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mask131 · 10 months

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Egyptian gods - The Ennead, Isis

After Seth, what next logical step but to explore his arch-nemesis. Horus you say? No... His sister and foe, the great Isis.

I) Wife, widow, witch

Let’s begin with the role of Isis in the Osirian legend. Isis is one of the two daughters of the god Geb (the earth) and the goddess Nut (the sky), alongside Nephthys ; and just like her sister married their brother Seth, she married her brother Osiris. It was a true “love at first sight” story. Literally. Osiris was born on the first of the epagomenal days, on the 14th of July. Isis was born on the fourth of the epagomenal days, on the 17th of July. Their wedding was celebrated on the 19th of July - which was the first day of the year in the Egyptian calendar. The couple dearly loved each other, and as Osiris inherited the throne of Egypt, they ruled as wise, kind and benevolent king and queen over humanity, adored and beloved by all...

Until the jealous and bitter Seth, envious and angry at his brother, murdered him, locked his body in a great chest and sent the sealed box into the Nile. Hearing about the disappearance of her husband, Isis entered a state of deep grief, cutting her hair and tearing apart her clothes. But, determined to give Osiris the proper burial he deserves, she went out to seek her husband’s corpse, exploring all of the Nile, from beginning to end. One day, she smelled a beautiful scent - and following it, she travelled for kilometers and kilometers, ending up at the palace of Byblos, in Phoenicia. There, she understood the smell that attracted her there came from a recent pillar, built to support the roof of the palace. Touching the heart of the Byblos rulers with her grief, Isis convinced them to allow her to break open the pillar - and inside of it was Osiris’ corpse... As it turns out, the coffin had floated all the way to Phoenicia, and there a tree grew around it, the same tree that was used to create this pillar...

Taking her husband’s corpse back with her to Egypt, Isis hid it away in the swamps of the Delta, out of fear of what Seth would do it... Unfortunately for her, the treacherous brother was informed of her arrival, and the god of the desert came into the swamp to cut Osiris’ body into little pieces and throw them into the river. Isis began a new quest, this time assisted by her sister Nephthys: slowly, she explored all of the Nile again, collecting all of the pieces of her husband, putting them back together like a morbid puzzle. She completed her quest at the town the Greeks called Herakleopolis, where she found the right leg of her husband. His body was re-created, except for a missing piece: his penis, that a fish had swallowed. As she tries to recreate her husband’s body, Anubis comes by Isis side and brings his help: with Nephthys by their side, the gods end up creating the very first mummy in the history of Egypt. As she and Nephthys give Osiris the deserved funeral rituals, Isis cannot help but try one last attempt at saving her husband: kissing him, she uses her magical powers to breathe some life-force into his corpse, resurrecting Osiris. Only for a brief time, however, as Osiris prefers to stay among the dead to become their king - but during his brief return to Earth, he still shares one last tender night of love with his wife... From which a baby will be born, young Horus. If you wonder about the missing penis... magic. That’s the solution to everything - Isis used magic. Don’t ask further questions.

[Note that this entire quest as described above comes from the Greek record of Plutarch, the only full and complete version of the legend of Osiris. We have Egyptian records, that do differ from Plutarch’s story, but they are all fragmentary and incomplete. For example, in the Egyptian stories the whole “swallowed by a fish penis” doesn’t exist, but in return in the Plutarch story it isn’t Horus that is born from the resurrection-sex, but Harpocrates...] The Egyptians themselves did celebrate and commemorate the quest of Isis during a trio of days. At the end of the season of akhet, the 27th, 28th and 29th days of the month of choiak were religious rituals re-creating Isis quest - the first two days are sad mourning days, while the third is a joyful series of rites celebrating the corpse of Osiris being found. In today’s calendar, the trio of days would be the 12th, 13th and 14th of November.

Now that her brother-husband had a proper burial, Isis puts her mind to the next order of business: protecting her son, Horus, and taking revenge against her brother Seth. She secretly raises Horus in the delta, hidden away, until he comes of age and she can bring him to the gods, claiming him as the true and only heir to the throne of Osiris, that Seth had usurped. Follows a long and complicated divine trial, a legal battle during which Isis constantly helps her son. In fact, she helps her son so much that Seth, annoyed at her constantly beating his arguments, convinces the president of the trial to move the court to a remote island, the “Middle-Island”, from which Isis will be banned: the god that acts as the ferryman to the island, Anti, is given the order to not let Isis in... But it is without counting on Isis’ magical powers - she merely has to transform herself into an old woman to trick Anti. It is Isis that will finally put an end to this legal feud that drags on for eighty years as, disguising herself as an attractive young woman, she will seduce Seth into confessing his crimes and his usurpation of the throne of Osiris... But as with everything in Isis’ life, the troubles won’t stop there. Seth will continue to challenge the authority and inheritance of his nephew, notably by convincing him to partake into a series of physical games and competitions, in which Isis will again help her son. But this time, she will discover her plans can backfire... One of the challenges Seth imposes on Horus is a “who can hold his breath under water the longest” contest, with both gods turned into hippopotami. Isis, trying to help her son, takes a harpoon and throws it into the water - but she mistakenly hits her own son instead of Seth. Immediately healing him with her powers, she then throws the harpoon again and hits Seth this time... But as she does, Seth reminds her plaintively that he is her brother – and Isis, overtaking by a sudden sisterly love, realizing she cannot harm her very own brother, removes the harpoon and heals Seth. Seeing his mother heal his hated uncle, Horus will get angry - so angry he will BEHEAD ISIS, before fleeing away with her head as her body turns into a stone statue... [This is actually a mix of two versions, one in which Horus beheads his mother because she took pity on Seth, another in which Horus got enraged at his mother for hitting him instead of his uncle.] Don’t worry though, thanks to Thoth she gets better. This however is without a doubt the last time she tried to help her son - who anyway finally managed to beat Seth in the end.

II) The most beloved of all goddesses

The popularity of Isis cannot be underestimated. She received a worship throughout ALL of Egypt, and her cult only stopped being active in Egypt in the 6th century. Not BC! 6th century current era! She was so popular that, during the Roman era, her cult was brought to Rome and she became one of the numerous mystery cults/foreign cults of the Roman Empire. Caligula, out of all Roman emperors, loved her greatly and had a temple built for her in Rome.

Isis represented the ideal woman for the Egyptians of old. She was a faithful and devoted wife, as much as a loving and helpful mother: alongside Osiris and Horus she formed the “triad of Abydos”. She was perceived as the protectress of family as a whole - with a special soft spot for women and children, that she protected much more than men. Her numerous quests to fetch her husband’s corpse, and then re-create it, also placed her in the role of a funeral goddess: alongside her sister Nephthys she was one of the goddesses who watched over both the corpses and the “resurrection” of the deceased - aka the dead finding a new existence in the afterlife. Isis was said to have been a goddess very close to humanity, so close she taught humans a handful of tricks and crafts: she gave them the basics of medicine, and explained to them how to spin flax and weave cloth. Her symbol was the “magical knot”, called the “knot of Isis” or “girdle of Isis” - the tyet symbol. The tyet symbol looks like the cross of life, the ankh, but with the branches falling down instead of going sideways: this sign was the symbol and amulet of “protection”.

Isis was one of the rare goddesses not depicted as an animal-headed woman. Isis usually appeared as a regular woman, with a chair/seat on her head. The symbol of the chair or the seat was her symbol, needed to write her name - but from it merely being a symbol of her name, this chair or seat became much, much more... For you see, this seat was equated and identified as the throne. The throne of Egypt. Wasn’t she after all the wife of Osiris, one of the former divine pharaohs, and the mother of Horus, the next divine pharaoh? Even more, all pharaohs were thought to be manifestations and embodiments of Horus, who was THE god of the pharaohs! By extension, Isis was seen as the “mother” of all pharaohs, the living embodiment of the throne of Egypt and the protectress of royalty. Isis was sometimes depicted with wings (in legends she was said to be able to turn into a bird, for example after tricking Seth into confessing his usurpation she flew triumphantly in the sky as a kite bird), and again these wings were a symbol of protection, as she wrapped them around either the pharaoh or the dead to shield them.

Through time her popularity grew so much that Isis started assimilating the attributes and functions of many other female goddesses: Sekhmet, Selkis, Neit, Satis, Opet... Her most notorious “fusion” was with the goddess Hathor, resulting in Isis inheriting the “cow horns holding the sun between them” or the sistrum in her hand, two symbols typical of Hathor. In fact, remember the “beheading” episode described above? The myth goes that Thoth healed Isis by giving her a new head... a cow’s head. This was to explain why Isis was sometimes depicted as cow-headed when Hathor was THE cow goddess, not Isis.

By the time the Ptolemaic dynasty and of the Roman domination, Isis had grown into the “universal goddess”, the “mistress of all the gods” and the one maintaining the very balance of the universe.

III) The goddess of magic

One final attribute of Isis must be given here: Isis was the goddess of magic. She was the sorceress-goddess, a wizardess among the deities of Ancient Egypt. We are in a case quite similar to the Norse pantheons, where the gods despite having supernatural abilities (the Egyptian gods for example can naturally transform into animals), do not “normally” wield magic, only a few of them does... And Isis is the goddess of magic, charms and enchantments. She was the goddess of spells, and her magical abilities were closely tied to the art of healing. To compare to yet another mythology, the Egyptian magic was closely tied to the magic of Ancient Egypt, where the sorceresses based their art on the “pharmakos”, those drugs and potions that could either be medicine or poison. Similarly, the spells and magical abilities of Isis mostly consisted in things such as removing venom from bites, healing sicknesses, banishing fevers, or resurrecting dying men. This might not seem like much to us today, but in a country of harsh weather filled with deadly diseases and venomous creatures, it was a LOT.

And one specific story actually shows how dangerous Isis’ powers can get, when used for more dubious purposes... A story that also explains why Isis grew to be such a powerful goddess. A story that, finally, highlights the two main “flaws” of Isis - the gods, being similar to humans, also have their flaws. And Isis represented the two typically “feminine” flaws in the Egyptian mind 1) curiosity, or rather a desire to know things at all costs and 2) cunning and ambition, the desire to gain as much power as they could. This story is the one of Ra, the sun god, master of the universe, source of all life, a god with unlimited power, numerous appearances and identities, and even more numerous names. And while all of these names and titles are known, one stays hidden. Ra’s true name, Ra’s first name - a secret name that the solar god hid inside himself (literally, he placed it inside his own body), so that no wizard or sorcerer could ever use any form of magic against him. In Ancient Egypt it was believed that the name of every being, be it a human or a god, held the person’s very essence into it - to know someone’s name was to have power over them. By hiding his true name, Ra made himself untouchable, unattackable, undestroyable. Isis however, as much curious about Ra’s secret name as jealous of his immense power, decided that she would get the sun’s true name. And she hatched a devious plan...

Ra had aged a lot. It might surprise you to learn that, but in the Egyptian theology gods do age. Much slower than humans, though, but they do - and Ra being the first of all the gods, time hit him pretty hard. At the time of the story, one of the most obvious signs of Ra’s aging was his constant drooling - which allowed Isis to steal some of his saliva... Mixing it with soil, she created a form of clay that she then sculpted into a snake, and placed onto the path the sun crossed each day to go through the sky. Animating the clay snake with a magic spell, Isis got Ra bitten - and the magical poison she had created for him was a true horror. Ra fell on the spot, too weak to move. He cried for help, summoning all of his children by his side - as he explained, he wasn’t attacked by either fire nor water, and yet his heart was burning and his limbs were freezing. Since Ra hadn’t created the snake in any way, he didn’t know what it was or how to deal with it – and none of his other “children” knew how to either. As the old god started to violently shake and tremble, Isis arrived and offered her help - promising to heal Ra and remove the poison from him... if he agreed to give her his name. “Because a man can only come back to life if he is called by his name.” Ra gave her a long list of all of his names and titles, but Isis insisted “No, no, no... these names won’t work. You must give me your true name, else I cannot heal you.” Ra, suffering too much, sweating heavily, starting to lose his sight, decided to relinquish his true name, and he gave it to Isis - quite literally, he took his name out of his body to place it inside Isis’s body... But he gave it to her on one condition. He knew that she would transmit his secret name to her own son, Horus – so he made her promise that she would force Horus into a divine oath, a solemn promise that he would keep for himself Ra’s true name, never give it to anyone else, and protect it forever. This is how Isis became one of the rare gods to know the true name of the creator-sun, which allowed her access to an immense power over the ancestor and master of all deities.

I will mention another story illustrating Isis’ magical powers, one that fans of Greek mythology will probably recognize (no need to tell you Isis was strongly associated with Demeter). This episode took place during Isis’ initial quest for her husband’s corpse - she was attracted to the town of Byblos by the wonderful scent the tree-pillar that had grown around her husband’s coffin was creating. Arriving at the palace of Byblos, she managed to touch the heart of the queen of the city, Astarte (not to be confused with the goddess), who allowed her to chop down the pillar of her temple. As a way to thank her, Isis decided to secretly make her a gift - and her idea of a surprise gift was to make Astarte’s son immortal. Hired as a nurse by the royal family of Biblos, Isis didn’t actually breast-fed the royal baby, but rather gave him a magical milk she created through her auricular finger. And every night, she took the baby and placed him inside a circle of fire while reciting incantations - a long process of several days that would transmute the baby into an immortal. However, Astarte grew suspicious of Isis actions, and interrupted one of her nightly fire-rituals, protecting her child she believed to be in danger. But in doing so, the queen interrupted the spell, and condemned her child to live a mortal life...

One final tale, and this post shall end. The story of Isis and the seven scorpions. As Isis was weaving the bandages needed to wrap the mummy of Osiris, she was interrupted by Thoth, who advised her to hide away Horus, to shield him from Seth’s wrath. Isis took Horus, selected seven scorpions to act as bodyguards, and they took off, crossing the Delta, arriving at the Town of the Two Sisters. There, Isis immediately went to the richest family and asked hospitality in their beautiful house – after all, she was a goddess! But the mistress of the house shut the door and refused to let these vagrants in. Isis was forced to ask hospitality from a poor and humble peasant girl, on the other side of the town. The scorpions however were not ready to forgive this insult – six of them took their poison and placed it in the sting of the seventh, that then entered the rich woman’s wife, and stung her son. The rich woman ran screaming all around the town, asking for help for her sick and poisoned son, but nobody helped her. Isis, hearing the woman’s screams, took pity on her, because she could not let a woman suffer the loss of her child. She went to help, and discovering the origin of the venom, she used the respective names of each of the seven scorpions to take control of the beasts, and remove their poison. The rich mother, deeply thankful for Isis’ miracle, abandoned all of her wealth, giving it all to both Isis and the young peasant woman that had welcomed the goddess. [Fun fact: in Ancient Egypt there were two types of scorpions. There was a dark kind, which was relatively harmless, the Scorpioniae. But there was a lighter-colored one, which was much more venomous and dangerous – the Buthridae.]

#egyptian mythology #isis #egyptian gods #egyptian goddesses #egyptian goddess #the ennead

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