Deciphering the secret rituals celebrated in honour of the falcon-headed god Horus.

"This is the oldest and most authentic guide to an ancient Egyptian temple ever written - its author was an ancient Egyptian priest who lived in the first century B.C., under the last kings of the Ptolemaic dynasty, when the construction and decoration of the huge temple of Edfu was completed. The anonymous priest's tasks was to compose a text long enough to make up a line of hieroglyphic inscription on the girdle wall of the temple, stretching around it to a length of some 300 meters, and in it describe the temple in detail - its layout and construction, the functions of its chambers and chapels, and its external appearance and the impression it conveyed to the faithful. The language of the text, arising within the long tradition of Egyptian temple building, is stylized and poetic, but remarkably, the priest fulfilled his assignment with such accuracy, devotion, and enthusiasm that the monumental inscription can be used today by the modern visitor as a reliable and informative guide to the temple." "The inscription is here translated in full, and appears with notes by the translator on the essentials of ancient Egyptian religion and ritual and on the discovery and documentation of Edfu Temple, while a comprehensive glossary explains unfamiliar terms and concepts. Illustrations of the temple, the original hieroglyphs, and the kings who build the temple complement the text."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved

Tools to powerfully write about and manifest your life using the power found in the sacred sites of ancient Egypt • Reveals how to create meaning from one’s life experiences and manifest new destinies through spiritual writing • Contains meditations and creative writing exercises exploring sacred themes in the Egyptian Book of the Dead and other hieroglyphic texts of ancient Egypt • Shares transformative and inspiring pieces written by those who’ve attended the authors’ Egyptian sacred tours Within each of us is a story, a sacred story that needs to be told, of our heroic efforts and of our losses. The scribes of ancient Egypt devoted their lives to the writing of sacred stories. These technicians of the sacred were masters of hieroglyphic thinking, or heka--the proper words, in the proper sequence, with the proper intonation and the proper intent. Learning heka provided scribes with the power to invoke and create worlds through their words and thoughts. To the writer, heka is a magical way to create meaning from experience. Through heka we manifest new visions and new relationships to ourselves and to others. We can make new art filled with beauty and light. Revealing the spiritually transformative power of writing, the authors take us on a journey of self-discovery through the sacred sites of Egypt, from the Temple of Isis to the Great Pyramid of Giza. Through meditations and creative writing exercises exploring the powerful themes found in the hieroglyphic texts of ancient Egypt and the Egyptian Book of the Dead, they show how, through writing, we can live beyond the ordinary, give our dreams form, and discover who we really are and what our lives really mean. Sharing transformative and inspiring pieces written by those who’ve attended their Egyptian sacred tours, the authors reveal how writing your spiritual biography allows you to reconnect to the creativity and divine within, face your fears, offer gratitude for what you have, manifest new destinies, and recognize your life as part of the sacred story of Earth.

175 documents, spanning more than 3,000 years, from the ancient mounds on the island of Elephantine are translated into English here for the first time. A massive collection of papyri and ostraca, written in many scripts and tongues - including hieratic, demotic, Aramaic, Greek, Latin, Coptic and Arabic.

DIVDIVThis fascinating book explores the evolution of religious dualism, the doctrine that man and cosmos are constant battlegrounds between forces of good and evil. It traces this evolution from late Egyptian religion and the revelations of Zoroaster and the Orphics in antiquity through the Dead Sea Scrolls, the Mithraic Mysteries, and the great Gnostic teachers to its revival in medieval Europe with the suppression of the Bogomils and the Cathars, heirs to the age-long teachings of dualism. Integrating political, cultural, and religious history, Yuri Stoyanov illuminates the dualist religious systems, recreating in vivid detail the diverse worlds of their striking ideas and beliefs, their convoluted mythologies and symbolism. Reviews of an earlier edition: “A book of prime importance for anyone interested in the history of religious dualism. The author’s knowledge of relevant original sources is remarkable; and he has distilled them into a convincing and very readable whole.”—Sir Steven Runciman “The most fascinating historical detective story since Steven Runciman’s Sicilian Vespers.”—Colin Wilson “A splendid account of the decline of the dualist tradition in the East . . . both strong and accessible. . . . The most readable account of Balkan heresy ever.”—Jeffrey B. Russell, Journal of Religion “Well-written, fact-filled, and fascinating . . . has in it the making of a classic.” —Harry T. Norris, Bulletin of SOAS/div/div