{"id":88365,"date":"2021-02-06T07:45:18","date_gmt":"2021-02-06T05:45:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/?p=88365"},"modified":"2021-02-06T07:46:20","modified_gmt":"2021-02-06T05:46:20","slug":"the-great-hymn-of-akhenaten","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/the-great-hymn-of-akhenaten\/","title":{"rendered":"The Great Hymn Of Akhenaten\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[281],"tags":[],"acf":{"old_id":"88365","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":36147,"related_cahpter":"671","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content":{"description":"Precursor to Psalm 104?\r\n\r\n","content":"

In around 1353 BCE, Amenhotep IV became king of Egypt. Five years later, he changed his name to Akhenaten and left the traditional capital at Thebes to found a new capital at a site now known as Amarna. Nothing about Akhenaten was conventional. He is depicted in statues and wall art as androgynous, with an aquiline, narrow face and bulging hips. His wife is even more famous: since its discovery more than a century ago, the<\/span> bust of Nefertiti<\/span><\/a> has been admired by viewers (including Hitler), and remains a central tourist attraction in the Pergamon Museum in Berlin. Akhenaten and Nefertiti<\/span> are depicted together<\/span><\/a> in various activities; occasionally she sits on his lap and kisses him, and sometimes they worship or smite enemies together.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

But it was in the religious sphere that Akhenaten was the most radical. Two thousand years into the written history of Egypt, he banned the worship of all gods except one: the Aten, the disk of the sun. (Aten is not to be confused with the more famous Ra [R\u0113\u2018], the sun god himself.) His new name reflected his piety, <\/span>akh-en-aten<\/span><\/i> meaning \u201ceffective for the Aten,\u201d and he named his son and successor Tutankhaten, \u201cliving image of the Aten\u201d \u2013 although he changed his name to Tutankhamun when he came to the throne and built the most famous tomb in the history of Egypt.<\/span><\/p>\n

Akhenaten was also a poet, or at least a patron of poetry. His best-known work is today known as The Great Hymn to the Aten, and it is preserved on the tomb wall of a high official during his reign. This is no small feat, because beginning in the reign of King Tut, there was a systematic effort to destroy all of Akhenaten\u2019s images and legacies. His capital was abandoned, the gods were restored, and Egyptian life returned to its old ways.<\/span><\/p>\n

But Akhenaten\u2019s Great Hymn likely lived on in another way, as well, besides being buried in a tomb on a wall. Many of the motifs and lines from the hymn appear in Psalm 104, especially in verses 20-30 of the biblical psalm.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
\n

Psalm 104<\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n

\n

Akhenaten\u2019s Great Hymn\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n

\n

20-21: You bring on darkness and it is night, when all the beasts of the forests stir.<\/span><\/p>\n

The lions roar for prey, seeking their food from God.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n

\n

27-34: When you set in western lightland, earth is in darkness as if in death. \u2026 Every lion comes from its den, all the serpents bite.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n

\n

22-23: When the sun rises, they come home and couch in their dens. Man then goes out to his work, to his labor until the evening.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n

\n

42-45: Earth brightens when you dawn in lightland\u2026. The entire land sets out to work.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n

\n

24: How many are the things You have made, O LORD; You have made them all with wisdom; the earth is full of Your creations.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n

\n

76-77: How many are your deeds! Though hidden from sight, O sole God beside whom there is none! You made the earth, you alone, all peoples, herds and flocks.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n

\n

25-26: There is the sea, vast and wide, with its creatures beyond number, living things, small and great.<\/span><\/p>\n

There go the ships, and Leviathan that You formed to sport with.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n

\n

53-58: Ships fare north, fare south as well, roads lie open when you rise; the fish in the river dart before you, your rays are the midst of the sea.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n

\n

27-28:All of them look to You to give them their food when it is due.<\/span><\/p>\n

Give it to them, they gather it up; open Your hand, they are well satisfied.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n

\n

85-86: You set every man in his place, you supply their needs. Everyone has his food, his lifetime is counted.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n

\n

29-30: Hide Your face, they are terrified; take away their breath, they perish and turn again into dust.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n

\n

125-128: When you have dawned, they live; when you set they die.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

There are many questions raised by this comparison. Are the texts genetically related? Did the author of Psalm 104 borrow directly from the Hymn to the Aten? I think this is likely, although many recent scholars have been reticent to come to that conclusion.<\/span><\/p>\n

Does this suggest a deeper connection, between Akhenaten\u2019s monotheism (\u201cO sole God beside whom there is none!\u201d) and the monotheism of ancient Israel? Here there are many more reasons for caution. But Freud himself, in his last published book, <\/span>Moses and Monotheism<\/span><\/i>, pursued exactly that idea. He daringly suggested that Moses was a priest of Atenism under Akhenaten. When the later kings banned this religion, it was driven underground, and Moses led some of the adherents out of Egypt, seeking to worship monotheistically elsewhere.<\/span><\/p>\n

Image:<\/span> The Wilbour Plaque \u2013 King Akhenaten and Queen Nefertiti, from the Brooklyn Museum<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n","image":{"ID":88366,"id":88366,"title":"ps104-Akhenaten and Nerfertiti","filename":"ps104-Akhenaten-and-Nerfertiti.jpg","filesize":0,"url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/ps104-Akhenaten-and-Nerfertiti.jpg","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/the-great-hymn-of-akhenaten\/ps104-akhenaten-and-nerfertiti\/","alt":"","author":"7","description":"","caption":"","name":"ps104-akhenaten-and-nerfertiti","status":"inherit","uploaded_to":88365,"date":"2021-02-06 05:45:00","modified":"2021-02-06 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