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The Egyptian Conception of Immortality By: George Andrew Reisner (1867-1942) |
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E text prepared by Aaron G. Wells Formatting notes: Footnotes are in [square brackets] and embedded in the
e text at the location of the superscript number in
the original text. Words and phrases in italics are
surrounded with underlines . Everything that appears
in all caps in this e text was in all caps in the
original text. THE EGYPTIAN CONCEPTION OF IMMORTALITY The Ingersoll Lecture, 1911 by GEORGE ANDREW REISNER THE INGERSOLL LECTURESHIP
Extract from the will of Miss Caroline Haskell Ingersoll, who
died in Keene, County of Cheshire, New Hampshire, Jan. 26, 1893. First. In carrying out the wishes of my late beloved father,
George Goldthwait Ingersoll, as declared by him in his last will
and testament, I give and bequeath to Harvard University in
Cambridge, Mass., where my late father was graduated, and which
he always held in love and honor, the sum of Five thousand
dollars ($5,000) as a fund for the establishment of a Lectureship
on a plan somewhat similar to that of the Dudleian lecture, that
is one lecture to be delivered each year, on any convenient
day between the last of May and the first day of December, on
this subject, "the Immortality of Man," said lecture not to form
a part of the usual college course, nor to be delivered by any
Professor or Tutor as part of his usual routine of instruction,
though any such Professor or Tutor may be appointed to such
service. The choice of said lecturer is not to be limited to any
one religious denomination, nor to any one profession, but may be
that of either clergyman or layman, the appointment to take place
at least six months before the delivery of said lecture. The
above sum to be safely invested and three fourths of the annual
interest thereof to be paid to the lecturer for his services and
the remaining fourth to be expended in the publishment and
gratuitous distribution of the lecture, a copy of which is always
to be furnished by the lecturer for such purpose. The same
lecture to be named and known as the "the Ingersoll lecture on
the Immortality of Man."
CONTENTS
I. Introduction
II. Sources of the Material
III. The Ideas of the Primitive Race
IV. The Early Dynastic Period
V. The Old Empire
VI. The Middle Empire
VII. The New Empire
VIII. The Ptolemaic Roman Period
IX. Summary
I. INTRODUCTION Of the nations which have contributed to the direct stream of
civilization, Egypt and Mesopotamia are at present believed to be
the oldest. The chronological dispute as to the relative
antiquity of the two countries is of minor importance; for while
in Babylonia the historical material is almost entirely
inscriptional, in Egypt we know the handicrafts, the weapons, the
arts, and, to a certain extent, the religious beliefs of the race
up to a period when it was just emerging from the Stone Age. In a
word, Egypt presents the most ancient race whose manner of life
is known to man. From the beginning of its history that is,
from about 4500 B.C. we can trace the development of a
religion one of whose most prominent elements was a promise of a
life after death. It was still a great religion when the
Christian doctrine of immortality was enunciated. In the early
centuries of the Christian era, it seemed almost possible that
the worship of Osiris and Isis might become the religion of the
classical world; and the last stand made by civilized paganism
against Christianity was in the temple of Isis at Philae in the
sixth century after Christ. It is clear that a religion of such duration must have offered
some of those consolations to man that have marked all great
religions, chief of which is the faith in a spirit, in something
that preserves the personality of the man and does not perish
with the body. This faith was, in fact, one of the chief elements
in the Egyptian religion the element best known to us through
the endless cemeteries which fill the desert from one end of
Egypt to the other, and through the funerary inscriptions... Continue reading book >>
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