In contradistinction to Chepera, sometimes Tum is considered as the god of the setting sun, but generally means the sun-god in general, who was especially worshipped at Heliopolis by the name of Tum.
Apepi is a great serpent looked upon as the principal enemy of the sun and as the power of darkness and evil. It must be overthrown each day unless the sun is to perish. The texts are full of spells for conjuring and overthrowing the Apepi. It was not possible to destroy it. Scarcely vanquished it reared its head anew. As the alternation of light and darkness never ends, so the struggle between Ra and Apepi continues through eternity, the more so as Egyptian mythology does not seem to have known an end of the world.
Words of the Lord of the Universe
"Lord of the Universe" is a frequent attribute of various deities. It is generally employed in texts referring to the hereafter, in designating Osiris, the lord of the nether world. But, as in the present text, it is also a designation of Ra, who being the creator of the world must also have the first claim to dominion over it.
which he spoke after he entered being: I am the nascent one as Chepera. When I took being, then was creation, all creations were after I took being. Numerous were the formations that proceeded from my mouth. There was not heaven, nor was the earth, nor had been created the good and the evil serpents in this place (i. e., on earth).
A similar description of the condition of creation is found in the burial pyramid of King Pepi I. of the 6th dynasty, about 3000 B. C., on l. 663-4: "Pepi was borne by his father Tum. There was not yet the heavens, nor was the earth, nor were the men, nor were born the gods, nor was death."
The sentence which is rendered by "the good and the evil serpents," reads in Egyptian, sa-ta-u t'etfet-u. Sa-ta is provided with the determinative, so that strictly it should be translated by "things of the ground of the earth." The connection with t-etfet-reptiles, however, shows that there is an error and that the determinative must be the serpent. The word sa-ta also signifies the serpent, more especially the good serpent, the agathodemon of the temples. The serpents are here mentioned above all other creatures because that animal plays an extremely prominent part in Egyptian
