CHAPTER XVII.

SUN WORSHIP— ZODIAC— MASONIC ALLEGORIES.
(sTV CAREFUL examination of the religious beliefs of the people of ^^ the ancient world, and a study of their mode or manner of worship, will show that in a great many countries, and especially in the " Far East," God has been worshipped under the symbol of the Sun. For thousands of years men have worshipped this great luminary, the source of all light, whose very essence is Generation and Life ; the container of both, for without the great and glorious Sun-God all the earth would be enwrapped in darkness and death. Its Light is emblematic of eternal verities and its heat of benevolence and love, thus constituting a fitting symbol of that great and incomprehensible Principle which holds the Kosmos in the hollow of His hand. They no doubt began to worship the vSun on account of observing the regularity of its motions, which knew no change
They observed that nations and cities would pass away and new ones arise upon the site of the old empires ; that tombs, temples and enduring monuments would decay and crumble into dust, be scattered to the four cardinal points of the universe, and still the regularity of the Sun's motions underwent no change. He visited the old and new alike, and his light shone with unchanging rays upon all. To them his apparent journeyings around the earth was emblematic of Life, Death and the Re-incarnation of the Spirit or immortality of the Soul, and instilled into the very heart and mind of man, not only thoughts on the Immortality of the Soul, but of that Immutability symbolizing the Great Eternal Unknown God, to whom they offered up their most profound love and adoration.
Long centuries before the Delta of the Nile was formed or brought from the mountains of Abyssinia, within the throbbing bosom of old God Nilus it performed its diurnal motions with the same unchanging regu-
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larity and exactitude that it does to-day. It was that steadfast, immutable motion, whose course throughovit the stellar world above, knowing no change, that caused men iu every age and every epoch of the world's history to ascribe God-like attributes to this glorious Orb, which is the same to-day as when Abraham saw it glitter in the plains of Shinar, as it is now and ever will be, for ever and ever, the most splendid and magnifi- cent object in all nature.
I do not wish to dwell upon the Si:n-worshippers of the world ; but will confine myself altogether to those of Egypt, and endeavor to show their proficiency in Astronomy and its relation to ancient Masonry. I have referred to the ancient legend of the slaying of Osiris by Typhon^ in the third chapter of this work, which will no doubt prove interesting to you, my dear Brothers, for whom this book was written.
The worship of the Sun in Egypt was the same as in other countries^ the basis of all religion. To them the forces emanating from this great and glorious luminary were as much a problem as they are to us, for Light, Heat and Electricity are as yet unsolved problems. We know that each one of them is manifested throughout the Kosmos ; but those manifestations are as yet mysteries to us, and so far we do not nor cannot understand them, only in their effects.
The great god of the ancient Egyptians was Amun, represented by a man standing upright, wearing upon his head a flat cap, with two tall straight feathers, and holding in his left hand the sceptre, while in the right he holds the sign of Life. We sometimes find him seated as a miummy, with the same red cap and feathers, holding in his hands the sceptre, scourge and crook, in which position he is supposed to represent Amun-Osiris. He may be found identified with many other gods.
Herodotus tell us in Book II, 42, that " the Thebans and those who, like them, abstain from eating sheep, say they do it for this reason, that Jupiter (Amun) when Hercules desired to see him, at first refused, but on his persisting, cut off the head of a ram which he flayed and held it before him, clothing himself in the skin and showed himself to him in this form. And for this reason the Egyptians represent Jupiter with the head of a ram. And once a year, on the festival of Jupiter, they kill and flay a ram and clothe the statue of Jupiter in the manner described, and then bring near to it another statue of Hercules."
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Jablonsk}' thought that Amun represented the Sun in Aries, and that the position of this Sun God Ra^ at the four cardinal points of the universe at the four great seasons of the year, was the symbol of the Egyp- tian Gods Amun, Horns, Serapis and Harpocrates. Although there is no positive evidence of this being true, there being no actual confirmation of the above opinion, 3'et, the name Ra — Sun — is often found joined together as Amun Ra, which seems to indicate their relationship, or an original connection -with the Solar god. We find upon many of the monuments throughout Egypt the name of Amun Ra that has been substituted for some other, and it has been so carefully and cleverly done that it is very difficult to ascertain what the original name could have been. According to Major Felix the obliterated characters "were a vulture flying, its body formed b}' an eye, holding in its claws a signet (Birch-Galler\' of Antiq., page 2, note 12). The fl3'ing vulture was the emblem of the goddess of Elithyia, who corresponded with the Lucina of the Latins. Bunsen sup- poses that the ithypophallic Khem was the god for whom Amun was substituted." There are various authorities who believe that it was on account of some change in the religious S3'stem of these people.
According to ancient Egj^ptian history we find that Amen-hetep IV (who reigned b. c. 1400) apostatized from the faith of his Fathers, and there is certain evidence to prove that his mother was the cause of this backsliding, which occasioned him to change his faith and name. He induced a great many prominent men to follow his example, but could not influence the priests of Egypt, as they were bitterly opposed to his form of worship. He had to leave Thebes on account of opposition by the people, urged on no doubt b}- the priests, Avhen thej' found that he had forsaken the True God for the heretical doctrines of his mother. Pos- sibly it may have been the name of this king that was erased from the tombs and temples. Let me quote you from Murray, ,page 60, in relation to this matter. " The heretic King Amen-hetep IV, who, under the influ- ence of his mother Teie endeavored to substitute a sort of Asiatic mono- theism, under the form of the worship of the solar disk, for the official religion of Egypt.
" The cult and very name of Amen were proscribed, the name being erased from the monuments wherever it occurred, and the King changed his own name from Amen-hetep to Khu-n-Aten, ' the glory of the solar
392 EGYPT, THE CRADLE OF ANCIENT MASONRY.
disk.' In the struggle which ensued between the Pharaoh and the pow- erful hierarchy of Thebes, Khu-n-Aten found himself obliged to leave the capital of his father and build a new one further north, called Khu-t- Aten, the site of which is now occupied by the village of Tel-el-Amarna and Haggi Qandil. Here he surrounded himself with the adherents of the new creed, most of whom seemed to have been Canaanites or other natives of Asia, and erected in it a temple to the solar disk, as well as a palace for himself, adorned with painting, sculpture, gold, bronze and inlaid work in precious stones. Along with the religious reforms had gone a reform in Art ; the old hieratic canon of Egyptian art was abandoned and a striving for realism took its place. Adjoining the palace was ' the house of rolls ' or record office, where the cuneiform tablets were discovered which have thrown so much light on the history of Egypt and Canaan in the century before the Exodus.
" The death of the King was followed by civil and religious war and the loss of the empire of Asia. The city of Khu-n-Aten was destroyed, not to be inhabited again, the Asiatic officials were driven from the country and the worship of Amen was restored." "The ancient Egj^ptians were the preservers if not the founders of Astronomy, and they claim to have been the teachers of the Chaldeans, whom they said were of their own stock and colony from Egypt " (see Herodotus, 2-82). The ancient Egyptians were most certainly very close observers of the aspects of the heavenly bodies and gave this science their most profound attention, for if we care- fully examine the meaning of the different signs of the Zodiac, as well as the symbol, we shall find that the various constellations are all named after some event or occurrence which happened in the ancient days of Pharaonic history in the " Land of Egypt." Again, the very fact of the Pyramids, in the plains of Gizeh, standing geometrically correct in rela- tion to their sides facing the four cardinal points of the universe, goes to prove their ability to establish an accurate meridian line.
There is no question but they divided the Solar year into ^ twelve months and these into three hundred and sixty days which they after- wards added to the five intercalary days, thus making the year very nearly correct. But the name Month in their hieroglyphic inscriptions is repre- sented by the crescent moon, consequently we judge from this that their months must originally have been Lunar, although they may have had
EGYPT, THE CRADLE OF ANCIENT MASONRY. 393
both Lunar and Solar. Of this we are not positively certain and we do not know exactly when the Solar month was introduced. These months each had a name, which names have been preserved to us by many writers and they correspond to those of the "Julian Year " as follows : i. Thoth — August; 2. Phaophi — September; 3. Athyr — October; 4. Choiak — November; 5. Tybi — December; 6. Mechir — January; 7. Phamenoth — February ; 8. Pharmuthi — March ; 9. Paeon — April ; 10. Payni — May ;