Walk Like An Egyptian: Ancient Faith, Modern Mind

Walk Like An Egyptian

Ancient Faith, Modern Mind

by Ramona Louise Wheeler

Edited by Martha Raber

HalsPals Press ~ Smashwords Edition

~ Copyright 1995- 2011 Ramona Louise Wheeler. All rights reserved. Cover art copyright 2011 Ramona Louise Wheeler.~

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Table of Contents

Part 1 ~ Corner Mythology

Chapter 1.1 ~ Myth=Self Talking to Ego

Chapter 1.2 ~ Lights! Camera! Quiet on the Set!

Chapter 1.3 ~ What If?

Chapter 1.4 ~ Dream Time

Chapter 1.5 ~ Midnight at the Crossroads

Chapter 1.6 ~ The Horus Paradox

Part 2 ~ Egypt’s Maps of the Psyche

Chapter 2.1 ~ Modern Maps

Chapter 2.2 ~ The Cat’s Nine Lives

Chapter 2.3 ~ Ritual and Prayer

Chapter 2.4 ~ A Flame

Chapter 2.5 ~ Maat, The Reality of Reality

Chapter 2.6 ~ Matty, Tawy, Dual Dimensions of Reality

Chapter 2.7 ~ Ancient Faith, Modern Mind

Chapter 2.8 ~ Inner Horizons

Chapter 2.9 ~ The Nature of Egypt’s Faith

Chapter 2.10 ~ The Power of Egypt’s Nature

Chapter 2.11 ~ Scientists of the Self

Part 3 ~ We Walk With Gods

Chapter 3.1 ~ What’s In The Box?

Chapter 3.2 ~ Soul and Awareness

Chapter 3.3 ~ Khopry Awakes

Chapter 3.4 ~ Atum, Night Sun, Father Time

Chapter 3.5 ~ Egypt in A Glance

Chapter 3.6 ~ Sunship Sailor

Chapter 3.7 ~ The Legend of Re and Isis

Chapter 3.8 ~ The Measurer

Chapter 3.9 ~ Seat/Throne of the Eye

Chapter 3.10 ~ Your Inner Worlds

Chapter 3.11 ~ Djed, Courage and Will

Chapter 3.12 ~ Snakes Get on Your Nerves

Chapter 3.13 ~ Re’s Towrope

Chapter 3.14 ~ The Seven Arit of the Serpent’s Coiled Embrace

Chapter 3.15 ~ The Falcon Within the Shrine

Chapter 3.16 ~ Heroes of Identity

Chapter 3.17 ~ Me and My Shadow

Chapter 3.18 ~ The Soul in Love

Chapter 3.19 ~ The Sandal Strap of Isis

Chapter 3.20 ~ Poisonous Love

Chapter 3.21 ~ The Lament of Isis

Chapter 3.22 ~ Lady of the House

Chapter 3.23 ~ Every Breath You Take in the Magic Moment Now

Chapter 3.24 ~ The Wetness of Life

Part 4 ~ Egypt’s First Family

Chapter 4.1 ~ Pole to Pole

Chapter 4.2 ~ The Birth of Osiris, Isis and Horus

Chapter 4.3 ~ Isis and the Pillar of Osiris

Chapter 4.4 ~ Hathor, Your Mother

Chapter 4.5 ~ In Love with Life

Chapter 4.6 ~ Hot Blooded Rage to Live

Chapter 4.7 ~ Weaver of Light

Chapter 4.8 ~ Honorable Old Woman

Chapter 4.9 ~ Bes, Baby Talk Magic

Chapter 4.10 ~ The Calm of Strong Nerves

Chapter 4.11 ~ Bread Winners

Chapter 4.12 ~ Horns of the Mind

Chapter 4.13 ~ Re If

Chapter 4.14 ~ Faithful Guide

Part 5 ~ The Great House

Chapter 5.1 ~ Man the Tool User

Chapter 5.2 ~ You Rule as Pharaoh in Your Inner World

Chapter 5.3 ~ Innermost Chambers

Chapter 5.4 ~ The Five Names of Pharaoh

Chapter 5.5 ~ Pharaoh’s Crowns

Chapter 5.6 ~ Blueprints of Reality

Part 6 ~ Talk Like An Egyptian

Chapter 6.1 ~ Read and Write

Chapter 6.2 ~ A, E, I, O, U and Sometimes Y

Chapter 6.3 ~ The Ancient Egyptian Book of the Dead -- Or Not

Chapter 6.4 ~ Introduction to the Author’s Selected Translations

Chapter 6.5 ~ The Selected Translations *

~ Words for the Evolution Contained in Re …

~ The Awakening of Re When He Shines …

~ The Awakening of Re

~ The Awakening of Osiris Who is Lord …

~ Words For the Eternal Being to Enter …

~ The Beginning of the Emerging While Awake …

~ You Who Make the Ba to Enter Perfected …

~ The First Part of the Glorification …

~ The Awakening of Osiris, Lord of Eternity …

~ Words on How to Open the Mouth for Osiris

~ Words on How to Bring Magical Spells to Osiris

~ Words on How to Grant Memory of His Name …

~ Words on How to Prevent Opposition to the Ib-heart

~ Words on How to Prevent the Ka of a Man …

~ Words on How to Receive Breaths …

~ Words For a Drinking Supply …

~ Words on How Not to be Scalded by the Water …

~ The Twenty-one Arits of the Double Coiled Serpent

~ The Declaration of Innocence

~ Words Upon Arriving at the Innermost Chamber of Dual Reality

~ Above the Head of Anubis

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Walk Like An Egyptian

Ancient Faith, Modern Mind

Pupil:

Tell me, Lord Thoth, how do I reconcile logic and spirit?

Thoth:

Who just asked that question?

Pupil:

I did.

Thoth:

Who are you?

Pupil:

(Pause.) Who am I? What does that mean?

Thoth:

There -- you have touched the mystery. Your spirit quest must answer that question: Who am I? The logic of your own existence will find the answer. ~ RLW

Part 1

Corner Mythology

Chapter 1.1

Myth=Soul/Self Talking to Ego

What remains changeless throughout seasonal changes, remains the same in every landscape, environment, climate or society? You. Mythology has always been about you in your environment, you in your world, you among your family, your friends, your enemies. You are the constant observer, the pitiless eye at the center of the world. You are the hero of every myth. You take it on faith that other people are as real as you. Tragedy inevitably arises from forgetting that reality, from losing faith in the reality of others.

~**~

Sigmund Freud did not like to talk about it. Carl Jung called it the Self and identified this unifying function at the center of the human psyche with soul-like qualities, even as he shied away from actually calling it soul. Whichever term you use, it is that bit of yourself at your core that feels permanent -- you, to the best of your ability. Your Self also knew how to grow an adult, conscious human being from strings of molecules.

The language of the Soul/Self is a language without words. Soul/Self existed before words and will continue to exist when all words are spent. Thus to understand your own inner Self -- and for that Self to understand you -- a firm grounding in mythological metaphor is necessary. Myths are not historically true in the sense that we mean history, rather myths are metaphors for the greater reality behind all truths. Learn to recognize and understand mythological metaphor and you will get to see around the corner to a larger worldview. Metaphors are doorways to the dimension of mind.

A powerful example of this function of metaphors is at play in the modern world -- today’s computer programmers are the direct descendants of shamans, magicians, witches, wizards and epic heroes of every era and nation. Magic must be studied and learned, taught by masters, memorizing the jargon of the spirits and elements. The education takes years. Magic works by precise recitations of words in a precise setting, with the mage’s tools and equipment precisely in place.

The computer programmer must study and learn from masters, memorizing the jargon of machine code and algorithm. The education takes years. The wonders which the computer has brought us, from weather tracking to Super Mario Galaxy and Avatar, are accomplished by the use of precise recitations of codes applied to the appropriate equipment.

(Yes, that is why you have that secret craving for magic. Your Soul/Self is proud of the real magic you perform at the computer every day and wants the proper metaphor to let you know that about yourself.)

The computer is a modern metaphor for our understanding of ourselves. Each of us is born the way a computer comes into the world: you were born with the same basic hardware as everyone else, variations provided by brand and model. Your DNA is your serial number. Knowing it helps speed up diagnostics. Once born/manufactured, you acquired your software and your bells and whistles from your parents/end users, your environment, education and society. You upgrade yourself through learning and through the experiences of your life.

This metaphor can be carried out into considerable detail. It has already become a template for biological research. Computers are, after all, wholly of human creation. We made them in our own image.

~**~

What we share with the Egyptians is more vital than the differences between then and now. Their minds, their hearts, hopes, fears and joys were the same as ours. They dreamed as we dream. The chemistry of their emotional lives was identical to ours.

To understand Egypt more fully, you must understand their use of metaphor. Egyptian visual and literary metaphors communicate subtle, abstract concepts and philosophies. Egyptians maintained their unique cultural identity for millennia, through changes of politics and war, with a lively, sophisticated and evolving system of spiritual metaphor.

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Chapter 1.2

Lights! Camera! Quiet on the Set!

A Modern Metaphor for the Core Concept of Egyptian Philosophy

Osiris is that eternal, permanent part of you, your Soul/Self. Osiris is your eternal film, the ultimate data-storage medium. You are the camera, the cameraman, the hero of your life-story, the villain, as well as many of the extras. You are the writer, director and cinematographer. You are the casting director, the set decorator. You are also the audience, the critic, your most devout fan. You are the Star of your own show, the number-one celebrity of your life. Eternity in the next life is a forever movie show, with your entire life story, every bit of it, running onscreen non-stop. The theater was designed by you, for you. The chairs are real comfy. No need for bathroom breaks, ever. The popcorn is perfect and always available. The menu is yours to choose from. The sodas are just the right temperature. You can have any pizza you want, with all the toppings and no fear of calories or cholesterol. You can drink beer and get buzzed but never nasty drunk.

You can have anyone you want with you as audience in that theater -- well, you can have their avatars there with you. You are an avatar in the theaters of those who knew you. Pets are allowed. All of them and they don’t fight. You have eternity to get to know yourself and your life -- you will at last understand why you wrote the script that way.

Of course, you also have to watch the awkward, tragic, embarrassing and cruel moments of your life story. Think about that as you walk through life toward this next life eternal. Think about that in the way you treat people in your life. Their avatars will be there to accuse you. You decide how the script reads. You decide what kind of hero you are going to be.

Osiris is the data-storage medium. Re (also spelled Ra.) is the light, the light of consciousness, of perception, of self-awareness, shining over your inner world as the Sun shines over waking reality. Only Re light can cross from this life to the next. Re is the only carrier of the data that makes you who you are. Horus is the focal point of that light, the lens which focuses the light upon the substance of Osiris, your eternal Soul/Self.

These three are the prime trinity and the trinity is within you, Osiris, Horus and Re. You are this trinity. This is your story.

~**~

Sometimes life does not work out well. Tragedy, grief, pain and sorrow can overwhelm. Egypt’s metaphor system did provide for these sad circumstances -- the weighing of your emotional-heart against the Feather of Reality. If your heart is too heavy with pain, then you have the option of letting Immomet, She Who Devours, destroy the identity of your life, erase your film, reformat the hard drive and prepare you for another chance, another go at life. Immomet is the ultimate mercy.

As a symbol of Egyptian mercy, Immomet is a conceptual metaphor from the depths of the psyche. Your identity is precious and its destruction is not to be taken lightly. Immomet is a chimera, a merger of three great devourers of the instinctual world -- the hippopotamus, the lion and the crocodile. Only these forces combined are powerful enough to un-make identity.

~**~

Sokar personifies the silence of the grave. He is the vast silences of the desert that embraced Egypt. Egypt knew that no answers come from the grave in waking life. Only in our dreams do we speak with the dead. This silence played dramatically with the Egyptian imagination and they did not shrink from it. They embraced it as the silence that underlies all sound and all life. In their world-view of balanced cosmic dualities, the profound silence of the next dimension was the natural balance to the noisy joy of being alive.

They built beautiful arks as carriers of that silence, bearing the embalmed body to its final resting place. Their respect for the silence is shown in the beauty of these arks. Their craftsmen understood the silence that underlies the joy of working on beautiful things. They joined their patron deity, Ptah, with the silence of Sokar, as Ptah Sokar. Ptah Sokar is a metaphor for the spirit of beauty that pervades everything Egyptian.

You Are Osiris. I Am Osiris. We are all Osiris.

Chapter 1.3

What If?

On the issue of faith, Egypt asked, "What if the next life really is eternal? What if consciousness really is immortal? If so, what are we to expect?" In the Egyptian worldview, consciousness, self-awareness, was a force as natural as light and gravity. They set out to create lives worth living in eternity, individual stories worth watching over and over. They shared each other’s stories, each other’s dreams and nightmares and in so doing expanded the view of life that they could take with them as memories. This shared awareness of awareness was the strength and focus of their civilization and their cultural identity for thousands of years.

The elaborate rituals and wealth involved in their funeral practices were metaphors for their profound respect for the biological container that is the human body, mortal vessel of an immortal soul. Animals become food. Human beings do not become food. The flesh gets to rest at last, its physical burdens set down. The Soul/Self has continued on, Beyond The Far Horizon. Egyptians showed their gratitude to their bodies for carrying them through life by the