Ancient Egyptian Religion: An Interpretation

by Henri Frankfort

"[T]he author gives a well-integrated and thoughtful interpretation of Egyptian thought which endeavors to uncover the roots of Egyptian religion. It is at this point that Frankfort has made his great contribution." — Journal of Religion
Until the publication of this masterly study, Egyptian religion was thought by most scholars to be a nearly impenetrable jungle of weird myths, doctrines, and practices, the product of numerous unrelated local cults existing side by side. Misconceptions were exacerbated by the monotheistic bias of Western thought. Henri Frankfort, former Research Professor of Oriental Archaeology at the University of Chicago and former Director of Excavations for the Egypt Exploration Society of London, presents formidable evidence to the contrary, by disregarding local differences in cults and dogmas and focusing instead on the trends and qualities that regularly recur in five important aspects of Egyptian life. Using this method, Dr. Frankfort concludes that there is one conviction underlying all Egyptian belief, i.e., that the universe is static and that only the changeless is ultimately significant.
Delving into Egyptian theology, the author shows how that view informed not only religious beliefs, but also Egyptian moral and political philosophy, government and society, and literature and art. Enhanced with 32 illustrations, this book is "one of the finest elucidations of these materials that we have anywhere" ( American Historical Review ). Chronological Table. Index. Preface. 32 halftones.

Genres: Religion, History, Egypt, Egyptology, Mythology, Nonfiction, Theology

208 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1948

Reviews

[Joshua Silverman · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm surprised that there are no reviews for this book. In general, I liked it. It was well researched, obviously, not overly reliant on footnotes (I've read some books where there's more text in footnotes than the actual prose), and fairly easy to read without getting into too much detail. I'ts a good mid-level book for those interested in ancient Egypt. Though, the only thing lacking (which is not the fault of the author or anyone), is that it's old (1948) and there are a lot better books out there because our technology has greatly improved over the past 60 years.

All in all, a short quick read (150 pages), which is well written in a non-academic way which keeps the pace light and fast.

[Mark · Rating 4 out of 5]

Henri Frankfort's Ancient Egyptian Religion: An Interpretation was first published in 1948 and is a slim volume at 180 pages. The work assumes that the reader has some degree of familiarity with ancient Egyptian culture, history, and geography. I would not recommend it as an introduction to this topic. However, although in an academic vein, it is very readable and Frankfort does a good job of defending his thesis that the basis of ancient Egyptian religion is a belief in an unchanging universe. According to Frankfort, the key to interpreting the tangle of various city-cults along the Nile, weird myths, and overly complex religious texts is to understand that the lodestar of Egyptian culture was a desire for permanence in the natural and political world.

[Mac · Rating 5 out of 5]

Henri Frankfort's "Ancient Egyptian Religion: An Interpretation" is not a long book, but it has a lot to say. I recall hearing one of my college professors discuss how, when writing her book, she knew that she wanted another chapter but didn't know what she wanted to say in it. In the end she came up with a sort of half-baked theory and stuck it in there. Henri Frankfort, on the other hand, seems to have written this book only when he knew exactly what he wanted to say.

He approaches the question of ancient Egyptian religion from several angles. There was no Bible or Qur'an that recorded Egyptians' beliefs and practices. Instead Frankfort gathers evidence from inscriptions, art, literature, and even architecture. In the end he builds a compelling case that the essential focus of Egyptian religion and thought was the changelessness of the universe. Things that seem to be changing--the sun's motion through the sky, the Nile's ebb and flow--follow eternal cycles.

Since this book was written in 1948, I imagine there have been new discoveries and advances in our understanding of ancient Egypt. I'm no expert on the subject, but to me "Ancient Egyptian Religion" still bears reading for the clarity of its thought and argument. I look forward to reading more of Frankfort's work in the future.

[John Gates · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found this book extremely interesting. Never before have I gotten a vibe of what Maat truly is until reading this. Difficult to thank Mr. Frankfort for his contributions, since he died in 1954. Oh well. This is definitely a good addition to my collection.

[Julia Herdman · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting but out of date.

[Aria]

(cover image of the copy i read. ISBN: 0061300772)

[Maan Kawas · Rating 5 out of 5]

Such a great book, I loved it!

[DAJ · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's difficult to rate this book because its historical importance and its usefulness today are different things. Interpretations of Egyptian religion in the early 20th century were dominated by a rationalistic school of thought that tended to dismiss myth as nonsense or to explain contradictory beliefs as the product of political conflicts. Bringing in insights from anthropology, Frankfort changed that. He laid out his general approach in Before Philosophy: The Intellectual Adventure of Ancient Man in 1946 and then explored it in depth in two books from 1948: this one and Kingship and the Gods. Because he interpreted gods and myths primarily as metaphors, he explained how seemingly contradictory ideas could so easily coexist. That insight laid the groundwork for a huge amount of the study of Egyptian religion that has taken place since. The phrase Frankfort coined to sum up this coexistence, "multiplicity of approaches", is now practically an Egyptological slogan.

Frankfort wasn't right about everything. He relied on anthropological descriptions of modern East African peoples to gain insight into ancient Egyptian thought, assuming that those peoples were closely culturally related to the Egyptians of the predynastic period. But as more recent works have shown (such as Ancient Egypt in Africa, edited by David O'Connor and Andrew Reid), it's not nearly that simple. Frankfort thought kings were absolutely and at all times considered gods, a belief that has now been challenged many times. And he posited a dramatically different mentality, "mythopoeic" or symbolic thought, to explain the way peoples before the development of Greek rationalism interpreted the world. The Egyptologist Herman te Velde, giving a generally positive evaluation of Frankfort's legacy, once said that the mythopoeic mentality "must now be dismissed as superfluous fiction." Modern Western culture is still shaped to a large extent by myths and symbols, and the Egyptians were probably more pragmatic than their religious symbolism makes them seem.

Fortunately, in this book Frankfort doesn't dwell on those subjects too much. His easily readable discussions of the thought processes behind Egyptian religion still make a decent introduction to the topic. The first chapter insightfully describes the gods; anyone who's read Conceptions of God in Ancient Egypt: The One and the Many, the fundamental book on Egyptian theology, will notice how much it owes to Frankfort. The second is about the Egyptian conception of the king and the state, and the third discusses the concept of Maat and its relationship to morality. Afterlife beliefs and funerary customs come next, and the last chapter discusses how religion shaped literature and art. Many of the details are outdated, and I'd prefer that somebody new to the subject would read a more recent book like Stephen Quirke's Ancient Egyptian Religion, but not many of the recent books speak in this much depth about how profoundly religion shaped Egyptian culture.