Chapter 35 Chapter 37 God of Creation

Although I only climbed to the top of the Great Pyramid in the middle of the night the day before, when I approached it under the hot sun the next day, not only did I have no sense of victory at all, but I felt like a tiny ant standing at the gate of the temple , with a temporary body of flesh and blood, facing the eternally magnificent and great hall.I have a feeling that this great pyramid will always sit on this land.The Greek historian Diodorus Siculus said in the 1st century BC that the pyramid "doesn't know what god gave it shape, put it on this sand, and it will stand still until forever".And who is his so-called "Where God", if it is not King Khufu that Egyptians have believed for generations?

For the second time in 12 hours, I climbed the Great Pyramid again.In daylight, the towering rock blocks pierced geological time, completely ignoring the baptism of human time, appearing majestic and terrifying.Fortunately, this time we only need to climb 6 floors of stones, and it is still a modern staircase, and we come to the "Mamen Cave", which is the main entrance to the Great Pyramid today. In the 9th century A.D., Mamen came here to explore and did not find the real entrance of the Great Pyramid. In fact, it is about 10 layers of stones from Mamen Cave, 55 feet above the surface, and about 24 feet east from the north-south axis.Below the entrance, which is protected by the gable masonry method with huge limestone blocks, is a downhill path of 26 degrees, 31 minutes and 23 seconds.What is strange is that the length and height of this passage are only 3 feet 5 inches and 3 feet 11 inches respectively, but the width is 12 feet, and the thickness of the floor is a full 33 inches, and the thickness of the ceiling slab above is even more. 8 feet 6 inches.

This kind of wonderful architectural structure can be seen everywhere in the Great Pyramid. The complexity of the structure is unbelievable, and the purpose is even more incomprehensible.We have no way of knowing how such a large stone brick was installed, let alone how the Egyptians were able to combine stones with stones at the most precise angle with the engineering technology at that time (reader It may have been discovered that the 26-degree angle of the downhill is a deliberate setting, and almost all downhill passages in the tower are designed in this way).And no one knows what the purpose of the construction is in such a delicate way.

everlasting light Entering the pyramid from the Mammon Cave entrance feels extremely unnatural, like trying to enter a mountain laterally from the side of a mountain, lacking a well-thought-out sense of geometric beauty and intentional purpose.And what's worse, when entering the dark and ugly horizontal passage from Mammon's Cave, you can only see devastation all around, all the Arab workers that Mammon allowed him to burn with fire, splash with vinegar, beat with hammers, Use a saw to saw, do everything possible to destroy, and open the traces of this road. The brutal behavior of the grave openers was, of course, barbaric and inexcusable.However, from another point of view, isn’t the original design of the pyramid designed to lure intelligent and curious descendants to come to explore in order to solve the unsolved mysteries?Think of it this way: If you were a pharaoh and wanted your body to survive your death forever, unharmed, would you choose to (a) hype yourself and future generations by letting them know where you were buried, or (2) Choose a secret, unknown location, never tell others, and no one else can find it?

The answer is obvious, of course the latter.Most ancient Egyptian pharaohs also chose the latter (for example, in the isolated Valley of the Kings in Luxor in Upper Egypt). So, if the Great Pyramid is really the king's tomb, why was it built so magnificently?Why create such a large tower with an area of ​​13 acres and a height of 500 feet?Or, we can ask, if the purpose is only to protect and hide Khufu's body, why the pyramid is designed to be so eye-catching and reverie, and no matter in what era and under what circumstances, it has never stopped bewitching tomb robbers , explorers desperately trying to break in?

The architects, masons, surveyors, and technicians who built the Great Pyramid were so talented that it was impossible not to notice this most basic human psychology.The pyramid is a collection of workers' strong ambition, excellent technology and aesthetic feeling, deep observation, and understanding of symbols and forms.Therefore, even in the long past, they must have fully understood that what they built was an everlasting light, standing forever on the highland on the west bank of the Nile, overlooking the world. Simply put, the people who built the pyramids must have built such a great building that will show off people's hearts forever through mysterious planning.They must have expected that someone would invade it in future generations, someone would measure it precisely, and because of its existence, human beings would forever remember the deepest secrets buried in ancient times.

crazy mind gymnastics At the point where the channel excavated by Mamen and the original 26-degree downward slope of the pyramid intersect, a stainless steel door is blocked, which divides the road into two parts: to the north is an upward slope, which can reach the original structure of the gable roof. The entrance; to the south, there is a downhill road of about 350 feet, leading directly to the foundation, which is about the height of the ground.If you continue down from here, through another passage, you can reach a wide underground space 600 feet directly below the pyramid.The straight passage was constructed with extraordinary precision, top to bottom, with a tolerance of only 1/4 inch on the sides and less than 1/10 inch on the roof.

Through the stainless steel door, I continued to stay on the tunnel of Mammon, took a few breaths of ancient air, and let my eyes get used to the dim artificial light, then bent down and climbed to the narrow and steep passage carved by Arab workers.When the Arab workers first entered the pyramid, the bottom of the ascent path was blocked by a thick granite block, which made it impossible to pass through. This passage was dug out as a last resort.From above the passage, two barricades of granite can be seen, in the same position as before, except that one of them was moved slightly during the excavation and was no longer in place.Ancient Egyptologists speculate that these two roadblocks must have been tied to the entrance of the passage from above, that is to say, they were moved 129 feet from the bottom to the top of the passage, and the roadblocks were moved all the way to the entrance of the passage (see "Towards Ancient Egypt") Key to Travel", p. 114. The Travelers Key to Ancient Egypt, Harap-Columbus, London, 1989.).But architects and engineers took a more realistic look at the Egyptologists' speculations as unreasonable, since there was so little gap between the barricades and the walls that it would have been difficult to move a few inches, let alone hundreds of feet. up.

If so, the granite barricades would have to have been erected at the same time as the construction of the pyramids.But why would it be necessary to close the road in the early stages of construction (especially when access is needed to expand the room and decorate the interior)?And if the purpose of the roadblock is to contain intruders, wouldn't it be easy and effective to place it at the bottom of the road?The easiest way is to block the upward ramp from the northern entrance from the bottom, so that there is no need to set up roadblocks anywhere else, and no one can enter. In any case, one thing is certain: throughout history, this barricade of granite has not only never successfully warded off intruders, but, like the iron gate in Blue Beard's tale, has only aroused the curiosity of intruders For example, Mammon did not retreat because of the roadblock, but encouraged him to dig a tunnel next to it and bypass it, because he was sure that there must be priceless treasures hidden behind the strict protection.

And did the people who built the pyramids take this into account when designing?Although we can't be sure, we don't have to immediately deny this possibility.Anyway, thanks to Thomas Gate (and humanity that has never changed for thousands of years), I was able to enter the upper part of the original uphill road that was not blocked by the road.This slippery passage, only 3 feet 5 inches wide and 3 feet 11 inches high (exactly the same size as the downhill), has a slope of 26 degrees 2 minutes 30 seconds (the slope of the downhill is 26 degrees 31 minutes 23 seconds). Why did the builders of the pyramids have a special fondness for 26 degrees?The inclination of all roads in the tower is 26 degrees, which is exactly half of the 52-degree inclination of the side of the pyramid. Is it intentional or coincidental (to be precise, it is 51 degrees, 50 minutes and 35 seconds. See "The Key to Traveling to Ancient Egypt", 112 Page.)?

Readers may not have forgotten the special significance of 26 degrees.It holds the key to determining the specific height formula of the Great Pyramid in order to correspond to the dynamics of the earth's surface.The original height of the Great Pyramid (481.3949 feet) and the circumference of the base (3023.16 feet) have the same ratio as the earth's radius and circumference, which is 2π (2×3.14). To achieve this ratio, the builder had to tilt the pyramid The angle of the tower is designed to be 52 degrees (the angle is too large or too small to make the height and circumference of the tower have a relationship of 2π). In Chapter 23 of this book, we saw that in the ancient city of Teotihuacan, Mexico, there was a monument called the "Pyramid of the Sun". The builders were obviously aware of the existence of π and used it in buildings middle.The relationship between the height of the Pyramid of the Sun (233.5 feet) and the circumference of the base (2932.76 feet) is 4π. The greatest pyramids of ancient Egypt and the greatest pyramids of ancient Mexico use the ratio of π at the same time, which is worthy of attention.When the two pyramids were built, it was still quite some time before the Greeks "discovered" π.Moreover, there is various evidence that the builders intended to convey a certain—and the same—message by using π. This is not the first time, nor will it be the last, that I have felt the moving touch of ancient wisdom.I don't mean Egyptian or Mexican wisdom in particular, but all wisdom that transcends time and draws us like a beacon.Some people are attracted by the wealth of their ancestors, while others are attracted by the wisdom of ancient people's seemingly inadvertent use of π, and try to find out whether there are other hidden mathematical mysteries. While thinking about this problem, I shrunk my body to half my height, felt my back rub against the limestone on the ceiling, and tried my best to go up the 26-degree slope. Let this road calculated by using trigonometric functions lead us to into the center of 6 million tons of rock.After hitting the ceiling with my head several times in a row, I began to wonder, why didn't the person who can design the pyramid with a genius, not think of designing the height of the passage two or three feet more?If they have the ability to design a pyramid (as it turns out they do), and put so many corridors in it, of course they should also be able to design these corridors so that people can stand in them.Again, I suspect that the pyramid designers made the corridors so narrow on purpose because it suited their needs.Also, they intentionally made the uphill that way because they wanted it to (rather than being forced by the form). Where is the motivation for this seemingly crazy ancient mental gymnastics? distant and unknown darkness After reaching the top of the uphill passage, I encountered another unexplainable puzzle of the pyramid, which is the great corridor known as "the greatest building left in the ancient kingdom".This one continues to extend upwards at an angle of 26 degrees, and finally almost disappears in the dark corridor above. The roof is an impressive beam-shaped dome structure. However, I have no intention of entering the Great Corridor right away.For from here, there is a parallel fork to the south, 3 feet 9 inches high and 127 feet long, leading to the Queen's Hall.I had visited the Great Pyramid years ago when I first became acquainted with it, and had admired the majestic beauty of the chamber, so wanted to relive the old dream.Unfortunately, when I walked a few feet to the entrance, there was a "Temporarily Do Not Enter" sign in front of me. I didn't know at the time that the Queen's Palace banned tourists from entering because Rudolf Cantenbrink, a German roboticist, was working in the narrow space inside.Employed by the Egyptian Archaeological Office, Ganden Belling has been carefully operating a $250,000 high-tech remote-controlled mini-robot Upuaut since early March 1993. (So ​​named because Egyptologists believe it was a cave that let air in and out) Debris was cleared nearby. On March 22, Upwat suddenly discovered that the surface of the ramp suddenly became very smooth after going up about 200 feet from the steep vent (with a slope of 39.5 degrees, but only 8 inches high and 9 inches wide).After investigation, it was found that the surface material of the section that Upwat entered was beautiful Tulu (Turn) limestone, which was usually only used to decorate sacred places such as churches and king's tombs.This alone is already amazing, and when Upwat walked to the end of this slope, he was even more surprised to find that there was a hard limestone gate in the stone pile, with metal accessories on it. Everything you need... There are two air holes in the queen's hall, one on the south side and the other on the north side, but what is amazing is that these two passages called air holes have no exit to the outside of the pyramid.For unknown reasons, the builders at that time deliberately did not chisel the end of the air vent, leaving the last 5 inches of stone, so that ordinary intruders would never be able to see or enter this air passage. Why?Why make the ventilation hole so that people can't find it?Or did the builders want to create a maze, so that future generations can find these two passages one day under the correct conditions they envisioned? After all, from the very beginning, we find that the Queen's Hall has two very obvious ventilation holes, which run through the north and south walls of the pyramid.The people who built this pyramid must have expected that one day the world would think that there should be ventilation holes in the Queen's Palace and start searching.After Mamen opened the door of the Great Pyramid in 820 AD, no one could have thought of this problem for about 1,000 years.It was not until 1872 that a British engineer (also a member of the Freemason secret society [Freemason]) Waynman Dixon (Waynman Dixon) began to suspect that "if there are ventilation holes in the king's palace, then the queen's palace should also have vents." ".After he knocked on the wall of the queen's hall, he found two passages.The first thing to open was the south vent, and he told Bill Grundy, the carpenter and jack-of-all-trades hand, to jump into the cave with a hammer and a saw and start digging and moving forward. Grundy, determined and conscientious, The work was smooth at first, and soon the softer (limestone) stone in front was chiseled. But, no! After a few knocks, Grundy's saw was stuck in the stone, and he couldn't get in. ." Grundy's saw was stuck in a "rectangular, parallel, barrel-shaped tunnel, just 9 inches wide and 8 inches high. After extending 7 feet from the wall, it began to climb at a steep angle into the unknown , the dark distance...". 221 years after Dixon's expedition, Gandenbessen finally used a robot to walk into the unknown and dark steep slope, using the latest technology to satisfy the human instinct of peeping that has never been weakened since 1872.Of the many interesting shots captured by the remote-controlled robot's camera, one of particular interest is the long metal rod made in the 19th century at the end of the vent.This is apparently evidence that Dixon, with his loyal subordinate Grundy, secretly probed the vents (British Museum presentation. 22 November 1993. Gunden Belling. Video by Robot Upwater. ).Presumably, they thought at the time that since the builders of the pyramid had spent so much effort to build a vent and then blocked it, they must have hidden something important and worth searching for, so they spared no effort to want it. Cut that vent open. If at the beginning we assume that there is a presupposed force in the dark that prompts the searcher to act, and after making the searcher work hard, it is found that the passage is actually a dead end, then this assumption is meaningless.Fortunately, when the search activity encountered a bottleneck, Ganden Belling found another door, and it was an iron gate hanging door. Not only did it have all the metal accessories, but there was also a confusing ditch underneath the door. groove.In the image taken back from Upwat, we see a black hole that leads to a deeper, farther, bottomless black hole... Obviously, another invitation to move on.Ever since Mamen opened the central tunnel of the Great Pyramid and entered the inner room, the world has repeatedly received similar challenges.First, Dixon came and successfully verified the hypothesis that "the Queen's Palace must also have a hidden vent". Then Ganden Belling took his high-tech robot and found a door on the vent. Next, we must know which door The secret behind the door—whether it brings us disappointment or an invitation to further exploration. hidden queen hall We will continue to discuss Gunden Belling and his robot Upvart in a later chapter.However, on the morning of March 16, 1993, completely unaware that such a discovery would be made, I was extremely disappointed at the closure of the Queen's Hall, and stared fiercely at the metal barricade blocking the door. I also remember that the average height inside the tunnel was 3 feet 9 inches, but it also varied slightly depending on the location.110 feet due south from where I stood, that is, 15 feet from the entrance to the Queen's Hall, the road drops abruptly, so that the passage is raised to 5 feet 8 inches.No one can reasonably explain the significance of this weird construction. The Queen's Hall has apparently been empty since the day it was built.The room is 17 feet 2 inches long from north to south, 18 feet 10 inches long from east to west, and the roof height reaches 20 feet 5 inches. Said to be in an unfinished state.Salt still oozes from time to time between the gray, rough limestone slabs of the walls.Many people have made all kinds of guesses, but in the end they all disappeared. There is still a square trace left on the north and south walls.It is said that in 1872 Dixon discovered a passage leading directly to the endless darkness of the mysterious vent.There is nothing on the west wall.Two feet south of the midline of the east wall, there is a concave round bell-shaped shrine 15 feet 4 inches high and 5 feet 2 inches wide at the base.The original shrine was 3 feet 5 inches deep, but when the medieval Arabs came in looking for treasure, they dug inside to find the treasure room, but nothing was found either. Ancient Egyptian scholars have not been able to come up with a strong statement about the function of the concave hole in the wall and the purpose of the queen's hall. Everything is still in chaos.The facts before us contradict each other.All we see are enigmas. Special organs of the Great Corridor Similarly, the Great Corridor is not only a big mystery, but also the most puzzling mystery in the Great Pyramid.Measured upwards from the 6-foot-9-inch wide floor, the height of the walls is 7 feet 6 inches.Above the wall line, there are 7 layers of stone blocks (each grid extends 3 inches inward), making the zenith gradually close, and at the highest roof, the width of the passage is only 3 feet 5 inches, and the height rises to 28. foot. As we have said before, the Grand Corridor needs to forever support the largest stone building on earth - the upper 2/3 of the weight.Isn't it strange that the ancient Egyptians, who are considered "quite technically primitive", were able to conceive, design, and successfully build such a great structure weighing millions of tons more than 4,500 years ago ? Assuming that the Egyptians chose to cover the large rain channel on flat ground, the length was no more than 20 feet, which was difficult enough given the technology at the time.But the Egyptians still had a problem for themselves. They covered the corridor with a length of 153 feet at an inclination angle of 26 degrees. Non-identifiable with the naked eye. What is even more surprising is that the pyramid builders used some very interesting concepts of symmetry when building.For example, the width of the roof of the grand aisle is 3 feet 5 inches, and the width of the floor is 6 feet 9 inches.Along the centerline of the floor of the entire aisle, there is a groove 2 feet deep and 3 feet 5 inches wide, and on both sides of the groove is a stone ramp 1 foot 8 inches wide.What is the function of this groove?Why is it exactly the same width as the roof, making the top and bottom look very symmetrical?Seen from the bottom up, the sides of the roof are covered with stones, which looks like a ditch ("Ancient Egyptian Pyramid Texts", page 281. The Ancient Egyptian Pyramid Texts (trans. R. O. Faulkner), Oxford University Press, 1969.). I know I'm definitely not the first person to stand under the great corridor and feel the helplessness of being placed in an unreasonable mechanism.Who ever said it was a false intuition?Those who dare to accuse others of being wrong must be able to produce evidence to prove that they are right.However, since ancient times, there is no record about the Great Corridor.Only the ancient Egyptians have mystical, symbolic, and strongly symbolic references in their texts on ritual ceremonies.According to these materials, the pyramid is a mechanism designed for the transformation of a person into an immortal body after death. It "opens the door of the sky and builds a road" so that the pharaoh "sublimates to the gods" after his death. I can fully accept the existence of this belief system and believe that because of this belief, the Egyptians were motivated to engage in such a large-scale mobilization.But what I can't understand is why the Egyptians needed to use a huge and complex organ device that is a corridor, a corridor, a room, and a tunnel, and weighs 6 million tons to achieve this mysterious, Spiritual, symbolic purpose. Standing in the corridor, I felt like I was in the depths of a huge organ, not only attracted by its undeniable beauty (a heavy, almost autocratic beauty), but also shocked by its unadorned simplicity (neither images of gods nor reliefs or any other text reminiscent of religion, worship).My first impression of the Grand Corridor was one of a certain sense of purpose.When the builder designed and built it, he obviously set specific functions and purposes for it.But at the same time, I can't help but realize the solemn and heavy atmosphere brewed by the Grand Corridor as a whole, as well as the meticulous construction. I was on the grand corridor, at about the halfway point, I felt the lights and shadows in the front and back of the corridor, dancing on the stone wall.Pausing, I looked up at the shadowed roof—the vaulted roof supporting the weight of the entire Great Pyramid of Egypt.Suddenly, I was overwhelmed with awe: this gigantic building of stones was so old, and I trusted it so much, standing in the very center of it, unquestioningly placing myself His life was entrusted to it.The large boulders piled up on the roof of the Great Corridor - with steeper and steeper slopes - best illustrate its high technical level.The great archaeologist and surveyor Flinder Petrie made the following observations about the Great Corridor: On the lower edge of each ceiling slab, there is a claw-like protrusion that fits into a cut in the upper part of the wall.Therefore, one slab above does not exert any pressure on the one below.In this way, the stone slabs are supported by the side walls and interlaced with each other. In theory, when the Egyptians built the pyramids, they were still in the Neolithic culture that had just escaped from the hunting life. It is really unimaginable that they could accomplish such a complex project. Along the 2-foot-wide central groove, I walked up the large corridor again.Modern people have laid a floor with wood on the ground, and with handrails, it is no longer difficult to go up.But in ancient times, the limestone floor was very smooth after being polished, and the upward slope was as steep as 26 degrees, making it almost impossible for ordinary people to walk on it. So how do they climb when they want to go up?Has anyone ever climbed it? At the end of the large corridor in the distance, the entrance of the "Palace of the King" can be vaguely seen, standing on top of it in the dark, waving to all the travelers who come to visit but are full of doubts in their hearts.