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AKHNATON, THE REFORMER

Thesis for the Degree of M. A
MICHIGAN STATE UNIVERSITY
YOUSIF ALI AL-THAKAFI
1977

 

 

JIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIl I

3 1293 01093 2345 .
MICHIGAN STATE UNIVERSITY
DEPARTMENT or HISTORY
EAST LANtwlNG. MI"HI(3A.N 48824

 

 

V

I“? I3 9 1997

 

ABSTRACT
AKHNATON, THE REFORMER
BY

Yousif Ali Al-Thakafi

In the first chapter of this thesis I have tried to
show the political and religious conditions prior to
Akhnaton. I concentrated on the relationship between the
pharaohs and their gods, explaining how the pharaohs were
affected by the gods. The second chapter discusses how Amon
and his priesthood gained power; how Amenhotep III, by
becoming accustomed to ease, luxury and personal enjoyment,
caused Egypt to gradually lose its power and wealth, and how
Tiy (Amenhotep‘s wife) became a great personality with a
tremendous amount of influence over her husband. Akhnaton's
name; the duration of his reign; his co-regency with his
father; the tutelage of his mother when he was a child; his
marriage to Nefertete, and his early work after he got to
the throne, including some possible reasons for his revolu—
tion against Amon, are the subjects of the third chapter.
The fourth chapter is confined to religion. The main gods
mentioned are Amon, Ra and Aton; their nature, the rivalry

among the priesthoods which ended with Aton's supremacy

Yousif Ali AlaThakafi

over Amon. In the fifth chapter I discuss different
opinions by some historians as to whether Akhnaton's new
faith was a true monotheism or not. I finally arrived to
the conclusion that Akhnaton's new faith cannot be taken as
a true monotheism as we believe in Judaism, Christianity
and Islam, but at the same time his new faith can be taken
as possibly a kind of monotheism.

The importance of Akhnaton's great revolution and the
possible reasons for the rapid collapse of his religion are

mentioned in my conclusion.

AKHNATON, THE REFORMER

BY

Yousif Ali Al—Thakafi

A THESIS

Submitted to
Michigan State University
in partial fulfillment of the requirements
for the degree of

MASTER OF ARTS

Department of History

1977

DEDICATION

To my 6012mm, motile/L and
my wifie, MuZaha

ii

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I wish to express my gratitude and appreciation to my
thesis advisor Professor Eleanor G. Huzar for her guidance,
advise and suggestions; to my main adviser Professor Donald
N. Lammers for his advice, help and encouragement throughout
my graduate program; to Mrs. Susan Brown for her editing;
to Barbie Mel and Shirley Goodwin for typing the various
rough drafts and my final copy, and last, but not least, to
my wife, Meslaha, who offered words of encouragement and

inspiration when they were needed most.

 

iii

TABLE OF CONTENTS

CHAPTER Page

INTRODUCTION 0 O O O O C O O O O O C O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O 2
I O AKHNATON ' S PREDECESSORS O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O O 6
I I O AKHNATON ' S PARENTS O O O O O I O O O O O O I O O O O O O I O O O O I O O 1 9

III. DURATION OF AKHNATON'S REIGN AND HIS EARLY
YEARSOOOOOCOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOCOOOOOCOOO 34

IV. RELIGIOUS REFORM............................. 51
The Background of Egyptian Religion....... 51
Aton's Nature and His Supremacy Over Amon. 61
V. AKHNATON AND MONOTHEISM...................... 84
VI. CONCLUSION................................... 96

BIBLIOGmHYOOOOOOOOO0.00000000000000COOOOOOOOOOOOOO 99

iv

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

Page
Akhnaton, The Reformer............................... 1
Map of Ancient Egypt................................. 5
Head of Standing Statue of Thutmose III.............. 14
Seated Statue of Amenhotep III....................... 23
WOoden Head of Queen Tiy............................. 24
Luxor, Forecourt of Amenhotep III.................... 30
Queen Nefertete...................................... 45
Some of the Principal Egyptian Deities............... 53
A Gold Statuette of the God Amon..................... 58
Akhnaton and His Wife Worshiping Aton................ 66
Akhnaton and His Family Under the Radiating Arms of
Aton................................................. 67
Akhnaton Sacrificing Before the Altar of the God Aton 68
City of Akhetaton.................................... 74
Reconstruction of Central Quarter at Amarna.......... 75
Courtier Before the Royal Pair....... ....... ......... 93

 

The Reformer

Akhnaton,

AKHNATON, THE REFORMER

INTRODUCTION

The Nile Valley in Egypt was one of the most important
regions in originating and spreading civilization in
ancient times. The successive periods of Egyptian civil-
ization include: Age of Pre-History, Historical Period,
Old Kingdom, Middle Kingdom, New Kingdom, and the Last
Decadence periods. During these periods, there were
intervals of weakness and strength in political, economic,
social, and religious issues, under the rule of various
pharaohs.

One of these pharaohs was Amenhotep IV (1367-1350),
renamed Akhnaton according to the name of his god Aton.
This pharaoh turned much of his attention to religious
reformation; therefore most historians mention him as a
reformer, rather than as a political person. Yet, some of
our current literature and thought rejects the importance
of Akhnaton's religious revolution. The point which should
concern us in this reformation is not what Akhnaton failed
to do, rather, what he tried to accomplish. The importance

of Akhnaton's reform is that he attempted to sweep tradition

aside, discard the polytheistic myths and abolish the
ancient rites.

In this thesis I have presented my analysis and inter-
pretation of the evidence relating to the importance of
Akhnaton's reformation. Particularly valuable in the prep-
aration of my thesis were the works of earlier scholars
such as Breasted, Brugsch, Baikie, Pendlebury, and Wilson.
I also found useful articles written by modern historians

in the Journal of Egyptian Archaeology and in the Journal

 

of the American Research Center in Egypt. The figures and

 

quotations used were selected as representative examples of
a large body of evidence. A more complete reference list
is found in the bibliography.

A thesis is an academic exercise done as professionally
as possible. By writing this thesis, under the guidance of
Professor Huzar, I have gained much: the opening of my mind
to new and extensive data in the area of ancient Egyptian
history, the methodology of thesis writing, and improvement
in my English. I am at the beginning of a long road into
the writing and the criticism of historical data and

concepts.

--Yousif Ali A1~Thakafi

Mediterranean Sea /

7, /

I .

 

' oHeliopolis
Giza (On)
Memphis 0
Abusir o ‘ \
Sakkara O \ O \
\ i4
_ “:2,
‘ r‘
.Tell el-Amarna 7% \ /
(Akhetaton) 7%)
7
“L \
€%\ RmISaI
(6
fix
’I/
Abydos o ’(l.
o Kamak \
Thebes a .
o Luxor
ANCIENT EGYPT
Edfu o a

o Assuan (Aswan) ‘\

(Elcplmnlinc)

. Philac

First Cataract

Map Of Ancient Egypt

Source: F. G. Bratton, The First Heretic (Boston:
Beacon Press, 1961). P. 9.

5

CHAPTER I

AKHNATON'S PREDECESSORS

What were the political and dynastic conditions prior
to Akhnaton's accession to the throne? What were the be-
liefs about the relationship between the pharaohs and the
gods? Did the religious beliefs actually help the pharaohs
hold the throne? How did it happen that the priests became
increasingly wealthy and powerful? Discussing these points
in the following chapter, I hope to paint a clear picture
of the decline of the Middle Kingdom and of the era prior
to Akhnaton's time. I

Two factors had precipitated the fall of the Middle
Kingdom: internal weakness under Amenemhat III, and inva-
sions of the Hyksos from the East. Thus began the second
Intermediate Period (1800-1570 B.C.) during which local
rulers controlled the South (Upper Egypt) and the monarchs
of the Delta area became vassals of the invaders.

After prolonged struggle against the Hyksos by the
Theban kings, Re-Sekenen and his son Kames, an outstanding
leader, Ahmose I (1575-1550) the brother of Kames, drove

the Hyksos into Palestine, and became the founder of the

Eighteenth Dynasty of Thebes. Ahmose I succeeded in unify-
ing the North and the South. He built the foundation of a
victorious Egyptian Empire. He also played a very important
role in domestic affairs. However, it was not until his
twenty—second year as ruler that the Egyptian monarch,
victorious on every side, no longer apprehensive of attack,
was able to turn his attention to domestic affairs, com-
merce, and restoration of those public edifices which had
suffered either from natural decay or from hostile attack
during the previous two or three centuries.1

The Egyptian people exalted Ahmose I and made him the
savior of their country. This is evident from the adage
inscribed in the rock-cut tomb of Ahmose I at El-Kab.

As translated by historians, it was written:

For the name of a valiant man resides in that which

he has done; it will not be obscured in this land

forever.

Ahmose I's consociation with Amon, the god especially
worshipped in Thebes, was strong, proclaimed by Ahmose in
order to assert his position as pharaoh through divine
association. The gifts that Ahmose I gave for construction

of monuments for Amon were great; this helped to make the

 

1George Rawlinson, History of Ancient Egypt, Vol. II.
(New York: Dodd, Mead, and Company, 1882), p. 214.

2Hans Goedicke, "Some Remarks Concerning the Inscrip-
tion of Ahmose, Son of Ebana," Journal of the American
Research Center in Egypt XI (1974), p. 31.

 

 

 

priesthood of Amon an important power in the land with
great resources and authority.

Ahmose I was succeeded by Amenhotep I (1550-1538), his
son by Queen Ahmes Nefertari. The name of Amenhotep means
"Amon is content," indicating the influence of Amon upon
the Pharaohs. Amenhotep I continued his father's work.

He led two expeditions: one was to the Nubia and the other
to Libya-~the land of a people called Aamu-Kenak. The
information we have of Amenhotep's deeds within Egypt are
confined mostly to his service to the god Amon. His archi-
tect, Ineni, inscribed:

Amenhotep I; he made it [a Pylon on the south side of

the great temple of Amon] as his monument for his

father Amon, lord of Thebes, erecting for him a great
gate of twenty cubits at the double facade of the
temple, of fine limestone of Ayan, which the Son of

Ra, Amenhotep, living forever, made for him.1

Thutmose I (1528-1510) succeeded Amenhotep I. He was
not the legal son but a half-brother of the late king. He
marched through western Asia until he arrived at the banks
of the Euphrates and Tigris. He also made campaigns among
the Nubians and the Libyans. Although he did arrive at a
distant area in Asia, his authority over the Asian terri-

tories was nominal if we compare it to the rule of the

later King Thutmose III. Petty kings in Western Asia

 

lJames Baikie, A History of Egypt II (London:
A. and C. Black, Ltd., l92§), p. 20.

constantly fought one another disregarding Thutmose I and
did not ask his help or compromise.

Thutmose I's relation to Amon was much like that of
his ancestors' before him. His architect was Ineni, the
one who worked for his father, and from Ineni's inscrip-
tions I quote the following:

I inspected the erection of the great doorway named

'Amon-Mighty-in-Wealth,‘ its vast door was of

Asiatic bronze, whereon was the Divine Shadow, in-

laid with gold. I inspected the erection of two

obelisks, and built the august boat of 120 cubits

in length and 40 cubits in breadth, in order to trans-

port these obelisks. They came in peace, safety and

prosperity, and landed at Karnak--their track was
laid with every pleasant wood.l

Thutmose I not only took care for the god Amon but
also beautified the temple of Osiris at Abydos. The in-
scription made by Ineni runs as follows:

Because I [Thutmose I] loved him so much more than

all gods, in order that my name might abide and my

monuments endure in the house of my father, Osiris,

First of the Westerners, Lord of Abydos, forever

and ever.

After the death of Thutmose I, a confused political
situation arose within the royal family. There was no son
of pure royal family blood to inherit the throne, only one
daughter-~Princess Hatshepsut. There was, however, a son

of another wife of Thutmose I, named Thutmose II (1510-1490),

 

lIbid., p. 34.
21bid., p. 37.

10

who could claim to be heir to the throne after he married
his half-sister Hatshepsut. During his reign, there were
two revolts in Kush and in Syria, but he was able to subju-
gate them early. He also continued to worship Amon in the
manner of his forebearers.

Thutmose II failed to provide a male heir of full
royal blood to succeed him, but a son by another wife,
named Thutmose III, was able--with the assistance of the
Priesthood of Amon--to succeed him under the guardianship
of his stepmother Hatshepsut. Hatshepsut, however, took
advantage of the youth of Thutmose III and attempted grad-
ually to appropriate the rule for herself, disregarding
Thutmose III. To execute her plan in spite of her knowledge
that the priesthood had bestowed upon Thutmose III the right
to the throne of his father, she called herself "The daugh-
ter of Amon."

The influence of Amon and his priests played an im-
portant role in Hatshepsut's gaining control of the throne
through her assertion that she was the daughter of Amon.
Two important achievements distinguished Hatshepsut's rule
of 22 years: her peaceful commercial expedition to Punt,
and the fine temple monuments constructed by her famous
architect, Senenmut or Sen-Mut, at Deir el-Bahri. These
monuments were constructed for the worship of Amon and the

glorification of the "daughter of Amon."

11

When Thutmose III (1468-1436) became of age, he
achieved his rightful throne. With the help of the priests
of Amon, he immediately removed Hatshepsut's name from her
monuments everywhere, inscribing his name instead. By do-
ing this, Thutmose asserted to the people Amon's dissatis—
faction with Hatshepsut, and he also demonstrated his own
enmity toward her. In rejection of the peaceful policies
of Hatshepsut, Thutmose III embarked on a vast program of
imperial expansion. During his reign, the Egyptian Empire
stretched from Libya on the west, Nubia, on the south, and
Palestine and Syria on the northeast. Did Thutmose III
plan to march upon these areas before his accession? If so,
for what purpose? A proper answer to these questions is
difficult with the available data, but we might assume that
Thutmose III had felt that Hatshepsut's policies paid more
attention to African politics than to Asian. Some countries
such as the Mitannion Kingdom had started to make allies of
tribes that were under Egyptian control in Asia in order to
instigate revolts against Egypt. Such developments would
bring disaster to the empire. Thus, Thutmose III took
action at once and set out on his successful campaigns.

During a period of almost twenty years, the great

Pharaoh had to carry on more than thirteen campaigns

against foreign nations, in the course of which town

after town had to be stormed, river after river to
be crossed, country after country to be traversed in

12

long days' journeys, under the difficulties of a
foreign climate and a hostile population.l

Thutmose III's excellent plans brought him a victory both
in the famous battle of Migiddo and in the occupation of
Kadish, the strategic places of Thutmose's enemies. The
Empire became very wide; however, there was a centralized
administration, over a series of vassal states subject to
control by Egyptian troops. Egyptian officials were sent
everywhere and inspectors spread widely. Sons of the heads
of conquered territories were sent to Egypt to study and
consequently were influenced by the Pharaonic policies.
Simultaneously, Egypt itself was influenced by Asia. New
ideas and habits were spread, and the Egyptians adopted the
worship of some Asian gods.

I will not go into the details of Thutmose III's rela-
tions with religion, as this is not the main purpose of
this chapter, but I will glance at how Thutmose III con-
tinued in the path of previous pharaohs in respecting Amon
and his priests and dedicating every good thing to him.
Thutmose was distinguished also as a builder of temples for
other gods of Egypt as well as Amon. A temple was built at
Thebes and many excellent things from the South and the

North--gold, silver, lapis lazuli, copper, bronze, lead,

 

lHenry Brugsch, History of Egypt Under the Pharaohs I
(2nd ed. London: Spottiswoode and Co., 18817] pp. 3661367.

 

13

and colors--were sent both to Amon's temple and also to
temples of other gods, like the temple of Ptah at Thebes,
the temple of the Sun at Heliopolis, and the Temple of the
Nubian god, Kneph. Although Thutmose believed in and built
temples to such other gods, the main and active god was
Amon, who brought him victory. Evidence of this can be
seen in the war songs and hymns that circulated among the
people after Thutmose's successful campaigns, like this one
in which Amon addresses Thutmose III:

I have come, causing thee to smite the princes
of Zahi,
I have hurled them beneath thy feet among their
highlands . . .
Thou hast trampled those who are in the district
of Punt,
I have caused them to see thy majesty as a
circling star . . .
Crete and Cyprus are in terror . . .
Those who are in the midst of the great green sea
hear thy roarings,
I have made them see thy majesty as an avenger
who rises upon the backs of his slain victim . . .
I have caused them to see thy majesty as a
fierce-eyed lion, 1
Thou makest them corpses in their valleys. . . .

One should not underestimate the great work that
Thutmose III did, either the enlargement of the Egyptian
Empire or the contributions to the great temples of Amon
and other gods at Thebes, Heliopolis, and other places.

The great wealth and the supreme power of Thutmose

contributed to the wealth and power of the priesthood of

 

1James H. Breasted, Ancient Record of Egypt II

(Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1906), pp. 264-
265.

I4

   

'0 .

 

um -”
w

-. . "-vrv t. v-

Head of Standing Statue of Thutmose III
(Cairo Museum)

Source: W. Stevenson Smith. The Art and Architecture of

 

Ancient Egypt (London: Penguin Books, lst ed.
(1958) I p. 960

 

15

Amon. Because Thutmose's success was attributed to Amon,
offerings of land and spoils were given to him. This power
of the priesthood of Amon affected the next pharaohs and
especially Akhnaton in his reformation.

When Thutmose III died, revolts, taking advantage of
any change of government, began in Syria and Palestine
against the Egyptian rulers. However, his son Amenhotep II
(1436-1413) who took part in the rule of his father,
marched into Syria at the head of his army, suppressing the
revolting peoples. Amenhotep II was harsh in his treatment
of captives from foreign countries. The inscriptions of a
Memphis Stele show us some examples:

When his majesty returned in joy of heart to his

father Amon, it was after he had slain with his own

mace the seven princes who were in the region of

Takhsi--one of the Syrian cities--they being hung

upside down on the prow of his majesty's Falcon

Boat. . . . Afterward [the king] hung six of these

wretched men before the ramparts of Thebes alongside

the hands [amputated from other slain enemies].

Then [the king] transported the other wretched one to

Nubia and hanged him on the wall of Napata to demon-

strate the victories of his majesty forever and

ever. . . .1

Amenhotep II believed that his god Amon gave him
victory over his foes, and he tried to show his people that

everything had been done under the direction of Amon.

Temples were erected at Amada, in Nubia, and at Thebes, and

 

1Anson F. Rainey, "Amenhotep II's Campaign to Takhsi,"
Journal of American Research Center in Egypt X (1973),
p. 72.

16

great quantities of gold and silver were dedicated for
decoration of the temples.

Amenhotep II was succeeded by a son by a subordinate
wife, Thutmose IV (1413-1405), who followed in the footsteps
of his father in maintaining the Empire acquired by his
grandfather, Thutmose III. The political history of this
Pharaoh was brief. From what we know, he sent one campaign
to Asia and another to Nubia. But when the kingdom of the
Mitanni made an alliance with the Egyptian Empire, to avoid
oppression by the Hittites from Anatolia, the wars between
Egypt and Western Asia ceased during the reign of Thutmose
IV. Also, as a result of this alliance, Thutmose married
the sister of the king of Mitanni. Thus, he brought foreign
blood to the royal family and, again, new ideas, new habits,
and customs were Spread throughout Egypt.

The Pharaohs since the founding of the Eighteenth
Dynasty all followed the same line in their religious faith
in Amon. Now, in the reign of Thutmose IV, there are indi—
cations of certain different religious movements which
influenced him. The priests of Heliopolis, who had been
chafing against the power of Amon and had been striving to
restore their own god, Ra--the ancient supreme deity before
Amon--were chief among these. As for Thutmose IV's leaning
towards the god Ra, several interpretations are possible.

Perhaps he got to the throne with the help of Heliopolitan

l7

priests1 who were jealous of the power and riches which
Amon and his priests had in Egypt. It is also possible
that the ideas came to his mind before he became king.
Thus, in an imaginative recreation:

When he was a young man he used to amuse himself upon
the desert uplands of Memphis, going along the road
there, shooting at a target with copper arrows, hunt-
ing wild animals, . . . and when the hour came for
him to give rest to his companions he used to go to
the region of Harmakhis--the area around the pyramids
of Gizeh--. . . . And a dream of sleep fell upon him
at the moment when the sun was at its zenith, and he
found that the majesty of this god (Sun-God, the
Sphinx) was speaking to him with his own mouth, as a
father talks with his son. 'Behold me, look at me, my
son Thutmose,‘ said the Sphinx. 'I am your father,
the Sun-God, and I will give to you my kingdom on
earth, . . . Yours shall be the land of its length
and breadth, . . . my countenance is upon you, and my
desire is toward you, . . . I am with you. I am your
guide.‘ And when he had finished speaking, the prince
awoke, and, understanding the words of this god, he
kept silence in his heart.2

Possibly the ideas may have come to Thutmose through the
influence of his foreign wife from Western Asia--a center
of religious speculation. But this kind of departure was
not a new thing in the history of the pharaohs. As I have
mentioned, Hatshepsut names herself the daughter of Amon to
proclaim his consent and support in attaining the throne.

Thutmose IV, though he was not the oldest son of his father,

 

l , .
E. A. Wallis Budge, Tut-Ankh-Amen (London: Martin

Hopkinson and Co.,.LUd.,l925), p. 19.

2Arthur Weigall, A Short History of Ancient Egypt
(London: Chapman and Hall,:Du3.,l935)7 pp. 134-135.

 

 

18

embellished his dream to make himself the legitimate son,

chosen by the God of Heliopolis to rule Egypt.

CHAPTER II

AKHNATON'S PARENTS

Amenhotep III (1405-1367) was not a son of royal blood.
Because of this, the priesthood of Amon plotted a story
that Amenhotep III was born by the consent of Amon.1 They
wanted to return to Amon the power which had been lost dur-
ing the days of Thutmose IV and the priesthood of Heliopolis,
who tried to restore the worship of Ra, the old Egyptian god,
in place of the worship of Amon and his predominant priest-
hood. The ascent of Amenhotep to the throne indicates the
power still held by Amon and his priesthood.

Amenhotep--or as his people called him, Nap-Maat-Re--
broke away from old Egyptian custom and married a girl of
common blood named Tiy. Tiy was a daughter of Yuya and his
wife Tuya. The tomb of the former was discovered by Davis,
Maspero, and Weigall in February, 1905. The grandson of
these two insignificant people, in a few years, altered the

whole course of Egyptian history and brought into existence

 

1This was inscribed on the wall of the temple of Amon
at Luxor. Abdulhameed Zide, Egypt, the Eternal (Cairo:
Dar El-Nahtata, A1 Arabia, 1966), p. 583.

 

19

20

a new movement which was destined to become the subject of
study and argument among historians and philosophers.

The origin of Tiy has been much debated. Rawlinson
suggests that she was Arabian, or possibly Ethiopian.
Breasted agrees with Maspero that she probably was a native
Egyptian. Some historians avoid the argument altogether.
Arthur Weigall writes:

Neither the names of the parents nor the place of

birth are known; and the reader will presently find

that it is not easy to say whether the child [Tiy]

was an Egyptian or a foreigner.

Sir Gaston Maspero (1907) says,

Until we have new evidence, I shall consider Touiya,

Touiyou, and Tiyi as being natives of the country

within which they lived and where their mummies have

been found.
There is a strong possibility that she was Egyptian for two
reasons: first, as some archeologists like Baikie and
Smith discovered, her parents had been buried within Egypt,
therefore they may have been natives; second, Amenhotep III,
as we will see, wanted to show his subjects that he married
a commoner, and if he wanted to stress any significance to

the Egyptian people that his wife was of common blood, he

must have chosen a native. It is also possible that her

 

lArthur Weigall, The Life and Times of Akhnaton,
2nd ed. (London: Thornton B'utterworth, Ltd., 1934) , pp.
20-21.

2James Baikie, A History of Egypt, Vol. II. (London:
A. and C. Black, Ltd., 1929), p. 178.

 

 

21

father was a Syrian hostage brought to Egypt during one of
the conquests of Thutmose III or his successor Amenhotep II.
Tiy did not show her approval of the worship of Amon, and
her affections seem to have been with Aton, whose worship
was much more akin to that of the dominant faiths of Syria.
According to Jones:

Her father was a priest of Min, the Egyptian equiva-

lent of Pan, or Adonis, and perhaps not in sympathy

with the corrupt priesthood of Amon-Re.l
Therefore, it is possible to assume she was a foreigner
from Syria. I cannot make a clear decision as to her origin,
but I would opine that if she was a foreigner, it is possi-
ble the creed of Aton could be found to correlate with her
personal background.

At any rate, whether Tiy was a native or a foreigner,
she was a great personality, and she had a tremendous
amount of influence over her husband, Amenhotep III.
Amenhotep announced to his subjects his marriage to Tiy and
inscribed a series of commemorative scarabs and distributed
them throughout his empire letting everybody know that he
had married a commoner. It might be concluded that.
Amenhotep was attempting to show his people that he was a
simple and unassuming ruler able to deal with different

classes even in the marriage situation.

 

1M. E. Monckton Jones, Ancient Egypt from the Records
(lst ed. London: Methuen and Co., Ltd., 1924), p. 141.

22

The commemorative scarabs were inscribed:

Live . . . king Amenhotep, who is given life, [and]
the great king's wife Tiy (Tyy), who liveth. The
name of her father is Yuya (wa), the name of her
mother is Tuya (Twy). She is the wife of a mighty

king whose southern boundary is as far as Karoy
(K-r-y) (and) northern as far as Naharin (N-h-ry-n).

l
Tiy's greatness and influence can be seen through
letters sent to her from minor kings and princes in Asia.
These letters contain direct requests for nearness to the
royal court through her influence upon her husband. Although
he married other wives--Sitamen, his daughter by Tiy;
Gilukhepa, daughter of the prince of Mittani; Shatarna,
who brought with her many ladies-in-waiting; and Tadukhepa,
a daughter of Dushratta of Mittani--they were mere names
compared with Tiy's position in his palace.2 Gradually,
Tiy came to hold unique powers and began to make public
appearances at the king's side. Royal decrees were made in
the name of Amenhotep III 32d Tiy. Her strong personality
among Amenhotep's wives encouraged her husband to execute
his order of building for himself and his wife a sumptuous

palace at Malkata on the western bank of the Nile near

Thebes. East of the palace a beautiful lake was created.

 

1James H. Breasted, Ancient Records of Egypt II
(Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, I906), p. 345.

2Abdulhameed Zide, Egypt the Eternal (Cairo: Dar El-
Nahtata, Al Arabia, 1966), p. 585.

 

 

 

Seated Statue of Amenhotep III

(Cairo Museum)

: Beacon

(Boston

The First Heretic

Bratton.

G.

F.

Source:

138.

 

p.

1961),

Press,

24

' 3 n v I" .I '
Jr... , ,2...
. ?:":r.7~.« 11::
. _ ..
.1 . ‘ 'y‘l'. r 't-{If' I.‘
‘ 1’.» $5.". ‘34,?!"
I‘ u _ .‘7'.-"". L": h.

I .
\ I I
'J’.

 

Wooden Head of Queen Tiy
(Berlin Museum)

Source: W. Stevenson Smith. The Art and Architecture of

Ancient E . (lst ed. London: Penguin BooEs
(1958), p. 117.

25

A scarab inscription records this venture of Amenhotep III.
His majesty commanded to make a lake for the great
king's wife, in her city of Zerukha. Its length is
3,700 cubits; its width, 700 cubits. His majesty
celebrated the feast of the opening of the lake in
the third month of the first season, day 16, when
his majesty sailed thereon in the royal barge, "Aten
Gleams".

The sun god was known by different names: Atum, Re
Harakhti, and Amon-Re; Aton was merely the word for the
sun-as-sun, the solar disk. The name of the barge is
evidence that Aton was a common word in the Egyptian vocabu-
lary before the time of Akhnaton. It would seem that Aton
was favored by Amenhotep's wife, Queen Tiy, for she did not
show her approval of the worship of Amon, and the barge was
named to humor her. No evidence exists that Amenhotep him-
self was an Aton worshipper, but he was aware of Aton.
Amenhotep built the new palace far from the old one which
adjoined the temple of Amon, which might represent a desire
to retreat from the presence of the jealous priests of Amon.
Although he primarily worshipped Amon, he did not make any
recorded objections to Aton. It was known that Aton was
an important god; only a limited number of people had heard
of him before the middle of the Eighteenth Dynasty; but, in

the near future, Aton was to bring about a theological

revolution.

 

lAbdulhameed Zide, 9_p_. cit., p. 584.

26

The appearance and the circulation of the worship of
Aton stemmed from the time of Thutmose IV. During Amenhotep
III's reign the idea of the worship of Aton spread, and by
the assistance of the women of Mittani at the royal court,
the priesthood of Heliopolis, and the most dynamic person
in the palace--Queen Tiy--a new cult of Aton took form in
Thebes. From the study by Bille-De Mot, I quote:

His name [Aton] appeared in all the domains, a company

of the royal guard was named after him; the golden

barge in which the king and queen floated on the re-

cently dug lake on the left bank was called Splendour

of Aten. A final daughter, born late in the life of

the royal couple, was named Bakitaten, Aten's Slave.1

Almost half a century after the conquests of Thutmose
III, during the reign 0f Amenhotep III, shared with his
wife Tiy, Egypt was able to indulge herself in imperial
magnificence. Though some of the neighboring kings did not
come under the direct control of Egypt, they came to be
allies with Egypt; they felt the Egyptian power and, conse-
quently, they tried to have her friendship rather than her
hostility. Boundaries were opened for trade. Movements of
people became more widespread. Smith gives us a picture of
this internationalism:

From Nubia and the Sudan, Sinsi, Palestine and all

of Syria, Riches had been pouring into her [Egypt's]
coffers for nearly a century. Merchants and couriers

 

1Bille-De Mot, The Age of Akhnaton (London: Evelyn,
Adams and Mackay, LTD., 1966), p. 39.

 

27

laden with wealth traveled between the Nile and the

Euphrates or Orontes with a degree of safety that

has perhaps not been equaled since.
Kings from these lands sent letters to the pharaoh urging
him to send them very great quantities of gold. This letter
which had been sent by the king of Mittani is an example:

When I wrote to my brother [Amenhotep III] I said,

‘Let my brother make our friendship ten times greater

than with my father,‘ and I asked of my brother a

great deal of gold saying, 'More than to my father

let my brother give and send me . . . so let my brother

send me gold in very great quantities, without measure

. . . for in my brother's land gold is as common as

dust.‘2

What was the influence of the wealth of Egypt upon
Amenhotep III? Did he use this wealth in strengthening his
military force and making new conquests as his predecessors
had done, or did he use it all for his personal life, or
for Amon and his priesthood? Did the power and the wealth
of Egypt influence his son, Akhnaton and his reformation?
Answers to these questions will be attempted in the follow-
ing pages.

The character which historians give to Amenhotep III

differs from that of his ancestors. Brugsch equates

Amenhotep III's reign with that of his grandfather

 

lHomer W. Smith, Man and His Gods (Boston: Little,
Brown and Company, 1956), p. 54.

2Abdulaziz Salah, Ancient Near East: Egypt and Iraq
(Cairo: Almactaba Al-Ameria, First Division,’I967),
p. 218.'

 

28
Thutmose III's,l while Rawlinson believes the Opposite:

Amenhotep did not extend the power of Egypt either

in the north or in the south. There are indications

that he maintained in the north the dominion which

had descended to him from Thutmose III, and abundant

proof that he engaged personally in military opera-

tions in the south; but we cannot ascribe to him any
extension of the Egyptian territory even in this
quarter.

There is no evidence that Amenhotep engaged in any
military Operation. Abdulaziz Salah emphasizes that the
military operations of Amenhotep III either in the North or
in the South were mere inspectional campaigns.3 As long as
there is no archaeological evidence or clear inscriptions
to indicate new conquests in the days of Amenhotep III, it
is unfair to refer to him as a conqueror equal to his grand-
father Thutmose III. Amenhotep's deeds indicate that he
was mainly interested in hunting, building, and in surround-
ing himself with grandness. He enjoyed the wealth of Egypt
and spent lavishly on his own pleasures. The plurality
of wives in his court is an indication of his possible
susceptibility to female influence. This reminds me of

Louis XIV of France (1643-1715) and Ismail Pasha of Turkey

(1879-1893). Nevertheless, tremendous building projects

 

lHenry Brugsch, History of Egypt Under the Pharaohs I
(2nd ed. London: Spottiswoode and Co., 1881), p. 469.

2George Rawlinson, History of Ancient Egypt, II
(New York: Dodd, Mead, and Co., 1882), p. 271.

3Abdulaziz Salah, Ancient Near East: Egypt and Iraq
(Cairo: Almactaba Al-Ameria, First Division, 1967), P. 217.

 

 

29

give Amenhotep III a place among the most distinguished of
the Egyptian pharaohs. In addition to the palace of Malkata
and the lake east of it, temples and statues were erected
everywhere. At Thebes, the temple of Amon which was built
in honor of Amenhotep's divine birth, was one of the most
magnificant in all Egypt. To the north of this temple,
Amenhotep III erected a new temple of Amon and to the south
he built another to the divine mother Mut. Also, temples

of Amon and Sedeing were built at Soleb in Nubia. Buildings
for the priesthood were constructed close to the temple at
Luxor. Inscriptions tell us how the god Amon appreciated all
of these establishments and favored Amenhotep and gave him
power and victory.

My son, of my body, my beloved, Nibmare,
My living image, whom my limbs created,
When I turn my face to the south,
I work a wonder for thee,
I cause the chiefs of Kush, the wretched,
to turn to thee,
Bearing all their tribute upon their backs.
When I turn my face to the north,
I work a wonder for thee,
I cause the countries of the ends of Asia
to come to thee,
Bearing all their tribute upon their backs.
When I turn my face to the west,
I work a wonder for thee;
When I turn my face to the Orient,
I work a wonder for thee;
I cause to come to thee the countries of Punt,
Bearing all the pleasant sweet woods of
their countries.1

 

lBreasted, Ancient Records of Egypt, pp. 361-62.

 

30

 

 

 

 

 

Luxor, Forecourt of Amenhotep III

Source: James Baikie. Century of Excavation in the Land
of the Pharaohs (London: The Religious Tract
Society, 1934), p. 124.

 

 

31

Egypt lost its power and wealth gradually. Amenhotep
III became accustomed to ease and luxury and dedicated him-
self to his personal enjoyments forsaking the habit and
tradition of his predecessors of going from time to time to
the borders of Egypt to seek out and assure the neighbors
and simultaneously to suppress and limit revolutionary de-
sires against Egypt. International relations between the
ancient Near East kingdoms were undergoing rapid changes
during the reign of Amenhotep III. Egypt under her supine
pharaoh was inert while Hittites started picking a quarrel
with the frontiers of Syria and the Mitanni. The Mitanni
were contented with their alliance with the Egyptian pharaoh.
Assyria, meantime, was also preparing for the amazing race
she was to run. Therefore, letters requesting help and
letters of flattery were sent to Egypt from the kings of
adjacent countries. The Mitanni's king sent a letter to his
ally Amenhotep III demanding his support against the
Hittites when they invaded Mitanni. The answer of Amenhotep
was negative, for the Hittite king was his ally. In the
middle and to the east of Syria, Amorite Chieftains--
Ribaddi and Abdashirta and his son Aziru--invaded each
other's properties, and all sent letters to Amenhotep III
requesting his assistance; but, simultaneously, they were
under the encouragement of the Hittites. The Hittite king

used this advantage to make puppet Chieftains and evil

32

geniuses of Egypt's Asiatic Empire without openly showing

his hostility to his ally, the pharaoh. Amenhotep, whose
desire was for peace in his time and for the enjoyment of
life, did not take the matter seriously. He might have
thought that he would not trouble his royal magnificence
with the petty affairs of a few border provinces. He
neglected to note that the Hittite kingdom, as a great grow-
ing power, was behind every movement in the Asiatic provinces
leading to uprisings against the Egyptian Empire.

It is worth focusing here on the main points of this
chapter and tracing the basic developments which took place
during Amenhotep III's reign. With the exception of his
inspection and oppression mission to Nubia, there was almost
nothing on the military side deserving mention. However,
one should not underestimate his interest and support of the
advancement of arts and construction. This interest is
apparent through the huge luxurious temples for his god Amon
at Karnak, his palace at Thebes, and the great lake of
Queen Tiy.

Amenhotep III's ancestors' conquests and the peaceful
era that prevailed in Egypt during his reign had a great
impact on the social arena. Due to his cultural interests,
large numbers of foreigners from Asia settled in Egypt and
affected the social and racial structure of Egyptian society.

This new social fabric gave impact to the growth of new

33

religious ideas represented in a return to the worship of
the old Egyptian god, Ra, in the form of the sun. Hymns to
Ra inscribed by the twins Suti and Hor, Amenhotep III's
architects, were similar in literary content to the ones
written during Akhnaton's era. This could be taken to indi-
cate that the concept of Aton existed prior to Akhnaton.

The controversy over the appearance of the name Aton and its
spread during Amenhotep III's era is still an unsettled
issue among historians. However, if it is true that
Amenhotep did not show resistance to the spread of Aton's
name side-by-side with Amon's, then it is probable that he
could have advocated the new religion had he not been in
fear of Amon and his priesthood. It would be realistic to
assume that the call to worship Aton was supported by Tiy,
and the priesthood of Heliopolis.

Queen Tiy is one of the characters that had a tremen-
dous influence over Amenhotep III (her husband). Her influ-
ence extended far beyond running the daily affairs of the
government. Amenhotep's polygamy, his interest in hunting,
and his search for personal satisfaction required her to
play an important role in the political life. As a conse-
quence, her influence upon her son and his beliefs cannot

be disregarded.

CHAPTER III

DURATION OF AKHNATON'S REIGN AND
HIS EARLY YEARS

After Tiy had grown to womanhood, she bore several
daughters and a son named Thutmose to Amenhotep III. This
son died when he was very young. After twenty years of
the reign of Amenhotep III (approximately 1400 B.C.),1 she
bore the future king of the Egyptian Empire. His parents
named him Amenhotep, the fourth pharaoh in the Eighteenth
Dynasty that was known by this name. Later he was known
by the name of Akhnaton.

It is very difficult for us to know the correct name
and date of Akhnaton because of the many years which sep-
arate his time and ours, during which much data has been
lost. But in the nineteenth century, the archaeologists
who specialized in ancient Egyptian studies translated the
hieroglyphic inscriptions and tried to insure the correct-

ness of the historical data available.

 

lArthur Weigall, The Life and Times of Akhnaton
(2nd ed. London: Thornton Butterworth,l¢dn, 1934), p. 36.

 

34

35

His actual name Amenhotep was changed to the name of
Akhnaton, in respect for the god Aton. The name means
"the spirit-soul of Aton." The name has been spelled by
historians in different ways, such as Akhnaton, Akhnaten,
Ikhnaton, Akhenat and so on. In the hieroglyphic inscrip-

tions, the name Amenhotep was given as: . (n ti” ce=5f§ 1
W

and the name Akhnaton as: (OW

 

 

 

 

As for the duration of his reign, historians megtion

different dates; for instance, Hayes says Akhnaton came to

the throne of Egypt between 1370-1353 B.C.,1 but Starr

states that Akhnaton was pharaoh between 1367-1350 B.C.2

According to Jones, he reigned between 1358-1350 B.C.3
Abdulaziz Salah gives the same date as Starr.4 But accord-
ing to observations made on Akhnaton's mummy by some

anatomists, Akhnaton was less than 25 years of age at the

time of his death.5 Thus, it seems probable that the

 

1William C. Hayes, The Scepter of Egypt (Cambridge:

Harvard University Press, 1959), p. 280.

2Chester G. Starr, A History of the Ancient WOrld
(2nd ed. New York: Oxford University Press, 1974), p. 92.

3M. E. Monckton Jones, Ancient Egypt from the Records
(lst ed. London: Methuen and Co., LTD, 19247) p. 146.

4Abdulaziz Salah, Ancient: Near East: Egypt and Ira
(Cairo: Almactaba Al-Ameria, F1rst D1vision, 1967),
p. 148.

5R. G. Harrison, "Pharaonic Remains Purported to Be
Akhenaten," Journal of Egyptian Archaeology V, 52 (1966),
p. 104.

36

duration of Akhnaton's reign extended from 1367-1350 B.C.
However, I would dispute the anatomists contention that
Akhnaton was less than 25 years of age at his death. This
seems unlikely in view of the length of his reign (17 years)
and the tremendous reformation he undertook during that time.
Here another issue regarding a possible co-regency be-
tween Akhnaton and his father should be discussed. Most
historians corroborate the idea of joint rule while others
hold to the opposing idea. Aldred supports the idea of the
co-regency, depending on the inscriptions which mention the
celebration of three Jubilees to Aton III.1 Since worship
of Aton developed under Akhnaton rather than under his
father, who worshipped Amon, yet the Jubilees of his father
(Amenhotep III) coincided with Jubilees for god Aton, the
existence of a co-regency seems probable. Aldred also
studied the work of Ramose, the vizier of Amenhotep III,
through the inscriptions and found it a good indication of
the co-regency. Ramose is shown in some inscriptions giving
a bouquet to Amenhotep IV (Akhnaton) which indicates his
(Ramose) appointment to office. Other inscriptions show
Ramose serving Amenhotep III as his vizier. During the
first Jubilee in the 30th year of Amenhotep III, Ramose

donated four jars of ale to his Lord. Yet after this

 

lC. Aldred, "The Beginning of the El-Amarna Period,"
Journal of Egyptian Archaeology V, 45 (1959), pp. 30-31.

37

year Ramose fails to appear in any reliefs. Death, sup-
posedly overtook him.l Ramose's appointment under Amenhotep
IV and his serving under Amenhotep III, coupled with not
appearing in reliefs after the first Jubilee, point tova
co-regency between Amenhotep III and Akhnaton.

Fairman concludes from the inscriptions on three car-
touches with the name of Amenhotep III, and on another
cartouche in front of it on the same stone block with the
name of Amenhotep IV, that both kings were alive and reign-
ing together. This block and other documents which have
survived, inscribed with the names of both kings, give
Fairman evidence of the co-regency. Fairman writes:

The remarkable feature of this block is, of course,

the association of Amenophis III [Amenhotep III]

and AmenOphis IV [Amenhotep IV], a form of associa-

tion that is without exact parallel in any of the

other documents of the Amarna period. In the first
place, it will be noted that the royal name is that
used before the change in name and the block cannot
therefore be dated much later than year 5 of Amenophis

IV/Akhenatoen [Akhnaton]. In the second place it is

quite extraordinary to find the names of both kings

with that of young king, Amenophis IV (Amenhotep IV],

preceding that of his father.2

Pendlebury supports the same idea of the joint rule,

but he is not sure of the exact length of it. One of his

 

1Aldred, "Two Theban Notables During the Later Reign
of Amenophis III," Journal of Near Eastern Studies 18
(1959): pp. 116-120.

2H. W. Fairman, "A Block of Amenophis IV (Amenhotep IV)
From Athribis," Journal of Egyptian Archaeology V, 46 (1960),
p. 81.

 

 

38

statements follows:

Unfortunately, in the present case we are not cer-

tain of the exact length of the co-regency of the

two Amenhoteps, but we have an indication. In the

ninth year of the new king's reign an alteration was

made in the titulary of the god Aton. A number of
objects have come to light bearing this later name

of the god in conjunction with the name of Amenhotep

III, and in one case in conjunction with his portrait

as an old man. This points to a co-regency of at

least eight years.

Another interesting piece of evidence supporting the
co-regency was discovered by Pendlebury in the Tomb of Huya,
the chief steward of the household of the queen Tiy. The
reliefs of the tomb deal with an important celebration of
some sort and a visit paid to Akhnaton in Tel El-Amarna by
the Queen Tiy. These are dated to the year 12. In part of
the tomb Queen Tiy's portrait is shown alone, and in another
part she is shown with her husband, Amenhotep III, as though
he was still alive. Pendlebury believes that the appearance
of these two pictures together is a good evidence of the
co-regency.

Giles, after he considered the views of those opposing

the idea of the co-regency and those who support it, went

 

to the supporting side: ". . . I shall take the co-regency
as a matter of fact, not theory. . . ."3
l

J. D. S. Pendlebury, Tel El-Amarna (London: Lovat
Dickson and Thompson, Ltd., 1935) , p. 11.

 

2Ibid., pp. 11-12.

3F. J. Giles, Ikhnaton (London: Hutchinson and Co.,
Ltd“, 1970). p. 84.

39

Redford wrote extensively in his book History and

 

Chronolpgy of the Eighteenth Dynasty of Egypt, trying to
understand, analyze, and discuss whether or not the co-
regency existed. He believed that the appearance of the
names of the two kings together cannot be taken as an
evidence of joint rule. They might have appeared together
because the death of Amenhotep III brought a temporary halt
to the nearly completed decoration of the temples, but the
work was continued by his architects as if he were still
alive, or because Akhnaton might have ordered finishing the
work as a memorial to his father.1 In another statement he
proposes that Amenhotep III abdicated his functions in favor
of his son.2

Gardiner, basing his argument on the Tel El-Amarna
letters, states that Akhnaton succeeded only at the death
of his father, when he was a mere youth. For the appear-
ance of the names of the two kings together, Gardiner argued:

I am convinced that the juxtaposition of the names

of Amenhotep III and of Akhenaten, wherever it occurs,

was due merely to filial piety, probably coupled with
the fact that a reference to Maat, the "Truth" so much

 

1D. B. Redford, History and Chronology of the
Eighteenth_Dynasty of Egypt YToronto: University of Toronto
Press, 1967). PP. 103-105. .

2Redford, "Some Observations on Amarna Chronology,"
Journa1_of Egyptian Archaeology V, 45 (1959), p. 35.

 

 

40

in the forefront of Akhenaten's creed, forms a
part of Amenhotep III's prenomen.

Smith does not accept the co-regency of 11 or 12 years,
but he seems to approve the existence of the co-regency for
a short period of two or three years:

. . . and that the young king acceded to the throne

upon the death of his father at the end of the co-

regency beginning in the 36th or 37th years, seems

to be backed by the other Amarna foreign corres-

spondence.2

In summary of these different theories: the ideas of
Aldred, Fairman and Pendlebury concerning the appearance of
the names and portraits of Amenhotep III and Akhnaton to-
gether in reliefs, on different occasions, support a co-
regency between the two kings. Redford's idea that
Amenhotep III retired and abdicated in favor of his son is
not positive for lack of evidence. It is possible, but not
likely, that Amenhotep III wished to make his son more
practical in government work, and so abdicated in favor of
him. Gardiner's argument against co-regency depends on the
letters which were sent by the Hittite king, Suppilulliuma,
and the Mitanni king, Tushratta, to Akhnaton and his mother

Queen Tiy after the death of Amenhotep III. These letters

 

1Sir Alan Gardiner, "The So-called Tomb of Queen Tiy,"
Journal of Egyptian Archaeology V, 43 (1957), p. 14.

2Sir W. Stevenson Smith, TherArt and Architecpure of
Ancient E t (lst ed. London: Penguin Books, 1958), pp.

 

41

do not contain convincing proof because they do not indicate
whether there was a co-regency or not. Therefore, I agree
with Giles when he says:

The Suppilulliuma letter constitutes no argument

either for or against the co-regency, . . . the

same group of letters certainly show that the

monarchs of the time only began bringing their
business to Ikhnaton after Amenhotep III had died.

1
Also, Gardiner's theory of the juxtaposition of the names
of the two kings as due to filial piety or correlated to
Maat is insufficient to refute the existence of the co-
regency. Even if what Gardiner believes is true, the filial
piety itself does not prove whether or not there was a co-
regency.

Finally, because there is no precise evidence to sup-
port the existence or the nonexistence of the co-regency,
although most arguments are in favor of its existence, and
because the joint rule is not alien to Near Eastern coun-
tries either in ancient or in modern times, in my estima-
tion, the co-regency between the two kings is probable.
One hopes that in the future we will gain more evidence to
clarify this question of co-regency.

Although there is not adequate information regarding
Akhnaton's childhood, three important elements, relevant

to the early years of Akhnaton should be studied: the

 

1Giles, 9p, cit., p. 61.

42

tutelage of his mother, his marriage with Nefertete, and
the early work of Akhnaton after his ascension to the
throne.

The important and the effective personality influenc-
ing Akhnaton during his childhood and youth was his mother,
the Queen Tiy. When her husband was alive, she worshipped
the god of Heliopolis and not the god of Thebes, possibly
due to her ancestry. Later, she gave her sympathy to her
son's belief and joined the royal family in worshipping the
one god Aton.l As for her influence on her son, Brugsch
says:

In the house of his mother Thi [Tiy], daughter of a

foreigner, beloved by his father, hated by the

priests, the young prince had willingly received

the teaching about the one God of Light; and what

the mouth of his mother had earnestly impressed upon

his childish mind in tender youth became a firm

faith when he arrived at man's estate.2

Tiy's position, as queen-mother and a guardian of her
son, was emphasized in most of the inscriptions of the
reign of Akhnaton. After her husband (Amenhotep III)
slipped into premature senility and during the probable

co-regency, she was the real head of the government.

Diplomatic letters to or from Asiatic kings were sent

 

lAbdul Monaam, Akhnaton. (Cairo: Al—Maktaba Al-
Thakafia, 1961), p. 37.

2Henry Brugsch, History of Egyptrpnder the Pharaohs I
(2nd ed. London: Spottiswoode and Co., 1881), p. 492.

43

under her name. As an example, a letter from Dushrata of
Mitanni has survived, dating from the last years of
Amenhotep III's reign; it is addressed, not to the old king
or to the young co-regent, but to the queen Tiy. This
letter carried greetings to Tiy, to her son, and
his bride, Tadukhepa. After the death of Amenhotep III,
Tiy continued her grasp upon the government, and her son
came under her trusteeship. Some letters were sent from
the allies of Egypt to Tiy and to her son reminding them of
the friendship of the allies with the late king and trying
to strengthen relations with the new heir.1
Because young marriages were frequent in Egypt,
Akhnaton, like his father, married a girl when he was about
twelve years old. Her name was Nefertete which means
"the beautiful one who came." Nefertete's origin is uncer-
tain. Bille-De Mot believes that she was a foreigner from
an Asiatic country, and identifies her with the daughter
of Tushratta, Tadukhepa, to whom Amenhotep III was married.2
Bratton and Smith believe that she was a native, perhaps a
half-sister of Akhnaton. But in considering two things,

I believe that she probably was not a foreigner identified

 

1James Baikie, A History of Egypt II (London: A. and
C. Black, Ltd.,l929). p. 237.

2E. Bille-De Mot, The Age of Akhnaton (London:
Evelyn, Adams and Mackay, Ltd., 1966), p. 40.

 

 

44

with Tadukhepa, but rather a native. First, there is a
letter sent by Tushratta to Amenhotep III distinctly refer-
ing to Tadukhepa as Amenhotep III's wife, not Akhnaton's;
"with Tadukhepa, my daughter, the wife, whom thou lovest,
may it be well."1 Secondly, the bust of Nefertete (this
was found at Amarna and is now in the Berlin Museum), shows
in the style of the work, the shape of the crown, and in
Nefertete's features, the portrait of a native.2

Nefertete's life with Akhnaton was much like the life
of Tiy with Akhnaton's father. After Akhnaton, she was the
most interesting figure of the reign, and her influence upon
her husband was remarkable. She shared with her husband all
the glories of the empire. Her portraits generally appear
with her husband's, and her name is frequently inscribed
side by side with her husband's name. To show how much
Akhnaton loved his wife, Queen Nefertete, he swore an oath
by his father:

Sweet love fills my heart for the Queen, . . .

Grant a great age to the Queen Nofri-Thi [Nefertete]

in long years; may she keep the hand of Pharaoh. . . .

What I swear is true avowal of that which my heart
says to me.3

 

lBaikie' 92. Cit. p p. 2420
23mm, 9p. cit., p. 205.

3Brugsch, pp, cit., p. 504.

45

 

 

Queen Nefertete
(Painted Limestone)

Inc., I960),

 

Doubleday & Company,

Immanuel Velikovsky, Oedipus and Akhnaton

(New York

Source

90.

p.

46

A prayer to Akhnaton and his wife also indicates the great
love for Nefertete:

.For the great king's wife, his beloved, abounding

in her beauty; her who sends the Aton to rest with

a sweet voice, and with her two beautiful hands,

bearing two sistrums, the Mistress of the Two Lands,

Nefernefruation-Nefertete, 1iv1ng forever and ever.

May she be by the side of wanre [Akhnaton] forever

and ever as the heavens abide under that which is

in them.

In Tel El-Amarna, the young pharaoh and his wife lived
a quiet life. She devoted herself to her husband and to
the religious reform to which he dedicated his life. She
bore him six daughters and appears to have been her hus-
band's constant companion. Reliefs depict Nefertete play-
ing with her husband and her daughters. In other portraits,
she is sitting on her husband's knee, giving him a kiss,
and sometimes riding her horsed chariot side by side with
her husband in visits to the temple of Aton.2 She was
faithful to her husband‘s religious beliefs, and hers was
the first supporting hand in spreading the worship of Aton.
She named her palace, in the northern end of Tel El-Amarna,
The House of Aton. Her name was changed to Nefer-Nefru-Aton

which means "Beautiful is the beauty of Aton."3

 

1James H. Breasted, Ancient Records of Egypt V, II
(Chicago: The University of ChICago Press, 1906). P. 410.

 

2Monaam, pp, cit., pp. 86-87.

3Jaroslav Cerny, Ancient Egyptian Religion (lst ed.
London: William Brendon and Son, Ltd., 1972), p. 36.

 

47

But because Nefertete gave birth to seven daughters and did
not provide Akhnaton with a son heir, Akhnaton married two
of his daughters, one after another, and Nefertete was
exiled to another palace. This probably contributed to the
collapse of his religion.

When Akhnaton ascended the throne, his main preoccupa-
tion was with religion. In the beginning, he showed his
respect, through worship, to different gods, in particular
the god Re-Harakhti. As an example, when Akhnaton came to
the throne as a youth he fixed his titulary in the follow-
ing manner:

Mighty Bull, Lofty of Plumes; Favourite of the

Two Goddesses, Great in Kingship in Karnak;

Golden Hawk, Wearer of Diadems in the Southern

Heliopolis; King of Upper and Lower Egypt,

Beautiful-is-the-Being-of-Ra, the Only-One-of Ra;

Son of the Sun, Peace of Amon [Amenhophis],

Divine Ruler of Thebes; Great in Duration,

Living for Ever and Ever, Beloved of Amon-Ra,

Lord of Heaven.1
But it was just a short time later that we find the surpris-
ing title: "High Priest of Ra-Horakhti, rejoicing in the
horizon in his name, "Heat-which-is-in-Aton."2 Akhnaton,

gradually, transformed and enhanced the obscure solar cult

of Aton until he eventually came to believe that Aton was

 

lArthur Weigall, The Life and Times of Akhnaton
(2nd ed. London: Thornton Butterworthq Ltd.,l934), p. 50.

2

 

Ibid.

48

the only one to be worshipped. The development and nature
of Aton will be described in the next chapter, but a ques-
tion which I would like to discuss is: What were the
reasons which motivated Akhnaton to make a religious revolu-

tion against Amon and his priesthood?

Abdul MOnaam leans to the belief that Akhnaton was edu-
cated by the priesthood of Heliopolis in his mother's house.
They (the priesthood) taught him the nature of Ra and his
supremacy in the past time and the maltreatment which people
suffered under the priesthood of Amon.l Supportive ideas to
Monaam's belief are given by Smith, Seele and Steindorff.
Steindorff and Seele write, "It appears quite possible that
the education of Amenhotep IV was considerably influenced
by the priesthood of Heliopolis."2 Giles points out that
the motivation came to Akhnaton from the East--the Asian
countries. Giles idea depends on the existence of great
numbers of the Asian people in Egypt. Those people included
dreamers, philosophers and poets. They impregnated
.Akhnaton's mind with ideas of philosophies and mysteries

‘which he applied to his religion.3 Ward argues that the

1Monaam, pp, cit., p. 71.

ZGeorge Steindorff and Seele, When Egypt Ruled the East
2nd ed. Chicago: The University of Ch1cago Press, 1957),
p. 201.

3Giles, pp, cit., p. 20.

49

power of the deity, Amon, kindled a desire on Akhnaton's part
to free the throne from a supposed stranglehold of the Amon
priesthood.1 Weigall believes that the young pharaoh was
influenced by his mother and her circle during his younger
years, but: "He was himself the leader and instigator of the

movement from the fourth year of the reign onwards. . ."2

It seems that Akhnaton, as a young boy, might not have
realized which of the two religions was better morally and
theologically for him; the worship of Amon, the main re-
ligion in Thebes in those days, or the worship of the sun-
disk, predominant in the city of Heliopolis. But when he
became old enough, he thought and looked carefully to the
type of worship of the sun the ancient Egyptians employed.
He might have compared that worship with the present
religion of his day, the worship of Amon whose priesthood
lived in wealth and luxury. He thought,possibly then, that
a return to the old Egyptian beliefs in the form of a sun-
disk by the name of Aton would be better and, consequently,
might stOp the domination of Amon and his priesthood.

As for Akhnaton's political work, in his early years,
Egypt foolishly lost one of her allies after another. As I
have mentioned, his main preoccupation was with religion.

1William A. Ward, The Spirit of Ancient Egypt (lst ed.
Beirut: Khayats, 1965), p. 70.

2Arthur Weigall, A Short History of Ancient Egypt
(London: Chapman and Hall, Ltd., 1935), p. 150.

50

In the words of Breasted, "the philosophizing theology of

the priests was of more importance to him than all the

1 O I O D
On h1s access1on, affairs 1n the

provinces of Asia."
Asiatic countries were in very bad shape. A series of
letters, now famous as the "Tel El-Amarna Letters" inscribed
in cuneiform characters, gives many details about the slow
disintegration of the empire in Asia as a result of the new
forces in that area. At the same time the letters show that
Akhnaton did not wish affairs of those countries to be
brought to his attention.2

As mentioned in the preceding chapter, the Hittites
were behind most movements in the Asiatic provinces leading
to uprisings against the Egyptian empire. In the days of
Akhnaton the Hittites took advantage of his pacific policy
and marched on Egyptian provinces in Syria.3 Another
foreign danger came from the nomadic bands, the Habiru, in
southern Palestine.4 The answer of Akhnaton to all the
letters which were sent urging action was a negative one.
He dedicated himself to his religious beliefs and forgot

that everything that is taken by force must be taken back

 

by force.
1James H. Breasted, A Histor of E t (2nd ed.
New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1951), p. 356.
2Salah, pp, cit., p. 220.
31bid.
4

Giles, pp, cit., p. 27.

CHAPTER IV

RELIGIOUS REFORM

The Background of Egyptian Religion

Egyptian civilization has spanned thousands of years
under the rule of different dynasties, during which many
political, social, economic and religious changes have
occurred. Thus, the roots of the Egyptian religion were
as remote to Akhnaton as he is to us. The ancient Egyptians'
religion changed and developed along with the political
system.

The ancient Egyptians looked to the forces of nature
as the most powerful influences in the course of their
lives; therefore, they honored and worshiped these forces
which they hOped would protect and keep them safe. The
people worshiped the sun because the sun gave them heat and
light, the earth because it produced the plants, and the
cattle because they plowed the ground. The Nile River was

an important factor in the life of all Egyptiansl; in fact,

 

lAbdulaziz Salah, Ancient Near East: Egypt and Iraq
(Cairo: Almactaba Al-Ameria,IPirst DiVision. I967),

p. 297.

51

52

they considered it the artery of their life. Many of these
natural forces were represented as gods in the form of
animals. Among those worshiped were the jackel-headed god,
Anubis; the ibis god, Thoth, the cat goddess, Bast, the
cobra-headed god, Edgo, and many others.1 Why did these
dieties appear in the form of animals? To help answer this
question, we must consider the environment and the written
language. The great use of pictures of animals in the
hieroglyphic script indicates that those animals existed
locally. Therefore, it is possible that the ancient
Egyptians, by portraying their gods in the form of the local
animals, desired to form a strong relationship between the
gods and the environment in which they lived. It is pos-
sible also, that each region--wanting to distinguish its
local god from others--chose a sign for its god which the
people believed would represent the real work of the animal
symbolized. For instance, the god Ra was represented in
the form of an animal body with the head of a falcon, and
the falcon is distinguished from other birds by the height
of its flight and the sharpness of its sight.

In ancient Egypt there was a multiplicity of gods
reflecting the multiplicity of the districts. Family gods
were among the earliest gods in Egypt, even before it came

to be known by the names of "Upper and Lower Egypt."

 

lIbid., pp. 297-298.

53

 

 

 

 

 

 

   

 

 

    

f LV)W
‘ I

CHNOVI raAw: THOTH

 

Some of the Principal Egyptian Deities

Source: Sir Alan Gardiner, Egypt of the Pharaohs (Oxford:
The Clarendon Press, l961)1

 

54

When small regions unified to form a state, the god of the
ruling family became the state god; however, other gods
still existed. I will not review any of the gods, except
the gods Amon and Ra as they are closely connected with
Akhnaton's religious reform.

Ra, the sun-god, had been worshiped in Egypt since
the dawn of history. He was symbolized as the sun-disk
(the brightest body of the celestial bodies), and at times
he was depicted in human form with a falcon head.1

Ra's powers changed in the process of time. He became
a very important god from the fourth dynasty onward. He
was sanctified and worshiped in most of the areas in ancient
Egypt where it was believed that he was the creator of every
thing, including gods and men. He daily sailed in his boat
from the Eastern horizon to the Western horizon, and was
called Ra-Horakhti in the morning and Atum in the evening.2
The rise of Ra from the East in the morning and his evening
descent in the West every day symbolized the Egyptian belief

in life after death.3 Because of the importance of Ra, his

 

1James H. Breasted, Development of Religion and Thought
in Ancient Egypt (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1912),
p. 9.

2

 

 

E. A. Wallis Budge, The Mummy: Chapters on Egyptian

. v v Y

Funeral Archaeology. 2nd ed. New Yofk: Biblo and Tannen,

1964, p. 270.

3This belief can also be observed in the construction
of the great pyramids and in placing furniture in them, for
use by the dead in the life after death.

55

name was incorporated with the name of the pharaohs; such
as: Snef-Ra, Khaf-Ra, Ne-user-Ra, Saru-Ra, and so onl;
Sometimes the pharaoh became Ra himself or the son of Ra.
The pharaoh was regarded as a direct link to god and the
agent of the god. To strengthen this position a more
direct link was often created. An old Egyptian legend tells
us that the wife of one of the priests of Ra conceived by
Ra the first three pharaohs of the fifth dynasty. "She is
the wife of User-Re, priest of Re of Sakhabu, but her three
children are in truth the sons of Re, his father."2
Successive pharoahs of Egypt were Ra's direct descendents,
and Ra was described as the first supporting hand of the
pharaoh.
He settles for him Upper Egypt, he settles for him
Lower Egypt; he hacks up for him the strongholds
of Asia, he quells for him all the people, who were
fashioned under his fingers.
Also, the priesthood of Ra of Heliopolis held an important
position; for these priests proclaimed that Ra gave them

the power to direct the affairs of the lives under his

omnipotence.

 

1John A. Wilson, The Culture of Ancient E t (13th ed.
Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1975 , p. 88.

2M. E. Monckton Jones, Ancient Egypt from the Records
(lst ed. London: Methuen and Co., Ltd., 1924), p. 23.

 

 

3Breasted, pp, cit., p. 14.

56

Amon, the God of Thebes, whose name means "the Hidden
One," was depicted as a man sitting on a chair, with two
long feathers of green and red on his head, possibly to
represent the tail feathers of a bird. As early as the
fifth dynasty, his name was found in the text of the pyra-

mids from that dynasty.1

He was a god of harvest and later
a god of the wind which "bloweth where it listeth, and thou
hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it
cometh, and whither it goeth."2 His wife was called Mut,
meaning "mother", and their son was the moon god, Khon.

His priests were the mediators to whom the people went to
ask help, health, or victory from Amon.

The reputation which Ra and his priesthood held in the
twelfth dynasty and prior to that encouraged the priesthood
of Amon, the local god at Thebes, to a syncretic identifi-
cation between Amon and Ra called Amon-Ra. From the begin-
ning of the twelfth dynasty Amon was frequently called
Amon-Ra. The priests of Amon shrewdly believed that they
could gain power with the pharaoh and be able to have more

control of the treasury of Egypt. Joining the names was,

in fact, a heavy blow for the priesthood of Heliopolis

 

lMohammad Sabir, Misr Tahta Zilal A1 Farainah (Cairo:
Dar Memphis, 1965)] p0 653.

2H. Frankfort, Ancient Egyptian Religion (New York:
Columbia University Press, l948)7’p. 22.

 

 

57

whose power weakened. The placement of Amon's name first
in the sequence and the locus of Amon's worship in

the capital of Thebes contributed to Amon-Ra's becoming the
state god and the king of gods, under the domination of

the priests of Amon.

Hail to thee, Amen-Ra, lord of the throne of the

earth, chief of Ap-to (Thebes), lord of truth,

father of the gods, maker of man, creator of the

beasts, lord of existences, enlightener of the

earth, sailing in heaven in tranquility.

Although Amon-Ra was frequently worshiped as one God, the
priesthoods of Amon and Ra continued to struggle for domin-
ance; and the supremacy of their own god.

The relationship between the pharaohs and the gods
gives us an indication of how the priesthoods gained and
held power. By ancient Egyptian legend, most of the
pharaohs came to the throne by the help of gods. The
pharaohs, in returning the good favor, put everything into
the hands of the priests of the gods, believing the gods
would then be the first supporting help in case of political
difficulties. For example, Thutmose III of the Eighteenth
Dynasty conquered his enemies under the auspices of his god

Amon. These achievements were recorded by him (Thutmoselfiflu

on the wall of the temple of Karnak.2 This record shows

 

1James Bonwick, Egyptian Belief andpModern Thought
(Indian Hill, Colorado: FalconTs Wing Press, 1956), p. 107.

 

2Supra, p. 13.

Source:

F. G. Bratton,
Press,

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59

the strength and grandness of Amon and his priesthood. The
reward to Amon from Thutmose III and other pharaohs was the
construction of huge temples in Thebes and in other parts

of the large empire. To these temples was donated most of
the booty which had been gained during the Asian conquests;
also, many plantations were given to Amon and his priesthood.
The pharaohs believed that all of Egypt was indebted to Amon,
for he caused its very existence, its fertility, its wealth,
and its progressive civilization. As a result, the priests
became the superintendents and despots of the country; they
were the beloved known sextons to Amon, his private communi-
cants--in short, the priesthood of Amon began to dominate
everything in Egypt, and by its intercession with Amon the
country flourished under his blessings.

Still, the main concern of the priesthood was for the
establishment of its control and the increase of its wealth.
Because these concerns clashed with the existence of other
gods, the priests established, as I mentioned, a syncretic
identification between Amon and the other gods. At this
juncture the reputation and wealth of Amon and his priest-
hood increased day after day while the priests of Ra and
other gods suffered the lack of financial resources and the
loss of position. Therefore, covetousness and jealousy
were surfacing among the priests of those gods. At the

head of these malcontents was the priesthood of the god Ra

60

at Heliopolis. To justify and support their movement
against Amon and his priesthood, the priests of Ra spread
the idea that Amon's faith and his theological school did
not affect the common life of Egypt and had not wrought the
progress in Egypt that their own theological school at
Heliopolis had done.

By the influence of the priesthood of Ra, Thutmose IV
(1413-1405) succeeded to the throne, and hostility to the
priesthood of Amon resulted. Ra was depicted as the sun-
disk with two extended arms ending in two human hands sur-
rounding the king and giving him prosperity.l (This repre-
sentation was chosen by Akhnaton for his god Aton.)

It would appear that the accession of Thutmose IV,
coming to the throne by the influence of the Heliopolitan
priests, was the first blow to Amon and his priesthood.
This change seems to be an introduction to a new doctrine,
an alteration point or a new image of the sun-god which was
to be completed by the pharaoh, Akhnaton.

The great influence of the priests of Amon, still in
control of the temples, as well as the short life of
Thutmose IV, gave the priests of Amon the opportunity to
regain their power over the throne. They worked in favor

of the new pharaoh, Amenhotep III, until he showed his

 

lSalah, pp, cit., -p. 308.

61

loyalty to Amon by the construction of huge temples at
Thebes and other places. Even though he was a loyal pharaoh
to Amon, he did not show clear objection to the new movement
which was the main threat to Amon during the reign of his
son Amenhotep IV (Akhnaton). This movement was the declara-
tion of the worship of Aton. The threat (still important in
the estimation of historians) was that Akhnaton's new faith
was considered as the first hesitant step toward the belief

in one god on earth, or monotheism.

Aton's Nature and His Supremacy Over Amon

 

It is not easy to determine the time of the emergence
of the word Aton as a religious name for one of the ancient
Egyptian gods. Most of the ancient evidence represents
Aton in the form of the sun-disk. The story (written on
papyrus and now in the Berlin Museum) of Sinuhe, one of
Ammenemes's I princes during the Twelfth Dynasty, speaks of
the death of Ammenemes I; "He flew away up to heaven and
was united with the sun [Aton], and his divine limbs were

1 But does the word

absorbed into him who created him."
sun (Aton) mean the physical form of the sun or a deity?
From Sinuhe's text, it seems that reference is made to a

god not to the physical form of the sun. Also, there is

 

lArthur Weigall, A Short Historygof Ancient Egypt
(London: Chapman and Hall, Dmi.,1935). P. 74.

62

other evidence, frequently appearing in some of the Egyptian
texts, of the sun-deity. One is the phrase "Lord of all
that the disk surrounds," another is the epithet "The Living
Aton."l A commemorative scarab, issued to Thutmose IV,
stating that the pharaoh fought "with the Aton before him,
and that he campaigned outside Egypt to make the foreigners
to be like the [Egyptian] people, in order to serve the Aton
forever,"2 indicates that the existence of the name of Aton
as a god before Akhnaton's time was true.

We have in this scarab definite proof, not only that

the Aten was already regarded as a separate and dis-

tinct form of the sun-god by Thutmose IV, but that

he was actually worshipped as a god of battles who

gave victory to the pharaoh and ensured his pre-emi-

nence over the rest of the world, making all mankind

the subjects of the Disk.3
Under Akhnaton's father, Amenhotep III, the old name for
the material sun, Aton, had come into prominent use. The
royal barge of Amenhotep III and his wife Tiy bore the name
"Aten Gleams",4 Ra-mose, the vizier of Amenhotep III,

worked as "steward in the temple of the Aton," and there

was an inscription asking this pharaoh to induce Amon-Ra

 

1Abdulhameed Zide, Egypt the Eternal (Cairo: Dar E1-
Nahtata, Al Arabia, 1966), p. 611.

2A. W. Shorter, "Historical Scarabs of Thutmose IV and
Amenhotep III," Journal of Egyptian Archaeology 17 (1931),
p. 23.

3

 

 

Ibid., p. 24.

4Supra, p. 25.

63

to give a mortuary offering to the "scribe of the Treasury
of the Temple of the Aton" named Pen-buy.l The hymns which
were engraved on the funerary stele by the twins Suti and
Hor are another supporting piece of evidence:

Homage to thee, Aton of the day . . . creator of

men and women, maker of other lives . . . the

creator of himself he was not born . . . conqueror

of the two lands from the greatest to the least.2
From the reign of Thutmose III there was an inscription
from the Semma reading:

They [various gods] shall cause your [King Thutmose]

stability to be like the stability of the heaven,

your lifetime like the Aton in it.
In all of these, Aton seems to have been known as a deity.
He had his own temple at Thebes, but the oppression of the
priesthood of Amon did not give Aton the opportunity to
rise as a state god until Amenhotep IV had reigned several
years. Although, by the fifth year of Akhnaton's reign,
art had been changed and the worship of Aton had made great
strides toward supremacy, the various other gods were still

acknowledged; and there was, as yet, no mention or indica-

tion of the "monotheism" which Akhnaton was soon to concern

 

lWilson, pp, cit., p. 210.

2Budge, pp, cit., p. 32.

3F. J. Giles, Ikhnaton (London: Hutchinson and Co.,
Ltd,, 1970). p. 116.

himself with.

cult

64

1

The cult of Aton depended greatly upon the ancient
of Heliopolis. Gardiner cites:

How dependent upon the ancient cult of Heliopolis
this early work was is seen not only from its
dedication to Re-Harakhti, but also in its mention
of his great obelisk in Karnak, for at Heliopolis
the impressive monolith known as the benben or
obelisk was as characteristic of the place as was
later at abian Mecca the black stone known as
the Kaaba.

To indicate this dependence further, Gardiner continues--

old

new

The

So too in year 16 the high-priest of the Aton,
Meryre, still bore the time-honoured Heliopolitan
title 'greatest of seers'.

Akhnaton did not try to conceal his new faith in the

sun-god Ra; when he instructed his vizier about the

faith he said:

The words of Ra are before thee . . . my august
father who taught me their essence. . . . It was
known in my heart, revealed to my face, I under-
stood. . . .4

vizier Ramose replied

Thou art the Only One of Aton; in possession of
his design. . . . Thou hast directed the mountains.
The fear of thee is in the midst of their secret

 

ed.

The

New

lArthur Weigall, The Life and Times of Akhnatop (2nd
London: Thornton Butterworth,2DUd.,l934)} p. 75.

2

 

Sir Alan Gardiner, Egypt of the Pharaohs (Oxford:

 

Clarendon Press, 1961), p. 218.

31bid.

4James H. Breasted, A Histor of E t (2nd ed.

York: Charles Scribner 9 Sons, 1951), p. 360

65

chambers, as it is in the hearts of the people.
The mountains hearken to thee as the people
hearken.

Thus he made the worship of Ra the basis of his new faith.
Akhnaton then assumed the office of High Priest of his new
god with the same title as that of the high priest of Ra,

2

"Great Seer". The important thing that one should observe

which differentiated the new faith from that of the sun-god
Ra was the concept behind the name by which Akhnaton called
his god, "Heat Which Is In The Sun" [Aton]. By this epithet
the king was trying to distinguish his god from the material
sun by giving him an abstract nature. Breasted emphasizes
the spiritual character in these words:
However evident the Heliopolitan origin of the new
state religion might be, it was not merely sun-
worship; the word Aton was employed in place of the
old word for "god" (nutzer) and the god is clearly
distinguished from the material sun. . . . The
king therefore, was deifying thp vital heat which
he found accompanying all life.
Regarding the phrase of "Heat Which Is In The Sun" [Aton],
Budge wrote
The heat of Aten gave him life and maintained it in
him, and whilst that was in him Aten was in him.

The life of Aten was his life, and his life was
Aten's life, and therefore he was Aten.4

 

Weigall, pp, cit, p. 71.
Breasted, pp, cit.

Ibid. I Pp. 360-361.

bUNH

Budge, pp. cit., p. 82.

.L.

m.“

uh.

 

 

 

5,.

 

1 .th... H.

Akhnaton and His Wife Worshiping Aton

Oedipus and Akhnaton

Doubleday & Company,

Immanuel Velikovsky.

(New York

Source

Inc. , 1960) , p. 90.

 

66

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Akhnaton and His Family Under the Radiating Arms of Aton

Source:

Bille-De Mot. Age of Akhenaten (London: Adam
& Mackay, Ltd., 1966). p. 100.

if”
. ‘

68

. «Gr.
mrmn

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e ; .Qo. #.
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Before the Altar of the God Aton

ificing

Akhnaton Sacr

Age of Akhenaten (London: Adam

& Mackay, Ltd., 1966), p. 52.

 

Bille-De Mot.

Source:

69

The symbol of Aton was never portrayed in human or animal
form, he was always represented by the solar disk with rays
extending from it, each terminating in a hand as if the ray
were an arm bestowing "life".1
No specific time of the break with Amon and his priest-
hood is recorded. We have seen that there were attempts by
some of the earlier pharaohs to break with Amon, but these
pharaohs were not as successful as Akhnaton because they
were subordinates of the power and influence of the priests
of Amon. Also, because the Egyptians believed that the
pharaoh was chosen by Amon, and because--sometimes--the
pharaoh was worshiped as a god, it was hard for the Egyptians
to change their habit of devotion to Amon by turning to a
worship of Aton. But the crisis for Amon came after the
sixth year of Akhnaton's reign when--by any means--he
decided to reduce and, in fact, to end that strong power
of the priests of Amon. After seeing the domination of the
priests, Akhnaton moved against Amon and his priesthood by
announcing that they had to worship only one god, Aton--
"The Living Father Aton". He said that Aton was "Ra-

Harakhti Radiating in the Horizon, as he was the light found

in the star Aton."2 Akhnaton meant that he wanted to limit

 

lIbid., p. 81.

2Salah, op, cit., p. 309.

70

this new belief. He did not want to surprise people with a
new name they were not familiar with, and he tried to
inspire the people to return to their forefathers' god.

The priests of Amon were afraid of Akhnaton's declara-
tion, especially when he called his god "Heat which is the
Sun", and when he declared his creed: One god not many,
Aton not Amon. His orders were given to workmen and serv-
ants to obliterate the name of Amon, not only from the
temples of Thebes but also in different parts of the
Egyptian empire. The temple of Aton was built in the garden
of Amon. Thebes was called "City of the Brightness of Aton".
This was followed by the change in his name--from Amenhotep
IV to Akhnaton.

.No doubt, Akhnaton was genuinely interested in reform-
ing religion, but I think his major motive was to break the
power of the priests of Amon. Thus, the atmosphere at
Thebes became confused over the change in religion, and
hostility characterized the relationship between Akhnaton
and the priests of Amon. Therefore, to sever every con-
nection with Amon and to further his religious reform,
Akhnaton thought it a good idea to move from Thebes, at
that time the capital city of Egypt and the abiding place
of Amon, to a new city called Akheteton "The place where

Aton rises".

71

Life in Thebes must have been increasingly dangerous
for Akhnaton amidst the growing resistance of the priests
of Amon to his new doctrine, and he may have felt that
Thebes was not a suitable place in which to develop his new
plan without a disturbance. It is possible that his depar-
ture from Thebes may have been as much an act of self-
preservation as it was a grand symbolic gesture of inde-
pendence. Regarding this, Baikie wrote:

Much more likely to impress his mind was the obvious

fact that Thebes, with its whole soil cumbered with

ineradicable roots of Amenism, and its atmosphere
poisoned by hostile tradition, was an absolutely
impossible field for the growth of the seed which he
was set upon sowing and fostering.

Thus Akhnaton knew that it would be better to develop
his plan of religious reform in a virgin soil, undefiled by
temples of the other Egyptian gods. Akhnaton departed as
other apostles and prophets in history have done. The
prophet Mohammad in 622 departed from Mecca to Medina in the
Arabian peninsula trying to develop the religion of Islam
in a new environment and among new people. The difference
was that Madina was inhabited before Mohammad's departure,
while Akheteton was uninhabited, virgin soil. Mohammad

also was sent from god as a prophet, but Akhnaton was an

Egyptian king, a god sent by himself or his god.

 

lJames Baikie, A History of Egypt II (London: A. and
c. Black, Ltd., 1929). p. 259.

 

72

The similarity between Mohammad and Akhnaton was the reali-
zation that a change of place was necessary to eliminate
every connection with the old traditional belief which would
stand as an obstacle in the road of the new doctrine.
Akhnaton found a location north of Thebesl for his
city. According to my facts on the location, I would
agree with the historian, M. E. Jones, who gives its loca-
tion as about 160 miles above modern Cairo.2 When Akhnaton
was nineteen years old, he developed his plan; at twenty-
one he took up residence there. The town was built as
rapidly as possible. He brought workmen from every profes-
sion and housed them in villages some distance from the
city. In hot haste according to the king's plan, the workers
erected temples in honor of the new faith, Aton.3
The city, with the name which means "The Place Where
Aton Rises", was built according to the king's oath which
was recorded on stele at the extreme northern and southern
boundaries of Akheteton, thus:
His majesty raised his hand to heaven, to him who
made him, even to Aton, saying, "This is my testi-

mony forever, and this is my witness forever, this
Landmark (stele). . . . I have made Akhetaton on its

 

1Supra, p. 5.
2Jones, op, cit., p. 149.

3Henry Brugsch, History of Egypt_Under the Pharaohs I
(2nd ed. London: Spottiswoode and Co., 1881), p. I§4.

73

south, on its north, on its west, on its east.

I shall not pass beyond the southern landmark of

Akhetaton toward the south, nor shall I pass beyond

the northern landmark of Akhetaton toward the

north. . . . He has made his circuit for his own,

he has made his altar in its midst, whereon I make

offering to him.1

Six years after his plan the whole city was more or
less habitable. There was no differentiation between rich
and poor districts--residences of nobles were intermixed
with those of civil servants, merchants and artisans, small
houses were built among large palaces. This can be taken
as a symbol of the democratic side of Akhnaton's politics.
In the middle of Akhetaton was the administration quarter;
north of this lay the merchant district; farther northeast
was the royal palace; and to the east were the queen's
apartments. There were also zoological gardens where the

2 The temple of Aton

king could watch animals and birds.
was erected in the middle of the city. It was open to the
sky and people could offer their devotions in every part.

For the burial of the king a decorated tomb was hewn in a

desert valley some five miles east of the city.3

The fine art in Akhetaton cannot be disregarded as

part of Akhnaton's contribution to reformation.

 

lBreasted, op, cit., p. 365.

2J. D. S. Pendlebury, Tel El-Amarna (London: Lovat
Dickson and Thompson, Ltd., 1935 , pp. 34-145, 89.

3William C. Hayes, The Scepter of Egypt II (Cambridge:
Harvard University Press, 1959), p, 281.

 

 

7 4 m Customs“

House

  
  
 
  
  
 
  
      

‘ North

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Stela
‘- / w
Norllx,Cxly / .
'

Altars|
'- Northern
Tombs
$5.
,.__ Forengn l'OHlCE

sf Smaller Temple Siela
I I ,'

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@Q? - 50"”! City 'N'Obles
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CITY OF AKHETATON

Stela

 

   
  

 

Ikhnaton’s Tornbl
II?
I'"
Maru Aton
(Summer Palace)
SouthermN
M
Customs Tom\bs\
Housle Alab/aster Quarries

 

/
Stela:

l §l§ Stela ‘ \

City of Akhetaton

Source: F. G. Bratton. The First Heretic (Boston: Beacon
Press, 1961), p. 93.

 

 

 

75

g Q . ' I, .
’. n V' -. ..‘ ' ’ ‘.' .‘ ‘ . . . . a
. a. - ._ . . 7‘1. r}. ‘ . t ' 0.. . .’ 'b . ‘, K. ." f.- . . ' - -.. .‘ . c
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. ‘ ' | . .‘ ' I ’ I . . , ’ ' I . , an. -- . -
. ...“ '. ' . .' ‘ ‘ .oI . '-. 1p; ,
‘1 ‘ . ‘ -. . t, ‘ f . .

 

Reconstruction of Central Quarter at Amarna

Source: W. Stevenson Smith. The Art and Architecoure of
Ancient Egypt (lst ed. London: Penguifi’Books,
1958), p. 127.

 

76

Abdulaziz Salah offers much data about the art in Akhetaton
during the days of Akhnaton. He divides the arts into
stages. The first stage of the art of Akhetaton began when
his artists carved a statue of Akhnaton himself with all
the abnormalities of his body. The next stage began after
the settlement of Akhnaton and his family; the art became
more beautiful than during the first stage. The faces of
Akhnaton and his wife possessed more gentleness and
sensitivity.1

In the Amarna period, there were famous artists who
still bring to life for us much data concerning the city of
Akhetaton. Bek, son of Man, the overseer of sculptors,
was one of the famous architects and sculptors in the new
capital. He left us a large commemorative tablet of Assuan.
This tablet shows Bek to the right of an altar and the
inscription above him indicates that the figure of Akhnaton
stood to the left of the altar. However, the figure of
Akhnaton was effaced probably right after his death. The
inscription reads:

Giving praise to the Lord of the two Lands,

obeisance to Wanre [Akhnaton], by the chief of works

in the Red Mountain, the assistant whom his majesty

himself taught, chief of sculptors on the great and

mighty monuments ofzthe king, in the house of Aton,
in Akhetaton, . . .

 

lSalah, op, cit., p. 254.

2James H. Breasted, Anciont Records of Egypt II
(Chicago: The University ofgChicago Press, 19067, p. 401.

 

77

Another important scene comes from the tomb of the
architect Merire, "High Priest of Aton". The reliefs show
the king proceeding to the temple of Aton, riding in his
chariot with his daughters, soldiers and officials. In
front of the temple's door, the priests stand greeting him.

Three scenes from the Tomb of Merire may indicate the
loyalty of the priests to the new faith. A lady of Merire's
household named Tenr--probably his wife-~sings praise of

Aton:

The rising is beautiful, 0 Living Sun . . .

0 Living Aton, beside whom there is no other,

who heals the eyes with his rays, the maker of

all things that are. . . . Grant thou thy beloved
son, living in truth, . . . [Ikhnaton] that he may
live with thee forever.

The appointment of Merire by Akhnaton as the High
Priest of Aton is recorded as follows:

Behold, I am appointing thee for myself, to be great
seer, of the Aton in the temple of Aton in Akhetaton,
. . . As for any commission with which thou are
charged, my heart is satisfied herewith, I give to
thee the office saying: 'Thou shalt eat the food of
Pharaoh, the lord of the house of Aton.‘2

And in another scene Merire is rewarded as he collects the

dues of the temple from the farms successfully.3

 

1Breasted, op, cit., pp. 405-406.
2Ibid., p. 405.
3Ibid., p. 407.

78

Another who enjoyed Akhnaton's favor was the architect,
Thutmose. He kept in his house a collection of statues of
Akhnaton and his wife and daughters. Others sculpted
Akhnaton while he was playing with his wife and daughters,
and while he was eating his meals. They portrayed his
daughters embracing or jesting with each other.1

One of the important personalities, who played a very
significant role in the art in Akhetaton, was Eye. On the
walls of his tomb he left a scene showing the royal family
on a balcony, throwing collars and vessels of gold to him-
self and his wife. In another scene, he and his wife were
depicted bowing down and chanting the famous hymn of Aton--
the hymn which was considered the foundation of the new
faith. This magnificant poem represents a form of relig-
ious literature in ancient Egypt and manifests clearly the
nature of this new state religion. For one studying
"Akhnaton and Monotheism" this hymn from the Tomb of Eye
shows a significant religious intensity comparable to the

Psalms of the Hebrews. Breasted compared some of its ver-

ses with that of the 104th Psalm of the Hebrews:

 

lSalah, op. cit., p. 255.

79

The Splendour of Aton

The dawning is beautiful in the horizon of heaven,

0 living Aton, Beginning of life!

When thou risest in the eastern horizon of heaven,

Thou fillest every land with thy beauty;

For thou are beautiful, great, glittering, high over the earth;
Thy rays, they encompass the lands, even all thou hastzmade.
Thou are Re, and thou hast carried them all away captive;

Thou bindest them by thy love.

Though thou art afar, thy rays are on earth;

Though thou art on high, thy footprints are the day.

Night.
When thou settest in the western Thou makest darkness and it is
horizon of heaven night
The world is in darkness like Wherein all the beasts of the
the dead forest do creep forth.
They sleep in their chambers The young lions after their
Their heads are wrapt up, prey;
Their nostrils stOpped, and They seek their meat from God
none seeth the other. (Psalm 104, 20-21)

Stolen are all their things,
that are under their heads,
While they know it not.
Every lion cometh forth his den,
All serpents, they sting.
Darkness reigns (?)p
The world is in Silence,
He that made them has gone to rest
in his horizon.

Day and Man

Bright is the earth, The sun ariseth, they get
them away,

80

When thou risest in the horizon, And lay them down in their dens
When thou shinest as Aton by day Man goeth fbrth unto his work,
The darkness is banished, And to his labour unit the

When thou sendest forth thy rays, evening.

The two lands (Egypt) are in (Psalm 104, 22—23)

Daily festivity
Awake and standing upon their feet,
For thou has raised them up.
Their limbs bathed, they take their
clothing;
Their arms uplifted in adoration
to the dawning.
Then in all the world, they do
their work.

Day and The Animals and Plants

All cattle rest upon their herbage

All trees and plants flourish,

The birds flutter in their marshes,

Their wings uplifted in adoration
to thee,

All the sheep dance upon their feet,

All winged things fly,

They live when thou hast shone upon
them,

Day and The Waters

The barques sail up—stream and Yonder is the sea, great and
down-stream alike. wide,

Every highway is open because Wherein are things creeping
thou has dawned. innumerable

The fiSh in the river leap UP Both small and great beasts.
before thee. There go the ships;

And thy rays are in the midst There is leviathan, whom thou
0f the great sea. hast fbrmed to sport with

him.

Creation of Man.

Thou art he who createst the man-child in woman,

Who makest seed in man,

Who giveth life to the son in the body of his mother,
Who Sootheth him that he may not weep,

A nurse (even) in the womb

81

Who giveth breath to animate every one that he maketh.

When he cometh forth from the body,

Thou openest his mouth in speech,
Thou suppliest his necessities.

Creation of Animals

. . . on the day of his birth,

When the chicklet crieth in the egg-shell,
Thou givest him breath therein, to preserve him alive.

When thou hast perfected him,
That he may pierce the egg,
He cometh forth from the egg,
To chirp with all his might;

He runneth about upon his two feet,

When he hath come forth therefore.
The Whole Creation

How manifold are all thy works!
They are hidden from before us,
0 thou sole god, whose powers
no other monarch possesseth.
Thou didst create the earth
according to they desire.
While thou wast alone;
Men, all cattle large and small,
All that are upon the earth,
That go about upon their feet;
All that are on high,
That fly with their wings.
The countries of Syria and Nubia,
The land of Egypt;
Thou settest every man in his
place,
Thou suppliest their necessities.
Every one has his possessions,
And his days are reckoned.
Their tongues are divers in
speech.

Watering the Earth

Thou makest the Nile in the nether
Thou bringest it at thy desire, to

O Lord, how manifold are
they works!
In wisdom hast thou made
them all;
The earth is full of thy
creatures
(Psalm 104.24.)

world,
preserve the people alive.

82

0 lord of them all, when feebleness is in them,
0 lord of every house, who risest for them,

0 sun of day, the fear of every distant land,

Thou makest (also) their life.

Thou hast set a Nile in heaven,

That it may fall for them,

Making floods upon the mountains, like the great sea;
And watering their fields among their towns.

How excellent are the designs, 0 lord of eternity!
The Nile in heaven is for the strangers,

And for the cattle of every land, that go upon feet;
But the Nile, it cometh from the nether world for Egypt.
Thus thy rays nourish every garden,

When thou risest they live, and grow by thee.

The Seasons

Thou makest the seasons, in order to create all thy works;
Winter bringing them coolness,

And the heat (of summer likewise),

Thou hast made the distant heaven to rise therein,

In order to behold all that thou didst make,

While thou wast alone,

Rising in they form as living Aton,

Dawing, shining afar off and returning.

Beauty Due to Light

Thou makest the beauty of form, through myself alone.
Cities, towns and settlements, -

On highway or river,

All eyes see thee before them,

For thou art Aton of the day over the earth.

Revelation to the King

Thou art in my heart,

There is no other that knoweth thee,
Save thy son Ikhnaton.

Thou hast made him wise in thy designs.
And in thy might.

The world is in thy hand,

Even as thou hast made them.

83

When thou hast risen, they live;

When thou settest, they die.

For thou are duration, beyond thy mere limbs,

By thee man liveth,

And their eyes look upon thy beauty,

Until thou settest.

All labour is laid aside

When thou settest in the west;

When thou risest, they are made to grow . . . for the king,
Since thou didst establish the earth,

Thou has raised them up for thy son,

Who came forth from thy limbs,

The king, living in truth,

The lord of the Two Lands Nefer-khepru-Re, Wan-Re,

The son of Re, living in truth, lord of diadems,
Ikhnaton, whose life is long;

(And for) the great royal wife, his beloved,

Mistress of the Two Lands, Nefer nefru aton, Nofretete,
Living and flourishing for ever and ever.1

 

lBreasted, A History of Egypt, pp. 371-376.

CHAPTER V

AKHNATON AND MONOTHEISM

The Hymns of Aton mentioned in the preceding chapter
are unique in their nature. They contain monotheistic
beliefs quite contrary to many of the similar hymns of other
Egyptian gods. Their importance from the historians' point
of view is their content; the ideas of monotheistic belief.
But this does not mean that the idea of monotheism did not
exist before the time of Akhnaton. This idea appeared in
Egypt as early as the first dynasties. The concept of
belief in one god can be seen in the early thought of the
Egyptians, especially in the period between the Old Kingdom
and the beginning of the Middle Kingdom when they worshiped
the sun as the greatest god of earth. They looked to the
sun as the creator of everything. He was the father of
other gods, so in essence he created them also, and he was
represented in many forms. In the New Kingdom, after Amon's
fusion with Ra, the Egyptian people started to describe
thoig god as a single, an absolute god with complete knowl-

edge. They conceived of him, also, as the greatest one,

84

85

and imagined him in different forms.1 The thing that pre—
vented the Egyptians from being truly monotheistic was that
they were convinced of the existence of other gods, although

they believed in a supreme god, what we call henotheism.

 

The abstract nature of true monotheistic belief cannot be
characterized with a concrete nature or affective attributes
which characterized the godhead of ancient gods., Smith
explains this by comparing the natures of Aton and Amon-Ra:

Ra of the Pyramid age had pursued a carnal life in

the solar heavens, drinking wine, stealing women, kill—
ing other gods and eating their Vitals in order to
obtain the Red and Green; and he had in time grown
senile and had been forced to abdicate by Isis's theft
of his magic power. Not even Amen, god of wind, had
escaped anthropomorphic materialization and had per-
force been identified with Ra in order to justify his
claims. But abruptly in Akhanaten's hands the carnal
aspects of the deity disappear entirely; Aten possesses
only the intangible, immaterial qualities of light,
heat or radiance, he has not even an image apart from
the disk with radiating arms of light.2

Can the revised faith of Akhnaton be considered as true
monotheism? In trying to answer this question I will elab-
orate on the points of view of some of the historians.

Breasted believes that the expanding of the Egyptian
empire before Akhnaton's time was accompanied by an intel-
lectual awakening which shook traditional beliefs. This

intellectual awakening can be seen in the fact that

 

1Jack Finegan. Light from the Ancient Past (2nd ed.
Princeton, New Jersey: Prificeton University Press, 1959),
p. 95.

2Homer W. Smith, Man and His Gods (Boston: Little,
Brown and Company, 1956), p. 60.

 

 

86

Akhnaton's new faith and his strong belief in Aton motivated
him to efface from the monuments not only the names of Amon
and other gods, wherever he found them, but also the word
god in its plural form--gods. The hymn of Akhnaton's new
faith, as Breasted points out, had an inspirational univers-
alism not found before, in Egypt or in other places. He
wrote:
He [Aton] is the universal creator who brought forth
all races of men and distinguished them in speech and
color of skin. His creative power still goes on
calling forth life, even from the inanimate egg. . . .
Akhnaton's thought passes beyond a purely materialis-
tic recognition of the sun's activity on earth, and
discerns the fatherly solicitude of Aton for all
creatures. It is the thought which lifts the movement
of Akhnaton far above all that had before been attained
in the religion of Egypt or of the whole East before
this time. . . .1
To affirm the spirit and powerfully emotional forces
of Akhnaton's movement, Breasted centers not only on the
hymn, but also on art. The simplicity of Tel El-Amarna art,
where Akhnaton is depicted kissing his little girl or sit-
ting her on his knee as a normal father would, "illustrates
Ikhnaton's (Akhnaton's) powerful individuality and his fear-
less readiness to throw off the shackles of tradition with-

out hesitation in the endeavour to establish the world of

things as they are, in wholesome naturalness."2 The epithet

 

1James H. Breasted, The Dawn of Conscience (New York:
Charles Scribner's Sons, 1933), pp. 291-292.

2

 

Ibid., pp. 295-296.

87

of Maat1 which Akhnaton adopted, as "Living on Truth",
Breasted points out was appended to Akhnaton's royal name,
and by doing so, ". . . he [Akhnaton] intended to extend
the old national moral order to exercise sway over the
greater international world of which he was lord."2 In
brief, these two aspects, wholesome naturalness and truth
were incorporated as part of Akhnaton's religion. Breasted
does not hesitate to say:

. . . that this whole monotheistic movement is the

culmination of the ancient recognition of a moral

order by the Egyptian thinkers of the Pyramid Age,

and their creation of a realm of universal ethical

values, represented by the inclusive term Maat,

brought forth by the sun-god at Heliopolis.3

Freud gives us an interesting Opinion on Akhnaton's
monotheism. He argues that Akhnaton worshiped the sun not
as a material form, but as a symbol of divine being whose
energy was manifested in its rays. He considers Akhnaton's
doctrine as the first and purest monotheistic religion to
develop in history. He writes:

He added the something new that turned into monothe-

ism the doctrine of universal god: the quality of
exclusive. In one of his hymns it is stated in so

 

1Maat, is truth and justice personified and signifies
order and law, moral and physical. M. Brodrick, Concise
Dictionary_of Egyptian Archaeolo (3rd ed. London:
Methuen and Co., Ltd., 1924). p. 4.

 

 

2Breasted, op, cit., p. 299.

31bid., p. 296.

88

many words:1 '0 Thou only God, there is no other god
than Thou'.

Wilson doubts the real existence of the idea of mono-
theism in Akhnaton's faith. He emphasizes that the phrase
"sole god" was used for some gods prior to Akhnaton's time,
and that Aton was Akhnaton's personal god. He writes:

The hymn is entitled the worship of the Aton . . . by

the king Akhen-Aton and the queen Neferti-ti, and

pharaoh says explicitly: Thou art in my heart, and
there is no other that knows thee except the son

[Akhen-Aton], whom thou hast initiated into thy plans

and into thy power.2
The appearance of the phrase "sole god" can be taken as a
flattering exaggeration meaning the only important god,
sometimes in order to focus the worshiper's attention upon
one god. Wilson's view of our modern Jewish, Christian,
and Moslems faiths as monotheistic and his view of Aton as
non-monotheistic conflict with the view of most historians
like Breasted, and Gardiner. To him, in the Amarna age
there were at least two gods: Aton was concerned strictly
with creating and maintaining life, and the ethics and the

religion were derived from Akhnaton, both being regarded as

gods.3

 

1Sigmund Freud, Moses and Monotheism (2nd ed. New York:
Alfred A. Knopf, 1947), p. 30.

2John A. Wilson, The Culturo of Ancient Egypt (13th ed.
Chicago: University of ChiCago Press, 1975), pp. 224-225.

3

 

 

Ibid., p. 224.

89

Gardiner supports the theory which says that Atonism
was a true monotheism. He based his idea on the unique
character of Aton who was not represented in human form,
or animal form, but in an abstract form. Akhnaton's sweep-
ing away of the vast accumulation of mythological rubbish
inherited from the past was a marvelous achievement.l

Albright points out that the Aton cult became a true
monotheism a few years into the reign of Akhnaton. He bases
his idea on the obliteration of other gods' names and on the
hymn of Aton, both happening some years into Akhnaton's
reign. In the famous Hymn to Aton, he (Aton) is explicitly
addressed as "the only god, beside whom there is no other".
The Aton cult was accordingly a true monotheism, Albright
asserts, and yet it was not suited to become the national
religion of Egypt because of some weak points. The "Truth"
which the king emphasized that "he lives in", is represented
in reality, by materialistic hedonism rather than by ethical
idealism. The religion itself had a materialistic character.
An absence of the character of social justice or concern
for the well-being of the masses was inherent in the re-
ligion. All of these points effectively prevented the

nationalism of the religion. The latter point seems to

 

1Sir Alan Gardiner, E t of the Pharaohs (Oxford:
The Clarendon Press, 1961), p. 227.

90

have been most important as shown in the immediate reaction
of hatred and violence after Akhnaton's death. This indi-
cates that the King and the Courtiers were apparently quite
without interest in the improvement of the lot of their
subjects.1

To sum up these theories: Breasted, in his positive
statement of the true monotheism of Akhnaton's new faith,
gave Akhnaton the distinction of being a true monotheist.
He put Akhnaton on the same level as the prophets. One of
his statements says: "It is important to notice, therefore,
that Akhnaton was a prophet both of nature and of human

life."2

But as far as we know there is no real evidence of
Akhnaton's teachings of Aton's being inspired in the way in
which other prophets had received inspiration. In the
Bible, and in the Holy Book of Islam (Koran), there is men-
tion of some names prior to Akhnaton‘s time like Abraham,
Isaac, Ishmael, but they were identified as prophets (in
the Koran) and patriarchs (in the Old Testament) of God;
not of "nature and human life".

As I pointed out, Breasted mentions the simplicity of

Amarna art and the appending of the word Maat in the royal

 

 

1W. F. Albright, From the Stone Age_to Christianit
(2nd ed. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins Press, 1957), ;u 222.

2Breasted, op, cit., p. 296.

91

name to create a moral order, as indications of Akhnaton's
reformation. This is discussable. In my opinion, the 'art'
and the use of 'Maat' show a meaning of 'candor or sincer-
ity', as opposed to a meaning of 'ethics'. The increase of
emotional content in the Amarna art, and the use of 'Maat'
support the idea of his materialistic hedonism rather than
a moral order. This example from Albright illustrates my
point.

Only cheerful and pleasant things could be described

in hymns portrayed in art. The beautiful family life

of the King, with his young queen and three little
daughters, absorbed the whole attention of the

artists, and the duties of Pharaoh as King and com-

mander,las magiStrate and administrator were disre-

garded.
Thus these points made by Breasted as indications of
.Akhnaton's religious reformation cannot be taken as valid
indications of Akhnaton's true monotheistic ideals.

Freud, in his account of Akhnaton's monotheistic char-
acter, follows closely Breasted's ideas, but some scholars
such as Wilson underestimate Akhnaton as much as Breasted
and Freud admire him. Wilson represents the opposite View
that Akhnaton's monotheism falls short of the worship of
one god. However, his statement that the Egyptians worshiped

Akhnaton and Aton simultaneously can be accepted considering

the tradition of worship of the pharaoh as god, and some of

 

lAlbright, op. cit., p. 222.

92

the verses of Aton's hymns in which Akhnaton was the son of
god and sometimes a god himself. In some portraits of
Akhnaton's courtiers, they (the courtiers) are depicted as
inclining, offering their prayers directly to Akhnaton.

The traditions underlying the worship of Akhnaton as another
god by his subjects do not prevent us from giving credence
to Akhanton's teaching of Aton as an approach toward mono-
theism. Even Wilson, in the following words, lends credence
to my contention. "One could say that it was the closest
approach to monotheism possible within the thought of the

1

day." As for Aton's being only Akhnaton‘s personal god,

as Wilson contends, it is unlikely. If Aton were only
Akhnaton's personal god, his subjects should have worshiped
other ones, and Akhnaton would not have had to order the
obliteration of the names of other gods. Also, according
to Aton's hymn, Aton was a god of animals, trees, water,'
mankind,near land and distant land; not just of Akhnaton.

The countries of Syria and Nubia

The land of Egypt,

Thou settest every man in his place,

For thou divider, hast divided the peoples.
Thou lord of every house, who risest for them,
0 sun of day, the fear of every distant land,
Cities, towns and settlement,

On highway or River,

All eyes see thee before them.

The cattle rest upon their herbage,

 

lWilson, 9p. cit., p. 225.

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All trees and plants flourish,
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l

Albright is concerned with Akhnaton's doctrine as hav-
ing a feeble character for a monotheistic belief. To me
his underestimation of Akhnaton's monotheism lies in his
concern with national religion rather than monotheism
itself.

It seems, then, that we are still a long way from final
judgment. Because the certain information that we do have
on Akhnaton's doctrine is that obtained from fragments of
hymns and art, through studying their nature we can under-
stand the concept of monotheism which was coming into being.
Aton is called the eternal, creator, regulator and governor
by the hymns, not only for Egypt, but the whole world.
Accordingly, he was king of the universe, and his light and
heat were the source of all life, and no concrete embodi-
ment was given to his image. Yet, according to the art,
the courtiers bowed and commoners kissed the dust before
Akhnaton2 and worshiped him as a god. This worship, of
course, was bound up in the tradition of worshiping the
pharaoh himself as a distinct god. This points out that

Akhnaton and his god were not one. Therefore, there remains

 

1James H. Breasted, A History of E9 t (2nd ed.
New York: Charles Scribner‘s Sons, 1951 , pp. 371-375.

 

2Supra, p. 93.

95

little doubt that Akhnaton's new faith was not monotheism,
in the most literal sense of the word. But because of the
proscription of the old gods and his giving Aton the single-
minded devotion of his entire being, I believe that
Akhnaton's approach to a new faith can be taken as a kind
of monotheism--even though it was not like the pure monothe-
ism of Christianity, Judaism, and Islam. But to underesti-
mate Akhnaton's reform is a critical mistake. His career
was completely unique and different from that of other
pharaohs. He tried to sweep away, in twenty years, a tradi-
tional life of two thousand years. If, then, he was not
the producer of a 'pure' monotheism, his sensitive mind,
his strong motives, his individualism made him the first to
try to make his god universal, beside whom there would exist
no other gods.

Breasted said of Akhnaton,

. . . Ikhnaton was the first individual in history,

. . . consciously and deliberately, by intellectual

process, he gained his position and then placed

himself sguarely in the face of tradition and swept
it aside.

 

1Breasted, The Dawn of Conscience, p. 296.

 

CHAPTER VI

CONCLUSION

In this thesis I have traced changes that Egypt went
through in political and religious issues after the Hyksos
invasion. I have concentrated on the factors which came
to bear on Akhnaton's religious reform: the relationship
between gods and the pharaohs, the nature of Egyptian gods,
the power of the priesthoods of the gods (notably Amon and
Ra), and finally, the nature and development of Akhnaton's
religion (Aton) itself.

In my opinion, after the death of Amenhotep III, Egypt
was in need of a king of strong leadership, but Egypt found
itself under the control of Akhnaton, the pacifist and
philosopher king whose main preoccupation was with religion.
During his reign the vast program of imperial expansion
effected by his predecessors was lost. The first responsi-
bility of the head of any government is keeping its exist-
ence politically, economically, socially, and religiously.
Thus, Akhnaton has been blamed for placing all of his atten-

tion on one side, the religious, and neglecting the external

96

97

affairs of his country. This deterioration of concern for
and, consequently, control of the Egyptian empire began
with Amenhotep III, and continued with Akhnaton. At the
closest borders and even inside the country dissolution
began as Akhnaton continued in his ideological meditation
with his religion.

Nevertheless, with his deep belief in the truth of his
doctrine, Akhnaton succeeded somewhat in freeing Egyptian
thought from inherited traditions and petrified opinions.
His great city of Ahketaton left undubitable evidence of a
new and creative spirit and provided a great revolution in
art and religion in the world at that time. But Akhnaton's
achievements, his new religion, and his great city, died
with him. Thirteen years after Akhnaton's proclamation of
his great religious revolution, his descendents returned to
the worship of Amon. The temples of Aton were closed and
the name was chiseled out of inscriptions. The capital was
returned to Thebes, the place in which the worship of Amon
flourished.

But why did not this great religious reformation take
hold and continue? Why did it fail to attract a following?
First, the religious doctrine presented new concepts, alien
to most of the people. During its short duration, the
peOple could not grasp the ideology, and they kept tradi-

tional worship. Second, his disregard for foreign policy

98

could have created an animosity towards Akhnaton himself,
whatever he did. Third, there was not a strong priesthood
of Aton to give the worship of Aton the support it needed

to continue. Finally, the fact that Akhnaton was worshiped
and that he did not completely discourage this weakened his
doctrine. These factors contributed to the inability and/or
unwillingness of the people to commit themselves to the kind
of monotheism which was the basis of Akhnaton's religious

reform.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

 

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