The Osireion at Abydos


Seti I

"Have you entered into the springs of the sea?
Or have you walked in the recesses of the deep?
Have the gates of death been revealed to you?
Or have you seen the gates of deep darkness?"
- Job 38:16-17

Temple of Osiris

Seti I was the son of a "horse stall" cleaner in ancient Egypt. Yet, he apparently became Pharaoh by virtue of his leadership skill in the military. Seti's son was Ramesses, the Pharaoh from whom the Hebrew slaves escaped in the Exodus. It was Seti I who supposedly discovered the Osireion. At least, he decorated the place and claimed it as his own. However, Neville and Murray, two of the esteemed archaeologists who discovered the Osireion in the early 1900's, stated - in published articles - their belief that Seti I did not build the place, but that it was perhaps 10,000 years old. There are some who still believe this theory.

Actually, I believe the Osireion wasn't discovered by Seti I at all. I believe it was discovered quite by mistake by his predecessor, Akhenaten. I say so because it helps to explain one of the most perplexing mysteries in all of Antiquity: the disappearance of Akhenaten's wife and co-regent, Nefertiti.

Pharaoh Akhenaten was very much a family man. He had many daughters and proudly posed with them in all the reliefs that survive his reign. He alone of all Pharaohs posed with his family so. Nefertiti was more than his wife and the mother of his beloved daughters. She was his co-ruler. She was Queen, in act as well as in name. Then she was abducted. Given his attachment to Nefertiti - and the universal love for her shared by all their subjects - it's not hard to imagine that everybody everywhere in Egypt dropped everything to look for her. They would have literally turned over every stone and burrowed under every sand dune to find her.

The historical record does in fact show that Amarna, the beautiful new city on the Nile built by Akhenaten and Nefertiti (who was widely acclaimed as the most beautiful woman of Antiquity), was destroyed toward the end of Akhenaten's reign. Historians believe Amarna was destroyed because Akhenaten had declared his belief in One God, thus offending all the local gods and goddesses, and their followers. That explanation would be logical, except for the co-regency of Nefertiti - whom many believed to be Isis incarnate. It's much more likely that Akhenaten's One God was worshipped in Amarna faithfully, and tolerated good naturedly elsewhere in the kingdom of Egypt. Given Nefertiti's godlike stature among all Egyptians, her disappearance would spark the greatest manhunt in the history of the world.

I believe Akhenaten tore the kingdom apart looking for her. We know for a fact that Amarna was torn asunder brick for brick; as were the environs, perhaps extending 100 miles south to the ancient burial grounds at Abydos. Nefertiti was never found; but I believe Akhenaten did find the Osireion, buried hundreds of feet deep in the sands of the burial grounds at Abydos. He saw the awesome beauty of it, and recognized its ancient origins. Perhaps he assumed Nefertiti was abducted by the same people who had built the Osireion; who must surely have seemed all powerful - to not only abscond with the most recognizable person in the Ancient world, but to have secretly built this magnificent temple of stone.



Curse of the Pharaohs

When Akhenaten found the Osireion, it was a Revelation. He was Pharaoh, but he - like all his predecessors - had been deceived. The existence of the Osireion was a shock. Moreover, he discovered that it had been used to imprison the strange creature Job calls Leviathan. The priesthood had discovered that this being had a malign influence upon human beings, giving them a temporary mental malaise that the priests promoted as a religious fervor. Leviathan was held captive in the Osireion, and brought to religious festivals in the "dog kennel sized" Ark of the Covenant. All of this had been kept secret by an underground bureaucracy. This secret society was the hereditary Egyptian priesthood that had built up a religious power base in Egypt since the demise of Job's kingdom circa 3000 BC. Leviathan had been their prisoner the whole time. It was these religious zealots who abducted Nefertiti, to keep Akhenaten silent; she was their hostage.

The Pharaoh was enraged, to say the least. Yet, more than the loss of his beloved Queen, he had learned an even darker secret: Leviathan was sentient. It wasn't just a strange creature with strange powers over human beings - it had high intelligence, values, and honor. Over the millennia it had learned the Hebrew slave's language; ultimately, it had communicated to them, inscribing the fabled tablets with the Ten Commandments into the slate slabs from its prison. Likewise, it had carved the steps leading down into the water well from the central island. Naturally, all of this upset the Hebrews greatly, and eventually they stole Leviathan, along with the Ark of the Covenant, and the tablets on which Leviathan had carved the Ten Commandments - hence, all evidence that Leviathan was an intelligent, spiritually advanced entity.

Pharaoh discovered the Hebrew slaves were as anxious as he to free Leviathan and to rid Egypt of its ultra powerful priesthood. It took the a generation to set up the plan - among other things, placing the Hebrew child Moses in the highest order of priests. They captured Leviathan, and made fast their escape from Egypt, under Ramesses who was Seti I's successor. They had to use all their powers to manage the escape, despite all the "plagues," unleased on Pharaoh and his people by the priesthood. The Hebrews succeeded, though, and they brought the priesthood's most sacred artifacts with them; the Ark of the Covenant, the Ten Commandments, and Leviathan. The Hebrews, upon arrival in their promised land, burned the "golden calf" in effigy, so to speak. Leviathan was free at last.

The Egyptian priesthood was livid with rage. Akhenaten's entire blood line was decimated by the many years of terrible plagues. The whole royal dynasty, their first born children, and those of all their functionaries, were killed. Once their power base in Egypt was secured, they sent army after army to conquer the Israelites and take Leviathan back. Ultimately, ten of the tribes were destroyed and never heard from again.

Bibliography

Alredo, Cyril Akhenaten Thames & Hudson LTD, London

Johnson, Paul A History of the Jews Harper and Row, New York

Redford, Donald B. Akhenaten: the Heretic King Princeton University Press, New Jersey

Tyldesley, Joyce Nefertiti: Egypt's Sun Queen Viking Press, London