The Prophet Joseph Smith's Explanation of Facsimile 2, Figure 5, with its startling names for stars and cosmic forces, opens an unfamiliar window onto Ancient Egypt. Are the unusual names part of a unique Mormon cosmology? or are they true Egyptian phrases, though expressed in a unique phonetic transcription?
"Fig. 5. Is called in Egyptian Enish-go-on-dosh; this is one of the governing planets also, and is said by the Egyptians to be the Sun, and to borrow its light from Kolob through the medium of Kae-e-vanrash, which is the grand Key, or, in other words, the governing power, which governs fifteen other fixed planets or stars, as also Floeese or the Moon, the Earth and the Sun in their annual revolutions. This planet receives its power through the medium of Kli-flos-is-es, or Hah-ko-kau-beam, the stars represented by numbers 22 and 23, receiving light from the revolutions of Kolob."
http://www.lds.org/scriptures/pgp/abr/fac-2?lang=eng
The lower panel, on which Figure 5 (the Hathor Cow) is found, presents 1) a Bird-Snake presenting the Wedjat-Eye to an enthroned Horus- or Amun-Min, 2) a woman, whose face is the Wedjat-Eye, holding a lotus blossom over the flanks of the divine Cow, and 3) Four Mummified Figures (the Sons of Horus), along with 4) the hieroglyphs Lotus Lion Ram.
What the Explanation describes is the transfer, borrowing, and reception of Light and Power from, or by means of, a governing star to a lesser star. Certain keys or governing powers work this transfer of light. The Explanation reads clearly, though the underlying astronomical conceptions remain utterly unfamiliar to moderns. Yet the Egyptian evidence for such transmission or sharing of stellar and solar light may be found in both the ancient art and literature (see Hugh Nibley and Michael Rhodes, One Eternal Round, 220-21, with illustration from tomb of Tutankhamun; 240, 267, 295-99, 334; David Klotz, Adoration of the Ram: Five Hymns to Amun-Re from Hibis Temple [New Haven, 2006], 176, 181-2: Shu-feathers, as on Fac. 2, fig. 2; also the hypocephalus as iris-and-pupil hiding Amun-Re, the spiritual power behind the physical light of the sun).
Outside the Egyptian evidence, the closest thing in all literature to the Explanation of Figure 5 is Section 88 of the Doctrine and Covenants (revealed 27 and 28 December 1832; 3 January 1833). Section 88 says that Jesus Christ both "ascended up on high" (Figure 2: Oliblish) and also "descended below all things [the lower panel that represents the lowest world, the world that borrows and receives light], in that he comprehended all things [the all-comprehensive round hypocephalus itself]." He is "the light of truth": "As also he is in the sun, and the light of the sun, and the power thereof by which it was made [borrows its light through the medium of the grand key, etc]." He is also in the moon, stars, and earth as their light and the power thereof by which they were made (Fig. 5: "as also moon, sun, earth," etc.). Because the wording about the sun, moon, earth, and stars also much recalls the Prophet's 1832 account of his youthful reflections before receiving the First Vision, we can trace a direct line of thought about the glories of the cosmos, from about 1818 to 1842, the year of the publication of Facsimile 2.
"Light proceedeth forth" from the presence of Christ "to fill the immensity of space" (Hugh Nibley cites the verse several times in One Eternal Round). Here is the "grand governing power" that fills other vessels, that is, stars and planets, with light. This light is the "power of God who sitteth upon his throne, who is in the bosom of eternity, who is in the midst of all things" (as the "heart star," Kolob, in Figure 1 of Facsimile 2, One Eternal Round, 250ff.). Human beings may be "quickened by a portion" of this glory, which comprehends more than one level of glory or power. A portion implies a measure, even a spark, sufficient to quicken, or bring to life, and to maintain that life and glory.
No wonder Hugh Nibley once taught a Sunday School class that Section 88 was the most Egyptian of all sections of the Doctrine and Covenants! Section 88, the 1832 Account of the First Vision, and the Explanation of Figure 5 must each be read in light of the other.
II
Kae-e-vanrash, like the other strange names in the Explanation, puzzles. Can it be read as Egyptian? The first rule of interpretation is to look for simplicity. Several Egyptian verbs and phrases express the powerful energy of the sun and the other heavenly bodies as the source of light and vision (see 88:11). We should both begin and end with such common but semiotically telling ("encyclopaedic") words. Second, a suggested phrase or word to explain the name should also fit the figures and actions on the panel. Any reading should thus be both peculiar and specific to one or more of the following: the inspired Explanation, the iconography of the hypocephalus (and its texts), or the writings of Egyptologists. A third and important rule is that we should not expect a crystalline phonetic transcription, that is, a match that answers exactly to our own assumptions about the phonology. The Prophet's readings reflect a 19th century American's attempts at reproducing the sound of the word, not a phonology with point-by-point exactitude; besides, Egyptian phonology remains but poorly understood. It would therefore be best to try a variety of possible Egyptian readings in order to evaluate how each attempt answers to the requirements of the Explanation and to the iconography of the hypocephalus.
Kae-e suggests at least four Egyptian expressions, and each deserves its fair shake. I favor reading Kae-e as a participial form of the verbal root x-'-j (= hae, as it is spelled in the Akhmimic dialect of Coptic). The lexeme expresses a royal or divine manifestation in glory and power. In particular, x-'-j (linked semantically with the verb wbn, to rise) expresses sunrise, coronation, royal accession, and festival appearance. We recall that Kae-e-vanrash has to do with Kolob, the source of light and energy, and is said to be the "governing power," or "grand Key," for the transfer of said energy.
Kae-e also reminds me of a semantically similar root that often appears with x'j: q-3-j. Q3j, a stative verb, signifies to be high; q3jw, the highest of all (Hugh Nibley, "The Three Facsimiles," 1980, plays with this reading). Q3j-' (the high of arm), an archaic royal title, corresponds to the figure of Min in the Lower Panel. The arm is symbolic of power and authority in the Ancient Near East. In Hebrew zeroah ramah signifies "the high arm" (Job 38:15); Job is asked: "Or hast thou an arm like God" (40:9).
I note a third possibility for Kae-e in k3, the ka-spirit or life-power (meaning the energies that enliven the physical body). The ka-spirit is also the medium by which the royal power is transferred from father to son. The notion of ka thus has to do with the continuity of the earthly dynastic line. In its plural form, K3w expresses a fullness of powers. The word fits the context: the bird-like serpent, who offers the Wedjat-Eye in the lower panel bears the k3w name: Nehebkau, the "provider of Kas" (for this figure, see Nibley and Rhodes, One Eternal Round, 307-8).
Kae-e also evokes the bull (k3) as symbol of kingship and godhood: k3 wr (= Kae-e, the great governing bull) and such planetary names as k3-pt (bull of heaven = Mars). In Hugh Nibley's discussion of the fifteen stars, which feature in the explanation of figure five, he refers us to a vignette from the Book of Gates of fifteen bearers of a ship ("the ship of bearers") whose prow and bow both show a bull's head; two further representations of the bull also hover over the ends of the ship (One Eternal Round, 298-99). Are we to think here of the vital energy of the bull alone, or of the elusive powers of k3w? Again, the rim of the hypocephalus speaks of the god as the "mighty bull," who is "exalted," or "lifted up," thus both k3 and q3. All these do recall the Prophet's explanation of Kae-e-vanrash. . . Perhaps k3w should be the favored reading, after all. Still, the vitalizing Ka seems to refer to the physical life of animal bodies rather than to the energy that fires sun and star, even while both are necessary for continuance of existence. (Both are necessary: Note how the Egyptian cosmos can never be the cold cosmos of "humanism," one in which animal life is mere--and fading--accident.) The scene from the Book of Gates binds these energies together.
How about -vanrash, a real puzzler? -Vanrash, if we follow basic Egyptian syntax and standard rules of phonology, invites several possibilities, but I'm not ready to endorse any of them. We're just guessing here. These include: (Participle) van + (Preposition) r + (Noun Phrase) ash and van + m + rash (with the preposition m merging with the final root letter n of the verbal form). -Ash suggests Eg. 'sh3 (to be many, many) and rash, rsh (to be joyful, joy). The Egyptian phrase 'ash3.t wnw (many in essences = mit vielen Wesen, of the Red Crown) could be written ashvan (Woerterbuch I, 307). -Vanrash might accordingly be read: wnw hr ash3.t, or the like. But I doubt it.
-Van puzzles; we typically don't think of a v in Egyptian. I see several possibilities (Nibley, 1980, notices the first two): wnj (to open), wn(n) (to be, exist), wbn (to rise, illuminate), and the thematically related solar bn-stone (or bn-bn stone), and bnw (phoenix and baboon). Wbn intrigues: the combination of the w or u + b suggests the possibility of the v, and the verb fits the theme of the manifestation of light. Take the Egyptian harp, bjnw (spelled like the words bnw or bjnw, phoenix, and bnw, baboon). In later Egyptian bjnw yields both boine (Sahidic Coptic) and ouwini (Bohairic), evidence that the /b/ phoneme, here, sounds something like the soft /b/ of Japanese or Spanish. The same phoneme occurs in the verb wnn (to be, to exist), as instanced in the Osirian epithet wnn-nfr (who shall ever be complete): ouenofre (Sahadic), benofer (Bohairic), ouenabre (Old Coptic), and ouenafer and ouenaf (pBM 10808). A glance at these Coptic spellings (nof/naf/nab, nofer/nafer, naf, ouen/ben), shows the difficulties in rendering the Egyptian phonemes into European alphabetic systems--even by speakers of ancient Egyptian (Woerterbuch, I).
A /v/ phoneme? Antonio Loprieno lists the inventory of consonantal phonemes for older Egyptian: no v. But, by the time we get to the Coptic inventory, we find the following entry under Labial Phonemes, in which "Voiced" is now "[Voiced]": /b/ [international phonetic alphabet, beta]. "The voiced phoneme /b/," we are told, "by this time was probably articulated as a fricative [beta]," Antonio Loprieno, Ancient Egyptian: A Linguistic Introduction, 40-1). "By this time" indicates a long development from Old Kingdom Egypt all the way down to Coptic editions of the New Testament. Professor Loprieno speaks of the "frequent alternation" of Coptic /b/ with /f/ and ou, that is, /w/, and gives as evidence the word for gold, nb - noub - nouf, and, again, harp: boine - ouwini, Ancient Egyptian, 248 n 58). Joseph Smith's transcription of /v/ is no howler.
Our -vanrash (wanrash, fanrash, or banrash), in an instant, starts to signify: Ba m rshw.t, the Ba in rejoicing? wnj wr, the great key?). The strong, stand-alone r must match a very specific word. Irj, to do or make, comes first to mind. But how about jrw (forms; created, made forms)? We then have: van-r-ash = wnn (m) jrw asha, being in many manifest forms or creations. What could come closer to the mark than x'y wnn jrw asha, the One who makes manifest (in light), being of many forms? or q3j wnn jrw asha, the Exalted One, who comes into being as many creations (forms)?
Hugh Nibley toyed with various readings but seemed to favor wnj r 'sha (the Exalted One who opens [makes light accessible] for many). This hits the nail on the head, but other readings also come to mind. For instance: wn r (or hr or m) 'sha (the One who exists as many), wn m rsh (who exists in joy), or even the solar phrase wbn m rsh (to rise or illuminate in joy), with wbn written with the determinative sign of the sunburst, its lengthened rays bathing a world in joyous light. Here is the transfer of light from one planet to another; and the mission of the sun, in Egyptian terms, is to bring joy and life to all things. Ultimately, as Heinrich Brugsch notes in his Thesaurus (I, 79), there are many suns in the reflective Egyptian cosmos. "These are all suns" (wnn r'.w: van-ra?) begins a text at Philae. And you must consider this--a touch of Venus, known to the Egyptians as d3j-bnw-wsjr (Traverses space by boat-Phoenix-Osiris). D3j could correspond to -go (in Enish-go-on-dosh), and bnw-wsjr does something recall our vanrash. "Something recalls" lacks specificity. We're just raking through the leaves for gold. . .and 'sh' (many) does not quite answer to gold: the phonological realization of the word in Coptic is ashe not ash. Yet these names, says Nibley, are written more for the ear than the eye--they are not exact transcriptions.
One possibility for Kae-e-vanrash, then, is to read the nominal chain as "the One high of arm, who rises and illuminates (the worlds) in joyfulness." The reading recalls Figure 7: Min with upraised hand and flail. Here is the peculiar and specific that approaches rigorous demonstration (as Nibley would say): Min is "He of the upraised hand" (with hand or arm, the sign of power in the Ancient Near East, also used euphemistically to describe generative power): "Praise of Min, exaltation of Horus with the upraised arm. Greetings to you, Min, as you come forth [like the sun at dawn], etc." (Louvre Stele C-30; see One Eternal Round, 304ff., 311). In this instance Min takes the epithet f3j-' (lifted of arm), but q3j-' ("high of arm") is perhaps the more ancient term.
Consider the following: (Min) Upraised of Arm [f3j-'] Tall of Plumes [High: q3j-shw.tj], King of the gods./Upraised of Arm [f3j-'], Lord of the double-crown, Mighty of prestige [wsr f3w] and Lord of respect," David Klotz, Adoration of the Ram (i.e., by the baboons: Hibis Temple hymns), 206-7. All of which also mirrors the baboons, "Kli-flos-isis," with arms uplifted, praising Kolob (Flo-s = f3w--so Nibley (1980); or even f3.w, "the bearers/lifters" as members of the solar crew. The imagery of uplifted arms can signal four or five things (all found in Egypt): attack (Min), uplift (Min), submission, and (thus) worship (the baboons)--and spontaneous joy or praise--a rejoicing over dawn. Further: uplifted arms for the Egyptians, like our own electronic transmitters and receivers (or like mountain peaks), convey energy in the form of light, as names of figures that adore the sun make clear: m3w-' (shining of arm) and shsp-' (receiving of arm), John Darnell, "Cosmological Composition of the Books of the Underworld," PhD dissertation, 122-3.
Why baboons? Young domesticated baboons were trained to carry small objects: they were bearers. The baboon symbolism thus reflects both simian habits in the wild (lifting arms at dawn; waving boughs in action of praise: praisers) and at home: t3 kjry f3j p3 mqr/jw bw f3j sw mw.t=s (The female kiry-ape carries the milk jar, though her mother did not carry it). The proverb suggests the usefulness of animals (cf. the Jaredite cureloms and cumoms): the "mother," or the wild kiry, lived as baboons have always done, but the kiry-ape today lives at home with us. (Baboons were also trained to pick figs and deposit them in buckets: lots of luck.) So here we have a wisdom text (writings often attuned to knowledge of the cosmos) that speaks of kjry f3j . . . sw (Kli-flos). The correspondence of kjry with k-l-i is exact: the Coptic word for this ape is kel, and the hieroglyphic spelling with its lateral glides (k-j-w: Medamud text) also spells kli or kel. (For the kjry or kel (Coptic), see John C. Darnell, "Hathor Returns to Medamud," SAK 22 (1995), 80ff; text from Instruction of Any (pBoulaq 410, 4), 83 n.188.)
Turning now to the iconography of the Lower Panel, we find Hugh Nibley interprets it (One Eternal Round, Chapter 8) as portraying the continuous transfer of light and its generative power (Eye, arm, flail, phallus, lotus) to Enish-go-on-dosh. The snake-bird carries the Eye (Light and Power) to the figure with upraised hand and flail, who sits on the throne; second, the Woman of the Wedjat-Eye, with outstretched arm, extends the same power (as lotus) to the cow (the Sun); third, we find the mummies that represent (says Nibley), among other things, the essential elements of organic life, in conjunction with the signs Lotus Lion Ram that, in my view, spell eternal renewal as palindrome (s-m-s: to cause to bring into being). What all this means is that without the Wedjat Eye, source of Light and Power, there can be no life: it is the key to, or medium for, all life.
Light and Power flow from arm to arm, a "borrowing," a "carrying," and a reception of Light from higher to lower orders of being, as also represented in other Egyptian vignettes. (The Ka-spirit or -power is also transferred from arm-to-arm, or in an embrace.) The Late Period papyrus of Khonsu-Renpet shows not only baboons but at least seven pairs of arms either upraised in praise or moving, carrying, and transferring the solar globe from place to place. In one vignette from the same papyrus, two outstretched arms, gingerly bearing the sun from above to below, meet in mirror image. The two sets of arms thus form a Round with the sun in the center: a hypocephalus. Here the sun descends from its place in the solar bark, but how many suns are there? Many suns, many arms, many songs of praise--the vignettes from Khonsu-Renep fill the universe with light. We also recall the mysterious text, King as Sun Priest, which describes the lifting of the sun into our world, to the accompaniment of the hymn (or "secret words") sung by baboons with arms raised in praise.
These same solar baboons (images of Thoth, or the reflective Moon) symbolize the transfer of truth (Maat) from above to below, being the "medium" through which such transfer is realized: "the baboons appear here as agents [media] of justice and communication. In a world become wide-ranging and complex, the baboons maintain the links between above and below. They 'let ma'at ascend' and also disseminate it downward." They are symbols of "representation and mediation" between "the weak and the strong"--the bridging of above and below (Jan Assmann, The Mind of Egypt, 187-8; Maat, 202ff.). Professor Assmann also notes (Maat, 186) that the hieroglyph of baboon offering the Wedjat Eye, a sign or scene often found on hypocephali, signifies kingship (or the endowment of kingship). Indeed "the apes [the kjkj and krjw] and griffin are capable of bridging the space between this world and the next" (John C. Darnell, "Hather Returns to Medamud," 79). Their joyful dance unfolds at the dawn-drenched South-East corner of the universe (the land of Punt; the cornerstone of the Temple; the place of Kolob's rising), the very point of the compass "from whence light emanates" (Brigham Young, Deseret Weekly News, April 1853). This is the Place answers to "There is the most light" (Brigham Young, at laying of the cornerstone of the Salt Lake Temple, Millennial Star 15 (1853), 488 = Hugh Nibley, The Message of the Joseph Smith Papyri, 154).
The image of the baboon, with outstretched or uplifted arms, thus stands for the medium by which power and light flow from place to place. The baboons, says the Explanation of Fig.5, receive their light from the revolutions of Kolob. One thinks of mirrors (the moon as mirror of the sun) and also of those verses in Section 88 that speak of each world being visited in its hour (there are 12 worlds mentioned). Notably, the Prophet's Explanation seems to associate, or even identify, the stars called Kli-flos-ises with the grand Key or Medium Kae-e-vanrash. Be that as it may, the method of transfer operates in the same fashion. That which is higher in authority or power transfers its radiance, glory, and light to an inferior world in a supreme sunburst of life, energy, and joy. That is the whole point of the several Egyptian books of the netherworld.
The hieroglyph of star, often found with the baboons on hypocephali, is to be read dw3, a word which literally means to sing a hymn (or even suggests, as Nibley notes, One Eternal Round, 242, that the baboons can be considered stars). The hymning may be what in fact causes the sun to rise, with hymn as medium of transfer, and thus corresponding to the upraised arms (upraised voices, upraised arms). At any rate, the pose of worship and the hymning go together. And the hymning, to be sure, signifies to rise in joyfulness and illuminate the worlds, again, an idea best expressed by the verbal roots x-3-j and w-b-n.
When the baboons lift their arms in praise they make a particular gesture, the hjj-gesture. The verb hjj means to jubilate or rejoice, and the corresponding gesture often signals sunrise (compare the homonymous root, x-'-j): hjj m 3x.t (rejoicing, making the hjj-gesture and rejoicing at the horizon, that is, at sunrise). The 3x.t, or horizon, is, under such joyful conditions, the wbn.t, that place on the eastern horizon where the sun rises. In fact the verb hjj can be written with the same sunburst determinative that writes wbn. The iconography of the secret Netherworld books in New Kingdom tombs, says Professor John Darnell, centers in the "cosmically sized [the 'grand governing power'] Re/Osiris standing with outstretched arms on the eastern horizon." He has just risen (wbn), and now lifts his arms in an expression of joy. Darnell also sees in the iconography of the risen Re-Osiris an emphasis on the generative power of the god (just as Nibley notes for Amun-Min). Re-Osiris, the father of all, rejoices and jubilates over his new creations.
The two halves of the label come together like puzzle pieces: if q3j-' signals Min, high of arm, the One who lifts the Sun at dawn and who possesses the generative power, then q3j-' and rash or rsh find a perfect match in the idea of the hjj-gesture at dawn. Indeed q3j, wbn or (w)bn, and x'j share a semantic field (q33, hill, bn or bnbn-stone, etc., sunrise, to be high, etc.). q3j-' (w)bn m rsh, while not the sole option, shows specificity.
Perhaps more specific to the context would be to read van- as bn.w (baboon). Here we have Kae-e-vanrash as a correlate of Kli-flos-isis (identified with the two baboons with upraised arms). Kae-e-vanrash then could be: q3j-' (or q3.wj-') bn.w (or bn.tj) m rsh (the One [twain?] high of arm in [the gesture or stance of] rejoicing).
This last reading does not obviate wbn. By wordplay, bnw (baboon) meets bnw (the benu bird or phoenix of sunrise, also a name for the Osirian planet Venus), the bn or bnbn stone (as light-receiver), and the verb wbn. Sun, stone, phoenix, morning star, and dancing baboons contemplate one constellation, and that is the Great Year Cycle of 1460 years that marks the heliacal rising of sun, Sirius, and Nile on New Year's Day: the Phoenix year of rising and rebirth (see Hugh Nibley, The Message of the Egyptian Endowment, 153). It is all one, a veritable chain of correspondences that takes us from cycle to cycle and world to world in a career of reflections.
Much, seemingly, can be made of the verbal root q3j; but we must remember that q3j is semantically linked to x'j (Woerterbuch), and it is this last root that best fits the idea of the grand key or governing power. X'j principally signals the rising of celestial objects (sun, moon, or stars) and, thereby, a manifestation of celestial glory. The solar rising, here described, is not only that of morning, it is the first creation of the sun on the First Morning of the world (Kolob as first creation, first in power). The verb, in its secondary sense, logically comes to refer to all manifestations of divine power and glory on earth (the transfer of the celestial power to an earthly setting), especially at New Years' Day or another festival. These terrestrial manifestations include: the appearance of a god in a festival procession, the inauguration and coronation of a king, the royal progress, and even the king's sallying forth to battle. In particular, x'j signals the manifest symbol of divine and royal power: the crown. The crown is the key and seat of governance, the governing power; the king is nb x'w, master of the crowns. And, most specifically, Chapter 162 of the Book of the Dead, which is the "hypocephalus chapter," and the Joseph Smith Book of Breathings both begin with an overwhelming view of the manifest powers of the god of creation at the time of his rising. The hypocephalus itself, with Kolob at center and crowned Oliblish at apex, also depicts such a manifestation.
But can x'j (nominal form, x'w) phonologically match kae-e? The match is clean. The Woerterbuch shows a Akhmimic Coptic spelling of x'j as hae (or Sahidic sha, Bohairic shai, and Fayyumic sheei). But how about the x, an h-phoneme? What has that to do with a k? We turn once again to the Coptic: the x-phoneme appears in Coptic variously as sh, h, and an occasional k. The verb x3j (to throw, lay down) finds its realization in Coptic as ko. But our work is not done until we consider the final -e: kae-e. What on earth can that be? Several options come to mind: the spelling x'j sometimes replaces x'w (crowns), and x'' (with the variant spelling, x'y, III 242, 3) can be found for x'w (manifestation in glory). Goddesses Mut and Hathor appear as x'y.t. I favor the idea of reading kae-e as a singular active imperfective participle, with the final -e as morphemic marker. The agent of the imperfective participle is Kolob, the Morning Star of all Creation, being he who continually makes manifest in supreme power and glory (x'y). In that primordial and universal manifestation of supreme power and rule, Kolob daily rises (wbn) to our local view--in the manifestation of solar power--to share his reflected light and energy even with us, amid universal rejoicing.
President Joseph F. Smith saw the ancient saints (including those Egyptians associated with Abraham, Joseph, and Moses) in the netherworld of spirits so greet "their Redeemer and Deliverer from death": "Their countenances shone, and the radiance from the presence of the Lord rested upon them, and they sang praises unto his holy name" (Doctrine and Covenants 138: 23-4). Here is the transfer of radiance from face to face, from above to below, from world to world, envisioned as worlds in song.
http://www.lds.org/scriptures/dc-testament/dc/138?lang=eng
x'j thrusts q3j aside. Or does it? By freeing q3j of its association with kae-e, we are free to suggest its use for another name-element found in the Prophet's Explanation of Facsimile 2. If kae-e phonetically recalls q3j, then -go (in Enish-go-on-dosh) is a dead ringer. We absolutely must have q3j as well as x'j. Q3j describes Kolob as "highly exalted" in the inscription of the rim of the hypocephalus (Figure 18). We don't need to toss out all that imagery about arms and the transfer of light from world to world, after all--when the Egyptian penned x'j, he also thought of q3j and of all that it implied. What we are speaking of is not a mere "looking-up of words," that is, the idea of dictionary, in which one-on-one definition is the rule, a rule of isolation. No. In order to "get" Egyptian we must move to the broader semiotic idea of encyclopaedia, a lexicon in which corresponding words and images reflect one another, and through which a universe can be bodied, spelled out. We must, with every word, sign, ritual, and text, strive to reconstruct something of the way in which the Ancient Egyptians organized their intellectual universe (Professor Antonio Loprieno always insisted on the idea as the key for unlocking Egyptian texts.)
Speaking of keys, let's have one more go at -vanrash. Because the Explanation refers to Kae-e-vanrash as a key, Hugh Nibley sensibly reads -van as wnj, the Egyptian verb of opening doors. In fact, such a reading itself opens onto many casements of correspondences. I'm thinking of the rather mysterious expression for the transfer of light and vision, wnj-hr (vanr), to open the face, which besides being the term for mirror, also describes various rituals, including the ceremonial revelation of a divine image. Another word for such a ceremonial revelation is, in fact, x'j. The phonological realization of wnj-hr in Coptic nearly matches -van (oyonah); earlier Egyptian would yield: oyan + r. And -ash? Among other possibilities, we might consider the very ancient expression for stars, 3x-3x, 3x-jx, or 3xx, which comes from the verbal root 3x, to shine, be glorious, be useful, to be a glorified spirit or star. More to the point: 3x.t (the glorious one), like 'nx or 'nsh (the living one: Enish-go-on-dosh) sometimes appears as a name for the Wedjat Eye, or even for the jewel or diadem that, in mirroring of light, glitters on the royal crown.
The Lady in Facsimile 2, fig. 5, whose face is a glorious Wadjet Eye, exemplifies the ceremonial "opening of the face." Lady Wadjet is a wnj.t-hr.t. The name Kae-e-vanrash certainly reflects the activity portrayed in figure 5, which activity, says Nibley, brings about the renewal of all life. We recall the following sentence from the Prophet's explanation of figure 5: "and to borrow its light from Kolob through the medium of Kae-e-vanrash," and we ask, with Nibley, whether the entire Lower Panel does not in fact depict that medium of Kae-e-vanrash? But can the action of x3j (manifestation in glory; sunrise, etc.) match what is depicted there in the worlds below? After all, the action starts with the bird-snake Nehebkau (the Attacher of Kas), an chthonic being whose peculiar and indispensable role is to carry food-offerings, that is, the Ka or vitality, through the tomb shaft. "Yet in this hymn [from Hibis Temple]," Nehabkau "is equated with the rising newborn sun: the scarab beetle flying out of the underworld," exactly the image depicted on the odd Memphite hypocephalus, David Klotz, Adoration of the Ram, 48. In other Ptolemaic texts, Nehabkau is "a newly awakened divinity," even "the morning sun," all of which explains why he is, here, both bird and serpent, Adoration, 48-9.
With outstretched arms, Nehabkau profers the Wedjat Eye to an enthroned divinity, and the action on the Lower Panel something matches the meaning of his name as "provider of the Kas." Which raises the question of whether Kae-e might not refer, after all, to the Ka-spirit and its transfer, rather than to x'j or any other verb? And what of the depiction in the Netherworld books of the solar bark passing through the elongated throat(!) or body of a bull (also Ka), as borne by 15 bearers (One Eternal Round, 298-9)? Does Kae-e, then, refer to the power represented by the bull? Without the hieroglyphic writing of Kae-e it is no simple matter to settle on any reading, though I favor the verb x'j: the Wadjet Eye that appears in splendor, in the depths below, and which is then authoritatively held and transmitted by the figure on the throne (the governing power). The same Eye then becomes the "key" that opens (from x'j to wnj) the face of Enish-go-on-dosh (as shown by the Wadjet Lady and the cow). X'j tends to be found at the head of sentences, being first in the unfolding sequence of light, in precisely the manner found in Kae-e-vanrash (Antonio Loprieno, Festschrift Lopez); besides, we wouldn't think first of the Ka-spirit as "opener of the eyes"--"light cleaveth unto light" (Doctrine and Covenants 88:40).
Kae-e-vanrash could thus be read as the name of a star or the medium of stellar (and thus solar) light and power: The one who makes manifest in glorious light and governing power, who opens the face of the shining stars" (or who transfers light and glory to them and through them). All of which matches the glorious expressions of Doctrine and Covenants, section 88, which states that the light flowing from the throne of God and which created and continues to power and illuminate sun, moon, and stars, is the same physical light by which we see and the same intellectual light by which we discern. Here is an exact description of the Egyptian phrase to open the face.
So can Kli-flos-isis match our reading of Kae-e-vanrash?
The guess at f3j.w "bearers" (that is, ones high of arm) as a reading for Flo-s (its bearers) comes after reading Hugh Nibley's discussion of a separate but related matter, the 15 stars under the control of Kae-e-vanrash. There are only a few instances of a significant number 15 in Egyptian texts, but Nibley tracks them down. Again: "These fifteen figures are designated as carriers or bearers (f3.w)" and form part of the solar crew in the Book of Gates (One Eternal Round, 298-9). Nibley considers these 15 "carriers" and "bearers" as "mediums" and "conveyers" of light and energy and relates these carriers to the 15 stars governed by Kae-e-vanrash, as in the Explanation of Figure 5. These 15 carriers (two rows of 15 each) further appear in the Book of the Night (see Fig. 1 in Gilles Roulin, "The Book of the Night," in Proceedings of the Seventh International Congress of Egyptologists, OLA 82, 1998, 1007). A vignette in the Book of the Amduat shows two rows of seven stars each, overshadowed by the greatest star of all, the winged sun, at the moment of its midnight revelation. The clock strikes 15, and the heavens are opened. Here is the revelation of light in darkness, the night sky, as anticipatory revelation of the perfect day. Next to these stars and sun stands a mediating or worshipping figure with upraised arm, "The One who is in heaven" (see Erik Hornung, 66-7).
Kli-flos-isis
Now, as noted, the Prophet's Explanation also refers to two baboons in connection with this governing force over 15 stars. They are called Kli-flos-isis.
Let's make some guesses, whether wild or not: Kli = qrjw (the ones who belong to the solar chapel--and who happen to be apes = see Nibley ("The Three Facsimiles," 1980) quoting Grapow on the relationship of Heb. c-l-h and Eg. q-3-r, or even k3). Another possibility is to read Kli- simply as qrjj/kel, "ape"; the qrj-apes praise the sun in a Late Period text (see John C. Darnell, "Hathor Returns to Medamud," SAK 22 (1995); J. Osing, "Review of Coptic Etymological Dictionary" [J. Cerny], 189). For flos or flo-s we have: "its bearers," or "weighers" (with scale determinative: Nibley associates the baboons with scales, so why not?), or the One(s) who carry him (sw). Here are the baboons, of uplifted hands (f3j-' = fl-o?), as bearers of the sun. All this recalls the k3 sign of outstretched arms, which Antonio Loprieno relates to the same etymological roots. K3.w refers to powers or spirits or vital forces (and the word to think of next is k3 (bull) with its vital forces). Apes as Vital Force as Bulls--now we're reading Egyptian. A new kind of dictionary must be invented for that language. . .
As for isis or flo s isis, the phrase or tag calls to mind a name of Horus: Horsiese (Horus, son of Isis). Siese is significant here because Isis is the goddess associated with the constellation of the Ewe, which includes the sons (or twins) of the Ewe: sr s3(.wj) sr.t (written) or sj(w) sj sj(w) (pronounced). In Egypt, ram and star share one name: sr = sjw and sb3=sjw. Sj sj sj (a palindrome) can thus be understood as "star, son(s) of the mother star (brighter star)." In the Greek Magical Papyri, as on other magical objects, we find the same name as Sisisro (W. Brashear, The Greek Magical Papyri, 3599). And Sisisro, with its three s's and two i's, something recalls Flos-isis.
In the Egyptian view of the divine heavens, Isis, her son Horus, the constellation of the Ewe, with its twin stars (lambs or rams), and Sothis, the brightest of stars all come together, like links in a chain. The idea of the mother star with her twins suggests nurture--these lambs suckle their mother Ewe (which again recalls the ka-spirit). Here is the idea of stars borrowing their light from a mother star. The imagery of the mirroring of faces (Hathor, the mother; the ritual of protecting the face) is related to this idea--the strengthening of the suckling babe by lifting it towards the sun, etc. sj sj sj also suggests the phrase s3 n s3 (sj n sj) son of the son, which signifies heirship, since it shows the legal heritage as reflecting a genealogical chain (Sons of Horus, Son of Isis, etc.). Son in the Ancient Near East always signifies possession, mastery, and so on. (Compare the idea of the scala naturae or Great Chain of Being with the argument of Abraham, Chapter 3, about one star and intelligence above another, until you come to Kolob = "if you could hie to Kolob.")
Study of the names of planets, as these appear in Brugsch's Thesaurus, shows us that such names do not so much form sentences as they make up discrete phrases strung together in the fashion Name + Descriptive Tags. The tags may include the name of the god identified with the planet, or simply the word star or star of the south, west, etc.
Kli-flos-isis consists of just such a string of descriptive tags or "names": Kli- (those who belong to the solar chamber or solar crew = the word also refers in the Amduat to a baboon), Flos- (f3.w, the bearers, those who bear, carry it, the weighers, written with a scale), -isis (Sons of Isis, or just "the stars", ha -kokabim"). How perfectly the name sequence matches the Egyptian pattern: Those of the solar chamber (or the Apes)--the Weighers or Bearers--these Stars (or these sons of Isis).
Power through the medium of Kli-flos-isis" suggests a "chain" (Coptic klal = Osing, Review of Coptic Etymological Dictionary, 189), even a genealogical chain, which in Egypt also signifies a hierarchical chain of authority, command, or measure through which the power flows (or upon which the power is drawn from one star to another). The two rows of seven stars each, in the Amduat, suggests the word order in its theological context as priesthood authority (here are two orders or rows of authority).
Finally, we have the Moon as Floeese, or Flo-eese, which could be read--remember, we're just having guessing for fun, mulling things over--Glory of Isis or Glory of the Stars (f3w, glory), or Carrier or Weigher (f3j) of the Stars, the Balance of the Stars, etc. Here we find the same ideas of balance and of centers of gravity and light that appear throughout the Explanation of Facsimile 2.
Notes:
A summary of the entire essay might be expressed as follows:
What could come closer to the mark than x'y wnn jrw asha, the One who makes manifest (in light), being of many forms? or q3j wnn jrw asha, the Exalted One, who comes into being as many creations (forms)? But it's only one guess.
For concise relevant discussion on Figure 5 see OER, 294, and all of Chapter 8.
Job and zeroa ramah (high arm): No Egyptian epithet has an older pedigree than q3j-', High of Arm. It is a royal designation that bespeaks ultimate power.
Curiously, the Kirtland Egyptian Alphabet includes a "midrashic" expansion on Job 24, 28:11, and 38:8-11. This expansion, written by one of the Prophet's associates (W.W. Phelps, F.G. Williams, Oliver Cowdery), likely originates from conversations with the Prophet Joseph, or from a momentary glimpse of "Eternity sketch'd," if you will, and should be considered merely as one brother's further, unofficial ideas about the matter. Again, Phelps's understanding of Kli- (as Heb. qli, swift, like a messenger, etc.), in Kliflosisis, reflects either momentary insight or perhaps use of a Hebrew lexicon. He was working hard and ringing-out many a well-earned dead end. (In so saying, I follow the gist of Hugh Nibley's observations on the Kirtland Egyptian Papers, as now published in An Approach to the Book of Abraham.)
It is one thing to have a glimpse of eternal wisdom when sitting with the Prophet, quite another to have the scribes then compare notes. The scribes, by study and certainly also by a partial gift of interpretation, got a few Egyptian, Semitic, and Greek words sorted out, e.g., Dah tu Hah dees Hell (Egyptian d3.t, Dat or netherworld = Greek hades), Toes (Egyptian t3(?): Land, Earth), Iota (Eye--see the Coptic eat, etc.), ho (x'j or h'j, crown, to make manifest), Zub (zp, time), Zipzi or Zipz (Zeptah), Crashmakraw (Korash-Mamackrah as planets or stars?), oop (w'b: purity, virtue)--no great shakes. More interesting is the Chaldean name for Egypt: Ahmestrah, a fascinating variant of the Semitic name Misr or Mitzraim: ah-mest-rah, with the -st combination much recalling the -ts of Mitzraim, and perhaps reflecting an ancient pronunciation (John A. Tvedtnes, speaking at a FAIR Conference, has also noted this matter.) Brother Joseph let them work away--but must have smiled. With the Book of Abraham, its Facsimiles and Explanations, God had something better in mind for His children.
Job speaks of doors for the sea beyond which it is not to come, and of masses of clouds that seal or block the waters (24:8: He bindeth up the waters in his thick clouds; and the cloud is not rent under them); Phelps's views of the cosmos consider a center of light, with bounds. Light "is drawn by the heavenly bodies according to their portions; according to the decree that God hath set, as the bounds of the ocean, that it should not pass as a flood, so God hath set the bounds of light lest it pass over and consume the planets." All this recalls the kabbalistic idea of the breaking of the vessels. Brother Phelps (with some coaching by the Prophet) was really pondering scripture here, and his profound comments much recall Annie Dillard's own remarks on the kabbalistic vessels (pilgrim as seeker), but it would be insult supreme to the Book of Abraham and to the Prophet Joseph's seeric gifts to make too much of this lovely yet inchoate idea or of anything else in the disparate, unhelpful notes we call the Kirtland Egyptian Papers. The decree "It shall not pass," after all, also ironically describes the very work of these brethren; God limited their vision, they worked themselves into a corner, and the Egyptian Alphabet plunged into obscurity. The Pearl of Great Price, we are told, throws a veritable "flood of light" on the truth of the Gospel--no holds barred.
Professor Jan Assmann's books tower over the field of Egyptology today. Maat, 1990, tops the list as far-and-away the best book ever written on Ancient Egypt from a sociological, semiotic, and culturally sensitive point of view.
wnj r 'sha for -vanrash and f3w (glory, awe) for Flo-s in Kli-flos-isis, l for 3 (Nibley, The Three Facsimiles of the Book of Abraham, p. ); see also discussion of "many" in One Eternal Round, 308.
For hymning as the cause of sunrise, or that which stirs awake the morning sun sun, see Sorensen's statement, as quoted in Papyrus British Museum 10808 and Its Cultural and Religious Setting. Compare this with the idea of Anubis beating the tambourine at dawn (sr m sr, to beat a tambourine cf. sr, the ram; wsjr, Osiris) to awaken Osiris (from his lion couch), that is, the resurrected Re-Osiris (Text: Dendara; see also my study of Papyrus BM 10808). Hugh Nibley, it will be remembered, compares the round hypocephalus to a drum, One Eternal Round, 218f, 405ff.
Khonsu-Renpet is treated in Jan Assmann, Maat, and Papyrus British Museum 10808.
The giant cosmic Re-Osiris appears in John Darnell, The Enigmatic Netherworld Books of the Solar-Osirian Unity, references found in Val Sederholm, Papyrus BM 10808 and Its Cultural and Religious Setting.
Copyright 2010 by Val Sederholm
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