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Conceptions of God in Ancient Egypt: The One and the Many
Osiris, Horus, Isis, Thoth, Anubis - the many strange and compelling figures of the Egyptian gods and goddesses seem to possess endless fascination. The renowned Egyptologist Erik Hornung here studies the ancient Egyptians' conceptions of god, basing his account on a thorough reappraisal of the primary sources. His book, now available in English for the first time, is the most extensive exploration yet undertaken of the nature of Egyptian religion.
Hornung examines the characteristics, spheres of action, and significance of Egyptian gods and goddesses, analyzing the complex and changing iconography used to represent them, and disentangling the many seemingly contradictory aspects of the religion of which they are a part. He seeks to answer two basic questions: How did the Egyptians themselves see their gods? Did they believe there was an impersonal, anonymous force behind the multiplicity of their deities? Throughout, he attempts to evoke the complexity and richness of the religion of the ancient Egyptians and of their worldview, which differs so greatly from our own.
A work of extraordinary distinction, Hornung's book will appeal to anyone interested in ancient Egypt, in ancient religion, and in the history of religion, as well as students and scholars of ancient history, anthropology, and archaeology. Sensitively translated by John Baines and with a new preface by the author, this edition has been amplified and updated with an English-language audience in mind.
Hornung examines the characteristics, spheres of action, and significance of Egyptian gods and goddesses, analyzing the complex and changing iconography used to represent them, and disentangling the many seemingly contradictory aspects of the religion of which they are a part. He seeks to answer two basic questions: How did the Egyptians themselves see their gods? Did they believe there was an impersonal, anonymous force behind the multiplicity of their deities? Throughout, he attempts to evoke the complexity and richness of the religion of the ancient Egyptians and of their worldview, which differs so greatly from our own.
A work of extraordinary distinction, Hornung's book will appeal to anyone interested in ancient Egypt, in ancient religion, and in the history of religion, as well as students and scholars of ancient history, anthropology, and archaeology. Sensitively translated by John Baines and with a new preface by the author, this edition has been amplified and updated with an English-language audience in mind.
296 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1971
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757 people want to read
About the author
Erik Hornung
75 books31 followersHornung was born in Riga, Latvia, in 1933 and gained his PH.D. at the University of Tübingen in 1956.
He was Professor of Egyptology at the University of Basel from 1967 to 1998.
His main research field has been funerary literature, the Valley of the Kings in particular.
He published the first edition of the Book of Amduat in three volumes between 1963 and 1967.
J. Gwyn Griffiths described Hornung as the foremost authority in such literature.
His book Conceptions of God in Ancient Egypt, The One and the Many has become his best-known work, in which he concludes, whilst acknowledging previous work by Henri Frankfort and his "multiplicity of approaches" and John A. Wilson's "complementary" treatment of Egyptian modes of thought, that "Anyone who takes history seriously will not accept a single method as definitive; the same should be true of anyone who takes belief seriously".
Hornung became Vice-President of the Society of the Friends of the Royal Tombs of Egypt in 1988. His books have been published in German, but many have been translated into English.
He was Professor of Egyptology at the University of Basel from 1967 to 1998.
His main research field has been funerary literature, the Valley of the Kings in particular.
He published the first edition of the Book of Amduat in three volumes between 1963 and 1967.
J. Gwyn Griffiths described Hornung as the foremost authority in such literature.
His book Conceptions of God in Ancient Egypt, The One and the Many has become his best-known work, in which he concludes, whilst acknowledging previous work by Henri Frankfort and his "multiplicity of approaches" and John A. Wilson's "complementary" treatment of Egyptian modes of thought, that "Anyone who takes history seriously will not accept a single method as definitive; the same should be true of anyone who takes belief seriously".
Hornung became Vice-President of the Society of the Friends of the Royal Tombs of Egypt in 1988. His books have been published in German, but many have been translated into English.
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Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews
February 2, 2024
As soon as one attempts to come to terms with the religion of ancient Egypt, one is immediately confronted by what I think of as the "transitivity" of Egyptian divinities; Hornung refers to it as their "vagueness." The gods were continually combined, recombined, made equivalent to one-another, interpreted as aspects of one another, schematized, and re-schematized in ways that make it difficult to think of them as having a single office or a stable identity. This is not merely a problem of historical development; frequently, a single god will be described in contradictory ways within a single text.
Unraveling this problem is the focus of Hornung's book, which is one of the foundational texts of modern Egyptology. Specifically, he wishes to address the apparent contradiction between references to God in the singular and gods in the plural, which are frequently found side-by-side in the same text. Hornung quotes Le Page Renouf, who described the problem well:
"Throughout the whole range of [ancient] Egyptian literature, no facts appear to be more certainly proved than these: (1) that the doctrine of one God and that of many gods were taught by the same men; (2) that no inconsistency between the two doctrines was thought of."
Making sense of this state of affairs is the purpose of the book, and to do so, Hornung goes back to the basics, and makes an exhaustive study of what we know or can deduce about how Egyptians viewed gods, what they meant by the term. The majority of the book comprises this detailed review which covers every conceivable aspect of divinity, including the hieroglyphs used to indicate them, the pantheons, descriptions of their appearance, their schematization into groups, and so on.
Hornung's knowledge is vast, and this detailed survey is the strongest part of the book. It contains a number of highly illuminating observations, such as his argument that we should not think of Egyptian depictions of deities as "pictures of what they looked like," persuasively arguing that they should instead be regarded as ideograms that reference the deities and indicate their general attributes in a pictorial language. No Egyptian, he claims, would have believed that Re actually had the head of a ram.
Now, here he evidences a concerning tendency to over-generalization. Truly, no Egyptian, in thousands of years of history? Knowing what I know of religious psychology, I will state with 100% certainty that plenty of Egyptians believed Re had the head of a ram, and didn't particularly trouble themselves about it. It is quite common to adopt a naive and literal reading of religious texts.
As interesting as this book is, I would say the majority of his review of characterizations of the gods is a digression from his main argument. His actual solution is not very complex, and could have easily been argued and demonstrated in an essay of about 15 pages. In this book, to a large degree, the journey is the goal.
His solution is based on his fascinating reading of Egyptian ontology, which holds that for the Egyptian, the very concept of existence entails plurality. The only thing that is really unitary is the undifferentiated, inchoate primordial reality from which all intelligible things emerged in the original creation, which is generally termed nun, or the primordial dark waters. Once things become determinate, they immediately take on an irreducibly plural character, which is why, for example, Egypt itself was called the "Double Kingdom," even millennia after Lower and Upper Egypt were united.
So to be is to be manifold, and this is the case for divinity as well. The Egyptian, then, works out a kind of theological and mythological algebra that allows them to articulate divinity as manifest in various forms. This position, which he describes as henotheism, borrowing from Friedrich Schlegel and F. Max Müller, essentially means that any of the numerous gods are themselves the totality of divinity.
Hornung seems to agonize over this characterization, and seeks to find a way to argue that such a position is in fact "logical," even if on the surface it appears to contradict the law of the excluded middle. Perhaps there are non-standard forms of logic, he writes, with which such a worldview can be made to accord - something suggested by quantum mechanics or the complementarity principle.
Here I think his near-total lack of a comparativist perspective really harms his analysis, for this conception of divinity will hardly appear to most readers of this book as novel and incomprehensibly strange. Christian theology is not technically henotheistic, but the difference between the Nicene interpretation of the Trinity and henotheism will only be comprehensible to specialists. So the western church presents us with a godhead that is three persons with one nature, and most lay Christians don't seem to lose much sleep over that, even if they don't have a clue what it means. Most people, unlike Hornung, simply take it in stride that we're talking about a different regime of reality, and that saying "there are three persons in the Trinity" is not like saying "there are three loaves of bread in this basket."
Hornung is curiously averse to allowing for such a stance, allowing that the domain of religious imagery is characterized by a different kind of logic. I suspect this has something to do with his insistence that for the Egyptians, the gods are entirely within the created order, and in no sense "transcendent." I am not certain how he reconciles this with his statement "What a god is cannot be defined. Whatever statement we make about him [sic], it does not exclude a mass of other statements." (258)
It seems pretty clear to me that Hornung's affinity for schematization and to rigorous detail often gets in the way of his larger arguments, and often takes a toll on his readability. Nevertheless, I think the core argument of this book is persuasive, and even if much of it was tangential to that core argument, it was still very much worthwhile.
Unraveling this problem is the focus of Hornung's book, which is one of the foundational texts of modern Egyptology. Specifically, he wishes to address the apparent contradiction between references to God in the singular and gods in the plural, which are frequently found side-by-side in the same text. Hornung quotes Le Page Renouf, who described the problem well:
"Throughout the whole range of [ancient] Egyptian literature, no facts appear to be more certainly proved than these: (1) that the doctrine of one God and that of many gods were taught by the same men; (2) that no inconsistency between the two doctrines was thought of."
Making sense of this state of affairs is the purpose of the book, and to do so, Hornung goes back to the basics, and makes an exhaustive study of what we know or can deduce about how Egyptians viewed gods, what they meant by the term. The majority of the book comprises this detailed review which covers every conceivable aspect of divinity, including the hieroglyphs used to indicate them, the pantheons, descriptions of their appearance, their schematization into groups, and so on.
Hornung's knowledge is vast, and this detailed survey is the strongest part of the book. It contains a number of highly illuminating observations, such as his argument that we should not think of Egyptian depictions of deities as "pictures of what they looked like," persuasively arguing that they should instead be regarded as ideograms that reference the deities and indicate their general attributes in a pictorial language. No Egyptian, he claims, would have believed that Re actually had the head of a ram.
Now, here he evidences a concerning tendency to over-generalization. Truly, no Egyptian, in thousands of years of history? Knowing what I know of religious psychology, I will state with 100% certainty that plenty of Egyptians believed Re had the head of a ram, and didn't particularly trouble themselves about it. It is quite common to adopt a naive and literal reading of religious texts.
As interesting as this book is, I would say the majority of his review of characterizations of the gods is a digression from his main argument. His actual solution is not very complex, and could have easily been argued and demonstrated in an essay of about 15 pages. In this book, to a large degree, the journey is the goal.
His solution is based on his fascinating reading of Egyptian ontology, which holds that for the Egyptian, the very concept of existence entails plurality. The only thing that is really unitary is the undifferentiated, inchoate primordial reality from which all intelligible things emerged in the original creation, which is generally termed nun, or the primordial dark waters. Once things become determinate, they immediately take on an irreducibly plural character, which is why, for example, Egypt itself was called the "Double Kingdom," even millennia after Lower and Upper Egypt were united.
So to be is to be manifold, and this is the case for divinity as well. The Egyptian, then, works out a kind of theological and mythological algebra that allows them to articulate divinity as manifest in various forms. This position, which he describes as henotheism, borrowing from Friedrich Schlegel and F. Max Müller, essentially means that any of the numerous gods are themselves the totality of divinity.
Hornung seems to agonize over this characterization, and seeks to find a way to argue that such a position is in fact "logical," even if on the surface it appears to contradict the law of the excluded middle. Perhaps there are non-standard forms of logic, he writes, with which such a worldview can be made to accord - something suggested by quantum mechanics or the complementarity principle.
Here I think his near-total lack of a comparativist perspective really harms his analysis, for this conception of divinity will hardly appear to most readers of this book as novel and incomprehensibly strange. Christian theology is not technically henotheistic, but the difference between the Nicene interpretation of the Trinity and henotheism will only be comprehensible to specialists. So the western church presents us with a godhead that is three persons with one nature, and most lay Christians don't seem to lose much sleep over that, even if they don't have a clue what it means. Most people, unlike Hornung, simply take it in stride that we're talking about a different regime of reality, and that saying "there are three persons in the Trinity" is not like saying "there are three loaves of bread in this basket."
Hornung is curiously averse to allowing for such a stance, allowing that the domain of religious imagery is characterized by a different kind of logic. I suspect this has something to do with his insistence that for the Egyptians, the gods are entirely within the created order, and in no sense "transcendent." I am not certain how he reconciles this with his statement "What a god is cannot be defined. Whatever statement we make about him [sic], it does not exclude a mass of other statements." (258)
It seems pretty clear to me that Hornung's affinity for schematization and to rigorous detail often gets in the way of his larger arguments, and often takes a toll on his readability. Nevertheless, I think the core argument of this book is persuasive, and even if much of it was tangential to that core argument, it was still very much worthwhile.
November 3, 2009
Erik Hornung is one of the great modern Egyptologists, and this book is probably his most important. However, it’s a fairly dense read, and I would recommend Jan Assmann’s The Search for God in Ancient Egypt, (written around the same time in the early 1980’s), as a more accessible in-depth view into ancient Egyptian thought.
Still, Hornung is clearly expert in his knowledge and applies it with a subtle mind. His primary purpose seems to be to argue against previous generations of Egyptologists who thought they saw a monotheistic cognitive framework in ancient Egyptian thought. Hornung’s argument is that, in fact, Egyptian cosmological thinking was polytheistic in its very essence. He believes that it’s easy to misinterpret many Egyptian invocations to gods that, in effect, flatter the god in question by asserting that he’s “the only one.” It’s a little like someone saying to his/her lover “To me, you’re everything.” That’s not a statement you’re meant to take literally, but it can still be true on a different level.
Hornung, however, goes well beyond that particular point. He describes Egyptian thought as pre-logical, a mode of cognition where if something is a, that doesn’t mean that it’s not also b. This, he argues, is a mode of thought that’s virtually unattainable for Western minds brought up on Aristotelian logic. If we could get there, he claims,
we shall be able to comprehend the one and the many as complementary propositions, whose truth values within a many-valued logic are not mutually exclusive, but contribute together to the whole truth: god is a unity in worship and revelation, and multiple in nature and manifestation.
That is, a god can be the only one in the cosmos, and at the same time be one of many. Consequently, Hornung sees monotheism, not as a stage along a continuum from polytheism, but as a “transformation”, accompanying the cognitive revolution to Aristotelian-style logic, a world of binary opposites, where the answer can be “yes” or “no” but not “yes and no.”
Although Assmann states that he disagrees with Hornung’s view of Egyptian polytheistic thought, I see their views as largely compatible. They both discuss the Akhenaten revolution – the short-lived imposition of true monotheistic worship on Egypt – as a hiatus utterly incompatible with the Egyptian worldview. But more than that, I think Hornung’s view of monotheism as a “conceptual transformation” fits in with Assmann’s view of the transition in Egypt’s history towards a kind of “cognitive dissonance”, with a “pantheistic theology of transcendence” which set the stage for later monotheistic thought. Under Assmann’s model, we’re still looking at a complete transformation between polytheism and monotheism - Assmann, in my view, goes further than Hornung by describing the transformative phase of post-Amarna Egyptian cosmology.
The most valuable take-away I get from Hornung is his emphasis on seeing the shift from polytheism to monotheism as a transformative stage in human consciousness. As he says, “Both of these worlds are consistent within their own terms of reference, but neither transcends historical space or can claim absolute validity.” I think this is an important frame of reference, which I elsewhere categorize by stages of the pfc’s advance in its power over human consciousness. In my categorization, there’s another shift from monotheism to scientific method, which has taken place over the past few hundred years. And most importantly, I think our world is ready for the next stage in the development of our global consciousness.
Still, Hornung is clearly expert in his knowledge and applies it with a subtle mind. His primary purpose seems to be to argue against previous generations of Egyptologists who thought they saw a monotheistic cognitive framework in ancient Egyptian thought. Hornung’s argument is that, in fact, Egyptian cosmological thinking was polytheistic in its very essence. He believes that it’s easy to misinterpret many Egyptian invocations to gods that, in effect, flatter the god in question by asserting that he’s “the only one.” It’s a little like someone saying to his/her lover “To me, you’re everything.” That’s not a statement you’re meant to take literally, but it can still be true on a different level.
Hornung, however, goes well beyond that particular point. He describes Egyptian thought as pre-logical, a mode of cognition where if something is a, that doesn’t mean that it’s not also b. This, he argues, is a mode of thought that’s virtually unattainable for Western minds brought up on Aristotelian logic. If we could get there, he claims,
we shall be able to comprehend the one and the many as complementary propositions, whose truth values within a many-valued logic are not mutually exclusive, but contribute together to the whole truth: god is a unity in worship and revelation, and multiple in nature and manifestation.
That is, a god can be the only one in the cosmos, and at the same time be one of many. Consequently, Hornung sees monotheism, not as a stage along a continuum from polytheism, but as a “transformation”, accompanying the cognitive revolution to Aristotelian-style logic, a world of binary opposites, where the answer can be “yes” or “no” but not “yes and no.”
Although Assmann states that he disagrees with Hornung’s view of Egyptian polytheistic thought, I see their views as largely compatible. They both discuss the Akhenaten revolution – the short-lived imposition of true monotheistic worship on Egypt – as a hiatus utterly incompatible with the Egyptian worldview. But more than that, I think Hornung’s view of monotheism as a “conceptual transformation” fits in with Assmann’s view of the transition in Egypt’s history towards a kind of “cognitive dissonance”, with a “pantheistic theology of transcendence” which set the stage for later monotheistic thought. Under Assmann’s model, we’re still looking at a complete transformation between polytheism and monotheism - Assmann, in my view, goes further than Hornung by describing the transformative phase of post-Amarna Egyptian cosmology.
The most valuable take-away I get from Hornung is his emphasis on seeing the shift from polytheism to monotheism as a transformative stage in human consciousness. As he says, “Both of these worlds are consistent within their own terms of reference, but neither transcends historical space or can claim absolute validity.” I think this is an important frame of reference, which I elsewhere categorize by stages of the pfc’s advance in its power over human consciousness. In my categorization, there’s another shift from monotheism to scientific method, which has taken place over the past few hundred years. And most importantly, I think our world is ready for the next stage in the development of our global consciousness.
April 30, 2025
Wonderfully informative and challenging to learn about the philosophical aspects of formations of theological thought.
November 11, 2022
Es una fumada increíble, pero una muy buena fumada
October 6, 2017
Wow.
I have struggled with this book for years (I think my begin date here is when I first entered it in Goodreads; I have no way of knowing when I actually started the book, but it was probably after 2006). It is quite dense, and it gets even more dense the closer you get to the end, but it's toward the end that Hornung really delves into the heart of his argument: the one and the many, up to which he has spent the entire book leading.
We typically think of the ancient Egyptians as polytheists. Hornung warns that it is not that simple. The subtitle of this book is "The One and The Many." If I may, allow me to present a paragraph from the concluding chapter, which may illustrate what a potential reader has in store for themselves:
"The attempt to see in Egyptian conceptions of god precursors of monotheistic belief has the character of an apologia and leads us away from this reality [the reality of the gods], while the opposition monotheism/polytheism does not seem to provide the key, because it is too narrowly formulated. The concept of pantheism is too far removed from the reality of the cult to be suited to ancient Egypt. The study of our topic is in danger of being bogged down by all these -isms; it needs to be revitalized."
I enjoyed the book, all told. I gave it four stars because the glossary of gods at the end is very low on information about a few gods, for which there are better sources (I'm thinking of George Hart's Dictionary of Egyptian Gods and Goddesses). But to be fair, the glossary is not why I bought the book. I bought the book because I'm Kemetic and wish to understand better the faith my life has led me to. And to that end, this book has delivered on that promise.
Occasionally Hornung betrays his secret belief, held by many monotheists, that monotheism was an advance for society (which is a bias); however, he also wishes that we could develop a "many-valued logic", as opposed to the yes/no logic of monotheism, in order to better understand the worldview of the ancient Egyptians. So perhaps I should not chastise him too hard.
Bottom line: Great book, but I would only recommend it to serious students of ancient Egypt.
I have struggled with this book for years (I think my begin date here is when I first entered it in Goodreads; I have no way of knowing when I actually started the book, but it was probably after 2006). It is quite dense, and it gets even more dense the closer you get to the end, but it's toward the end that Hornung really delves into the heart of his argument: the one and the many, up to which he has spent the entire book leading.
We typically think of the ancient Egyptians as polytheists. Hornung warns that it is not that simple. The subtitle of this book is "The One and The Many." If I may, allow me to present a paragraph from the concluding chapter, which may illustrate what a potential reader has in store for themselves:
"The attempt to see in Egyptian conceptions of god precursors of monotheistic belief has the character of an apologia and leads us away from this reality [the reality of the gods], while the opposition monotheism/polytheism does not seem to provide the key, because it is too narrowly formulated. The concept of pantheism is too far removed from the reality of the cult to be suited to ancient Egypt. The study of our topic is in danger of being bogged down by all these -isms; it needs to be revitalized."
I enjoyed the book, all told. I gave it four stars because the glossary of gods at the end is very low on information about a few gods, for which there are better sources (I'm thinking of George Hart's Dictionary of Egyptian Gods and Goddesses). But to be fair, the glossary is not why I bought the book. I bought the book because I'm Kemetic and wish to understand better the faith my life has led me to. And to that end, this book has delivered on that promise.
Occasionally Hornung betrays his secret belief, held by many monotheists, that monotheism was an advance for society (which is a bias); however, he also wishes that we could develop a "many-valued logic", as opposed to the yes/no logic of monotheism, in order to better understand the worldview of the ancient Egyptians. So perhaps I should not chastise him too hard.
Bottom line: Great book, but I would only recommend it to serious students of ancient Egypt.
December 19, 2018
Tough going but well worth it if you want to know about the real ancient Egypt.
January 21, 2025
Not an easy read, but very well researched and thought provoking academic text.
January 17, 2024
The original German edition was one of the seminal books in the study of Egyptian religion. Hornung examined how the Egyptian gods were depicted, what they were named, their ties to particular places, how they were born and died, how they were combined with each other, and how their characteristics contrasted with Akhenaten's sole god, the Aten. Building on Henri Frankfort's views of the "multiplicity of approaches" in Egyptian religious belief, Hornung said that the surreal complexity of Egyptian theology makes sense as an illustration of a subject humans cannot fully grasp. Along the way he made the final break with the school of thought that dominated studies of Egyptian religion in the mid-20th century, where contradictory beliefs were treated as the product of political conflicts. He also pointed out that many scholars' desire to find monotheism in Egyptian religion was based on their unspoken assumption that monotheism is superior. Scholars have disagreed with some of Hornung's assertions (most notably Jan Assmann, who reopened the monotheism debate in The Search for God in Ancient Egypt), but to a large extent they all build on his work. It's not exactly easy reading, but the style is fairly straightforward, and I actually find the concluding chapter rather stirring.
January 7, 2025
Joyita de las que hay pocas. De todo lo que he leído relacionado con el Antiguo Egipto es probablemente lo mejor.100% recomendado aunque hay que venir con la religión e historia egipcia conocida de antes.
Le pongo 4 estrellas porque tarda en entrar en materia y me ha faltado jugo explotando los paralelismos con más neoplatónicos/neopitagóricos más allá y creo que si se conoce más en profundidad el catolicismo o cristianismo ortodoxo se le puede sacar aún más juego, ignoro si existe un trabajo sobre esto, pero como que me ha faltado algo que en teoría está.
En conclusión el libro tiene tanto jugo en cuanto a contenido que se merece las 5, seguro que lo acabaré releyendo. Lectura muy muy recomendada, de las mejores lecturas del año sin duda.
Le pongo 4 estrellas porque tarda en entrar en materia y me ha faltado jugo explotando los paralelismos con más neoplatónicos/neopitagóricos más allá y creo que si se conoce más en profundidad el catolicismo o cristianismo ortodoxo se le puede sacar aún más juego, ignoro si existe un trabajo sobre esto, pero como que me ha faltado algo que en teoría está.
En conclusión el libro tiene tanto jugo en cuanto a contenido que se merece las 5, seguro que lo acabaré releyendo. Lectura muy muy recomendada, de las mejores lecturas del año sin duda.
March 7, 2010
reading this in german atm, der eine und die viele
January 24, 2018
Read, recommended by Nigel Hetherington
- For future studies and my Hatshepsut (18th Dynasty) project, thank you, Nigel!
- For future studies and my Hatshepsut (18th Dynasty) project, thank you, Nigel!
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August 4, 2011Not a light read, but well worth the time of anyone interested in Egyptology.
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