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Egyptian Mythology / Gods of Egypt
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Isis
Isis (Isis) is one of the greatest goddesses of antiquity, who became a model for understanding the Egyptian ideal of femininity and motherhood.
She was revered as the sister and spouse of Osiris, the mother of Horus, and, accordingly, the Egyptian kings, who were originally considered the earthly incarnations of the sokol headed god.
Being very ancient, the cult of Isis probably originates from the Nile Delta.
Here was one of the oldest cult centers of the goddess, Hebet, called by the Greeks Iseion (modern Behbeit el Hagar), currently lying in ruins.
Probably, initially she was a local deity of the Sebennite, but already the "Pyramid Texts" of the V Dynasty indicate the key role of this goddess in the general Egyptian pantheon.
Initially associated with the god Horus, due to the rise of the popular cult of Osiris, Isis is already the sister and wife of Osiris and the mother of Horus.
Its original features in the period of the New Kingdom are transferred to Hathor.
In the Heliopolitan theological system, Isis, the younger deity of the Ennead, was worshipped as the daughter of the god Heb and the goddess Nut, respectively, as the great granddaughter of Ra.
Isis and Osiris
In the myths, some of which have come down to our time only in the well known retelling of Plutarch ("About Isis and Osiris"), the goddess is well known as the faithful spouse of Osiris, whose body she found in long wanderings after the god was killed by his brother Seth.
After collecting the remains of Osiris cut into pieces, Isis, with the help of the god Anubis, made the first mummy out of them.
Isis fashioned a phallus out of clay (the only part of the body of Osiris that Isis could not find was the phallus: it was eaten by fish), consecrated it and attached it to the assembled body of Osiris.
Turning into a female vulture — the bird of Khat, Isis spread her wings over the mummy of Osiris, uttered magic words and became pregnant.
In the temple of Hathor in Dendera and the temple of Osiris in Abydos, relief compositions have been preserved, which show the secret act of conception of a son by the goddess in the image of a falcon stretched over the mummy of her husband.
In memory of this, Isis was often depicted in the form of a beautiful woman with bird wings, with which she protects Osiris, the king or simply the deceased.
Isis often appears on her knees, wearing a white afnet bandage, mourning each deceased person as she once mourned Osiris himself.
According to legend, Osiris became the ruler of the afterlife, while Isis gave birth to Horus in a reed nest in the swamps of Hemmis (Delta).
Numerous statues and reliefs depict the goddess breastfeeding her son, who took the form of a pharaoh.
Together with the goddesses Nut, Tefnut and Nephthys, Isis, who bears the epithet "Beautiful", is present at the birth of each pharaoh, helping the queen mother to be delivered from the burden.
Isis is "the great enchantress, the first among the gods", the mistress of spells and secret prayers; she is called in trouble, her name is pronounced to protect children and family.
According to legend, in order to acquire secret knowledge and gain magical power, the goddess fashioned a snake from the saliva of the aging god Ra and earth, which stung the solar deity.
In exchange for healing, Isis demanded that Ra tell her his secret name, the key to all the mysterious forces of the universe, and became "the lady of the gods, the one who knows Ra in his own name."
With her knowledge, Isis, one of the patron deities of medicine, healed the baby Horus, who was stung by scorpions in the swamps.
Since then, like the goddess Selket, she was sometimes revered as the great lady of the scorpions.
The goddess gave her secret powers to the Mountain, thereby arming it with great magical power.
With the help of cunning, Isis helped Horus to gain the upper hand over Set during the dispute over the throne and inheritance of Osiris and become the ruler of Egypt.
Isis and Ra
Isis, having a reputation among people as a sorceress, decided to test her powers on the gods.
In order to become the mistress of heaven, she decided to find out the secret name of Ra.
She noticed that Ra had become old by that time, saliva dripped from the corners of his lips and fell to the ground.
Like a real sorceress, she collected drops of Ra's saliva, mixed it with dust, made a snake out of it, pronounced her spells over it and put it on the road along which the sun god passed daily.
After a while, the snake bit Ra, he screamed terribly, and all the gods rushed to his aid.
Ra said that despite all his spells and his secret name, he was bitten by a snake.
Isis promised him that she would heal him, but he must tell his secret name.
The sun god said that he was Khepri in the morning, Ra at noon and Atum in the evening, but this did not satisfy Isis.
And then Ra said: "Let Isis search in me, and my name will pass from my body to hers."
After that, Ra disappeared from the sight of the gods on his boat, and the throne in the Boat of the Lord of Millions of Years became free.
Isis agreed with Horus that Ra should swear that he would part with his two Eyes (the Sun and the Moon).
When Ra agreed that his secret name should become the property of the sorceress, and his heart was taken out of his chest, Isis said: "Expiring, Poison, come out of Ra, Eye of Horus, come out of Ra and shine on his lips.
It is I who conjure, Isis, and it was I who caused the poison to fall to the ground.
Truly, the name of the great god is taken from him, Ra will live, and poison will die; if poison lives, Ra will die."
The symbol of Isis was the royal throne, the sign of which is often placed on the head of the goddess.
Since the era of the New Kingdom, the cult of the goddess has become closely intertwined with the cult of Hathor, as a result of which Isis sometimes has a headdress in the form of a solar disk framed by cow horns.
The sacred animal of Isis as the mother goddess was considered the " great white cow of Heliopolis — - the mother of the Memphis bull Apis.
One of the widespread symbols of the goddess is the amulet tet - "the knot of Isis", or "the blood of Isis", often made of red minerals carnelian and jasper.
Like Hathor, Isis commands gold, which was considered a model of incorruptibility; on the sign of this metal, she is often depicted kneeling.
The celestial manifestations of Isis are, first of all, the star Sepedet, or Sirius, the "lady of the stars", with the rising of which the Nile spreads from one tear of the goddess; as well as the formidable hippopotamus Isis Hesamut (Isis, the terrible mother) in the guise of the constellation Ursa Major, who keeps the leg of the dismembered Seth in the heavens with the help of her crocodile companions.
Also, Isis, together with Nephthys, can appear in the form of gazelles that keep the horizon of heaven; the emblem in the form of two gazelles of the goddesses was worn on diadems by the younger spouses of the pharaoh in the era of the New Kingdom.
Another incarnation of Isis is the goddess Shentait, who appears in the form of a cow, the patroness of funeral veils and weaving, the mistress of the sacred sarcophagus, in which, according to the Osiric ritual of the mysteries, the body of Osiris killed by his brother is reborn.
The side of the world that the goddess commands is the west, her ritual objects are the sistrum and the sacred vessel for milk — the situla.
Together with Nephthys, Neith and Selket, Isis was the great patroness of the deceased, protected the western part of the sarcophagi with her divine wings, commanded the anthropomorphic spirit Imseti, one of the four "sons of Horus", the patrons of canopes.
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