But Egyptology, while thus aiding to sweep away the former conception of our sacred books, has aided biblical criticism in making them far more precious; for it has shown them to be a part of that living growth of sacred literature whose roots are in all the great civilizations of the past, and through whose trunk and branches are flowing the currents which are to infuse a higher religious and ethical life into the civilizations of the future.[1]
But while archæologists thus influenced enlightened opinion, another body of scholars rendered services of a different sort—the center of their enterprise being the University of Oxford. By their efforts was presented to the English-speaking world a series of translations of the sacred books of the East, which showed the relations of the more Eastern sacred literature,to our own, and proved that in the religions of the world the ideas which have come as the greatest blessings to mankind are not of sudden
- ↑ For general statements of agreements and disagreements between biblical accounts and the revelations of the Egyptian monuments, see Sayce, The Higher Criticism and the Monuments, especially chap. iv. For discrepancies between the Hebrew sacred accounts of Jewish relations with Egypt and the revelations of modern Egyptian research, see Sharpe, History of Egypt; Flinders Petrie, History of Egypt; and especially Maspero and Sayce, The Dawn of Civilization in Egypt and Chaldæa, London, published by the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 1894. For the statement regarding the Nile, that about the middle of July "in eight or ten days it turns from grayish blue to dark red, occasionally of so intense a color as to look like newly shed blood," see Maspero and Sayce, as above, p. 23. For the relation of the Joseph legend to the Tale of Two Brothers, see Sharpe and others cited. For examples of exposure of various great personages of antiquity in their childhood, see G. Smith, Chaldæan Account of Genesis, Sayce's edition, p. 320. As to Trinities in Egypt and Chaldæa, see Maspero and Sayce, especially pp. 104-106, p. 175, and pp. 659-663. For miraculous conception and birth of sons of Ra, ibid., pp. 388, 389. For ascension of Ra into heaven, ibid., pp. 167, 168; for resurrections, see representations in Lepsius, Prisse d'Avennes, et al.; and for striking resemblance between Egyptian and Hebrew ritual and worship, and especially the ark, cherubim, ephod, Urim and Thummim, and wave offerings, see same, passim. For very full exhibition of the whole subject, see Renan, Histoire du Peuple Israel, vol. i, chap. xi. For Egyptian and Chaldæan ideas in astronomy, out of which Hebrew ideas of "the firmament," "pillars of heaven," etc., were developed, see text and engravings in Maspero and Sayce, pp. 17 and 543. For creation of man by a divine being in Egypt out of clay, see Maspero and Sayce, p. 154; for a similar idea in Chaldæa, see ibid., p. 545; and for the creation of the universe by a word, ibid., pp. 146, 147. For Egyptian and Chaldæan ideas on magic and medicine, dread of evil spirits, etc., anticipating those of the Hebrew Scriptures, see Maspero and Sayce, as above, pp. 212-214, 217, 636; and for extension of these to neighboring nations, pp. 782, 783. For visions and use of dreams as oracles, ibid., p. 641 and elsewhere. See also, on these and other resemblances, Lenormant, Origines de l'Histoire, vol. i, passim; see also George Smith and Sayce, as above, chaps, xvi and xvii, for resemblances especially striking, combining to show how simple was the evolution of many Hebrew sacred legends and ideas out of those of earlier civilizations. For an especially interesting presentation of the reasons why Egyptian ideas of immortality were not seized upon by the Jews, see the Rev. Barham Zincke's work upon Egypt. For the sacrificial vessels, temple rites, etc., see the bas-reliefs figured by Lepsius, Prisse d'Avennes, Mariette, Maspero, et al.
