Lecture VII. Osiris And The Osirian Faith. 159
into two classes. From thenceforth the Egyptians became the
democratic people that they still are. As the Pharaoh on earth
ruled a people who before him were all equal, so between the
subjects of Osiris, the Pharaoh in heaven, no distinctions of rank
were known except such as were conferred by himself.
The same belief which had substituted theushebtifor the
human peasant had filled the tombs with the objects which, it was
thought, would best please the dead man. Besides the meat and
drink which had been provided for thekafrom time immemorial,
there was now placed beside the mummy everything which it
was imagined he would need or desire in the other world. Even
the books which the dead man had delighted in during his earthly
existence were not forgotten. It was not necessary, however, that
the actual objects should be there. It was thekaonly of the object
that was wanted, and that could be furnished by a representation
of the object as well as by the object itself. And so, besides the
actual clothes or tools or weapons that are buried in the tombs,
we find imitation clothes and tools, like the“ghost-money”of the
Greeks, or even paintings on the wall, which, so long as the object
was correctly depicted in them, were considered quite sufficient. [173]
One of the most touching results of this thorough-going realism
has been noticed by Professor Wiedemann.^143 “The soles of
the feet (of the mummy) which had trodden the mire of earth
were removed, in order that the Osiris might tread the Hall of
Judgment with pure feet; and the gods were prayed to grant milk
to the Osiris that he might bathe his feet in it and so assuage the
pain which the removal of the soles must needs have caused him.
And, finally, the soles”were then placed within the mummy,
that he might find them at hand on the day of resurrection, and
meantime make use of theirka.
The doctrine of the resurrection of the body involved also
a doctrine of a judgment of the deeds committed by the body.
(^143) The Ancient Egyptian Doctrine of Immortality, p. 48.