Chapter III. The Allegorical Theology of the Egyptians

[DIODORUS] ‘THESE Gods,’ he says (the Sun and the Moon, which are according to the Egyptians Osiris and Isis), ‘govern the whole cosmos, supplying nourishment and growth to all things in three distinct seasons, which by an invisible motion complete their circuit, spring, summer, and winter; and these being each of a very opposite nature to the others complete the year in excellent harmony. These deities, they say, contribute most to the quickening of all things with life, Osiris making the chief contribution of fire and wind, and Isis of water and earth, and both alike of air; and by these all things are generated and nourished. And for this reason, they say, the whole body of universal nature is made up completely out of the sun and moon, and as to the live parts of these before mentioned, breath, fire, earth, water, and finally air----just as in a man we count up head, and hands, and feet, and the other members----in the same manner the body of the cosmos is all composed of the parts before mentioned.

‘Each of these, they say, was regarded as a god, and a special name given to each according to his proper character, by those of the inhabitants of Egypt who first made use of articulate speech. So they called the wind Zeus, the word being so interpreted, and as he was the author of the soul in living beings they supposed him to be, as it were, a father of all.[1]

‘And with this, they say, the most illustrious poet of the Greeks agrees, when he speaks of this god, as

‘Father of men and gods.’ [2]

‘Fire by interpretation they called Hephaestus, considering him to be a great god, and to contribute much to the production and perfect growth of all things. The earth they supposed to be a sort of vessel containing all natural productions, and called it Mother: and the Greeks in like manner call it Demeter, the word having been a little changed through lapse of time.

‘For of old she was called Γῆ μήτηρ (Earth Mother), as Orpheus bears witness, saying----

‘Earth Mother of all, Demeter, giver of wealth.’ [3]

‘The water, it is said, was called by the ancients Oceané, which being interpreted is ‘Mother of food,’ but among some of the Greeks it was supposed to be the Ocean, concerning which the poet says,

‘Oceanus sire, and Tethys mother of gods.’ [4]

‘For the Egyptians consider their river Nile to be the Ocean, and that the gods had their origin near it, because in Egypt alone of the whole world there are many cities founded by the elder gods, such as those of Zeus, Helios, Hermes, Apollo, Pan, Eileithyia, and many others.

‘The air, it is said, they called Athena, the word being so interpreted, and they regarded her as the daughter of Zeus, and supposed her to be a virgin, because the air is naturally incorruptible, and occupies the highest place of the whole cosmos: on which account the fable went that she sprang from the head of Zeus. She was called also Tritogeneia from changing her nature thrice in the year, in spring, summer, and winter. She is also called Glaucopis, not as some of the Greeks supposed because she had light-blue eyes, for this is silly, but because the air has a bluish appearance.

‘They say that the five gods before mentioned travel over the whole world, and appear to men in the forms of sacred animals, sometimes also transforming themselves into the likenesses of men or other things: and that this is not fabulous, but possible, since these are in truth the progenitors of all things. The poet too, they say, having landed in Egypt, and had tales of this kind imparted to him by the priests, in a certain passage of his poem stated the above-mentioned circumstance as actually occurring:

‘They, curious oft of mortal actions, deign In forms like these to round the earth and main, Just and unjust recording in their mind, And with sure eyes inspecting all mankind.’ [5]

‘Thus much then the Egyptians say concerning the gods who are in heaven, and have had an eternal generation.

‘But others, they say, were born of these on earth, who having been originally mortal have obtained immortality on account of their wisdom and general beneficence to mankind, and some of them have been kings in Egypt. Of these some have the same names, when interpreted, as the gods of heaven, but others have received a name of their own; as Helios, and Kronos, and Rhea, and Zeus also, whom some call Ammon; and in addition to these Hera, Hephaestus, and Hestia, and Hermes last: and Helios was the first king of the Egyptians, having the same name as the luminary in the heaven.’ [6]

Such, then are the statements of the historian whom I have mentioned.

Moreover Plutarch, in his book On the story of Isis,writes as follows, word for word: [7]

[PLUTARCH] ‘Let us begin again, and consider first the simplest of those who are thought to speak in the more philosophical way. Now, just as the Greeks make Kronos an allegorical name for time (Chronos), and Hera for the air, and the birth of Hephaestus for the transformation of air into fire, so these say that in like manner among the Egyptians Osiris is the Nile, wedded to Isis the earth, and Typhon is the sea, into which the Nile falls and disappears.’

After these and similar statements, he refers the legends concerning the said deities back again to daemons, and then again gives first one allegorical rendering and afterwards another.

Now we might reasonably ask, to which set of gods, will they say, do the forms belong which are engraven on their statues. Are they those of daemons? Or those of fire, and air, and earth, and water? Or likenesses of men and women, and shapes of brute animals and wild beasts?

For it has been admitted even by themselves that certain mortal men have had the same names with the Sun and the universal elements, and that these men have been called gods. Of which then would it be reasonable to say that the sculptures on the lifeless statues are forms and images? Of the universal elements? Or, as their appearance plainly shows, of mortals now lying among the dead?

Why, even if they would not say so themselves, surely true reason shouts and cries aloud, all but in actual speech, and testifies that they of whom we speak have been mortal men. And Plutarch with superabundant pains describes the particular character of their bodily shapes, in his work On Isis and the Gods of Egypt.speaking as follows: [8]

‘The Egyptians narrate that in body Hermes was short-armed, and Typhon red in complexion, and Horus fair, and Osiris dark-skinned, as having been by nature men.’

Thus speaks Plutarch. So then their whole manufacture of gods consists of dead men; and their physical explanations are fictitious. For what need was there to model figures of men and women, when without them they could worship the sun and moon and the other elements of the cosmos?

To which of these two classes did they assign names of this kind, and with whom did they begin? I mean, for example, Hephaestus and Athena, and Zeus, and Poseidon, and Hera.

Were these in the first place names of the universal elements, which they have since ascribed to mortals, making them of the same name as the heavenly bodies? Or on the contrary, have they transferred the names in use among men to the natural substances?

But why should they address the natural elements of the universe by names of mortal men? And the mysteries belonging to each god, and the hymns, and songs, and the secrets of the initiatory rites,----do these introduce the symbols of the universal elements, or of the mortal men of old who had the same names with the gods?

Then as to wanderings, and drunken fits, and amours, and seduction of women, and plots against men, and countless things, which are in truth shameful and unseemly practices of mortal men, how could any one refer these to the universal elements, acts which bear upon their very face mortality and human passion?

So that from all these proofs this wonderful and noble physiology is convicted of having no connexion with truth, and containing nothing really divine, but possessing only a forced and counterfeit solemnity of external utterance. Hear, however, what Porphyry records concerning these same gods in his Epistle to Anebo the Egyptian.[9]