime of the eternal sun god Re in return for the offering.
Conclusion
Offering cults were the primary manifestation of ancient Egyptian worship. The primary goals of ritual were the maintenance of the balance of the cosmos, supporting the forces of truth and order (maat) against those of chaos (isfet), and the perpetuation of personal existence against the darkness and emptiness of non-existence. This emphasis upon existence motivated the Egyptian, be it a king or his subjects, to respond to and maintain the hundreds of gods and goddesses, each of whom required human response and care through offerings. The cults of deceased kings needed to be maintained in order to perpetuate their deeds and memories. Innumerable deceased individuals needed offerings to sustain them as active spirits, enabling them to live eternally in the afterlife.
Offering rituals structured the Egyptian world. The gods created the cosmos, and it was the responsibility of the king and his subjects to care for them through offering rituals. The power and authority of the king stemmed from his relationship with the gods and his ability to mediate between the divine and profane. Obedience to the ruler and the offering cults that perpetuated his name created the social and political framework of everyday life.
The specific requirements of offering cults created the built environment. Temples, tombs, and shrines were all constructed as places in which rituals were enacted. Offering cults were the backbone of the Egyptian economy. Food destined for offering tables was raised on estates throughout Egypt. Some of these lands were owned by the temple establishments; others were crown lands that yielded produce in the form of taxes that helped maintain and serve the royal memorial cults. Temples and religious establishments were major employers. Enormous numbers of men and women served in temples as porters, sweepers, gardeners, herdsmen, watchmen and police, scribes, accountants, musicians, and priests of various ranks. Others worked in bakeries and breweries to produce offerings. Artisans produced statues that were the recipients of offerings or were the focus of festival processions, and craftsmen (and women) wove linen, compounded perfumes and incense, and created jewelry—all essential elements of offering rituals. The depth and scope of the importance of offering rituals demanded that much of the produce of the land should serve the cult of the gods, the king, and the dead. The world of the ancient Egyptians was suffused in ritual.