MJ Thomas Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
>
> Now, look at how the modern world has changed to a
> staggering degree in the last 200 years or so.
> In my own lifetime - about a third of the time
> span between Khufu and Unas - the world has
> changed dramatically.
> But one thing that hasn't changed very much at all
> in the last two centuries is the world's major
> religions.
>
> When I look at how long the world's major
> religions have been around with very little in the
> way of change, I fail to see how the core of the
> PTs (whichever bits of the Texts it may be) could
> not predate Unas by many, many centuries - perhaps
> even before Menes.


The Pyramid Texts do not reflect ancient Egyptian religion, as we popularly understand religion in the 21st century. As I've stated elsewhere, they were, by their very nature, the equivalent of what we would now consider "science". I have borrowed Phillip Pullman's phrase from his "Dark Materials" series to describe it most concisely: Experimental Theology.

As such, the proper comparison in their level of change would not be between modern organized religion, but rather between the technology of today as compared to the technology of 200 years ago. As with our own modern technologies, hot air still rises and gravity still works. Our worldview of the nature of nature hasn't changed dramatically. In 1783, the Montgolfia brothers used those basic facts to build the first hot air balloon. We now use those "facts" of nature to produce electricity via nuclear fission.

This is not a dogmatic "organized religion" we are investigating here. Comparing it to the oriental cults is not an appropriate way to understand it, unless you are explicitly contrasting them. They couldn't be more different.


Anthony

You can lead a horse to water but you can't make him think.