115 lines
6.2 KiB
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115 lines
6.2 KiB
Plaintext
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The God Set
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by Setnakt
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The best English study of Set is Te Velde's _Set, God of
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Confusion_ Brill 1977. If this particular text is unavailable through your
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library, I recommend a a short cheap and very
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reliable book by George Hart: _A Dictionary of Egyptian Gods and Goddesses_,
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Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1986. This very ambiguous god was alternately deified
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and demonized depending on the
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cultural/political currents running through Egypt. Allow me to present here a
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brief history of Set.
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Predynastically: Set was an important deity appearing in the art of the Hamitic
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peoples living in the Ombos and Naquada regions. Interestingly, his was the
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only god-figure not composed of parts from recognizable Earth animals.
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(The Hamitic speakers donated most of the terms to religious philosophy to the
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Egyptian langauge that seperate it from other Semitic languages including ba,
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ka, neter, etc. If somebody really wants to find the roots of the Egyptian
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religion, they should go up the Nile and do some serious anthropology among
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Hamitic speaking native cultures-- the roots of the Nile may hold keys to
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Egyptian thought that mute stones do not).
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Archaic Egypt: Set generally occupies a secondary role to his enemy Horus,
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champion of the people of the North (except in the 2nd dynasty when one pharaoh
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took a "Set" name rather than a Horus name.) Set is intimately connected with
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teaching astronomy,the methods of agriculture, medicine, and above all magic.
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He is said to have opened the mouth of the other gods, and is the patron of the
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sem ritual. His cult titles include "Great of Magic" and "Eternal". There is
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indeed evidence that Set is set apart from other gods to die (Bonnet's
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commentaries on the
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Pyramid texts).
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The astronomical cult, which placed the afterlife in the region of the Northern
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heavens -- particularly in and around the
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constellation of the Great Bear was replaced in the Fourth
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dynasty by a growing sun cult centering on Re and Horus. The great stellar
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monument that Imhotep designed were replaced by the solar pyramids of the
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Fourth and Fifth dynasty's. (Notably Cheops took no chances in the great
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Pyramid's design -- although outwardly a solar monument he had a hole bored
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through the
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stones aligned with the position of Alpha Draconis (a star in the Great Bear
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called Thuban = "the Subtle One" a Set cult
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title?) just in case that was where his ka was heading.
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During the next few dynasties (4 - 17), Set is generally
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ignored. His functions are absorbed into other gods. Thoth picks up the
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attributes of magic, Osiris picks up the attributes of Mysterious time _djet_
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as opposed to exoteric time _neheh_. Set keeps his attributes a storm and
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stellar god, and gradually comes to be associated with all night fears --
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nightmares,
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desert fiends, and bad animals such as the hippo and the jaguar of the South.
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He is mentioned in a famous 12th dynasty writing called _The Discourse of a man
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with his ba_ in which his solar aspect IAA is referred to. Bikka Reed has a
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great translations of this text.
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In the 18th dynasty a remarkable Pharoah Hatshepsut reintroduced the worship of
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Set by building a Temple dedicated to him and Horus the Elder at Ombos. This
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marked a strong interest in Set's eternal nature, for example in Hatshepsut is
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the prophecy (which she had placed in her tomb at Der el-Medina) that "She will
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not only enjoy the days of Horus, but the days of Set will be added to her
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span."
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She was also interested in the antinomian nature of the Set cult -- in fact she
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preformed one of the most scandalous acts
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available to a woman -- she acted as a man. This early feminist clearly found
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Set, a great archetype to Work with. Set was
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popular among her family until the Kingship of Akhenaton (may he be reborn
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forever drowning in the jaws of Sobek the crocodile god).
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The very militaristic pharaohs of the Nineteenth dynasty, who were probably
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descended form a family of Set priests at Tanis, delighted in Set both in his
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militaristic role and as God of Foreign places. Ramses II for example called
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himself the Son of Set. The Set cult too was very popular with foreigners
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coming to live in Egypt. His worship has always been connected with the
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outsider.
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The Twentieth Dynasty began by looking very favorably on this god, as is shown
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in the name of its founder Setnakt, "Set is Mighty." There is also considerable
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evidence that the set cult was favored among artisans of the time (see Romer's
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_Ancient Lives_, Henry Holt, 1984, and if you've got as copy of Stephen Quirk's
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_Ancient Egyptian Religion_ check out the beautiful Stella of Aapehty --
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probably the most beautiful surviving
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example of Setian art).
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By the end of the Twentieth Dynasty, as the funerary cult of Osiris became the
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dominate force in popular Egyptian religion,more and more, Set as the murderer
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of Osiris became the Evil One. In fact by the Twenty Sixth dynasty it was a
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common
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practice to disfigure any representations of Set. He became --for all practical
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purposes the Christian devil. Some scholars have even derived the name Satan
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from Set-Hen, a cult title meaning the Majesty of Set, but I am dubious of this
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particular derivation.
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However Set was not down for the count. During the Ptolemaic period Set, merged
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with the Greek titan Typhon, became the
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figure for the _goes_ or sorcerer to use. After Hermes the most often invoked
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god in the Magical papyri is Set-Typhon. This entity was used to bring spirit
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helpers ( bird would fly down and announce that the magician was now under the
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protection of a god -- a popular Typhonic practice outside of Egypt as well se
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Morton Smith's _Jesus the Magician_). Set was also the god to invoke to send
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dreams, perform healings on the head or spinal column, and to cause enmity
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between enemies.
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There seems to be a few common threads running through the Set cult: the quest
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for immortality, antinomianism, and the practice of magic. Perhaps this is why
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Michael Aquino's current Temple of Set finds this figure so appealing as an
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archetype for the Left Hand Path. Like Hatshepsut before Aquino has Opened the
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Mouth of this ancient god, and the articulation of the Principle of
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Isolate Intelligence is available to us today.
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/* end of article */
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