Image via Wiki Commons – Public Domain.

Let’s talk about pagan pride and its place in Kemeticism. I’ve got work and uni looming on the horizon, so this will have to be a brief-ish post. Lucky you!

In short, pagan pride should fill the hearts of every Kemetic neo-pagan out there. Absolutely! There’s a massive difference between taking pride in who you are, versus what you are. The latter is ego, the former is a healthy cultural identity, which is a crucial component to the reconstruction of ancient Egyptian religion.

Besides, do you think the AEs are not proud of who they are? They who navigated the afterlife, reunited their Ba and Ka to become an Ahk? They who serve as our spiritual guardians today, along-side the goddesses and gods of ancient Egypt? Dua!

…don’t mind my pagan pride!

Kidding aside, Christian interpretations of pride and sin obviously don’t apply to Kemeticism, however, that’s not to say sin did not exist in ancient Egypt. It certainly did. Let’s not forget whose religion came first (sorry, JC)!

The ancient Egyptians had a very clear delineation between right and wrong action, which was judged upon entrance into the afterlife in the Weighing of the Heart Ceremony as depicted in the Ancient Egyptian Book of the Dead found primarily in the Papyrus of Ani . In this ceremony, as most Kemetics would know, the heart (or ib) of the deceased is weighed against a feather, symbolising Ma’at. The heart of the righteous person would be equally as light as a feather. The heavy heart of the wrong-doer would sink. A big no-no (see the 2011 article, The book of Death: Weighing your heart by Francesco Carelli).

The Goddess Ma’at. Image via Wiki Commons – Public Domain.

If the newly deceased person was non-compliant with the conduct expected of them in life, they faced severe consequences. This included being devoured by Ammit, a multi-hybrid lion / crocodile / hippo beast (but don’t worry, I’ve met with Ammit and they’re super nice now, just like Sekhmet, whose main concern is to help you, not to rip you apart). During the ceremony, a person must profess their innocence from wrong-doing in a series of 42 negative confessions or declarations to the gods. The first of which, states:

Hail, Usekh-nemmt, who comest forth from  Anu,  I have not committed sin.

See? Sin.

Not all hope was lost though, if you’d done a few naughty things in life and wished to have a change of heart, which the AEs called a swallowing of the heart. There were also lots of spells in the Book of the Dead to help you along the way — totally witchin’.

I almost forgot, the inspiration for this post on pagan pride comes from the wonderful Priestess Tara, who I follow on Twitter. Her pagan pride tweet attracted a rather inappropriate rebuttal. Ah, but what would the internet be without those? Kudos to Priestess Tara, for handling it so graciously.

 

isnt pride a sin?

— GooeyPrick (@GooeyPrick) August 8, 2021

It’s kind of hard to take seriously anyone who calls themselves a gooeyprick, and I’m doubting the sincerity and human-ness of the quarent. Since the topic of pagan pride and  Kemeticism hadn’t yet been covered in the blog, I thought why not dive in? It’s a chance to solidify what we believe and where we stand.

So there you have it. Thank you for reading Kemetic Blog. Stay tuned for an upcoming post dedicated to the 42 negative confessions, which I look forward to sharing. As always, stay safe and well.

P.S. A shout out to Thoth at Anubis, who also take part in the weighing of the heart ceremony.

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