Chapter 26 Second, success or failure is it

Because the gods of Egypt were changed from totems. Can't a totem become a "national god"?cannot.What is the relationship between totems and ethnic groups?blood relation.What is the relationship between the state and the people?public relationship.Tribes are organized by clans, and clans are organized by blood.The difference between a tribe and a country is that members of a tribe believe that they are descendants of the same totem, while a country must "divide residents according to regions and use power to deal with affairs."Therefore, in principle, changing a tribe into a country requires changing the totem at the same time.First, all tribal totems must be wiped out.Then, either take part of it and reshape one, such as the Chinese dragon; or simply create another patron saint directly, such as Athena who competes for posts.

Unfortunately, Egypt failed to do so. The Egyptians' approach was to turn all totems into gods, just as they directly turned all tribes into countries.Therefore, as many tribes as there were originally, there will be as many nomes later; as many totems as there were originally, there will be as many gods later.If this Nome is a confederacy of tribes, then there will be many gods in the same Nome.Coupled with the addition of later creation, it is said that there were as many as two thousand gods in ancient Egypt. right?With dozens of nomes, how could there be more than two thousand gods?

There are two reasons.First of all, they have many gods, almost every village has one, similar to our land father-in-law.Secondly, the attitude of the ancient Egyptians towards religion was extremely open and enlightened.Not only do they treat other Nome gods equally, even foreign gods are willing to have dinner with them when they come. Well!With so many gods, who has the final say?Lord God. There are also two main gods.One is local and one is national.So, who is the main national god?Which Noam is the boss of the rivers and lakes, their god is the main god.Horus, for example, was originally the patron saint of Thinis.After King Narmer (Menes) of Thinis "unified the world", Horus became the common god of upper and lower Egypt.Of course, in order to be accepted by everyone, a sun must be added on the head of the eagle, because the sun god was worshiped by the ancient Egyptians.Later, Thebes became the boss, and Amon of Thebes became the main god.Amon used to have various images, sometimes a goose, sometimes a snake, and sometimes a sheep.But in the end, a red sun rose above its head.

In other words, as long as one's own god becomes the sun god of all Egypt, he will be secure. However, the boss takes turns sitting on the bank.Thus, ancient Egypt would have many main gods, and even many sun gods—Ra, Horus, Amun, Aten, and so on. This means that "the emperor takes turns to do it, and he will come to my house next year", how can it not be chaotic? What's more, no matter who is the pharaoh, he has to insist on the "divine authority of the king", and he has to curry favor with the temple and priests, such as fighting for power and profit. The priest who helped her son to the throne was the priest.Obviously, the priests in the late dynasty were like the relatives of the Eastern Han Dynasty in China and the eunuchs in the late Tang Dynasty.Finally, Egypt has since entered the "post-dynastic period".

Speaking of which, this is also what the pharaohs did on their own.Because the temples and priests were originally fattened by themselves, who knew that they would not lose their tails?But they have to rely on temples and priests.Because the rationality of their rule and the legitimacy of their regime all come from gods, and they are gods transformed from totems. Theocracy is doomed to quench thirst only by drinking poison.The success or failure of ancient Egyptian politics all depended on the transformation of totems into gods. Can it not then become something else? can.Like Rome.

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