The Egyptian Book of the Dead
We often think of “The Book of the Dead” as either comparable to our modern Bible or the Tibetan Book of the Dead and neither of these is correct. Ancient Egyptian royalty began painting instructions for the afterlife in tombs for the soul to have directions for it’s journey. Eventually, these tomb paintings were written on papyrus and included in the tomb instead of inscribed on its walls. These scrolls were not a codified instruction set like the Bible we think of; rather each “book” was a compilation personalized by priests after a conversation with the person about their struggles in life and hopes/fears after bodily death.
Ancient Egyptian’s believed that the soul would be revived in the afterlife upon bodily death in a perfect continuation of life on earth, if the soul was able to pass a series of trials, tests and judgements. A personalized “book” then was akin to having an answer key for the ultimate final exam: it was directions on where to go, how to interact with different gods and what to say in the various judgements.
Eventually these “books” were commodified for the general public and your unique book would reflect your financial resources and your particular journey through life. The directions were like spells, written by many priests over about 1,000 years, that you could purchase a la carte to include as few or many spells as you could afford, although eventually the “books” became fixed at 190 uniform spells. The royalty would have spells for every imaginable encounter (e.g. not being bitten by a snake) while others may only have the basic directions (e.g. how to address Osiris).
A better translation of these funerary texts would be “Book of Coming Forth By Day” or “Book of Emerging Into the Light”. Differing from the Tibetan Book of the Dead, these texts were not designed to be read to the dying soul but to be utilized by the dying person themselves to prepare, comfort and review and then to be used as tools to navigate life after bodily death.
What would our world look like if we spent comparable time and energy compiling our unique books for (we) the dead?
