Kemetic Deities in the Modern World, Part 1: Relations to Abrahamic Religions
I'll start this off with a quick disclaimer: I am a Kemetic and this article is about my personal religious beliefs. I am writing this largely to share said views with anyone who is at all curious about Kemetism, and am under no illusion that I will be convincing anyone whose mind is already made up about religion. I do not see any purpose in arguing about the subject of religion as there is virtually no chance whatsoever of anyone being convinced to change their beliefs on it. Be forewarned also that I will be saying some not-so-nice things about some other religions, namely Islam and Catholicism.
Moving on, as a Kemetic, I am a member of a small but rapidly growing faith that is essentially a modern reconstruction of the religion followed by the people of Ancient Egypt (Kemet). At various points of my life, mostly during childhood, I had briefly considered converting to various mainstream religions but was ultimately disillusioned by all of them for various reasons.
As a life-long obsessive cat lover, I had of course been vaguely aware of Ancient Egyptian religion
(namely Bast) for a long time, but had not taken it very seriously until about half a decade ago when I attempted to pray to Bast out of desperation during a very unpleasant event. Needless to say, not only was my prayer answered, but I actually had a vision of Her afterward. I immediately converted to Kemetism, and the rest is history.
Eventually it began to bother me however, just how comparatively tiny the worldwide Kemetic community still is. While I am certainly
not one to care about how many people agree with me, the minuscule size of the religion did pose a philosophical quandary -- if my Gods are real, then why do so few people seem to notice them and why do they appear to have no presence in the modern world? After some more research and contemplation on the subject, I appeared to have found my answers.
While Kemetism names
a large number of various deities, there are only three whose identities are needed in order to understand this article: Ra, Ma'at, and Apep.
Ra is the principal God, the ruler of the universe, and the father of Bast and Sekhmet. He is directly associated with the Sun and its life-giving properties.
Ma'at is simultaneously the important concept of morality/justice/truth, and the Goddess who embodies these concepts and stands in sharp contrast to the chaos that filled existence before Her creation by Ra. As Kemetics, it is perhaps our most important duty to uphold the concept of Ma'at in both our words and our actions.
Apep is a malevolent god who represents chaos and darkness. Being of these concepts, he is the sworn enemy of both Ra and Ma'at. He is typically represented as a giant serpent, keep this in mind for later.
This is the part of the article where things will quickly become very controversial.
Satan, or the Devil, is widely considered to be the incarnation of evil and a being who tempts humans into committing sin. Another popularly name for this being is "Lucifer". To quote the Book of Isaiah:
"How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning!" Lucifer also happens to be Latin for "light-bringer", or "enlightenment-bringer". Both of these definitions are extremely important for understanding who the being known as Satan actually is.
Let us consider the term "light-bringer" first. Obviously, virtually all of the life-giving warmth and light that our planet receives comes from the Sun. As previously mentioned, Ra is directly associated with the Sun and its life-giving properties.
The second definition, "enlightenment-bringer", is a much more interesting and... enlightening. If someone is the bringer of enlightenment, then we can assume that his sworn enemy is someone who instead wants to suppress knowledge and keep everyone in the dark. The history of mainstream religions such as Catholicism is littered with egregious examples of
them doing just that. And no religion is more guilty of this iniquity than the religion of Islam.
From the
burning of the vast library of the University of Nalandra to the
destruction of historical artefacts today, Islam has been on a violent quest to destroy and suppress knowledge for 1,400 years and counting. Even today,
much of the Muslim world is completely illiterate and lacking the most basic education on anything beyond the Qu'ran. The religion itself even originated from a man who was
completely illiterate and whose revelations came to him while he was living in a dark cave. Think about what I just said for a moment.
Indeed, religions such as Islam and Catholicism, among others, can only truly function when their adherents choose to live in complete metaphorical darkness and by extension lack the intellectual tools needed to question the blatantly false claims that they are being fed. I will refrain from further elaboration because the point of this article is not to bash other religions, so much as to explain how I believe they are linked to Kemetism.
Moving on, let's further examine the sworn enemy of Ra and Ma'at: the serpentine god Apep. Being the embodiment of chaos and the enemy of truth and enlightenment, it stands to reason that he would be a bedfellow of cults that fight against those concepts. While there are many ancient evil deities who one could associate with these groups, Apep is perhaps the only one whose imagery is actually being blatantly used by them.
The Vatican Audience Hall, or Paul VI Audience Hall, is a massive building inside Vatican City that is used by the Pope for his speeches. It is also ostensibly designed to resemble a giant serpent. Take some time to look at
these stunning photographs of various parts of the building for yourself. Every single part of this building was designed around not only making it resemble an enormous snake, but to imply that the Pope is the mouthpiece of this snake. The scale of this design, to me, especially appears to be an intentional reference to the colossal serpent that Apep is said to resemble, as opposed to the smaller serpent that tempted Eve in the Garden of Eden.
One can easily dismiss this as a series of bizarre coincidences, but just how likely is it that all of this is accidental? Ancient Egyptian religion has existed in some form or another for 5,000 years, and it's interesting at the very least to see its Gods and their relationships be described so well in modern religions.
There is another explanation that I have pondered for how Kemetic deities relate to the modern world, that has nothing to do with other religions, but I will cover this in a later article in the interest of brevity.
