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Book of the Dead |
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The Book of the Dead is more popularly known as The Book of Coming Forth By Day and is an integral part of ancient Egyptian mythology. The ancient Egyptians believed in afterlife. With this belief, the Egyptians used to mummify the dead persons specially the pharaohs and the wealthy class of the society. During the process of mummification, the Book of the Dead was provided to the mummy which contained information about how to navigate in afterlife. The Book of the dead was written in typical Egyptian papyrus scroll and was buried in the burial chamber along with the mummy.
Weighing of the heart: Book Of the Dead: this is an important phase of the book. According to this verse, the deceased is weighed against the feather of truth. It is a symbolic trial. If the deceased is found guilty or have done sins in his life he is proved to be unworthy. If he is found true and worthy he gets the company of god.
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Continuing the journey: Book of the Dead: If the deceased is found worthy he begins his eternal journey. The later part of the book contains magical spells that helps the spirit to reach its destination and protect the deceased during his journey to underworld to join the god. During his journey, he has to provide secret passwords in each of the gates to get entry.
The negative confessions: The Book of the Dead: The deceased provide 42 statements as his innocence in 2 series. He has to take the name of each of the gods to declare him innocent.
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Cost of Book of the Dead: The book is too costly for a normal wage worker. It can be the equivalent to half a year's salary of a laborer. The purchases of the book should be planned well ahead of time. The cost of the book mainly depends on its quality of papyrus. Images with illustrative texts were mandatory. In fact the images were more important than the texts. So the texts were often reduced to insert images.
Versions of Book of the Dead: The book became highly organized and well standardized during the Intermediate Period. The book was renamed as Saite Recension in this period.
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