Egyptian mythology: god Thoth. Gods of Egyptian mythology Attributes of the god Thoth

god name Thoth(Egypt. Djehuti) is already found in the Pyramid Texts, which associate this god with the moon. In this capacity, Thoth was identified with Khonsu (Khonsu-Toth), the moon deity of the Theban triad Amon-Mut-Khonsu. Thoth was also identified with the fertility deity Sebek, whose sacred animal was the crocodile, depicted walking on a crocodile. The art of writing, counting, and all the sciences, primarily magic, were associated with his name. Usually he was depicted as a man with the head of an ibis, crowned with a solar disk and a lunar crescent. Due to the fact that the moon played an important role in the measurement of time, "Thoth gradually came to be considered the god of time, even in cases where the moon had nothing to do with his functions or with periods of time." Thoth was dedicated to the first month of the Egyptian year and the sixth hour of the day. In Egyptian inscriptions of the late period, Thoth is characterized as the Twice Great. The Greeks identified him with Hermes, calling him Hermes Trismegistos (Thrice Great Hermes). “The prevalence of his cult reached its peak at the beginning of the New Kingdom, when the pharaohs began to be called in his honor Dhutmes (Thutmose), the son of Thoth ... However, temples in his honor were rarely erected.”

That considered the patron god of professional scribes. In the iconographic image of the peacock, Thoth "personified the wisdom of the scribe, immersed in himself and the Word, and together with him the very process of writing and what was written were involved in the divine principle." On the vignettes of the 125th chapter of the Book of the Dead, Thoth appears as the scribe of the great court of the gods in the afterlife, which is reflected in his epithet "the lord of Truth." Thoth himself was presented as a judge in the world of the gods and, accordingly, was considered the patron of judges. In the days of the New Kingdom, Thoth begins to be considered either the creator of various languages, or a translator from other languages, in any case, knowledge of many languages ​​\u200b\u200bis associated with him. The account and numbers were the personification of the wisdom of Thoth, and since “the moon divides time into segments, the lunar Thoth also became the god of a fair measurement. The qubit dedicated to him was the unit of measurement for the planning of temples." Partially, the possession of the science of counting was transferred to the goddess Seshat ("Scribe"), in whose sphere of influence was the building art. This goddess was associated with writing and record keeping. It was she who was charged with the duty to write down on the leaves of the shed tree “the years of the life and reign of the pharaoh”. Another important function of this goddess was to participate in laying the foundations for future temples. The laying ceremony, in which Seshat, setting the baseline in the construction plan, along with the pharaoh, pulled the cord between two staves, was called "Cord Laying". The image of this ritual is preserved on wall bas-reliefs. The cult of the goddess Seshat was of ancient origin, "local forms of worship of her are found before the III dynasty, so that she was the forerunner of Thoth."

According to the Turin papyrus, in the list of pharaoh-gods who reigned on earth before people, the god Thoth reigned for 7726 years. He ruled after the god Horus and before the goddess Maat, portrayed as a woman with an ostrich feather in her head. Maat was considered the daughter of Ra, the personification of harmony and peace, law and justice. In the afterlife, Thoth, the accuser of the deceased, forced Anubis to weigh the heart of the deceased on the scales, and it was supposed to balance the feather of Maat. It is not surprising that Maat began to be considered the wife of Thoth, like the goddess Seshat before her. The goddess Nehemauit is also mentioned as the wife of Thoth. As for the parents of the god, the god Ptah and the goddess Mut were considered to be them, but not everywhere. In Sais, in Ramessidian times, the goddess Neith was considered his mother, and in Hermont in Ptolemaic times, the goddess Rait-Taui. In the magical text "Isis and the Seven Scorpions" Thoth calls the sun god Ra his father: "I am Thoth, the first-born son, the son of Ra, Atum and the Host of the gods ordered me to heal Horus for his mother Isis and also heal the one who is under the knife."

Various ancient legends merged in the image of Thoth. The meaning of his Egyptian name - Dzhehuti - is unclear. The ibis and, later, the baboon were considered his sacred animals, and Thoth himself was depicted with the head of an ibis, possibly indicating the Delta as his homeland. The 15th Lower Egyptian nome has the ibis sign as the emblem of the nome. The ibis, the incarnation of the god of wisdom and the moon Thoth, “standing in the water before other birds greets the dawn. ... The arrival of the ibis-Thoth in Egypt was associated with the floods of the Nile. Since the white ibis with the ends of the flight feathers painted black was considered the sacred bird of the god Thoth, all the dead ibis were brought to the city of Hermopol, the center of the cult of Thoth, to be buried in the necropolis. A whole underground city has been preserved under Germopol, with rooms, corridors, branching in different directions. “In the walls of these passages, niches were pierced everywhere, where there were jugs and coffins with mummies of sacred ibis. ... More than four million burial vessels were counted there.” Mummies of birds “were wrapped in a special way in a multi-colored canvas, and a gilded mask with a crown was put on their heads. Sometimes the eggs of sacred birds were placed in clay urns.” It is curious that the same ritual of “opening the mouth and eyes” was performed on the fallen ibis, as on the deceased person - “this is how the earthly dirt was removed from the ibis and the divinity given at birth returned.” In Abydos, a cemetery of sacred ibis was also excavated, dating back to the middle of the 2nd century AD. e. In the time of Herodotus (II, 65) the killing of an ibis was punishable by death.

The sacred animal of Thoth was also a baboon: "There was a belief that near the temple of Thoth in Hermopolis, where the remains of groves of coconut palms are still preserved, baboons were revered - the sacred animal of this god." Coconut palms were associated with Nubia, since "topographically, the border of coconut palms extended far to the south." The Salye papyrus contains lines in which the coconut tree is associated with Thoth: “You are a huge coconut tree sixty cubits in which there are nuts. There are kernels in nuts and they are filled with water. You take water from here. Come to save me, O silent One! Since both baboons and palm trees came from southern places, they were depicted together. Perhaps for this reason, such epithets of Thoth as "lord of the Bedouins" and "lord of foreign countries" arose. According to the Egyptian concept, baboons greet the rising sun with prayers and hymns, "also say goodbye to him at sunset and even meet him and help the night sun when it travels through the underworld." In the tomb of Petosiris, high priest of the god Thoth in Hermopolis, who lived during the reign of Ptolemy I, one of the funeral magical texts says: “When the great dog-headed [god] Thoth sits on the throne, he prepares to judge every person according to his deeds committed earth." It follows from these lines that Thoth, as a judge of the dead, could be portrayed either as a man with a baboon's head, or as a "dog-headed" baboon. The souls of sinners, having passed the judgment seat, are sentenced to the “second death”: “Anubis or the baboon Thoth will lead them to the place of punishment”, where they will either be thrown into the fire, or into the depths of primordial chaos, or cut with knives. “In the place of torment at Thoth, as the god of justice, there are four baboons who guard the Lake of Fire or catch the souls of the condemned in a net in order to subject them to punishment.”

Inventing words and voicing all things and objects, He, in essence, created the language. The discovery of the art of reading sacred prayers was also attributed to the god Thoth. "He also owned a book on the protection of the spirit of the deceased, which he wrote with his own fingers, establishing a writing system." He was credited with the creation of the "Book of Breath", which was placed in the coffin along with the "Book of the Dead". When Osiris died, Thoth supplied him with the right spells to suppress the forces of darkness, facilitating his accession to the world of the dead. Following Osiris, each deceased hoped to receive the same help: "He was supposed to return his speech, teach him to cast the right spells, take him with Anubis to the Hall of Judgment, write down the final verdict and, possibly, speak out in his defense." Therefore, it was believed that Thoth guards each deceased and leads him to the kingdom of death. But Thoth was considered not only a connoisseur of magic, the "Great Charm", as he is called in the "Tale of the Birth of Horus", but also the Great Healer. "His preeminence in magic naturally led him to become the god of medicine, since magic was as important to medical professionals as the knowledge of medicines." During the battle between Horus and Set, Thoth stood by, healing the wounds that the opponents inflicted on each other. Pouring milk into the eye socket of Horus, He restored his eye and restored the reproductive organ. uprooted by Horus, Setu. When Horus beheaded his mother Isis in anger, Thoth put a cow's head on her body.

For many centuries, the formula for addressing Thoth was - "Father Thoth", "Father Moon". Even in the 4th century A.D. e. Nectaneb I says: "The Great One built a house for his father Thoth, the great god from Shmun (Hermopolis), the great god who came out of the nose of Ra (i.e. the sun), the creator of his beauty." On the walls of the pyramid of Senusret III, inscriptions were found that say "about the existence during this period of a pronounced lunar calendar with a number of holidays in honor of the moon. For the first time, five additional days appear to the 360-day year. "The myth says that the god Ra, angry with the goddess Nut, who cheated on him with the god of the earth Geb, promised that the goddess would not be able to give birth to children from Geb on any day of the year. Then Thoth had to sit down to play checkers with the Moon and win five additional days, which the Egyptians began to add at the end of the year.In these days, Nut gave birth to her five children - Horus, Osiris, Isis, Set and Nephthys.

The center of the cult of Thoth was in Khmun (Copts. Shmun, modern El-Ashmunein). The name of the city means "Eight" and was received by the city in honor of the eight gods, consisting of four pairs of gods, of which Thoth himself was not included. The Greeks called this city Hermopolis, identifying the god Thoth with Hermes. Germopol was the metropolis of the Hare Nome and had its own necropolis. In the Pyramid Texts, "Eight" as the name of Hermopolis is not found, it becomes popular in the era of the Middle Kingdom. One of the Germanic versions of the creation of the world tells that "it is not known from whom and how the divine egg appeared in Hermopolis, from which the god Ra himself originated, who then created other gods." The already mentioned Petosiris tells that "the shell of this divine egg is buried on the ground of Hermopolis". Although it is not possible to establish the time and reason for the proclamation of the supreme god of the ogdoad of the Hermopolis Thoth, but the saying 669 from the Pyramid Texts connects Thoth, the bird and the egg with rebirth: “Your rebirth is in the nest of Thoth ... Look, the king exists, here he grows together, here he breaks the egg.

Human consciousness follows strange paths. Sometimes similar in different cultures, sometimes unique and very original. Who would explain why and where did the idea come from that long-beaked ibises can be associated with counting and wisdom? And not those ibises that are now called "sacred" (Threskiornis aethiopicus), but those that are "forest" (Geronticus eremita). They are bare-headed and look like vultures as vultures! On the other hand, maybe this hypothetical complicity in death turned out to be the stone that formed the basis of their veneration? In addition, let us recall that in ancient Egypt, ibis annually flew to the flood of the Nile, which made it possible to consider them heralds of the revival of nature. And their crooked long beaks do not allegorically resemble almost crescents ...

In the pre-dynastic era, Thoth was revered as the deity of the moon. By the Early Dynastic period, he acquired the functions of a deity of writing. In the Pyramid Texts, he is associated with an afterlife cult - in the form of an ibis, he transfers the dead to the Duat, the Egyptian space of the dead. By the end of the Old Kingdom, after the rise of the cult of Ra *, Thoth is included in the circle of ideas associated with the worship of the Sun. During the period of the Middle Kingdom, Thoth becomes a judge of the dead, acquires the functions of a deity of time and medicine. In the Texts of the Sarcophagi he is mentioned as the protector of the dead in the Duat; in this role enters in the "Book of the Dead". In the New Kingdom, it also becomes a deity of magic and sorcery. In the Hellenistic period, after the conquest of Egypt by Alexander the Great, Thoth began to be identified with Hermes. And the popularity of such a tandem exceeded all expectations, stories about them spread throughout the Oikumene.
With the advent of game worlds, Thoth, like many already seemingly forgotten gods, began to make an “alternative career”. And although his image has not yet turned out to be as popular as, for example, the image of the felino-headed Bastet, in some universes he continues to fulfill his divine functions, for example, in the Forgotten Realms setting. But in the "Gray Hawk" setting, in addition to Thoth himself, as they say, there were ibis-headed humanoids worthy of him.

God of wisdom in different nations had its own. With their help, people received knowledge, and also had the opportunity to keep various records and annals. In ancient Greece, for example, Zeus swallowed his first wife Metis, who was the personification. As a result, he received all her knowledge and learned to separate good and evil.

god of wisdom in ancient egypt

He was not only the god of wisdom, but also the patron of counting, writing and science. He was considered the first creator of the calendar and books. Since the ibis is considered a sacred animal of this god, Thoth was depicted with the head of this bird. Its main attributes are papyrus and various writing instruments. Thoth is the god of wisdom, who taught people to write, and he also created all intellectual life. In addition, he taught the Egyptians mathematics, medicine and other important sciences. According to existing legends, Thoth was a scribe and participated in the trial of Osiris. He also took part in funeral rituals and recorded the results of the weighing of the soul. That is why he was given another name - "leading the soul."

Indian god of wisdom and prosperity

Ganesha is the god of abundance and wealth. People turned to him to achieve in business. They portrayed him as a large child with a huge belly, which can be girded by a snake. He has a head like an elephant, but with one tusk. Behind it is a halo, indicating holiness. Ganesha sits on a wahan - an animal that is a symbol of insolence. It could be a rat, a shrew or a dog. The god of knowledge and wisdom could have a different number of hands from 2 to 32. In the upper hands is a lotus flower and a trident. There are images in which Ganesha has a pen and books in his hands, since it was these objects that indicated that he was a great fox. They can depict him with three eyes. Ganesha is the first deity that a person could turn to using special prayers.

Veles is one of the ancient gods. He was considered the patron of wisdom, fertility, wealth and livestock. His main act was that he set in motion the world that Svarog and Rod created. He was depicted as a tall man with a long beard. He was dressed in a long cloak, and in his hands he had a staff, which was, in fact, an ordinary snag. Veles was considered a werewolf, so there are images where he is half a man and half a bear.

One of the most famous and greatest deities revered by the inhabitants of Ancient Egypt was Thoth, the god of wisdom and knowledge. He is also known under the name of Atlant (since he was the successor to the wisdom of the lost Atlantis). In Greek mythology, Thoth corresponds to Hermes Trismegistus, who is the central figure of Hermeticism and the founder of alchemy. It is about this most important and interesting deity that will be discussed in our article.

According to legends that have survived to this day, Thoth was the deified king of Ancient Egypt. He lived several tens of thousands of years before our era, in an era called by historians the reign of the Gods. It was also called Atlanta. It was believed that he possessed secret knowledge inherited from the civilization of the lost Atlantis.

God Thoth married Maat, the patroness of Essence and Order. His close relative was Seshat, the goddess of writing.

What was the god Thoth doing?

It was believed that Atlas is the personal scribe of the great god Ra. No ancient gods were depicted as often in the society of Ra as Thoth. It was also believed that he was engaged in accounting and classification of dead souls during the judgment of Osiris. At the same time, his wife Maat determines the degree of sinfulness of the dead by weighing their hearts on special scales. In accordance with this, one can trace the belief of the inhabitants of Ancient Egypt that justice in the form of Maat and wisdom in the form of Thoth should be inseparable, like husband and wife.

In addition, Atlas was an intermediary between the gods and people. In accordance with Egyptian mythology, he was considered the patron not only of wisdom, but also of writing, counting, exact sciences and scribes. In addition, Thoth was called the creator of the calendar and the lord of time. The ancient Greek philosopher Plato, in his writings that have survived to this day, wrote that this god revealed to his people numbers and letters, as well as geometry and astronomy. Among the ancient Greeks, Thoth corresponds to a god named Hermes.

moon god

At first, Thoth was associated in mythology with the image of the night luminary, but later Khnum took his place. According to modern historians, the god Thoth became the patron of wisdom precisely because of his connection with astronomy, astrology and the moon.

historical footprint

In ancient Egyptian mythology, Thoth left a noticeable mark, showing himself to be the wisest deity. Despite the fact that he was not destined for the main role in any plot, in all events he showed himself from the best side. So, for example, in one of the myths, the god Thoth acts as an intermediary between Ra and Isis, without interfering in their complex relationship. At the same time, he manages to help Isis save her son Horus from the bite of a poisonous creature. Speaking in his defense, Thoth built his speech in such a way that, if necessary, it could also be interpreted as support for the god Set. Thus, the patron of wisdom also possessed an admirable talent for diplomacy.

In addition, Thoth was the builder of the Great Pyramid at Giza, where he allegedly integrated his ancient knowledge and hid the secrets of the civilization of the lost Atlantis.

Also, this god led the work of the most important archives of the ancient Egyptian civilization. He also patronized the very popular and well-known library of Hermopol to this day. In addition, according to the ancient Egyptians, Thoth dominated all the languages ​​of the world, and was also the language for another deity named Ptah.

guise

The avatar (or the incarnation of God on earth) of Thoth was considered the ibis bird. However, today birds of this species (scientifically called forest ibises) no longer exist, as they have been replaced by other birds. Until now, researchers cannot accurately answer the question of why the ibis was chosen as the patron of wisdom and knowledge. Perhaps the ancient Egyptians endowed the bird with such powers for some traits of its character or due to the fact that its feathers were used for writing.

Another sacred animal of the god Thoth was the baboon. Today, of course, few people will agree that these monkeys are distinguished by wisdom, however, the inhabitants of Ancient Egypt, however, like the Chinese and Indians, were confident in the high intelligence of the mentioned animals.

Be that as it may, the god Thoth in most images appears with the head of an ibis.

Worship

Apparently, in the days of ancient Egypt, science was not in one of the first places in the list of state subsidies. Despite the fact that the god of wisdom Thoth was very revered, to this day the temples intended for worshiping him have practically not survived. So, only the remains of two sanctuaries have survived: Tuna-El-Gebel with a destroyed labyrinth, and Ashmunein, located ten kilometers from it, which the ancient Greeks called the "Great Hermopolis". According to numerous archaeological studies, it was Hermopolis that acted as the main place of worship of Thoth. It is likely that for this reason the ancient Egyptians did not build many other sanctuaries.

Attributes

The invariable attribute of Thoth, present in all his images, is the magic wand "Caduceus". According to legend, it was thanks to him that a mortal man became the god Hermes and gained access to three worlds: the Gods, the dead and the living. The wand is a rod crowned with the sun and wings, which wrap around two snakes with open mouths. "Caduceus" symbolizes the energy of Kundalini. It also reflects everything that happens in the Universe in the form of trinity processes.

Another integral attribute of Thoth is the scribe's palette, which personifies his patronage of languages, writing and various exact sciences.

Emerald Tablet

According to legend, the ancient Egyptian god Thoth was the author of a huge number of books on astrology, alchemy, medicine and chemistry. It is believed that in total he wrote more than 36 thousand works, the main of which is the famous "Emerald Tablet". The ancient Egyptians believed that on a small emerald plate, the deity managed to fit all the wisdom of our Universe. According to another belief, the "Table" was discovered in the tomb of Thoth, who was buried in the Great Pyramid of Giza by Alexander the Great in the 4th century BC.

Emerald plates have survived to this day, so it is not surprising that many scientists have studied and continue to study them. According to one of them, Dr. Maurice Doreal, who published a translation of the text of the Tablet in the 30s of the last century, the writing on it dates back to about 36 thousand years BC. The researcher claims that after the death of the legendary Atlantis, Thoth founded a colony in Ancient Egypt. This is confirmed by the presence on the "Tablet" of signs of the language, which, apparently, was spoken by the ancient Atlanteans.

It is also believed that part of the knowledge that the god of Egypt Thoth conveyed to people is contained in the Tarot system, the cards of which originated from golden tablets - pages in the amount of 78 pieces. Also, according to the legends of the esoteric orders, 22 pictures of the Major Arcana of the Tarot are depicted on the walls of twenty-two rooms in one of the Egyptian temples, where the students-magicians were initiated into secret rituals by their mentors.

Another proof of the existence of Hermes are the ancient papyri describing how the pharaoh Cheops (or Khufu) was looking for the "ark of the wisdom of Thoth." This relic has survived to this day, was studied by scientists using the most modern methods, and today is stored in the Berlin Museum.

The veneration and cult of animals in ancient Egypt, of course, was facilitated by the diversity of the animal world. The Egyptians observed various animals and found in them many qualities that were useful and instructive for humans. The ibis bird was perceived as a rational being, sometimes even wise, which allowed the Egyptians to consider this bird smart and endowed with many spiritual qualities.

Here is how Plutarch roughly describes the observations of the ancient Egyptians. “The ibis bird is quite energetic and likes to eat a lot. It feeds on all sorts of reptiles, in particular, snakes and scorpions. Despite the mud, this bird sticks its long beak everywhere and finds food for itself. But before going to bed, the ibis always cleans itself, and cleans its nest. Ibis builds nests on date palms, is wary of cats. The ancient Egyptians equated the hatched ibis chick by weight with the heart of a newborn human child. If you connect the distances between the legs of the ibis and the tip of the beak, you get an equilateral triangle. What do you not sacred geometry?

Also, according to ancient scriptures, it is known that the priests always used water for washing from the sources where the ibis drank. They knew that where impure or poisoned water, the wise ibis bird would not drink. There is no doubt that the ibis bird was identified with the god Thoth among the Egyptians. So they turned to God - Thoth during prayers and spells in those days, as evidenced by ancient writings: "I appeal to Thoth - the venerable ibis!" In funeral prayers from ancient papyri, the following expression is often found: “I am a great ibis! My name is Thoth!"

God - That was identified by the ancient Egyptians with the best spiritual qualities, deep knowledge, the great secret of the universe. Moreover, ancient writings testify to the participation of Thoth in the creation of the world. In particular, the emphasis is on the wisdom of his divine heart. He is presented as one of the wise gods, thanks to whose divine word, the dismemberment of the primary chaos took place. In one of the ancient inscriptions describing the picture of the universe, Thoth is described as standing to the right of the four divided elements, and holding a papyrus, and pointing to these four elements with his right hand.

But, these writings are later and are associated with the veneration of Thoth as the supreme deity in the city of Ermopol. Therefore, it cannot be argued that such a concept of the creation of the world was "present" in all of Ancient Egypt. Nevertheless, the Egyptians still called Thoth also the creator with the help of the word. And also, he was called the creator of the word of God. But this epithet has already been mentioned more in religious writings. Hence the participation of Thoth in the creation of literature and writing. Known beliefs of the Egyptians in the power of words, and in the word of God. And the god Thoth was the lord of the word of God, a teacher, a compiler of magical sacred formulas. Depending on the time and location, Thoth is mentioned in ancient writings as the ruler of heaven, earth and great in the underworld.

Also, Thoth is often mentioned as being related to the heavenly bodies, and specifically to the Moon. In ancient scriptures there are such words: "Wrap around the sky like Ra, go around the sky like Thoth." It is easy to understand that we are talking about the sun god Ra and the moon god Thoth. And yet, Thoth is quite often presented as the ruler of the western side of the world. It is also appropriate to mention the connection of Thoth with Ra and Osiris. One of the writings speaks of the words of Osiris that He threw the gods under his feet. And that the word from the mouth of Thoth came to Osiris. Often, Thoth appears to have returned the eye of Horus, and his assistant in the fight against enemies, for example, Set.

It is known that judging and separating the cycles of the gods was the prerogative of Thoth, with the help of his skillful command of the word of God, connection with the Moon and also identified with the ibis bird. Many ancient spells mention the magical power of the word Thoth. And he is also referred to as a just judge. Moreover, there are frequent references to Thoth in ritual texts as a protector from demonic forces, as an assistant, escort and arbiter of the “destinies” of those leaving for another world.

God Thoth is the god of knowledge and books, identified with the great knowledge of the universe, with the victory of life over death, with the beneficent light of the moon in the darkness of the night. And the ladder from earth to heaven is called in the ancient papyri "Gift of Thoth."