Ra God - The Egyptian Sun God
I thought I would do some posts of the Ancient God around the World. I have always been fascinated with
the God Ra- The Egyptian Sun God. Partly do to the fact that I've seen a few movies that I've really liked, but I thought it would be important not just for myself but as a interesting post to explore the true ancient history/legend Ra God - The Egyptian Sun God. For one thing Ra is one of the most famous Gods in ancient Egypt. Ra is often represented as a solar disk or a circle drawn over his head, as a deity associated with the sun. He is frequently depicted with the body of a man and the head of a falcon. Ra has a human body and his falcon head, which were often similar to the God Horus. The only difference between the to Egyptian Gods, was God Horus wore a crown on his head while Ra God wore a disk of the sun encircled by a cobra.
One had a Crown of probably Gold on his head which was associated good/ the other the Disk of the sun encircled by a cobra which suggested his fierce and destructive nature which will become apparent in his live time of destruction of humankind. Ra also was always holding a scepter in one hand and a ankh in the other.
One of the reason that I found that Ra may have used the ankh which by the ways was one of the most
popular Egyptians symbols in Ancient times - was it was a symbol of life. The reason for their use of the ankh, it seems that they used it quite often in everyday life. The ankh is shown in many of the Egyptian drawings and painting, being held by a God with it in front of the kings nostrils, so that he can breath in the eternal life from the ankh, so then it will enter his entire body. The Ankh was also used to decorate the
Thrones and platforms of the Kings and Gods at the time of ancient Egypt, but back to my Post on the God Ra. I thought you might find a few of the Ancient symbols that they use to be interesting too.
The God Ra was seen as a God in the Book of the Dead in Ancient Egypt. They even had a hymn that
described Ra in the Book of the Dead, which goes-
Ra the God of The Sun in the Book of the DEAD
You rise m you rise, You shine, you shine, you who are crowned king of the gods.
You are the lord of heaven,
You are the lord of earth;
You are the creator of those who swell in the heights and of those who dwell in the depths.
You are the One God who came into being in the beginning of time.
You did create earth, you did fashion man, You make the watery abyss of the sky
You did create the earth, You did fashion man.
You did make watery abyess of the sky
You did from Hapi (the Nile)
You did create the watery abyess,
And you do give life to all therin that is.
You have Knit together the mountains,
You have made humans and the beasts of the field to come into being,
You have made the heavens and the earth.
Worshiped be you whom Mat (The goddess f truth and Justice) embraces at morn and at eve.
You ravel across the sky with heart swelling with joy...
That is the hymn that is describe that come decently from the Book of the Dead-
I find it quite interesting myself.being that I have never truly seen or read anything from such a book
You my dears will have to make your own thoughts on this one.
Now about Ra - the God of the Sun and with strong ties with the book of the dead. Of all my post that I
have done on different Gods and Goddesses, I am finding that Ra is quite challenging to write. He has many fasts to his personality and to his life as an God. I hope I am able to write about him in a way that in understandable and show how powerful an god he was in his time in Ancient Egypt.
Ra appeared in many different forms, depending on the role he was playing at the moment, he could change. So In hes, yu could say he was a shape-shifter.
For examples: i am Khepera in the morning, and Ra at noonday and Autumn in the evening - this proves that Ra was a shape-shifter. Khepera was the God of the scarab beetle, and in Egypt the worship of the Khepera scarab beetle is far older than the worship than Ra. It seems more that I read about Ra and his time of Power in Ancient Egypt. I am finding that there a many variables to the God Ra as I go into his history of his Power of his people. So
Ra became associated with the Khepera God, as the scarab beetle is what you could call further evidence that the priests of Ra were able to assimilate their more recent God with thew established ones. This one was particular, however , had a fascination of biological origin.
Ancient Egyptians had observed that the scarab beetle laid its eggs in dung and they pushed it around on the
ground until it became a ball. The Egyptians imagined that this could be a symbolism of the sun because it was round and it gave off heat and it was a source of life at the same time. Also it seemed to represented the self and creative powers of the sun god Ra. So the Ancient people of Egypt started to picture the sun being pushed across the sky by a giant beetle. Because they felt this is how it was divinely done with the Gods -Ra the Sun God. Eventually the people image became associated with death and rebirth too, since it appeared that the scarab beetle had died and was re-born again when the larva emerged from the ball.
So when Ra shape-shifted to Khepera - God of the Scarab beetle, he was usually depicted in human form with a scarab in place of his head. Ra was almost always carry an ankh and a scepter. He was considered a God of Creation in Ancient Egyptian times since the beetle was most often observed in the act of creating itself anew.
Khepera was also associated with the resurrection of the body too, since that was what seemed to be
happening when the scarab beetle was born. Note: It explains whey so many Egyptians place the scarab beetle in tombs and on bodies of the dead-this-then- was form of Ra in the morning-
Ra to his own shapes that he shape-shifts, at midday but in the evening he will assumed the form of Atum which has other spelling but I think I'll stick with the one..
Atum is one of the oldest forms that Ra - Sun of the God, had been revered by the ancient Egyptians and it
 |
| Atum-Ra God |
was also the form in which Ra was to have created the universe out of the chaos. Although if you look at all the drawings and painting of Ra in his temple, he was always depicted as fully human, without an animal head. Interesting eh! Ra was especially revered because of his association with souls of the dead. This makes perfect sense, being that he was very much part of the famous Book of Dead, as I mention earlier in the post. Ra would ride his solar boat during the final hours of daylight, to preparing to fight his opponents in the night. It was believed that souls receive recently released from their bodies, waiting at the beginning of the valley for the solar boat (the underworld), which meant that they came aboard just as sun went down into the underworld the time when the pilot of the solar boat was Atum, the form of Ra in the evening. I hope I haven't lost any of you my dear friends and followers. It is a bit hard to follow, but I am trying my best to make it as easy as I can to understand and also make it interesting to. Shall we continue! OK...here we go!
In addition to Ra's manifestations or shapeshifting as Khepera and Atum, he was also linked with numerous other gods throughout his long reign. Very early in his reign he was linked to Horus to form the assimilated
God Herakhty or Horus. Most would call him God Horus in this form as the morning sun. In this form his relationship with his people led the Egyptians to depict Ra with the Falcon's head.
During the middle of his reign of his kingdom, when Amun and his Theban priests were dominated in Egyptian religion, Ra was assimilated with this God from the south to form Amun-Ra whose, worship in Thebes [Which is now called Luxor] led them to a building of the temple of Karnak. It was one of the most
imposing religious structurs made by humans. The curious student of 5ra today will find scant remains of the
once considerable worship of this God Amun-Ra.
His Character as this God Amun-Ra, was so much assimilated with other gods and their attributes that only
rarely did anyone could find relics that depict Ra singly out. It seems that when he was God Amun-Ra, his people and high court you could saw could separted the two.. I guess to much shapeshifting...
South of Cairo In worship of Ra the Sun God was almost always involved of another God, usually Amun. It seems that one of the most impressive tomb that shows this - In the Vally of the Kings on the Walls of the Tomb of Seti I. In this tomb it show the myth of the destruction of the human king under Ra's order, the adventures of Ra, and other royal tombs ther econtain a list of seventy of five praises of Ra that reveal his
character: Here is an example of his praises:
Praise be unto yo u-
you exalted power-
who enter into the hidden place of Anubis (god of death)-
behold-
(your) body is Khepri .Even further south at Abu Simble-
Ra was again worshiped in combination with other gods-
the Great Temple of Rameses II was dedicated to Ra-Herakhty.
Ra was also depicted in the papyrus scrolls that make up what we call the Book of Dead. They contain
hymns and prayers to Ra in his various forms, as well as numerous beautiful drawings of Ra. They are all in papyri in Europe now.
So how it Ended for this many faces God of Sun Ra. Well It has been a interesting story and history learningmore about Ra. I have always been curious and now I now I hope I have made it kinda clear for you all my dear friends and Followers.As to what happened to Ra. Baboons talked much about the rising of Ra -the Sun God that the ancient Egyptians began associating Egypt with Ra -the Sun God as clearly the face of the Great Temple at Abu Simble.
After that its very unclear but I will try. It seems that the same papyrus who contained the scrolls also contains an improtant tatterdemalion of Ra as the cat with a Knife attcking Apophis, whose story its told in the following article. Hunefer idenified himself with those who , like the cat protected Ra form his enemises.
The Papyrus of Anhai contains a beauiful drawing of a nun holding the solar boat. And insid at the center of the boat is not Ra, but as scarab pushing the solar disk skyward, where itsi received by Osiris and Nut. Watching the rising sun from advantageous positons inside the boat are seven deities, one of whom has a falcon head and may well be Ra.
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