isisraa3

Freely adapted from the Egyptian book of the dead

THE LEGEND OF RA AND ISIS.go to painting

Now Isis was a woman who possessed words of power; her heart was wearied with the millions of men, and she chose the millions of the gods, but she esteemed more highly the millions of the "khu's" --the essences of men-- .

And she meditated in her heart, saying, "Cannot I by means of the "sacred name of God make myself mistress of the earth and become a goddess like unto "Ra in heaven and upon earth?"

Is that not my natural right ?

Am I not the mother of the world?

Now, behold, each day Ra entered at the head of his holy mariners and established himself upon the throne of the two horizons.

The holy one had grown old with rigidity. He dribbled at the mouth, his spittle fell upon the earth, and his slobbering dropped upon the ground. And Isis kneaded it with earth in her hand, and formed thereof a sacred serpent in the form of a spear; she set it not upright before her face, but let it lie upon the ground in the path whereby the great god went forth, according to his heart's desire into his double kingdom.

Now the holy god arose, and the gods who followed him as though he were Pharaoh went with him; and he came forth according to his daily wont; and the sacred serpent bit him. The flame of life departed from him, and he who dwelt among the cedars (?) was overcome. The holy god opened his mouth, and the cry of his majesty reached unto heaven. His company of gods said, "What hath happened?" and his gods exclaimed, "What is it?" But Ra could not answer, for his jaws trembled and all his members quaked; the poison spread swiftly through his flesh just as the Nile invadeth all his land.

When the great god had stabilised his heart, he cried unto those who were in his train, saying, "Come unto me, O ye who have come into being from my body, ye gods who have come forth from me, make ye known unto Khepera that a dire "calamity hath fallen upon me. My heart perceiveth it, but my eyes see it not; my hand hath not caused it, nor do I know who hath done this unto me.

What is it ?

What can it be ?

Never have I felt such "pain", neither can sickness cause more woe than this. I am a prince, the son of a prince, a sacred essence which hath proceeded from God. I am a great one, the son of a great one, and my father planned my name; I have multitudes of names and multitudes of forms, and my existence is in every god. I have been proclaimed by the heralds Tmu and Horus, and "my father and my mother uttered my name; but it hath been hidden within me by him "that begat me, who would not that the words of power of any seer should have "dominion" over me if ever they should KNOW my name.

I came forth to look upon that which I had made, I was passing "through the world which I had created, when lo! something stung me, but what I know not".

Is it fire? Is it water? My heart is on fire, my flesh quaketh, and trembling "hath seized all my limbs.

What is it ?

What can it be ?

Let there be brought unto me the children of the gods with "healing words and with lips that know, and with power which reacheth unto heaven" .

The children of every god came unto him in tears,

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Isis came with her healing words and with her mouth full of the breath of life, with her enchantments which destroy sickness, and with her words of power which make the dead to live. And she spake, saying, "

What hath come" to pass, O holy father? What hath happened? How come you know not ? Sole ruler of the world ?

A serpent hath bitten thee, and a thing "which thou hast created hath lifted up his head against thee. Verily it shall be cast "forth by MY healing words of power, and I will drive it away from before the sight of thy "sunbeams."

The holy god opend his mouth and said, " I was passing along my path, and I was " going through the two regions of my lands according to my heart's desire, to see that "which I had created, when lo! I was bitten by a serpent which I saw not. Is it fire? Is it water? I am colder than water, I am hotter than fire. All my flesh sweateth, I quake, my "eye hath no strengh, I cannot see the sky, and the sweat rusheth to my face even as in the "time of summer."

Then said Isis unto Ra, "O tell me thy name, holy father, for whosoever "shall be delivered by thy name shall live."

[ And Ra said], " I have made the heavens and the earth, I have ordered the montains, I have created all that is above them, I have made the water, I have made to come into being the great and wide sea, I have made the `Bull of his mother', from whom spring the delights of love. I have made the heavens, I have streteched out the two horizons like a curtain, and I have placed the soul of the gods within them. I am he who, if he openeth his eyes, doth make the light, and, if he closeth them, darkness cometh into being. At his command the Nile riseth, and the gods know not his/my name .I have made the hours, I have created the days, I bring forward the festivals of the year, I create the Nile-flood. I make the fire of life, and I provide food in the houses. I am Khepera in the morning, I am Ra at noon, and I am Tmu at even".

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Meanwhile the poison was not taken away from his body, but it pierced deeper, and the great god could no longer walk.

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Then said Isis unto Ra " What thou hast said is not thy name. O tell it unto me, "and the poison shall depart ; for he shall live whose name shall be revealed(to Isis)."

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Now the poison burned like fire, and it was fiercer than the flame and the furnace, and the majesty of the god said," I consent that Isis shall search into me, and that my name shall pass from me into her,"
 

Then the god hid himself from the gods, and his place in the boat of millions of years was empty.

And when the time arrived for the heart of Ra to come forth, Isis spake unto her son Horus, saying, "The god hath bound himself by an oath to deliver up his two eyes"

Thus was the name of the great god taken from him, and Isis, the lady of enchantments, said, "Depart, poison, go forth from Ra.

O eye of Horus, go forth from the god, and shine outside his mouth. It is I who work, it is I who "make to fall down upon the earth the vanquished poison ; for the name of the great god hath been taken away from him".

It is I Isis who proclaim by my will "May Ra live ! and may the poison die, may the poison die, and may Ra live!" These are the words of Isis, the great goddess, the queen of the gods, who knew Ra by his own name and who allows Ra to reign or not reign according to her own will. These are the words of Isis who can poison the very heart of the god if she wills it so. These are the words of Isis who will gradually poison to the death all that does not acknowledge her greatness.
 

and it came to pass that Isis ,drunk with power, relinquished Osiris; It was too late when she sensed the trap she had got herself into by denying Osiris. She plunged obcessively into her new status of supreme power. That Power achieved by wile and practiced from behind the scenes corrupted her being.
She was to age rapidly, and gradually lost her magic and her charm. Still she was greatly feared.

As the fear of "Her" or "She" or "It" grew enormously to encompass all space, it gradually faded from conscioussness and it was repressed, denied and then forgotten!

Isis sat on her throne ordering the great Raa at will from behind the scenes, till one day she woke-up to the fact that she had been deprived of all her powers, be it her legitimate or her magical powers. "SHE" from Goddess Creatrix of the World, became reviled, despised fettered and handicapped with a thousand male-made obstacles.

She sensed somehow that this calamity had befallen her when she denied Osiris and opted, mesmerised with the attraction of power, for her russe with Raa. Isis became acutely aware of the cries of Osiris entombed, mumified and banished safely into the underworld and long forgotten in his agony.

The vestiges of wisdom left to Isis somehow inspite of her deeply denatured state, caused Isis to be gripped by a knowledge that her liberation  was inseperably linked to the liberation of the great Osiris, so deeply wronged. This knowledge was only achieved many many centuries later. In the meantime she wallowed in her new powers enjoying the apparent humiliation of the great Raa inexplicably numb to the cummulative corruption and denaturing that was befalling her and all that was attached to her.

Matriarch versus usurping patriarch versus matriarch !(another chapter in the never ending Osiris drama)GO BACK TO THE "Blues of Osiris the first GREEN"

revenge of the wronged matriarch

betrayal and demise of ISIS the primordial
matriarch