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In the sixty-fourth chapter of the Book of the Dead, dating back to the Itch dynasty about 3733 B.C., the rubric tells us that:
" If this chapter is known the person is made triumphant upon earth, and in the nether world, and he performeth all things that are done by the living. This composition is a secret-not to be seen or looked at. Recite the chapter when sanctified and pure, not approaching women, not eating goats' flesh or fish."
The text contains the following passages:
" I am Yesterday, To-day and To-morrow, for 1 am born again and again. I am That Whose Force is unmanifest and nourisheth the Dwellers in the West. I am the Guider in the East. The Lord of the Two Faces Who seeth by His own Light. The Lord of Resurrections Who cometh forth from the Dusk and Whose Birth is from the House of Death.
"Ye Two Divine Hawks upon your stations; Watchers of the Material World ; ye who go with the bier to its eternal home, and ye who conduct the Ship of the Sun; advancing onwards from the highest Heaven to the place of the Sarcophagus. "This is the Lord of the Shrine which standeth in the centre of the Earth, He is in me; and I am in Him.
"Mine is the radiance in which PHTHA floateth over His Firmament.
"Oh! Sun Who smileth gladly, and whose heart is delighted with the perfect Order of this day as thou enterest into Heaven and comest forth in the East: the Ancients and those Who are gone before, acclaim thee! " Let thy paths be made pleasant for me.
" Oh! thou who leapest forth! Conductor of the Shades and the glorified Ones from the earth! Let the fair path to the Western Abodes, which is made in behalf of those who faint, and for the restoration of those who are in pain, be granted unto me. " Blessed are they who see the bourne. Beauti ful is the God of the motionless heart, who restoreth Peace to the Torrent. " Behold! there cometh forth the Lord of Life, Osiris,' Thy support who abideth day and night.
"Let thy ways be made wide for me to traverse the earth and the expanse of Heaven. Shine Thou upon me, 0 penetrating power, as I draw near to the Divine words my ears shall hear in the Abodes of the West. Let no pollution of that which brought me forth be upon me. Deliver me, protect me from him who closeth His Eyes at twilight and bringeth to an end in darkness. (The annihilator. )
"I am He Who bursteth the Bonds. Utter most Extension is my Name. I bring to its fulness the Force which is hidden within me.
" I fly up to heaven and I alight upon earth and mine eye turneth back towards the traces of my footsteps. I am the offspring of yester day. The caverns of the earth have given me birth, and I am revealed at my appointed time."
This is the Triumphant Death-Song of the Initiated Egyptian. To Him the Life beyond the grave-the abodes of the West-opened a wider range of activity. To him Initiation meant the hastening of the Time of Ripened Power when he might become One with the Great God of Humanity, Osiris; slain that he might rise again, perfected through suffering, glorified through humiliation.
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