168 The Religions of Ancient Egypt and Babyloniatemple service, but also to all the various branches of sacred lore.
Among these were the books which have been called the Bibles
of the ancient Egyptians.
Foremost amongst the latter is the Ritual to which Lepsius
gave the name of the Book of the Dead. It was first discovered by
Champollion in the early days of Egyptian decipherment, and a
comparative edition of the text current during the Theban period
has been made by Dr. Naville. Papyri containing the whole
or portions of it are numberless; the chapters into which it is
divided are inscribed on the coffins, and even on the wrappings
of the dead, as well as on the scarabs and theushebtisthat were
buried with the mummy. It was, in fact, a sort of passport and
guide-book combined in one, which would carry the dead man
in safety through the dangers that confronted him in the other
world, and bring him at last to the judgment-hall of Osiris and
the paradise of Alu. It described minutely all that awaited him
after death; it detailed the words and prayers that would deliver
him from his spiritual enemies; and it put into his mouth the
confession he would have to make before the tribunal of the
dead. Without it he would have been lost in the strange world
to which he journeyed, and hence the need of inscribing at least
[183] some portions of it on his tomb or sepulchral furniture, where
their ghostly doubles could be read by his ka and soul.
The Book of the Dead was the Bible or Prayer-book of the
Osirian creed. Its universal use marks the triumph of the worship
of Osiris and of the beliefs that accompanied it. It was for the
follower of Osiris that it was originally compiled; the judgment
with which it threatened him was that of Osiris, the heaven to
which it led him was the field of Alu. The Pyramid texts of
the Fifth and Sixth Dynasties imply that it already existed in
some shape or other; the Osirian creed is known to them in all
its details, and the“other world”depicted in them is that of the
Book of the Dead.^150
(^150) The extraordinary care with which the sacred texts were handed down