Ptah

Kemetic name: Ptah
basic information:

Ptah: The God of creation and creative arts. Usually the husband of Sekhmet, but also husband of Anath, mother of Nekaybaw (Twa Nation) and sometimes the husband of Bast. By the New Kingdom Bast no longer is associated with any one husband, instead being the perpetual virgin sexual partner of every God and Goddess. Creation occurs when the Cosmic Lotus rises from the Chaos of Nun. On this Cosmic Lotus is the Cosmic Egg, which is Ra-Sekhmet-Bast. Bast and Sekhmet are picture right, below. The Cosmic Egg opens to reveal Ptah. In some myths Ptah creates the Elder deities: Ra, Atum, Amon, and Mwt. Ptah is shown as a bald man, a hawk, or a scarab beetle.
holy days

Paopi: Ptah is the God of the month of Paopi of the season of Akhet (Inundation), which was from approximately mid August to mid September.

http://www.teenwitch.com/DEITY/KMT/PTAH.HTM

Ptah - "Creator" Great Name of Netjer of Mennefer (G/R Memphis), the capital of the dual Kemetic state for most of its history, Ptah is depicted as a mummified man wearing a skullcap and bearing the symbols of life, power and stability (ankh, was, djed) in his unfettered arms, standing on the plinth which is part of Ma'at's hieroglyphic name and was used as a straightedge by stonemasons and architects. Ptah is sometimes seen as an abstract form of the Self-Created One, Who effected creation through the actions of His heart (identified with Her-wer) and His tongue (identified with Djehuty), and Who "set all the Netjeru in their places and gave all things the breath of life." As a creator (and more directly involved with the physical act of creating than either Ra or Tem), Ptah is intimately connected with the plastic arts and especially with architecture and stonemasonry, and is patron of sculptors, painters, builders and carpenters, as well as anyone who creates with his or her hands. The transit which was the stock tool of masons, and the title of Ptah's High Priest, "Master Builder," would centuries later be picked up by a pseudo-Egyptian Western fraternal organization known to the world simply as Masonry.

http://www.kemet.org/glossary/ptah.html

Patron of: creation, craftsmen, artisans.

Appearance: A man with a punt beard, wrapped up like a mummy, but with his hands free which grip a great staff made up of the symbols for life, stability, and power. Sometimes he wears a skullcap crown and stands on the hieroglyph for Maat.

Ptah and Sekhmet pictured above left

Description: In the Memphite theology, Ptah is the primal creator, the first of all the gods, creator of the world and all that is in it. He is not created, but simply is. In some stories he is the personification of the primal matter, Ta-Tenen, which rose out of Nun, the fundamental seas. His wife is said to be Bast (or Sakhmet) and their children are Nefertem, Mahes, and Imhotep.

Ptah's importance may be discerned when one learns that "Egypt" is a Greek corruption of the phrase "Het-Ka-Ptah," or "House of the Spirit of Ptah."

Worship: Worshipped throughout all of Egypt, his cult centers were Memphis and Heliopolis.

Variants:

Ptah-Seker-Osiris
A composite funerary god worshipped during the Middle Kingdom period. In this form he represents the three aspects of the universe: creation, stability, and death.

http://www.touregypt.net/godsofegypt/ptah.htm

Ptah (Pteh, Peteh) was the predynastic Mennefer (Hikuptah, Memphis) god of craftsmen, pottery and creation. The Egyptians believed that he was a god who created everything from artifacts to the world egg to the other deities themselves. The Opening of the Mouth ceremony was believed to have been devised by him. He was a god of creation and rebirth.

Ptah was usually depicted as a bearded mummiform man, wearing a close fitting skull cap. Only his hands come out of his shroud, and he was usually shown holding a staff that incorporated the djed pillar, the ankh symbol and the was scepter.

The origin of Ptah's name is unclear, though some believe it to mean 'opener' or 'sculptor'. As a god of craftsmen, the later is probably correct. He was a patron of the arts, protector of stonecutters, sculptors, blacksmiths, architects, boat builders, artists and craftsmen. His high priest was given the title wr khrp hmw, 'Great Leader of Craftsmen', and his priests were probably linked to the different crafts.

It was believed that Ptah invented masonry and that it was he who crafted the boats that the dead used to travel to the Duat. The Book of the Dead describes him as:

...a master architect, and framer of everything in the universe...

-- Egypt - Myths and Legends, Lewis Spence<

It was believed that Ptah created the heavens and the earth while Khnum fashioned the animals and people on his pottery wheel. Ptah created the giant metal plate that was believed to be the floor of heaven and the roof of the sky, he also created the struts that upheld it. He created the universe by speaking words through his Tongue (linked to the god Thoth and the goddess Tefnut) and by thoughts coming from his Heart (linked to Horus the Elder).

There came into being as the heart and there came into being as the tongue ... in the form of Atem. The mighty Great One is Ptah, who transmitted [life to all gods], as well as (to) their kas... (Thus) it happened that the heart and tongue gained control over [every] (other) member of the body, by teaching that he [i.e., Ptah] is in every body and in every mouth of all gods, all men, [all] cattle, all creeping things, and (every thing) that lives, by thinking and commanding everything that he wishes... Thus all the gods were formed and his Ennead was completed. Indeed, all the divine order really came into being through what the heart thought and the tongue commanded. Thus the ka-spirits were made... by this speech... Thus were made all work and all crafts, the action of the arms, the movement of the legs, and the activity of every member, in conformance with (this) command which the heart thought, which came forth through the tongue, and which gives value to everything.

-- Primal Myths, Barbara C. Sproul

Not only was Ptah a god of creation, but he was involved with the soul's rebirth in the afterlife. He was related to the dead since Old Kingdom times, where he was believed to have invented the Opening of the Mouth ritual to allow the spirit to be able to see, hear, speak and eat as a living being.

The Osiris Ani [whose word is truth, saith]:- I eat bread. I drink ale. I gird up my garments. I fly like a hawk. I cackle like the Smen goose. I alight upon that place hard by the Sepulchre on the festival of the Great God. That which is abominable, that which is abominable I will not eat. [An abominable thing] is filth, I will not eat thereof. That which is an abomination unto my ka shall not enter my body. I will live upon that whereon live the gods and the Spirit-souls. I shall live, and I shall be master of their cakes. I am master of them, and I shall eat them under the trees of the dweller in the House of Hathor, my Lady. I will make an offering. My cakes are in Tetu, my offerings are in Anu. I gird about myself the robe which is woven for me by the goddess Tait. I shall stand up and sit down in whatsoever place it pleaseth me to do so. My head is like unto that of Ra. I am gathered together like Atem.

Here offer the four cakes of Ra, and the offerings of the earth. I shall come forth. My tongue is like that of Ptah, and my throat is like unto that of Hathor, and I remember the words of Atem, of my father, with my mouth. He forced the woman, the wife of Geb, breaking the heads near him; therefore was the fear of him there. [His] praises are repeated with vigor. I am decreed to be the Heir, the lord of the earth of Geb. I have union with women. Geb hath refreshed me, and he hath caused me to ascend his throne. Those who dwell in Anu bow their heads to me. I am [their] Bull, I am stronger than [the Lord] of the hour. I unite with women. I am master for millions of years.

-- The Chapter of Making the Transformationn into Ptah, The Book of the Dead

Ptah was also a miracle worker. It was believed that Ptah saved the town of Pelusium from Assyrian invaders with an army of rats. Ptah ordered the rats to sneak into the camp of the Assyrians and gnaw through the bowstrings and shield handles of the enemy. Without weaponry or defense, the Assyrian army fled. It was also said that he stopped a fight between Horus and Set:

He judged between Heru and Set; he ended their quarrel. He made Setthe king of Upper Egypt in the land of Upper Egypt, up to the place in which he was born, which is Su. And Geb made Horus King of Lower Egypt in the land of Lower Egypt, up to the place in which his father was drowned which is "Division-of-the-Two-Lands." Thus Horus stood over one region, and Set stood over one region. They made peace over the Two Lands at Ayan. That was the division of the Two Lands.

-- The Shabaka Stone

The Apis bull was regarded as the Ba of Ptah while it was living. The bull's main sanctuary was near the temple of Ptah in Mennefer, near the bull's embalming house where he became linked to Osiris after death. Herodotus wrote that the Apis bull was conceived from a bolt of lightning, it was black with a while diamond on his forehead, the image of a vulture on his back, double hairs on his tail and a scarab mark under his tongue. The lightning was thought by the Egyptians to be Ptah in the form of a celestial fire, who mated with a heifer. With a creation god as his father, the bull was believed to be a fertility symbol. The heifer that produced the bull was venerated as a form of the goddess Isis. There was only one Apis bull at a time, and the cult of the Apis bull started at the beginning of Egyptian history. While alive, the bull was known as the 'Spokesman' of Ptah and his 'Glorious Soul'.

He was married to either Bast, Sekhmet or Wadjet. His union with Bast was thought to have produced a lion-headed god called Mihos, while Nefertem was his son by either Sekhmet or Wadjet. Different towns believed that Ptah was married to their goddess, and thus the confusion with his family ties. Mennefer had a triad consisting of Ptah, Sekhmet and Nefertem. The architect of the Saqqara Step Pyramid, Imhotep, after he became deified came to be regarded as the son of Ptah. As father and creator of the gods, the deities he created first were Nun and Naunet and the nine gods of the Ennead. The nine were Tem, Shu, Tefnut, Geb, Nut, Osiris, Isis, Set, and Nephthys who were considered to be both the teeth and lips of the mouth of Ptah and the semen and the hands of Tem.

He was linked to two other Mennefer gods - Ta-tenen and Sokar. Ta-tenen (known as Ptah-Ta-tenen when the two were combined) was an earth god connected with the primeval mound as it rose from the waters of Nun while Sokar was a god of the necropolis. This reinforced Ptah's aspects of a god of creation and a god of the dead. Ptah-Sokar was also connected with Osiris, and known as Ptah-Sokar-Osiris. Statues of the three-in-one god showed a mummiform man wearing the sun disk, corkscrew ram horns and long plumes or the atef crown. These statues often contained a copy of spells from The Book of the Dead.

Ptah was a creator god, the third highest god in Egypt. He was the god presiding over the Second Egyptian month, known as Paopi by Greek times. From a local god of craftsmen to the deity who crafted the universe and the other deities, Ptah was only overshadowed by the sun god Ra, and the hidden god Amen. He fashioned the universe through words of power and by thought, as well as creating different parts by hand. He helped the dead on their travels through the afterlife, allowing them to transform into his divine figure, or by building the boats on which they could travel. He was the one who allowed the dead to be like the living after death with the Opening of the Mouth ceremony. The Apis bull was his sacred animal, more of a representation of his soul on earth who gave fertility and rebirth to the people. He was an ancient god who the Egyptians worshiped through their long history. 

http://www.touregypt.net/featurestories/ptah.htm

Ancient History Sourcebook:
The Precepts of Ptah-Hotep, c. 2200 BCE

Precepts of the prefect, the lord Ptah-hotep,
under the Majesty of the King of the South and North,
Assa, living eternally forever.

The prefect, the feudal lord Ptah-hotep, says: O Ptah with the two crocodiles, my lord, the progress of age changes into senility. Decay falls upon man and decline takes the place of youth. A vexation weighs upon him every day; sight fails, the ear becomes deaf; his strength dissolves without ceasing. The mouth is silent, speech fails him; the mind decays, remembering not the day before. The whole body suffers. That which is good becomes evil; taste completely disappears. Old age makes a man altogether miserable; the nose is stopped up, breathing no more from exhaustion. Standing or sitting there is here a condition of . . . Who will cause me to have authority to speak, that I may declare to him the words of those who have heard the counsels of former days? And the counsels heard of the gods, who will give me authority to declare them? Cause that it be so and that evil be removed from those that are enlightened; send the double . . . The majesty of this god says: Instruct him in the sayings of former days. It is this which constitutes the merit of the children of the great. All that which makes the soul equal penetrates him who hears it, and that which it says produces no satiety.

Beginning of the arrangement of the good sayings, spoken by the noble lord, the divine father, beloved of Ptah, the son of the king, the first-born of his race, the prefect and feudal lord Ptah-hotep, so as to instruct the ignorant in the knowledge of the arguments of the good sayings. It is profitable for him who hears them, it is a loss to him who shall transgress them. He says to his son:

Be not arrogant because of that which you know; deal with the ignorant as with the learned; for the barriers of art are not closed, no artist being in possession of the perfection to which he should aspire. But good words are more difficult to find than the emerald, for it is by slaves that that is discovered among the rocks of pegmatite.

If you find a disputant while he is hot, and if he is superior to you in ability, lower the hands, bend the back, do not get into a passion with him. As he will not let you destroy his words, it is utterly wrong to interrupt him; that proclaims that you are incapable of keeping yourself calm, when you are contradicted. If then you have to do with a disputant while he is hot, imitate one who does not stir. You have the advantage over him if you keep silence when he is uttering evil words. "The better of the two is he who is impassive," say the bystanders, and you are right in the opinion of the great.

If you find a disputant while he is hot, do not despise him because you are not of the same opinion. Be not angry against him when he is wrong; away with such a thing. He fights against himself; require him not further to flatter your feelings. Do not amuse yourself with the spectacle which you have before you; it is odious, it is mean, it is the part of a despicable soul so to do. As soon as you let yourself be moved by your feelings, combat this desire as a thing that is reproved by the great.

If you have, as leader, to decide on the conduct of a great number of men, seek the most perfect
manner of doing so that your own conduct may be without reproach. Justice is great, invariable, and assured; it has not been disturbed since the age of Ptah. To throw obstacles in the way of the laws is to open the way before violence. Shall that which is below gain the upper hand, if the unjust does not attain to the place of justice? Even he who says: I take for myself, of my own free-will; but says not: I take by virtue of my authority. The limitations of justice are invariable; such is the instruction which every man receives from his father.

Inspire not men with fear, else Ptah will fight against you in the same manner. If any one asserts that he lives by such means, Ptah will take away the bread from his mouth; if any one asserts that he enriches himself thereby, Ptah says: I may take those riches to myself. If any one asserts that he beats others, Ptah will end by reducing him to impotence. Let no one inspire men with fear; this is the will of Ptah. Let one provide sustenance for them in the lap of peace; it will then be that they will freely give what has been torn from them by terror.

If you are among the persons seated at meat in the house of a greater man than yourself, take that which he gives you, bowing to the ground. Regard that which is placed before you, but point not at it; regard it not frequently; he is a blameworthy person who departs from this rule. Speak not to the great man more than he requires, for one knows not what may be displeasing to him. Speak when he invites you and your worth will be pleasing. As for the great man who has plenty of means of existence, his conduct is as he himself wishes. He does that which pleases him; if he desires to repose, he realizes his intention. The great man stretching forth his hand does that to which other men do not attain. But as the means of existence are under the will of Ptah, one can not rebel against it.

If you are one of those who bring the messages of one great man to another, conform yourself exactly to that wherewith he has charged you; perform for him the commission as he has enjoined you. Beware of altering in speaking the offensive words which one great person addresses to another; he who perverts the trustfulness of his way, in order to repeat only what produces pleasure in the words of every man, great or small, is a detestable person.

If you are a farmer, gather the crops in the field which the great Ptah has given you, do not boast in the house of your neighbors; it is better to make oneself dreaded by one's deeds. As for him who, master of his own way of acting, being all-powerful, seizes the goods of others like a crocodile in the midst even of watchment, his children are an object of malediction, of scorn, and of hatred on account of it, while his father is grievously distressed, and as for the mother who has borne him, happy is another rather than herself. But a man becomes a god when he is chief of a tribe which has confidence in following him.

If you abase yourself in obeying a superior, your conduct is entirely good before Ptah. Knowing who you ought to obey and who you ought to command, do not lift up your heart against him. As you know that in him is authority, be respectful toward him as belonging to him. Wealth comes only at Ptah's own good-will, and his caprice only is the law; as for him who . . Ptah, who has created his superiority, turns himself from him and he is overthrown.

Be active during the time of your existence, do no more than is commanded. Do not spoil the time of your activity; he is a blameworthy person who makes a bad use of his moments. Do not lose the daily opportunity of increasing that which your house possesses. Activity produces riches, and riches do not endure when it slackens.

If you are a wise man, bring up a son who shall be pleasing to Ptah. If he conforms his conduct to your way and occupies himself with your affairs as is right, do to him all the good you can; he is your son, a person attached to you whom your own self has begotten. Separate not your heart from him.... But if he conducts himself ill and transgresses your wish, if he rejects all counsel, if his mouth goes according to the evil word, strike him on the mouth in return. Give orders without hesitation to those who do wrong, to him whose temper is turbulent; and he will not deviate from the straight path, and there will be no obstacle to interrupt the way.

If you are employed in the larit, stand or sit rather than walk about. Lay down rules for yourself from the first: not to absent yourself even when weariness overtakes you. Keep an eye on him who enters announcing that what he asks is secret; what is entrusted to you is above appreciation, and all contrary argument is a matter to be rejected. He is a god who penetrates into a place where no relaxation of the rules is made for the privileged.

If you are with people who display for you an extreme affection, saying: "Aspiration of my heart, aspiration of my heart, where there is no remedy! That which is said in your heart, let it be realized by springing up spontaneously. Sovereign master, I give myself to your opinion. Your name is approved without speaking. Your body is full of vigor, your face is above your neighbors." If then you are accustomed to this excess of flattery, and there be an obstacle to you in your desires, then your impulse is to obey your passion. But he who . . . according to his caprice, his soul is . . ., his body is . . . While the man who is master of his soul is superior to those whom Ptah has loaded with his gifts; the man who obeys his passion is under the power of his wife.

Declare your line of conduct without reticence; give your opinion in the council of your lord; while there are people who turn back upon their own words when they speak, so as not to offend him who has put forward a statement, and answer not in this fashion: "He is the great man who will recognize the error of another; and when he shall raise his voice to oppose the other about it he will keep silence after what I have said."

If you are a leader, setting forward your plans according to that which you decide, perform perfect actions which posterity may remember, without letting the words prevail with you which multiply flattery, which excite pride and produce vanity.

If you are a leader of peace, listen to the discourse of the petitioner. Be not abrupt with him; that would trouble him. Say not to him: "You have already recounted this." Indulgence will encourage him to accomplish the object of his coming. As for being abrupt with the complainant because he described what passed when the injury was done, instead of complaining of the injury itself let it not be! The way to obtain a clear explanation is to listen with kindness.

If you desire to excite respect within the house you enter, for example the house of a superior, a friend, or any person of consideration, in short everywhere where you enter, keep yourself from making advances to a woman, for there is nothing good in so doing. There is no prudence in taking part in it, and thousands of men destroy themselves in order to enjoy a moment, brief as a dream, while they gain death, so as to know it. It is a villainous intention, that of a man who thus excites himself; if he goes on to carry it out, his mind abandons him. For as for him who is without repugnance for such an act, there is no good sense at all in him.

If you desire that your conduct should be good and preserved from all evil, keep yourself from every attack of bad humor. It is a fatal malady which leads to discord, and there is no longer any existence for him who gives way to it. For it introduces discord between fathers and mothers, as well as between brothers and sisters; it causes the wife and the husband to hate each other; it contains all kinds of wickedness, it embodies all kinds of wrong. When a man has established his just equilibrium and walks in this path, there where he makes his dwelling, there is no room for bad humor.

Be not of an irritable temper as regards that which happens at your side; grumble not over your own affairs. Be not of an irritable temper in regard to your neighbors; better is a compliment to that which displeases than rudeness. It is wrong to get into a passion with one's neighbors, to be no longer master of one's words. When there is only a little irritation, one creates for oneself an affliction for the time when one will again be cool.

If you are wise, look after your house; love your wife without alloy. Fill her stomach, clothe her back; these are the cares to be bestowed on her person. Caress her, fulfil her desires during the time of her existence; it is a kindness which does honor to its possessor. Be not brutal; tact will influence her better than violence; her . . . behold to what she aspires, at what she aims, what she regards. It is that which fixes her in your house; if you repel her, it is an abyss. Open your arms for her, respond to her arms; call her, display to her your love.

Treat your dependents well, in so far as it belongs to you to do so; and it belongs to those whom Ptah has favored. If any one fails in treating his dependents well it is said: "He is a person . . ." As we do not know the events which may happen tomorrow, he is a wise person by whom one is well treated. When there comes the necessity of showing zeal, it will then be the dependents themselves who say: "Come on, come on," if good treatment has not quitted the place; if it has quitted it, the dependents are defaulters.

Do not repeat any extravagance of language; do not listen to it; it is a thing which has escaped from a hasty mouth. If it is repeated, look, without hearing it, toward the earth; say nothing in regard to it. Cause him who speaks to you to know what is just, even him who provokes to injustice; cause that which is just to be done, cause it to triumph. As for that which is hateful according to the law, condemn it by unveiling it.

If you are a wise man, sitting in the council of your lord, direct your thought toward that which is wise. Be silent rather than scatter your words. When you speak, know that which can be brought against you. To speak in the council is an art, and speech is criticized more than any other labor; it is contradiction which puts it to the proof.

If you are powerful, respect knowledge and calmness of language. Command only to direct; to be absolute is to run into evil. Let not your heart be haughty, neither let it be mean. Do not let your orders remain unsaid and cause your answers to penetrate; but speak without heat, assume a serious countenance. As for the vivacity of an ardent heart, temper it; the gentle man penetrates all obstacles. He who agitates himself all the day long has not a good moment; and he who amuses himself all the day long keeps not his fortune. Aim at fulness like pilots; once one is seated another works, and seeks to obey one's orders.

Disturb not a great man; weaken not the attention of him who is occupied. His care is to embrace his task, and he strips his person through the love which he puts into it. That transports men to Ptah, even the love for the work which they accomplish. Compose then your face even in trouble, that peace may be with you, when agitation is with . . .These are the people who succeed in what they desire.

Teach others to render homage to a great man. If you gather the crop for him among men, cause it to return fully to its owner, at whose hands is your subsistence. But the gift of affection is worth more than the provisions with which your back is covered. For that which the great man receives from you will enable your house to live, without speaking of the maintenance you enjoy, which you desire to preserve; it is thereby that he extends a beneficent hand, and that in your home good things are added to good things. Let your love pass into the heart of those who love you; cause those about you to be loving and obedient.

If you are a son of the guardians deputed to watch over the public tranquillity, execute your commission without knowing its meaning, and speak with firmness. Substitute not for that which the instructor has said what you believe to be his intention; the great use words as it suits them. Your part is to transmit rather than to comment upon.

If you are annoyed at a thing, if you are tormented by someone who is acting within his right, get out of his sight, and remember him no more when he has ceased to address you.

If you have become great after having been little, if you have become rich after having been poor, when you are at the head of the city, know how not to take advantage of the fact that you have reached the first rank, harden not your heart because of your elevation; you are become only the administrator, the prefect, of the provisions which belong to Ptah. Put not behind you the neighbor who is like you; be unto him as a companion.

Bend your back before your superior. You are attached to the palace of the king; your house is established in its fortune, and your profits are as is fitting. Yet a man is annoyed at having an authority above himself, and passes the period of life in being vexed thereat. Although that hurts not your . . . Do not plunder the house of your neighbors, seize not by force the goods which are beside you. Exclaim not then against that which you hear, and do not feel humiliated. It is necessary to reflect when one is hindered by it that the pressure of authority is felt also by one's neighbor.

Do not make . . . you know that there are obstacles to the water which comes to its hinder part, and that there is no trickling of that which is in its bosom. Let it not . . . after having corrupted his heart.

If you aim at polished manners, call not him whom you accost. Converse with him especially in such a way as not to annoy him. Enter on a discussion with him only after having left him time to saturate his mind with the subject of the conversation. If he lets his ignorance display itself, and if he gives you all opportunity to disgrace him, treat him with courtesy rather; proceed not to drive him into a corner; do not . . . the word to him; answer not in a crushing manner; crush him not; worry him not; in order that in his turn he may not return to the subject, but depart to the profit of your conversation.

Let your countenance be cheerful during the time of your existence. When we see one departing from the storehouse who has entered in order to bring his share of provision, with his face contracted, it shows that his stomach is empty and that authority is offensive to him. Let not that happen to you; it is . . .

Know those who are faithful to you when you are in low estate. Your merit then is worth more than those who did you honor. His . . ., behold that which a man possesses completely. That is of more importance than his high rank; for this is a matter which passes from one to another. The merit of one's son is advantageous to the father, and that which he really is, is worth more than the remembrance of his father's rank.

Distinguish the superintendent who directs from the workman, for manual labor is little elevated; the inaction of the hands is honorable. If a man is not in the evil way, that which places him there is the want of subordination to authority.

If you take a wife, do not . . . Let her be more contented than any of her fellow-citizens. She will be attached to you doubly, if her chain is pleasant. Do not repel her; grant that which pleases her; it is to her contentment that she appreciates your work.

If you hear those things which I have said to you, your wisdom will be fully advanced. Although they are the means which are suitable for arriving at the maat, and it is that which makes them precious, their memory would recede from the mouth of men. But thanks to the beauty of their arrangement in rhythm all their words will now be carried without alteration over this earth eternally. That will create a canvass to be embellished, whereof the great will speak, in order to instruct men in its sayings. After having listened to them the pupil will become a master, even he who shall have properly listened to the sayings because he shall have heard them. Let him win success by placing himself in the first rank; that is for him a position perfect and durable, and he has nothing further to desire forever. By knowledge his path is assured, and he is made happy by it on the earth. The wise man is satiated by knowledge; he is a great man through his own merits. His tongue is in accord with his mind; just are his lips when he speaks, his eyes when he gazes, his ears when he hears. The advantage of his son is to do that which is just without deceiving himself.

To attend therefore profits the son of him who has attended. To attend is the result of the fact that one has attended. A teachable auditor is formed, because I have attended. Good when he has attended, good when he speaks, he who has attended has profited, and it is profitable to attend to him who has attended. To attend is worth more than anything else, for it produces love, the good thing that is twice good. The son who accepts the instruction of his father will grow old on that account. What Ptah loves is that one should attend; if one attends not, it is abhorrent to Ptah. The heart makes itself its own master when it attends and when it does not attend; but if it attends, then his heart is a beneficent master to a man. In attending to instruction, a man loves what he attends to, and to do that which is prescribed is pleasant. When a son attends to his father, it is a twofold joy for both; when wise things are prescribed to him, the son is gentle toward his master. Attending to him who has attended when such things have been prescribed to him, he engraves upon his heart that which is approved by his father; and the recollection of it is preserved in the mouth of the living who exist upon this earth.

When a son receives the instruction of his father there is no error in all his plans. Train your son to be a teachable man whose wisdom is agreeable to the great. Let him direct his mouth according to that which has been said to him; in the docility of a son is discovered his wisdom. His conduct is perfect while error carries away the unteachable. Tomorrow knowledge will support him, while the ignorant will be destroyed.

As for the man without experience who listens not, he effects nothing whatsoever. He sees knowledge in ignorance, profit in loss; he commits all kinds of error, always accordingly choosing the contrary of what is praiseworthy. He lives on that which is mortal, in this fashion. His food is evil words, whereat he is filled with astonishment. That which the great know to be mortal he lives upon every day, flying from that which would be profitable to him, because of the multitude of errors which present themselves before him every day.

A son who attends is like a follower of Horus; he is happy after having attended. He becomes great, he arrives at dignity, he gives the same lesson to his children. Let none innovate upon the precepts of his father; let the same precepts form his lessons to his children. "Verily," will his children say to him, "to accomplish what you say works marvels." Cause therefore that to flourish which is just, in order to nourish your children with it. If the teachers allow themselves to be led toward evil principles, verily the people who understand them not will speak accordingly, and that being said to those who are docile they will act accordingly. Then all the world considers them as masters and they inspire confidence in the public; but their glory endures not so long as would please them. Take not away then a word from the ancient teaching, and add not one; put not one thing in place of another; beware of uncovering the rebellious ideas which arise in you; but teach according to the words of the wise. Attend if you wish to dwell in the mouth of those who shall attend to your words, when you have entered upon the office of master, that your words may be upon our lips . . . and that there may be a chair from which to deliver your arguments.

Let your thoughts be abundant, but let your mouth be under restraint, and you shall argue with the great. Put yourself in unison with the ways of your master; cause him to say: "He is my son," so that those who shall hear it shall say "Praise be to her who has borne him to him!" Apply yourself while you speak; speak only of perfect things; and let the great who shall hear you say: "Twice good is that which issues from his mouth!"

Do that which your master bids you. Twice good is the precept of his father, from whom he has issued, from his flesh. What he tells us, let it be fixed in our heart; to satisfy him greatly let us do for him more than he has prescribed. Verily a good son is one of the gifts of Ptah, a son who does even better than he has been told to do. For his master he does what is satisfactory, putting himself with all his heart on the part of right. So I shall bring it about that your body shall be healthful, that the Pharaoh shall be satisfied with you in all circumstances and that you shall obtain years of life without default. It has caused me on earth to obtain one hundred and ten years of life, along with the gift of the favor of the Pharoah among the first of those whom their works have ennobled, satisfying the Pharoah in a place of dignity.

It is finished, from its beginning to its end, according to that which is found in writing.

Source:

From: Charles F. Horne, The Sacred Books and Early Literature of the East (New York: Parke, Austin, & Lipscomb, 1917), Vol. II: Egypt, pp. 62-78.

Scanned by: J. S. Arkenberg, Dept. of History, Cal. State Fullerton

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© Paul Halsall May 1998 halsall@murray.fordham.edu
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