Exhibition spotlight: ‘Before the Pyramids’ at the Oriental Institute
The following short article provides a virtual tour of some of the items on show in the recent exhibition from the Oriental Institute Museum’s 2011 exhibit, Before the Pyramids: The Origins of Egyptian Civilization, at the University of Chicago. [more…]
By Brian Alm
Edition - December, 2011
Ancient Egyptian Religion, Part 3 – Temples, Festivals and Personal Piety
By Brian Alm Published on Egyptological, Magazine Edition 3, December 7th 2011 Introduction Thus far we have covered the fundamental concepts and ideologies that informed the religion of ancient Egypt — cosmic order (maat), the duality of paired principles, and divine magic (heka) — and how theology explained Creation and equipped humankind with the [more…]
By Brian Alm
Edition - September, 2011
Ancient Egyptian Religion, Part 2 – Concepts of Creation, God, and Eternity
In Part 1 of this series I presented three guiding ideas of Egyptian religion: order (maat), duality (polarity, balance), and magic (heka). In this part I speculate briefly on how it all began and then we will see how the ancient Egyptians explained cosmogony (the creation of the universe) and deified the principles of Creation and order on Earth. [more…]
By Brian Alm
Book Review: Religion and Ritual in Ancient Egypt by Emily Teeter
If you’ve read Emily Teeter’s other books on Egyptology or her catalogues for the exhibits she manages at the University of Chicago’s Oriental Institute, you will expect this book to be full of great detail and thorough scholarship, delivered with ease in a flowing style that makes it a fast read and enjoyable throughout. If those are your expectations, you will be rewarded. [more…]
By Brian Alm
Edition - June, 2011
Ancient Egyptian Religion, Part 1. The Conceptual Foundations
Introduction
This article, the first of a five-part series on Ancient Egyptian religion, will lay these conceptual foundations for all that follows: cosmic order, maat; duality, the balance of binary aspects of a whole; and magic, heqa, which makes everything possible. Subsequent articles will cover the major theologies, Creation myths and associated deities, resurrection and eternity, and the religion as it is expressed in temple and tomb architecture, ritual, art and writing. [more…]
By Brian Alm