HORUS

'Horus' is one of the most ancient gods of the Ancient Egyptian religion who appears in his earliest form in late Predynastic Egypt. Represented as a falcon his name is believed to mean 'the high' or 'the far off'^[1] and his earliest connections are to the sky and kingship. Because the cult of Horus survived for the whole of the Ancient Egyptian civilization he gained many forms and associations.
Horus was usually represented as a man with a falcon's head. One important association is the ''Eye of Horus'' which was an Egyptian symbol of power and of the offerings made to the god Osiris and by extension all the dead. In one myth cycle Horus' left eye is injured during his struggle with his uncle Set, who had murdered Osiris in an attempt to seize the Egyptian throne. The Eye of Horus, its injury, and subsequent restoration became an important symbol for the unified land of Egypt and in the funerary rites of the renewal after death.

Contents

Origin of name

Forms of the god Horus

Sky god

Sun god

Conqueror of Set

Brother of Isis

Mystery religion

See also

References

Origin of name

Horus is recorded in Egyptian hieroglyphs as and is reconstructed to have been pronounced
★ , meaning "Falcon". By Coptic times, the name became ''Hōr''. It was adopted into Greek as ''Hōros''. The original name also survives in later Egyptian names such as Har-Si-Ese literally "Horus, son of Isis".^[2]

Forms of the god Horus

Sky god

This is thought to be the original form of Horus.^[3] His name meaning 'high' or 'distant' reflects his sky nature. He was seen as a great falcon with outstretched wings whose right eye was the sun and the left one was the moon.
One of the sky-god forms of Horus was 'Nekheny' (meaning 'he of Nekhen' or Hierakonopolis).

Sun god

Since Horus was said to be the sky, it was natural that he was rapidly considered to also contain the sun and moon. It became said that the sun was one of his eyes and the moon the other, and that they traversed the sky when he, a falcon, flew across it. Thus he became known as 'Harmerty' - ''Horus of two eyes''. Later, the reason that the moon was not as bright as the sun was explained by a tale, known as the ''contestings of Horus and Set'', originating as a metaphor for the conquest of Upper Egypt by Lower Egypt in about 3000BC. In this tale, it was said that Set, the patron of Upper Egypt, and Horus, the patron of Lower Egypt, had battled for Egypt brutally, with neither side victorious, until eventually the gods sided with Horus.

As Horus was the ultimate victor he became known as 'Harsiesis', 'Heru-ur' or 'Har-Wer' ( 'Horus the Great'), but more usually translated as 'Horus the Elder'. In the struggle Set had lost a testicle, explaining why the desert, which Set represented, is infertile. Horus' left eye had also been gouged out, which explained why the moon, which it represented, was so weak compared to the sun. It was also said that during a new-moon, Horus had become blinded and was titled 'Mekhenty-er-irty' ( 'He who has no eyes'), while when the moon became visible again, he was re-titled 'Khenty-irty' ( 'He who has eyes'). While blind, it was considered that Horus was quite dangerous, sometimes attacking his friends after mistaking them for enemies.
Ultimately, as another sun god, Horus became identified with Ra as 'Ra-Herakhty' ''rˁ-ˁḫr-3iḫṯ'', literally ''Ra, who is Horus of the two horizons''. However, this identification proved to be awkward, for it made Ra the son of Hathor, and therefore a created being rather than the creator. And, even worse, it made Ra into Horus, who was the son of Ra, i.e. it made Ra his own son and father, in a standard sexually-reproductive manner, an idea that would not be considered comprehensible until the Hellenic era. Consequently Ra and Horus never completely merged into a single falcon-headed sun god.
Nevertheless the idea of making the identification persisted, and Ra continued to be depicted as falcon-headed. Likewise, as Ra-Herakhty, in an allusion to the Ogdoad creation myth, Horus was occasionally shown in art as a naked boy with a finger in his mouth sitting on a lotus with his mother. In the form of a youth, Horus was referred to as 'Neferhor'. This is also spelled 'Nefer Hor', 'Nephoros' or 'Nopheros' () meaning 'The Good Horus'.
In an attempt to resolve the conflict, Ra-Herakhty was occasionally said to be married to Iusaaset, which was technically his own shadow, having previously been Atum's shadow, before Atum was identified as Ra, in the form ''Atum-Ra'', and thus of Ra-Herakhty when Ra was also identified as a form of Horus. In the version of the Ogdoad creation myth used by the Thoth cult, Thoth created Ra-Herakhty, via an egg, and so was said to be the ''father'' of ''Neferhor''.

Conqueror of Set

By the Nineteenth dynasty, the previous brief enmity between Set and Horus, in which Horus had ripped off one of Set's testicles, was revitalised as a separate tale. According to Papyrus Chester-Beatty I, Set was considered to have been homosexual and is depicted as trying to prove his dominance by seducing Horus and then having intercourse with him. However, Horus places his hand between his thighs and catches Set's semen, then subsequently throws it in the river, so that he may not be said to have been inseminated by Set. Horus then deliberately spreads his own semen on some lettuce, which was Set's favorite food (the Egyptians thought that lettuce was phallic). After Set has eaten the lettuce, they go to the gods to try to settle the argument over the rule of Egypt. The gods first listen to Set's claim of dominance over Horus, and call his semen forth, but it answers from the river, invalidating his claim. Then, the gods listen to Horus' claim of having dominated Set, and call his semen forth, and it answers from inside Set.^[4] In consequence, Horus is declared the ruler of Egypt.

Brother of Isis

When Ra assimilated Atum into ''Atum-Ra'', Horus became considered part of what had been the Ennead. Since Atum had had no wife, having produced his children by masturbating de facto, Hathor was easily inserted as the mother of the previously motherless subsequent generation of children. However, Horus did not fit in so easily, since if he was identified as the son of Hathor and Atum-Ra in the Ennead, he would then be the brother of the primordial air and moisture, and the uncle of the sky and earth, between which there was initially nothing, which was not very consistent with him being the sun. Instead, he was made the brother of Osiris, Isis, Set, and Nephthys, as this was the only plausible level at which he could meaningfully rule over the sun and the Pharaoh's kingdom. It was in this form that he was worshipped at Behdet as 'Har-Behedti' (also abbreviated 'Bebti').
Since Horus had become more and more identified with the sun since his identification as Ra, his identification as also the moon suffered, so it was possible for the rise of other moon gods, without complicating the system of belief too much. Consequently, Chons became the moon god. Thoth, who had also been the moon god, became much more associated with secondary mythological aspects of the moon, such as wisdom, healing, and peace making. When the cult of Thoth arose in power, Thoth was retroactively inserted into the earlier myths, making Thoth the one whose magic caused Set and Horus' semen to respond--in the tale of the ''contestings of Set and Horus'', for example.
Thoth's priests went on to explain how it was that there were 5 children of Geb and Nut. They said that Thoth had prophesied the birth of a great king of the gods and so Ra, afraid of being usurped, had cursed Nut with not being able to give birth at any point in the year. In order to remove this curse, Thoth proceeded to gamble with Chons, winning 1/72nd of moonlight from him. Prior to this time in Egyptian history, the calendar had 360 days, and so 1/72 of moonlight each day corresponded to 5 extra days, and so the tale states that Nut was able to give birth on each of these extra days, having 5 children. The Egyptian calendar was reformed around this time, and gained the 5 extra days, which, by coincidence, meant that this could be used to explain the 5 children of Nut.

Mystery religion

Since Horus, as the son of Osiris, was only in existence after Osiris's death, and because Horus, in his earlier guise, was the husband of Isis. In late Gnostic traditions, it came to be said that Horus was the resurrected form of Osiris. Likewise, as the form of Horus before his death and resurrection, Osiris, who had already become considered a form of creator when belief about Osiris assimilated that about Ptah-Seker, also became considered to be the only creator, since Horus had gained these aspects of Ra.
Eventually, in the Hellenic period, Horus was, in some locations, identified completely as Osiris, and became his own Father, since this concept was not so disturbing to Greek philosophy as it had been to that of ancient Egypt. In this form, Horus was sometimes known as 'Heru-sema-tawy' ( 'Horus, Uniter of Two Lands').
By assimilating Hathor, who had herself assimilated Bat, who was associated with music, and in particular the sistrum, Isis was likewise thought of in some areas in the same manner. This particularly happened amongst the groups who thought of Horus as his own father, and so Horus, in the form of the son, amongst these groups often became known as Ihy (alternately: Ihi, Ehi, Ahi, Ihu), meaning "sistrum player", which allowed the confusion between the father and son to be side-stepped.
The combination of this, now rather esoteric mythology, with the philosophy of Plato, which was becoming popular on the Mediterranean shores, lead to the tale becoming the basis of a mystery religion. Many Greeks, and those of other nations, who encountered the faith, thought it so profound that they sought to create their own, modelled upon it, but using their own gods. This led to the creation of what was effectively one religion, which was, in many places, adjusted to superficially reflect the local mythology although it substantially adjusted them. The religion is known to modern scholars as that of Osiris-Dionysus.

See also

★ Heru-Ra-Ha

★ Egyptian pantheon

References

1. ''The Routledge Dictionary of Egyptian Gods and Goddesses''. Routledge, Oxford and New York, 2005. Edited by George Hart. 2nd Edition, Page 70.
2. http://www.egyptianmyths.net/horus.htm
3. The Complete Gods and Goddesses of Ancient Egypt by Richard H. Wilkinson, Thames and Hudson, page 200.
4. Theology WebSite: The 80 Years of Contention Between Horus and Seth