The Ancient Tradition

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Music

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You’re listening to The Ancient Tradition. A Wonk Media Production. Music provided by Joseph McDade. He is your host, Dr. Jack Logan.

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Welcome to the ancient tradition. I’m your host, Jack Logan.

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Great to have you listening in. Have you ever wondered if God, upon the creation of the world, revealed to human beings a pure, true religious tradition? Because on this podcast, we explore the surprising and what I consider to be mind boggling evidence that’s found in the oldest religious writings and cosmologies, theologies, symbols, sacred architecture, rituals, and myths.

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pointing to a distinct primordial tradition, which we refer to on this program as the ancient tradition. On this podcast, we delve into the evidence. We look at all of the patterns. We talk about the theology. And we contemplate the spiritual implications of that theology. It’s not always in line what we think things are going to be. So it’s a podcast that’s going to spark some discussion.

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It may even provoke a lot of questions. And ultimately, I hope that it inspires the pursuit of the divine. Be sure and check out our companion website, thea because you can find pictures and transcripts and links to each of our past episodes, which are pretty darn important to getting a comprehensive view of the theology inherent in the ancient tradition. In today’s episode,

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We’re going to dig into the texts that were left by the ancient Egyptians to see if they, like the ancient Mesopotamians, attest that God imposed a divine wall or barrier of some type in the cosmos to separate sacred and profane space. So let’s start by looking at an ancient Egyptian document translated by the famed Egyptologist, Kurt Sete.

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dated to the 19th dynasty, which spanned from 1550 to 1292 BC, which speaks of the gods giving the earthly Egyptian pharaoh dominion over everything under the heavens until it reaches the dark primordial waters. The text reads, quote, “‘Cause your boundaries to extend beneath the whole reach of the sky to the limits.’

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the eternal darkness. So this text clearly indicates that ancient Egyptians understood that there was a boundary to the King’s dominion and that that boundary was distinguished by the quote limits of the eternal darkness. The earliest known ancient Egyptian iconographic depiction of the cosmic boundary between the sacred and the profane was actually found in the tomb of King Tut.

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He ruled from 1332 to 1323 BC. And in this image, an ancient Egyptian god is depicted encircled by a snake. And that snake’s devouring its own tail. This image is known as the Arabaros. The name Arabaros comes from Greek, where aro means tail and baros means eating. So when you put them together, it’s the tail eating or the tail devourer.

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And sometimes it’s called the dragon, which is Greek for dragon or snake, arabaros, or the snake or dragon tail eater. Which incidentally, I think I’ve mentioned this on the program before, is why Draco Malfoy in the Harry Potter series is named Draco. Rawling wanted his name to mean snake, like the Slytherin house that he was part of, and to associate him with Voldemort, who was the serpent.

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If you would like to see a picture of the King Tut Arabaros, you can find it on the webpage for this episode. Okay, so how does this image of a snake eating its own tail symbolize the cosmic division between sacred and profane space? Well, for the answer to that, we need to look at another ancient Egyptian text. This one’s found in the Khafin texts, in Khafin text four, spell 321.

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In this text you’ll see that the image of the snake is directly connected to the cosmogony, the creation of the universe or earth, and to the creator Atum. As I read, see if you can decode the symbol. The text reads, quote, I, and I here refers to Atum, am the outflow of the primeval flood, he who emerged from the waters.

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So here, Autum is telling us that he’s the one who emerged in the midst of the dark chaotic profane waters. The text continues, quote, I am the provider of attributes serpent with its many coils. I extend everywhere in accordance with what was to come into existence. He, the indwelling soul.

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So, Atum’s referring to himself here. It was who made the universe. I bent right around myself. I was encircled in my coils. And by coils, Atum is referring to the coils of a snake. So, Atum is referring to himself here in this text, symbolically as a snake. In this text, Atum’s telling us that when he emerged in the midst of the profane waters, at the time of creation,

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that he extended his presence out over the waters, over all the chaotic elements that were to quote, come into existence, which tells us that he didn’t extend his presence over all the chaotic waters, just over the waters that he wanted to come into existence. Then he tells us that those elements that took on an ordered form became the universe. Then he tells us that as part of this creative process, he bent himself

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into a circle like a snake. Now that’s interesting. To understand the symbolism behind what Atum is telling us here, we have to understand why real snakes do this. Circle themselves in their coils. Because in the natural world, snakes coil themselves as a defense mechanism against threats. By curling up, they shield their vulnerable areas, create a more intimidating appearance,

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poise themselves to strike if a predator ventures too close. And this coiling behavior is mainly a way for snakes to protect and defend themselves against predators. So when Atum tells us that like a snake, he coiled himself around the universe he just created, we get the impression that he did this to protect the sacred space he just created. Protect it from what? Well, from the predators.

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that lurk in the profane waters, the ruined gods, like we learned in our previous episode. Now, listen to the last thing he says. The text reads, quote, “‘I bent right around myself. “‘I was encircled in my coils, “‘one who made a place for himself “‘in the midst of his coils.'”

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This is kind of an amazing little text. The last part of the text is pretty important. He tells us that he made a place for himself in the midst of his coils, the midst. The midst is the very center. So Atum’s telling us that he created the universe, his cosmic kingdom, his cosmic temple, and he made a place, a home for himself in the very center, in the sacred center of the cosmic temple he just created.

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Take a second and picture the symbol of a coiled snake in your mind, where the head of the snake is in the center and the snake coils around itself again and again and again, making concentric circles around the center. Does this make you think of anything we’ve talked about on the program? Because it should, it should conjure up in your mind the image of a circum-pump.

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because that’s the same image Atum is creating here when he says, quote, I bent right around myself. I was encircled in my coils, one who made a place for himself in the midst of his coils. What we glean from the symbolism Atum is using here is that he resides in the sacred center of his creations. The serpent’s spiraling coils

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extend outward and symbolize that God’s power and influence permeates every inch of his kingdom. The outer coil symbolizes the farthest boundary of his realm and represents the threshold that separates God’s kingdom from, quote, the limits of the eternal darkness. Note how the coiled snake symbol that Atum uses here is a miniature

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replica of his cosmic kingdom. Amazingly, the coiled snake symbol is a microcosm of the macrocosm. The coiled snake symbolizes how the cosmos, God’s heavenly kingdom, is actually structured. We get this same structural diagram of God’s kingdom in the even more simplified symbol, the circum-punct, where the point, the punct, is the point of the

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in the center of the circle represents the sacred center of God’s kingdom, the location of God’s personal residence, and the outer circle, the circum represents the cosmic boundary or wall around his kingdom. For today’s discussion, our primary focus is on this outer circle, Atum’s outer coil. Note how it is Atum’s outer coil that completely encircles his kingdom.

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This matters because this indicates that it’s Atum’s power and authority that serves as the protective barrier or wall that safeguards his kingdom. It indicates that Atum is the wall. This notion is further substantiated in ancient Mesopotamian texts like the Epic of Gilgamesh, where Gilgamesh and Enki must journey to the paradyceical cedar forest, which Tablet Five calls the quote

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dwelling place of gods. So keep in mind that this forest is not a regular earthly forest. This forest is located in the divine realm. If you’re a longtime listener, you’ll recall that Gilgamesh and Enki had to defeat the awful monster Humbaba before they could enter this sacred cedar forest where dwelt the glorious god Shamash, who like the Egyptian Atum-re

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was symbolized by the sun. And let me remind you, like we discussed many times on the program, that in the ancient world, God was symbolized by a sacred tree. Keep all of this in your mind when you listen to what Gilgamesh and Enki do. So let’s start with this question. Why did Gilgamesh and Enki want to gain entrance to the Cedar Forest, the dwelling place of the gods? Well, they wanted to gain access to the forest,

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so that they could gain access to the trees. And why did they want to gain access to the trees? They wanted to gain access to the trees so that they could cut the trees down and use the trees to build the sacred city of Uruk, the temple, the gate, and the wall that was to surround the city. Keep in mind that although the epic refers

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to a cedar forest, to cedar trees, to the felling of those trees, to the wood of those trees, and to the use of those trees for building the sacred city of Uruk. They’re being used in the epic as religious symbols to conceal greater esoteric or spiritual truths. When Gilgamesh and Anki speak of using the timber from the sacred trees, which were found in the divine forest, to build

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say a magnificent gate for a temple, which the texts say they did, you Areodite listeners will see that this text conceals the teaching that God is the wood. It’s teaching that God is the actual gate by which one enters the temple. And if the temple itself is made from the wood of the sacred tree,

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then again, it symbolizes that God is the temple. And if the protective wall that is built around the temple is built from the wood of the sacred tree, then just like is suggested in ancient Egypt by the outer coil of the snake, it indicates that God is the wall that separates the sacred from the profane.

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And if God is the wall that protects us from the profane, then like I suggested in the last episode, it makes perfect sense ritually speaking that the anointing oil, which is the gift of the sacred tree, is what protects one personally from all that is profane. I hope you’re starting to see how profound symbols are and how if you ponder them,

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you’ll gain great insight into the spiritual realm. And when this happens, you will have acquired what the ancients referred to as wisdom. Wisdom is spiritual knowledge and spiritual understanding. For those willing to ponder them, the ancient texts and ancient symbols are literally dripping in wisdom. I consider them a global treasure.

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One of the building projects for which Gilgamesh was known was, you guessed it, building a real, a literal, massive protective wall around the sacred city of Uruk. In fact, the Epic of Gilgamesh begins by heaping praise on Gilgamesh for accomplishing this exact architectural feat. Listen to what the prologue to the Epic of Gilgamesh says about

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Gilgamesh built around Uruk. And this is the Stephanie Dalley translation. He, and this refers to Gilgamesh, journeyed far and wide, weary and at last resigned. He had the wall of Uruk built, the sheepfold. See its wall, which is like a copper band. Survey its battlements, which nobody else can match. Go up on the wall of Uruk and walk around.

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I love how this text refers to the protective wall as a quote, sheepfold, a place where sheep are kept safe and as a quote, copper band, which suggests both strength and beauty. And the text clearly indicates that this wall was used to defend the city against enemies when the text invites us to quote, survey the battlements.

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You might be wondering to yourself, have archaeologists found evidence that a wall was built around the ancient Mesopotamian city of Uruk? Well, yes. Yes they have. They estimate that it was built sometime around 3000 BC. And the wall was massive. Archaeologists estimate that it stood between 40 and 50 feet tall.

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which encompassed the entire city, measured more than five and a half miles long. A 50-foot tall wall is enormous. To construct a 50-foot tall wall five and a half miles long in 3000 BC was an architectural feat if there ever was one. But we all know that Gilgamesh didn’t literally build this wall.

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out of the cedar trees in the sacred cedar forest. Cause remember that forest was in the spiritual realm where dwelt the gods. But we do know that the ancient Mesopotamians built a wall around their sacred city of Uruk made out of brick.

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So why did the ancient Mesopotamians build a 40 to 50 foot tall wall around the city of Uruk? According to Jill C. Katz in an article published in the fourth edition of the 2017 volume of Near Eastern Archaeology, titled, Building a City Wall, Speaking of the building of walls in the ancient world did not build them to thwart large scale military threats.

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because there weren’t any. She writes the following on page 282, quote, the lack of evidence for large scale military threats and the equipment to counter them forces us to reconsider the meaning behind these monumental walls. Katz goes on to argue that cities in the Southern Levant and cities like the Neolithic Jericho were walled to quote,

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symbolically demarcate sacred space. Within the walls was the world of the sacred and outside the walls, that of the profane. We learned the same thing in Dina Ragavan’s book, Temple’s Ritual and Cosmic Symbolism in the Ancient World. The ancients built these walls to replicate the structure of the heavens on earth. Or as Ragavan says on page one, as,

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reflection or embodiment of the cosmos. As above, so below. The earthly wall that Gilgamesh built around the sacred city of Uruk served as a replica of the cosmic boundary that separated sacred from profane space in the heavens. Just as the cosmic boundary or wall found in the heavens served to keep the awful profane sea monsters out of God’s kingdom,

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So too did the wall Gilgamesh erected around the sacred city of Uruk serve to keep the profane enemies of Uruk out. See, the entire sacred city of Uruk with its sacred temple in the center of the city was built to mirror the way God’s cosmic kingdom was structured.

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Back to the ancient Egyptians and the symbol of God’s kingdom as a coiled snake or as an araboros, a snake biting its own tail. In both cases the image used to symbolize the sacred boundary around God’s kingdom is a circle. Now this is where the ancient Egyptians get into some significant what I call symbolism stacking, where they stack multiple meetings into the same symbol

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point. And the Arrobaros is a great example of this. In Coffin Text 714, Atum is actually referred to as a circle. The text reads, quote, I, speaking of Atum, was in the primeval waters. I was he who came into existence as a circle.

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Because the text opens in reference to the primeval waters, we know the context of this text is the cosmogony. So the text is talking about Atum appearing in the beginning in the primeval waters as a circle. Okay, so what does this circle symbolize? Well, more than one thing, which is where we get into symbolism stacking. On one level, the circle symbolizes the sun. It symbolizes that Atum on the day of creation,

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appeared in the primordial waters as a glorious being of light, which the ancient Egyptians symbolized by the sun. The sun and its rays also symbolize the extent or the outer limits of Atum’s kingdom, as well as the extent of the living pharaoh’s dominion. They’re parallel.

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Occasionally, this was symbolized iconographically prior to the Amarna period, which dated to between 1348 and 1320 BC as a solar disk with outstretched rays. But more often than not, this idea was depicted as a solar disk with outstretched wings, the winged disk, which is one of the most prominent ancient Egyptian symbols. One of the things that the wings represented, because there are several,

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was the sun’s rays or vice versa. They represented the same idea. They represented the reach of God’s power and authority, the reach of his kingdom, like the loving care of a brooding bird. The outstretched wings represented, now listen to this, divine protection, like a wall, protection against evil.

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Which is why the ancient Egyptians placed these winged disks on the walls of temples and on tombs and above doorways and on stele. They served as symbols of protection.

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You can find images of the solar disc with outstretched rays and the solar disc with outstretched wings on the webpage for this episode. In the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, in Gallery 111, you can find this beautiful necklace that was found among the jewelry of the Princess Sahathar unit. It was found in her underground tomb, which was found beside the pyramid of King Senesaret II.

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who reigned between 1897 and 1878 BC. Let me read the Met’s description of this item. They write, this cloisonné pectoral is inlaid with 372 cut pieces of semi-precious stones. The heraldic design is replete with symbolism. Zigzag lines on the base bar

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represent the primordial waters out of which the primeval hill emerged. Each of the falcons, symbols of the sun god, clasps a circular hieroglyph, meaning encircled, thus declaring the solar deity’s supreme power over the universe. Now listen very closely to what the hieroglyphs on this necklace say, because it’s what they say that’s so important to our discussion.

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The Met writes, quote, hieroglyphic signs make up the design and the whole may be read, quote, the God of the rising sun grants life and dominion over all the sun in circles of 1,000,000 on 100,000 years to King Sennachereth II. Did you catch what it said? This necklace says that God gives the king

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In this case, King Senniuseret II, life and dominion overall that quote, the sun encircles, all that the sun encircles. In other words, the bounds of King Senniuseret II’s dominion, which is symbolic of the bounds of Atum’s dominion, the totality of creation is symbolized by the sun and everything that the sun can encircle.

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which is also what the winged sun symbolizes. The outstretched wings of which represent all that the sun or God in circles. Everything within the circle of those outstretched wings is divinely protected. Life can only be found inside that circle. And this is where the symbolism gets kind of amazing. See, the ancient Egyptian hieroglyph for quote,

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all the sun in circles, is known as the Egyptian Shen Ring. The word Shen actually means two in circle. This ring is actually very, very similar to the ring held centuries later by the Zoroastrian god Ahura Mazda that we talked about in episodes number 48 and 50. If you recall, the ring that Ahura Mazda holds isn’t a ring like one would wear on their finger. It’s actually a ring made of rope.

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and it represents the rope that Ahura Mazda used or gave to the king, the Shah on Shah, to measure out the ground plan for or mark the boundaries of a temple before he began construction. The rope and the rod were Ahura Mazda and the Shah on Shah’s temple building tools. Now, just guess what the ancient Egyptian hieroglyph for the Shen Ring looks like.

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Yep, a rod and a ring. The hieroglyph is a circle with a short perpendicular rod at the base. So it’s just like the Zoroastrian ring and rod that a Hora Mazda holds out, but you gotta kind of turn it 45 degrees to the right. So the circle sits atop the rod or bar. This hieroglyph actually represents a coil of rope bound to a straight rod. And yes,

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This rod and rope represent the same rod and rope that were used by ancient Egyptian temple builders to define the boundaries of ancient Egyptian temples. Yes, the boundaries or the limits of the temple. We know that the earthly temple that the ancient Egyptians built was a replica of God’s heavenly temple. So the Shen Ring symbol, which represented the tools,

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The ancient Egyptians used to map out the boundaries of the earthly temple also served as a symbol of the boundaries of God’s cosmic temple. Are you following all of this? Because it’s pretty amazing. I hope you can see how the Shen Ring itself is a replica of God’s heavenly kingdom and the protective circle or wall that surrounds his kingdom. And this isn’t just me making this argument.

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It’s widely concluded by Egyptologists that the circular form of the Shen Ring represented eternal protection in ancient Egypt. It’s amazing because this small but prominent Egyptian symbol served as a microcosm of the macrocosm too. And there’s even more to this. The Shen symbol was directly connected to kingship and the new royal name the king adopted at coronation.

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known as the prenomen or throne name. See, the ancient Egyptians inscribed the new king’s prenomen or throne name and sometimes his nomen, his birth name, right in the center of the Shenring, symbolizing that the king and his dominion were encircled by divine protection, by a divine protective wall, which we know represents the boundary around God’s sacred cosmic temple.

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More often than not, Egyptian scribes needed to elongate the chen ring so that it could hold the total length of the king’s new royal name. Today, most of us know this elongated rope ring as a cartouche, which is the name the French gave it because they thought it resembled the paper gun cartridges that they used. The ancient Egyptians actually called it chenu.

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The ancient Egyptians inscribed the king’s name inside the chen ring to symbolize that the king was surrounded by a circle of divine protection.

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Right after I put this section of today’s program together, I came across an article titled The Encircling Protection of Horus, published in the Proceedings of the 12th Annual Symposium of Current Research in Egyptology, where to my surprise, the author David Ian Lightbody argued in 2011 what I’ve just argued here, that the Shen Ring symbolized a boundary or enclosure wall.

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pages 134 and 135 he demonstrates that the word family that’s associated with the ancient Egyptian word Shen is directly related to the notion of the protection of a sacred enclosure. On page 134 he writes, quote, the form-based word family of the word Shen, S-H-E-N,

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directly relates to the circumferences of buildings and tombs and their protection. And then referring to this word family, significant meanings include the words protection, encircle, enclose, surround, circumference, and perimeter.

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On page 135 where he lists the words found in the Shenward family, one of the words SNW literally means enclosure wall. And another word that begins with SNWT literally means quote, the pyramid and temple are encircled. This last one sort of stopped me in my tracks because

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That was exactly what I had concluded in my own research, that the Shen Ring represented the protective ring or wall around God’s sacred temple precinct, and here it was on page 135, written right on the page in ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs, the temple is encircled.

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This is incredibly significant because as I mentioned, the Shen Ring was a prominent ancient Egyptian symbol. So for the ancient Egyptians to create a stylized version of a divinely protected enclosure in the Shen Ring, it indicates that the ancient Egyptians were not only aware that God’s cosmic temple, of which their temples was a microcosm, was encircled by a protective wall of some sort. It also indicates that this doctrine

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constituted a very important component of the ancient Egyptian religion. Lightbody, like I argued, argues that the Shen was directly associated with the laying of temple foundations and the stretching of the cord ritual. On page 134 and 135, Lightbody writes, quote, the ritual setting out of building plans through the stretching of the cord ceremony

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is attested from the Old Kingdom. And it seems plausible that the Shen ropes are related to those used in these foundation rituals. The establishment of temples seems to have included the stretching of the cord ceremony, which set the orientation and involved an encircling of the building, perhaps while setting out the boundary. Lightbody goes on to illustrate that

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protection and dominion symbolized by the Shen Ring was not only incorporated in ancient Egyptian architecture, it also played an important role in ancient Egyptian ritual. Lightbody writes the following on page 134, quote, the symbolism of pharaonic protection and dominion encompassed the architecture to designate, delineate, and protect.

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enclosed royal spaces. Just as the pyramids, temples, and tombs were protected by encircling rituals and spells. And we learned many many many episodes ago that spells in ancient Egypt were a form of divine utterance. This encirclement was depicted and embodied in the art and artifacts contained within these sacred spaces.

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And what was the Pharaoh hoping to protect himself and his dominion from by way of these encircling rituals? Well, we know, his enemies, which were theologically associated with the awful sea serpent of Pophos, who lurked in the primeval waters of Nune. On page 138, Lightbody writes, texts referring to the mythical origins of the Egyptian temple refer

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to these early palisade enclosures and rituals of protection for warding off snakes and enemies. Now listen to this. Often the rituals included in circling processions where the Pharaoh and his entourage would seem to have verified the integrity of the enclosure and bestowed sacred blessings to ensure its strength. What Lightbody says here is really interesting.

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It had me thinking about episode number seven, the King of the Four Corners. If you recall in that episode, we talked about an ancient Egyptian kingship ritual known as running the circuit as part of the Royal Sed Festival, which renewed the strength and the vitality of the reigning king. The king would run a circuit around the perimeter of a field, which symbolized the entirety of his dominion.

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a dominion which he had inherited from his father.

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Ancient Egyptians performed many encircling type ceremonies and rituals to ensure the divine protection of a particular space. In light of these rituals, Lightbody writes, quote, “‘I believe circumambulation ceremonies, such as the Sokar Festival, are descended from these early rituals of encircling protection.'” We’ve certainly touched on circumambulation rights on this program.

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But what Lightbody says here also had me thinking about the possible association between rituals of encircling protection and the ring dance. I don’t have time to develop this here, but it’s definitely something worth pondering. Note how everything about the Shen Ring symbol teaches and reinforces the theology taught within the ancient tradition. The Shen Circle.

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represents many things. It represents the sun, which represents the glorious nature of Atum’s being, a being of ineffable light. The circle also represents the rope used by divine architects to lay out the boundaries of Atum’s sacred temple precinct. And the circle also represents the boundary or wall itself that encircles Atum’s sacred cosmic temple precinct.

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And note as well how this symbol directly associates kingship with temple building, which you should be starting to gather by now represents two core theological elements taught within the ancient tradition. It’s the king’s new royal name that’s placed directly inside the protective shin ring, the rope and rod. The tools used

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to build a sacred temple. And take note how this symbol was used to house the king’s new name, the name that reflected the new nature, the king’s rebirth that he acquired upon coronation. A name that you’re gonna see down the line reflects the king’s full sanctification. Shen Ring symbolism is symbolism stacking in its finest form.

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See again, God is the circle. God is the protective wall that safeguards or encircles his sacred cosmic precinct and everything that’s lucky enough to be inside that sacred space. In Pyramid Text 366, God is actually referred to as the Great Circle. The text reads, quote, the Great Circle, in your name of

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great surround, an enveloping ring in the ring that encircles the outermost lands.

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Note how this text refers to God as a quote, enveloping ring, and the quote, ring that encircles the outermost lands. Keep in mind that this text is very, very, very old. It was written on the walls of King Tete’s pyramid by Egyptian scribes, sometime around 2290 BC.

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What great circle is this text referring to? Again, the meaning is layered, but great circle is unquestionably connected to Atum, or ray. It was symbolized by the sun disc, the sun disc that encircles the outermost lands like an enveloping ring. With this in mind, I wanna return to the ancient Egyptian symbol, the araboros, the snake devouring its own tail.

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I argued at the beginning of today’s program that the aroboros is a symbol of the protective boundary around God’s cosmic kingdom. But how so? From the text that we read earlier, where Atum made a place for himself in the midst of his coils, we learned that Atum was sometimes symbolized by a snake. In the aroboros, the snake that is biting its tail represents Atum.

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captures the notion of Atum’s glorious nature as the sun, as well as the cyclical nature of the sun itself, where it rises each morning, circles the earth, and then it dies in the evening, which represents birth, death, and rebirth. That process, it’s symbolized by the snake eating its own tail. It’s Atum that encircles his creation,

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which is symbolized by the sun circling the earth. It’s Atum that protects his creation from the awful Apophis and the eternal darkness. The Arabaros symbolizes that Atum is the protective wall. I’d argue that at least one of the reasons why the ancient Egyptians depicted the snake eating its own tail, of which rebirth was one,

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was to convey the notion that the border around God’s creation is completely sealed. It is completely sealed off from the primordial waters, like the bitumen. There’s no gap or opening by which the profane waters can pollute the sacred space inside. And I argue this because this is what is conveyed by the Shenring and what was also conveyed in ancient Egyptian protection rituals. On the micro level,

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The goal of those rituals was to create a sealed protective barrier around a particular sacred space, effectively stopping demons or enemies from entering that space. On the macro level, the image of the Auroboros depicted a closed system model of the universe, which I’ve noted earlier in the podcast is a view that many contemporary astrophysicists are beginning to embrace.

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Now, lest you think that I might be taking my interpretation of this symbol a bit too far, listen to how Marinus Vandersleuths in Volume 1 of Traditional Cosmology connects the Araboros to exactly what we discussed in our last episode, episode number 51, the Cosmic Wall, to the Gourd and to the Seed, or as Irving Finkel referred to Atrahasis or Noah’s Ark, as a Walnut.

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with its kernel of life inside. On page 105, speaking of the ordered space, which was surrounded by the waters of unorganized chaos, van der Sluis writes, quote, in a large number of traditions varying from archaic, unpolished myth to the elevated astronomical understanding, and he’s talking about astrophysicists there, this receptacle

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was conceived to be shaped like a hollow, enclosing or surrounding perimeter or shell, for which the generic term enclosure could be used. The domain encompassed by the enclosing ball or circle was primarily characterized as the first organized cosmos, land or earth, as opposed to the unorganized.

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state of chaos that continued to exist outside it. Note how van der Sluis argues here that the distinguishing characteristic between the enclosure and the waters is organized, cosmo-sized, or sanctified space, and unorganized, uncosmo-sized, profane space. He continues, quote,

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five biological metaphors, and I would say symbols, based on the procreation of offspring in the natural world were most prominently employed in the mythical descriptions of this enclosure. A shell, a gourd, or nut, a seed, and likewise, an egg. Now listen to this. A sixth common symbol to describe the perimeter of the enclosure

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is that of an encompassing serpent. An encompassing serpent is the Ara Baros or some rendition of it. Baner Sluss is telling us here that from his research, he found that the ancients symbolized the perimeter of the outer boundary of this special cosmo-sized enclosure, which we know represents God’s cosmic temple as an encompassing serpent.

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So we were right on track in our interpretation. Very interestingly, R.T. Rundle Clark associates God as the great circle, the boundary that surrounds his kingdom to the ancient Egyptian Ka, K-A. I don’t have time to get into this too much here, but the hieroglyph for the Ka is what looks like two vertical or upraised arms, except that that’s not what it is at all.

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The hieroglyph is actually an image of a horizontal embrace. Clark notes that another version of pyramid text 366 exclaims of God, quote, “‘You encircle everything within your arms.'” So another way one could imagine or symbolize the cosmic barrier between sacred and profane space would be with an image of God

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encircling his kingdom in a loving, protective embrace.

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On page 232, Clark writes, quote, an embrace is protective. The high God put his arms around his progeny to shield them from the disintegrating powers of the primeval waters. And then on page 240, he continues, the world has to be protected against the disintegrating forces of the surrounding chaos. All the people’s

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of antiquity felt that light and life were constantly threatened by very real cosmic enemies. Hence the need to put a guard around the earth or its symbolic alternative, the primeval mound.

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I also want to point out that many of these same ideas are present on the Pharaoh’s crown. If you’ve ever looked at a Pharaoh’s crown, you’ll notice that there’s a cobra right in the center of the crown, poised, ready to strike. It’s called a uraeus, which is the Greek word for a kind of snake. This cobra was believed to protect the Pharaoh from his enemies, who were understood to be the incarnation of the evil forces of chaos.

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It’s the serpent that protects the king and his kingdom.

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Over time, the ancient Egyptians began to interpret the snake in the Arobaro symbol, which was once considered a tomb as the profane water serpent or dragon who’d been relegated to the waters for his rebellion. Instead of the serpent being interpreted as guarding or protecting the sacred space God created when he created the universe, now he was seen as a threat to the order and the stability of the realm.

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The serpent came to represent the primordial waters themselves. But despite this, despite these varied interpretations, they all reinforce the central belief that in the cosmos, sacred and profane space is divided. Whether the snake is conceived as protecting God’s cosmic temple or is conceived as threatening it, the snake marks the boundary.

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between where God’s cosmic temple ends and the profane waters begin.

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If ancient Egyptian temples were meant to be a microcosm of the macrocosm, then we would expect the boundary or barrier between cosmic, sacred and profane space to be visible in ancient Egyptian temple architecture. And guess what? That’s exactly what we find. Do you remember the ancient Egyptian city of Heliopolis? We talked about it quite a bit in episode number 34, the Ebenezer.

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If you don’t remember, the ancient Egyptians believed that Heliopolis was the actual location where the primordial hillock rose out of the primordial waters on the day of creation. There was no more sacred place in all of ancient Egypt. Unfortunately, the temple that was built there is no longer standing, but archaeologists have found evidence of a massive wall that surrounded the city.

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Andrew Curry, writer for Archaeology Magazine notes in the March-April 2019 edition, the following dimensions of the wall. Listen to the unbelievable width of the wall that surrounded Heliopolis. Quote, based on their width, some sections revealed by recent excavations are 55 feet across in some spots. Can you imagine that?

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Walls that are 55 feet wide. That’s just crazy. Kari goes on. Roe, now Roe was a German Egyptologist who worked on the site, estimates that Heliopolis might have been guarded by walls up to 60 feet high. 60 feet high, can you imagine that? Roe states, quote, “‘In a flat landscape, it must have looked more “‘like a fortress than a city.’

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So that’s a massive wall. But how do archeologists know that this isn’t just a plain old wall rather than a microcosmic depiction of the boundary dividing sacred and profane space? Well, that’s where the excavation gets really interesting because guess what archeologists found? In the spring of 2014, archeologists unearthed about 150 foot section of the southern portion of the wall.

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and they found that the wall was undulated. Okay, so what in the heck does that mean? A scholar by the name of Max Johann Biersendorf in an article titled, Undulating Mud Brick Walls in Ancient Pharaonic Egypt, explains the wall that surrounds the ancient Egyptian city of Heliopolis like this. Quote, the most striking feature of this wall is the undulating construction. It’s composed of mud bricks placed in curves that are ascending and descending.

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and not organized in a plain horizontal fashion. The undulating appearance yields a regular pattern of concave segments alternating with convex ones. To put it simply, the wall that encircled Heliopolis was constructed to look like a wave. It was constructed to look like water, like the profane chaotic primordial waters that surrounded God’s cosmic.

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temple. Now if I would have told you at the beginning of today’s episode that the ancient Egyptians constructed walls around their temples that looked like waves, this would have made no sense to you. But now that you know ancient Egyptian temples were constructed to be microcosms of the macrocosm, then you know precisely why the ancient Egyptians built a wall that looked like water around the sacred temple city of Heliopolis. They did it!

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represent the wall, the membrane, the shell, the tough rind that divided the sacred temple precinct inside from the profane chaotic waters outside. And from the colossal height and thickness of the wall they obviously didn’t want the profane world to have any chance of penetrating the sacred temple precinct inside.

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If you’d like to see an artist’s rendering of Heliopolis’s undulating walls, along with pictures of undulating walls, at other archeological sites in Egypt, you can find them on the webpage for this episode. Each of the ancient Egyptian symbols we’ve discussed in this episode, the Shenring symbol and the Arabaros symbol, attest that in the heavens, there is a strict division between sacred and profane space.

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Over time, many of the theological ideas we’ve discussed in today’s episode have been altered or corrupted and even usurped by various groups. One example of this is the practice of ritual magic, where practitioners use salt or chalk or flour to draw a magic circle that they believe will offer them magical protection. Among the Wicca, a modern day pagan religion that was developed during the mid-

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20th century AD, so not that long ago, the casting of a magic circle is widely practiced. Entomologically, the word wicca comes from the Old English word, P-I-C-C-A, which is pronounced witta, which is a masculine noun meaning sorcerer or male witch. Whether these modern day witches or wiccans recognize it, when they ritually cast a magic circle,

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They’re drawing heavily from the rich religious legacy handed down by the ancients and the theology the ancients taught within the ancient tradition. While Wiccan rituals are most likely significantly altered versions of the original teachings, they provide further evidence that an ancient religious tradition was imparted to humanity in the beginning.

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one that ultimately gave rise to the vast majority of religious traditions we see today. On this program we refer to that original religious tradition as the ancient tradition. I’m going to have to leave it there. I hope I’ve given you a lot to think about. Until next time, I’ll leave you with the words of William Shakespeare, “Knowledge is the wing wherewith we fly to heaven.”  I’m Jack Logan.

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You’ve been listening to the Ancient Tradition. A Wonk Media Production.