Be pure by knowing your heart,
Thus shall your Ka be present in all
Your deeds.
Be pure by speaking your heart,
Thus shall the voice of your Ka
Be heard in all your deeds.
Be pure by working through a
True heart,
Thus shall the wisdom of your Ka
Be manifest in your deeds.
Now in my mind's eye I behold the Lake of Creation beyond the walls of the pylons and courtyards, dazzling in the light of the early dawn, shimmering like molten gold beneath the cascading rays of the Netjer Ra upon His horizon. I stand as I was born, naked, without hindrances, fresh to the air of life, renewed by the cool grace of the pure waters surrounding my lower body. I behold my flesh, shiny in the cascade of silver water splashing over my limbs, charging my flesh with revitalization and life.
Sa ankh sa ankh sa ankh. I am given the protection of life. I am given the essence of life as protection for my Ka. I bathe in the living stream from which Ra in the beginning came forth. I bathe in the living stream by which the Wedjat Eye was made whole again when it was wounded. Like the Wedjat Eye, I am brought back together, healed, made wholesome and granted divine power. My faults are washed away in the living stream. My misdeeds are cleansed, my ills absolved. The man I was has been purified. The man I am is pure! I ascend the ladder of the Netjer, entering the Celestial Mansion, becoming light-radiance, embracing the Ka of the Divine One. I have bathed in the Lake of Reeds with the flesh of the God, and I am like Him, in truth, for eternity!
I have bathed in the Lake of Reeds,
Even as Ra has bathed in the Lake of Reeds.
I have bathed in the Lake of Reeds,
Even as Heru has bathed in the Lake of Reeds.
I have bathed in the Lake of Reeds,
Even as Geb has bathed in the Lake of Reeds.
Heaven has been bathed and Earth has been bathed.
The Holy Horizon has been bathed in the
Waters of the Eternal Stream, these waters in which
I bathe!
I have bathed with Ra in the Lake of Reeds,
Thus Heru shall ordain my flesh and anoint my feet!
O Nuwit, take my hand!
O Nuwit lift me up!
O Shuw, take my hand!
O Shuw, lift me up!
O Heaven, give me Your hand and lift me up!
O Earth, give me Your hand and lift me up!
O Air, give me Your hand and lift me up!
O Spirit of the Netjer, give me Your hand
And lift me up!1
Another voice pierces the caverns of my heart, traveling through my blood and spreading warmth through my veins. A white light pierces my heart, capturing my love, washing clean my fear and my imperfections. I am swayed to lift my face to the Stars, though it is not their light that shines across my breast. The newly reborn Sun sheds its illumination upon my closed eyes, and from behind shut lids my eyes sense the color of turquoise striking the waters around my body. I am overjoyed. I am overflowing with gratitude. The ecstasy of this moment dispels all shadow and fills my heart with radiant light.
The gates of the Sky are thrown open for you!
The doors of the Firmament are thrown open at
Dawn for you, O Heru, O Son of the Gods!
The Eastern Horizon is thrown open for you.
The doors of Heaven are thrown open at
Dawn for you, O Heru-Akhuty, O Son of the God!
The gates of the Sky are thrown open for you,
For you have bathed your heart in the Lake of Reeds
Where Atum had His beginning!
The doors of Heaven are thrown open at
Dawn for you, O Bull, O Son of Menu,
Purified of all ill in the Celestial Waters where
Ra had His beginning!
The gates of the Sky are thrown open for you.
The doors of Heaven are thrown open at
Dawn for you, O Celestial Leopard, O Son of
The Great Leopard, empowered in the Stream
From which Tat the Earth had His beginning!
The gates of the Sky are thrown open for you.
The doors of Heaven are thrown open at
Dawn for you, O Sah, O Shining One in the Firmament,
Consecrated in the Flood where Pat the Heavens
Had Her beginning!2
Shall I now be ushered into the presence of the Netjer? Shall I see the countenance of the Lord Menu (Min) surrounded by a halo of flaxen light, His robust limbs and stalwart member caressed by the soft glow of torchlight? Shall I embrace my Lord in the Primordial Ocean of His own shrine, receiving His essence as the Sa of my renewed Self? Let me go forth to the God, I say to my own heart. Let me go forth to the Netjer Who awaits the vessel of my Ka to fill it with radiant light.
My desire is fulfilled almost before I am conscious of its presence in my heart. The distance between us is shortened, the halls and doors and pylons sweeping by in a flurry of gold and sparkling white stone. I breathe the intoxicating fragrance of sandalwood hanging heavy in the air, and know at once that I am in the presence of the living God. My feet fail me, my legs bend beneath the weight of my body, and my back and neck are instinctively bent as if by some unseen hand pressing slowly upon me. I am again surrounded by the Stars of the night Sky, which looms above my head as dark as lapis, speckled with glowing flecks of gold.
O Mother Nuwit, You of the Heavenly Vault, Lady of the Great Night, Whose body carries aloft the body of the Sun! May You receive me when my time comes, and pass me through the protective embrace of Your belly, until at last I am reborn as one of the Imperishables, the Stars of Your Ka burning brightly forever! And I am in the presence of Sah, here in this most intimate chamber of the Divine Mansion. He is as the brightest Star glimmering in the firmament above me, shedding His light upon walls sheathed in symbols of the Mysteries, enveloping the Shrine of the God in His glory.
May my heart be filled with Your light, I pray. May I shine like You even in times of darkness. May my heart project Your light unfailingly, guiding me through the night sky of the realm of men. May I reach Blessedness even while alive upon the Earth, turning away sorrow, cultivating joy, removing suffering from every place that I travel! O Sah, burn brightly with me, granting me the Sa of the Netjer to carry with me as I go!
"But Sah is Sia", a gentle voice says from within the magnificence of a closed and sealed shrine. It is the voice of the Netjer my Lord, the Sun of Creation, the radiant heart from which the pulse of the Universe beats. He continues.
"Do you not know that your true guide is knowing itself? Sia is the Netjer of discernment within the Self, the quality of perceiving things as they are, not as we desire them to be in relation to other things. Sia is the parent of sa'a, which is ultimate awareness, the state of existence beyond relative existence, the fundamental Cause of all causes. This is the nature of the Cosmos, alive, an entity of causes and their effects. Each effect has a cause, and each cause is the result of another cause. All of this was urged and divided from a first cause, which had its beginning in the Void of all things. The All, the Complete, the Perfected. This was Atum in the Nuwn. This is Atum, the Netjer personifying all Netjeru, the Source of the All, the Cause of the causes of Creation.
To have Sia, sa'a, one must first recognize the truth that all things are the result of a cause and its effects, that the Self is the product of causes and their effects. All action provokes reaction. All deeds yield fruit, though their offspring may not be seen for many generations. A man having true perception, the manifestation of Wisdom, Sia, recognizes the effects that will arise from any given cause, and governs his actions accordingly. He sees that all thought gives birth to Creation, to behavior, emotion, and reaction. He sees that all action produces results that themselves may echo through eternity, thus he works skillfully to produce actions that will benefit Creation, instead of detract from it.
This is the Way of Ma'at, the Order upon which I founded this world, through which I brought about all things that are and shall be. It is in the vessel of the heart, the will from which a man accomplishes his destiny, that a man's future is woven; for what he feels he behaves upon, whether in thought or physical action. Through this impulse of emotion he wills, however unknowingly, the causes and effects that will determine the course of his life. It is a Sahu, a skillful wielder of Sa, of Sia, who foresees the patterns of causes and their effects, and masters his emotions and impulses that he might give rise to all that is beneficial. This is what is meant in the precept sa'a-hat, "know the heart". Only a wise man can accomplish this task, my son".
My heart is bowed in humility. I kiss the Earth in the presence of my Netjer, emptying my heart of all selfish ambition, desiring only that it be filled with the Wisdom of the Netjer's love. To love Netjer is to love the nature of Creation Itself, which manifests without discrimination, whole, as an entity without a separate Ka. Am I not a manifestation of that Ka? Are all Kas not children of that same Ka, the Ka of Creation that encompasses all things? Is this not the true Wisdom of the Netjer's Sa, that Essence of Life flowing undiminished through all things that live? This is Sia, the Wisdom of wholeness that recognizes the interdependence of all beings, the causes from which the effects of the Universe emerge. Sia is the Wisdom that unites all things, the Sa pulsing through the veins of the Cosmos. I hear the song of the Netjer Sia in the chambers of my heart, and within me the music of understanding arises.
I am Sia, Bearer of the Great Wisdom
Who is seated at the right hand of Ra.
I am Sia, the Uniter of Hearts, Whose
Wisdom is greater than that of the Gods,
Whose possession is that of Creation and
Its mysteries, Who knows all the things
From which Creation comes forth into
Being!
I am Sia, Whose charge is the greatness
Of Wisdom, Who is seated at the right
Hand of Ra, Whose possession is the
Book of the God in which are inscribed
All the things that were, all the things
That are, and all the things that have yet
To come into being!3
Notes
1 Adapted from the Pyramid Texts, Utterances 253, 564 and 567.
2 Ibid, Utterance 325.
3 Adapted from the Pyramid Texts, Utterance 250.
All text copyright © 2006, 2015 Rev. Ptahmassu K.M. Nofra-Uaa