Egypt, Trunk of the Tree, A Modern Survey of an Ancient Land, Vol. 1.

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An award-winning writer and international journalist leads the general reader through the history of ancient Egypt, exploring the maze of facts and fantasies, and examines Egypt's place in the history of religion and monotheism in particular. He shows how Egypt both influenced and mystified other civilizations for centuries.This, Volume I, situates the Egyptian religion, political system and society within the contexts — some of them stretching back as far as before c. 4000 BC — of the early history of religion, mythology, technology, art, psychology, sociology, geography and migrations of peoples.(Volume II discusses the major consequences that arose from Egypt's system. The religious, funerary, afterlife and societal views of Egyptians are compared to the other major religions and societies. Their probable influence on Greek religion and on Hebrew and Christian monotheisms is carefully traced, as are Egypto-Hebrew relations. The highlights of Egypt's religious, political, colonial, artistic and literary life are examined as well as the subsequent decline of Egypt.)

About the Book

Ancient Egypt built a society on a remarkable mixture of the new, the useful and the beautiful, while retaining primitive magic, obscurantism, and the infantile but extraordinarily poetic. Egypt was also one of the most optimistic nations ever founded, inventing optimistic answers to many of man's fundamental questions.Writing in an easy to read narrative literary style while respecting the norms of Egyptological scholarship, the author examines the contradictory opinions of major Egyptologists (and the major loonies), and brings us closer to Egypt's core meaning and influence. Along the way, he illuminates the enchanting, imaginative beauty of the Egyptian saga.This, Volume I, situates the Egyptian religion, political system and society within the contexts - some of them stretching back as far as before c. 4000 BC - of the early history of religion, mythology, technology, art, psychology, sociology, migratory movements and geography. The anchoring of religious belief in divine immanence and diversity, but a frenzy for religious change without change, the omnipresence of magic, the immense powers of the pharaoh-god and the turning point for man that ancient Egypt represented in many key theological, political, artistic and technological domains from very early dates are examined.

Introduction

One of the most intensive periods of religious, political, technological cultural and economic change that ever occurred took place in Egypt starting in about 3100 BC, and continued for 2000 years. Together with Sumer, Egypt became an advanced Early Bronze Age sedentary, literate society which had incorporated and gone beyond Neolithic values. The era of surplus economies and organized societies and religions adapted to the values of a high yield agro/ irrigation society was opened. Egypt then became the main zone of development, the vanguard, the motor and the soul of humanity from the firm establishment of its system about 2700 BC until the beginning of its decline in the 12th century BC. Religion was the central framework of all societies during these times, but never before had religion been so successfully used as the central reality and justification of human life. Never before had a system of religious magic and mythology, grounded in an animistic perception of the immanence of the divine in nature, been so perfected and made so credible. Never before had such an elaborate religion and such an all-inclusive mythology been invented. Never before had the multiple realities of the universe and existence been so astutely bonded together in a sacred system of diversity, dualism and primeval order and harmony re-created on a daily basis. The pragmatic Egyptians fervently believed that magic was truth, and not a miracle. They believed that magic was a part of the divine laws and that it was expressed in their mythology (which was of course not mythological as we understand the term, but a true description of the universe and its origins and man and the correct behavior to be adopted. As false and illusionary as it was, the complex Egyptian system of magic, and the animistic belief in the divine aliveness of nature and mythology gave them efficient tools for building the most modern and vital religion and state of the time.