Was Akhenaten the founder of a new religion and of monotheism?

 

An interesting article by the UCRI (in French only) on the subject of monotheism introduces the subject well: "to approach the subject of monotheism in ancient Egypt is an exercise as passionate as it is perilous. Though the specialists agree on many points, their conclusions diverge widely and we would not pretend to give a final answer here but just to propose a few points for reflection. Belonging, as we do, to a Judeo-Christian world, we have many prejudices which could prevent us from making a healthy analysis of forms of religious thought different from our own. Specialists often have a religion of their own and judge those of others with condescension. On the other hand, it would be an equally vain effort to wish to make Egypt, at all costs, that which we want it to be: it has much more to teach us."

 

The majority, like Erik Horning or Jan Assmann, think that the system evolved by Akhenaten is sufficiently complete and original that we can speak of a new religion, which would, for the first time in the history of the world, be accessible to us at its genesis.

 

Others esteem that his reform should be viewed not as a religion but simply as a philosophy of nature.

 

Aayko Eyma has kindly authorised me to publish the resumé of a debate which occurred in the EEF

We must make the distinction between the official cult and the popular cults. The latter were still widely practiced by the masses who adored mainly the little personal protective gods like Bes or Tawosret... in parallel with the official Atenism.

 

The place held by these divinities in the official religion is more difficult to understand.

 

We know that their cult was not denied or their statues destroyed; -Atenism is therefore not a monotheism-; their adoration was not forbidden- Atenism is therefore not a monolatry-

 

It appears that we must consider Atenism as a form of henotheism in which the ancient gods were tolerated (on condition that they had no connection with political life, as did Amun) but were humbled in an Atenist reinterpretation: they are now linked to the eternal aspects of the king and queen and, by this fact, formed an integral part of the homage rendered to the royal family: Atum/Ptah-Amenhotep III; Hathor-Tiy; Shu-Akhenaten (whose feathers the king could wear, see fig. 21, fig 44); Tefnut-Nefertiti." (see fig 21, fig 44); Tefnut/Hathor-Nefertiti.

"The Amarna experiment" represents, in fact, the personal experiment of the king. Akhenaten "discovered" the Aten via philosophical research or profound intuition (he says clearly that the god is in his heart) and thought that light, as a unique principle, could explain the whole cosmos.

 

So the immanent and the transcendant are inextricably mixed: "though you are far away, your rays are on earth" say the hymns.

 

But, through the light, he was tied to the visible universe which forced him to deny all which did not relate to it: the night, life in the underworld, and the divinities of the traditional pantheon, especially Amun, "the hidden one" and Osiris.

 

Akhenaten had made the Aten into a concentrate, a synthesis of all the gods of Egypt having a solar connotation. But the debate is still open as to whether we have here a real, coherent monotheism.

 

We have seen that even the name of the god refers, at least at the beginning, to three divine entities: Ra, Horus and Shu. In the same way, the Aten formed a triad with the royal couple, contrived on the one uniting Atum (the one creator god), Shu (whose feathers were sometimes worn by the king) (fig 21)) and Tefnut.

 

The existence of a triad seems, à priori, surprising but we have learned from christianity that the notion of trinity does not seem to be incompatible with that of a "unique" god...

 

We have to be careful with the word "unique" in Ancient Egypt. It is often used by the faithful to give preference to the god that they have chosen for themselves. And nobody is worried about writing on a stela the name of "the one Aten" and mentioning, immediately after, Osiris and Khnum...

 

fig 21

Whatever the case, Akhenaten did not create this religion from nothing. He pushed to the extreme the conclusions of the train of thought of which we have spoken and which tended to combine the many in one.

 

I think that his personal intuition was really one of a single god and that the concept of monotheism is indeed present in the king's mind when we read, carved in his tombs, "there is only he" and he very clearly considers himself as the god's sole interlocutor: "no other knows you", which reminds us strangely of certain passages in the Bible. We can also follow the intellectual path of the king which says, at the start "there is no other god LIKE Thou", changing, at Amarna, to " there is no other god BUT Thou".

 

However this does not allow us to talk about about monotheism, because this term covers not only a single god, but also a communicating god, which is not the case as we have seen.

 

Was Akhenaten a "revolutionary"?

 

If we accept that a revolution in any domain (politics, fashion, technology...) represents a brutal and drastic split with the past, we can accept this qualification for the religious policy of the king because, although he did not change everything, as is so often stated, he nevertheless caused an upheaval in Egyptian history.

 

We have here, nevertheless, the prototype of a modern word which has connotations very far removed from those of the Amarna period and which should be used with great prudence.

 

When we read the hymns, we are struck be the apparent discordance between their loftiness and what we have already said about the person and the actions of the king himself, about whom we could say that he is a passionate but unapproachable person.

 

In addition, the original ideas of the king are accompanied by the appearance of a court comprising new people, of which not a negligible number were opportunists, giving the severe judgement of Morenz: "Terror at the top, careerism at the bottom".

 

And here lies the recurrent problem in the history of humanity and for which Akhenaten seems to be the precursor; in the name of seductive ideas – at least for those who are adepts of one of the formal religions – Akhenaten will build a system of inexorable rigour and use all the religious and temporal power available to a Pharaoh of Egypt to try to impose it on all and sundry by force, without there being a real adhesion, either by the elite or by the people of Egypt.

 

This religion, centred on the king who is the "only one to know the Aten" was thus condemned to die with its founder and, indeed, it fell into oblivion for 2300 years until the end of the 19^th Century.

But Akhenaten himself did not disappear and subconscious traces of Akhenaten's ideas were incorporated into the Egyptian religion and lasted to its end. We have already given some examples of this.

 

Thus, in a certain manner, we can consider the Amarna period as a breeding ground for the spiritual and artistic future of Egypt.

 

We have compared the texts of the hymns with Psalm 104 of the Old Testament, written several centuries later, whose accents are certainly close.

 

Inevitably, some have deduced the existence of a secret cult, of a community of initiates who perpetuated the ideas of Akhenaten to the time of Moses. Or we can even read that Akhenaten and Moses were simply one and the same person!

 

Sigmund Freud, on his part, considered Moses as an Egyptian who transmitted the knowledge of Akhenaten to the tribes of Israel...

 

It is more prudent and probably truer to consider that the incontestable similarities, which may be established, are due to a parallel evolution of reflections in this cosmopolitan near east where the mixing of ideas and population were incessant.

 

In passing, note the irony of history; the religion founded by Akhenaten, a person of whom the history is certain, has disappeared, while the Hebrew religion based on a mythical person, Moses, whose existence nobody has ever proved, has lasted, with the success with which we are familiar.

 

The mono-Atenism of Akhenaten was the first demonstration in history of the distinction "real god – false god" which would be repeated in the mono-Jawehism of Moses. It is through this obstinate research of the "unique principle" in the 14th century BCE that Akhenaten may appear like a modern man. Unfortunately, it is also the basis for fundamentalism, intolerance and persecution, which the polytheistic world never knew.

 

Fortunately, the ancient Egyptian civilisation was able to survive for 18 centuries after Akhenaten.

 

It was another monotheism, that of Christ, which finally destroyed it. By an extraordinary intuition, several centuries before this end, theologians foresaw that the abandon of the cult of the gods would signify the end of Egypt. Here's what they said: "the gods, leaving the earth, will return to heaven; they will abandon Egypt. This country, which was once the home of the holy liturgies, now, bereft of its gods, will never again enjoy their presence. Egypt, Egypt, nothing will remain of your cults but fables and even your children, later, will not believe them. Nothing will survive but words carved in stones to recount your pious exploits".

 

More photographs??

 

© Thierry BENDERITTER 2002-2008

 

In this article I have tried to be as objective as possible.

 

Below, after the bibliography, you will find my personal opinion.

 

Bibliographic summary

 

(only the really consulted works are mentioned)

for a complete bibliography, to see : Martin Geoffrey Thorndike : A bibliography of the Amarna period and its aftermaths : the reigns of Akhenaten, Smenkhare, Tutankhamun and Ay (1350-1321), Kegan Paul, 1990

• ALDRED C: Akhenaton, roi d'Égypte, Seuil 1997
• AMARNA LETTERS N°1, 2, 3, 4, KMT communication.
• ASSMANN J: Akhanyati's theology of light and time. Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, Proceedings 7, IV. Jerusalem: The Academy, 1992
• ASSMANN J: "Aux origines du monothéisme", le Monde de la Bible: janvier-février 2000
• CABROL A: Amenhotep III le magnifique, Le Rocher, 1993
• CANNUYER Ch: Akhénaton, précurseur du monothéisme? Bibliothèque Clio 2006
• CHAPPAZ J-L: Amenhotep IV à Karnak, Revue "Égypte, Afrique et Orient": N°13
• CHAPPAZ J-L: L'Horizon d'Aton, Revue "Égypte, Afrique et Orient" : N°14
• DESROCHES-NOBLECOURT C: Toutankhamon, Pygmalion 1963, AUPC, 2001
• ERMAN A, RANKE H: La civilisation égyptienne, Payot, 1952
• GABOLDE M: Amarna, la cité du Roi-Soleil, Revue "Égypte, Afrique et Orient": N°14
• GABOLDE M: D'akhénaton à Toutankhamon, Lyon, 1998
• GRANDET P: Hymnes de la religion d'Aton, Seuil 1995
• HORNUNG E: Les dieux de l'Égypte, le un et le multiple, Le Rocher 1971
• HORNUNG E: Akhenaten and the religion of light, Cornell University Press, 2001
• KMT: vol 10 N°4
• KOZLOFF A, BRIAN B, BERMAN LM, DELANGE E: Aménophis III, le Pharaon soleil, RMN 1993
• MATHIEU B: Le grand Hymne à Aton, Revue "Égypte, Afrique et Orient" : N°13
• MORAN WL: Les lettres d'El Amarna, Cerf 1987
• MORENZ S: La religion égyptienne, Payot 1977
• QUIRKE Stephen: le culte de Rê, Le Rocher, 2001
• REDFORD D B: Akhenaten, the heretic king, Princeton University Press, 1984
• REEVES N: Toutankhamon, Belfond 1991
• REEVES N: Akhenaten Egypt's False Prophet. Thames &Hudson, 2001
• SCHÄFER H: Principles of Egyptian art, Griffith Institute, Oxford, 1966
• (in) The Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt:
  • EATON-KRAUSS M: Akhenaten, vol I, p 48-51
  • SCHLÖGL HA: Aten, vol I, p 156-158
  • BRIAN B: Amarna, vol I, p 60-65
• VERGNIEUX R.,GONDRAN M., Amenophis IV et les pierres du soleil, Arthaud 1997

You can consult the following useful sites:

• Exhibition "Pharaohs of the Sun". An absolute must visit! :
• You will find here the whole of The Great Hymn to the Aton
• A site entirely dedicated to the sovereign: Akhenaten
• An inescapable site on the city and the tombs; the Official Website of the Amarna Project.
• The Akhenaten Temple Project

MY PERSONAL OPINION ABOUT AKHENATEN AND HIS TIME - by Th.B.

 

It is difficult to break away from our religious and general education in order to judge, not by our values but by those of the day but it is the only way to do it.

 

Personally, I do not agree with the idea that monotheisms are a spiritual (or other) progress in the history of humanity (I've the same opinion concerning the alphabet in relation to hieroglyphs, but this is not the place to discuss it).

 

I am also lukewarm about what I should think of the person of Akhenaten. He produces a mixture of disgust and irresistible attraction in me. His reign introduced, in a tangible manner, a "disorder" (in the Setian sense of the term) in the apparently well-oiled succession of the New Kingdom sovereigns as well as in Egyptian history and everyone distinguishes a "before Amarna" and an "after Amarna" either in images or in ideas. In the same way, the singularity of architectural or artistic realisations of this time immediately cause us to recognise the work as being from the Amarna period.

 

I wondered what could have been the personality and psychology of the king. He was certainly an intelligent man with a religious spirit, a sense of the sacred. I consider absurd the theses that make him out to be a sort of atheist on the pretext that he developed not a religion but a philosophy of nature. I even think that the theory making the king into a tortured being, almost a mystic, is correct but in a pathological sense, because this religious spirit had to double as a very pronouncedly exalted and egocentric character. The Aten was the one god and Akhenaten his "prophet". A prophet combining the persons of Mohammed for the message and Jesus as the indispensable intermediary (there's an anachronism!! I couldn't find a better analogy.). It is difficult to know if he believed himself invested with a divine mission or if the intransigence which he showed was just part of his character. Maybe both are true.

 

Akhenaten was, without doubt, a strong man except, maybe, during the last years of his reign. It would have been impossible for a timid spirit to oppose himself, as he did, to the traditions of millennia, to a powerful clergy and to succeed partially without an iron hand. That his temperament did not push him to military action changes nothing.

 

On the other hand, I wonder if he didn't suffer from a phobia of the night, of the dark with, as a corollary, a metaphysical anguish, which dissipated only with the coming of the morning. This could explain his joy and relief at each sunrise, which he would then have transcribed in the hymns. I even wonder if this phobia was not the principal motive force in his proceedings and if we should not see things in the opposite way to the usual, i.e. the light as repulser of the night.

 

I think the king had a paradoxical vision of the world, both universalist with respect to the power of his god and reductionist, almost regionalist, in the worship to be rendered to him. Did he conceive the creation of Akhetaten as a preliminary stage? We don't really see how far Akhenaten would have liked to push his actions.

 

In the Amarna system, all creation being the act of the Aten, nothing could be bad. Note here, however, that there is not really a notion of love in this relation, but of dependence on the divinity. It seems clear to me that he wanted his subjects to have a similar relationship with him as he had with his god; he wanted absolute power over souls as he already had over bodies. There was no question, for example, that a person other than himself would be the "refuge of the poor", a rôle which was formerly devolved upon Amun. One more reason to eliminate the latter.

 

Could his action have had nothing but a political end as has sometimes been said? To establish a total royal absolutism? I don't think so, even if that had been an appreciable motive.

 

In all, I see Akhenaten as a partially sick mind in, perhaps, a sick body, as someone, (in the real sense, an individual), fascinating in spite of (and because of) the disgust which he inspires in me.