Health, religion, law, politics, and philosophy are not separate and distinct in AE thought. A grid such as Zenet could be used to represent and inter-link many of them.
Triumphing against adversity, often fighting alongside the gods, is a repeated theme. In the game of Zenet, (alt. Senate, or sn.t Senet) we are presented with an activated summary of the New Kingdom Netjerworld philosophy. During play we strive for leadership of the Council of Thirty (against an opponent), thereby to become a god our self. Senate combines Kemetic principles of Law, Governance, Religion and the Calendar. One meaning of the name of this game from the hieroglyphic symbol mn is “enduring”, or perhaps the more accurate onomatopoeic translation is “remaining.”
Amun is, by virtue of being hiddenness itself, ubiquitous, and the idea of
hiddenness implies potentiality as well as mystery and otherness. This ubiquity
based upon the concept of hiddenness was reinforced by the identification of
Amun with the omnipresent breath of life as well as the force of sexuality.
Amun's appeal was by no means abstract, however. Commoners, and especially
the poor, could appeal to the omnipresent Amun for justice and compassion (see
especially the themes of social justice in the prayers to Amun used as school
texts in the Ramesside era, trans. in Lichtheim 1976 vol. 2, 111-112), travelers
for protection (as Amun-of-the-Road, see esp. the `Report of Wenamun' in
Lichtheim, ibid. 224-230) and kings to legitimize the extension of Egyptian
sovereignty into foreign lands (see, e.g., the inscription of Thutmose III in
Lichtheim, op cit. p. 30, where Amun commands the king to extend the borders of
Egypt). Amun featured in juridical oaths, which is noteworthy inasmuch as it is
not Amun-Re but Amun who is invoked, and thus not simply the symbol of royal
power but the symbol of all-pervading justice (Widson 1948). Amun's ubiquity
allows him to witness everything that occurs and to hear all requests; stelae
are dedicated to "Amun who hears," and a hymn from Hibis describes him as having
"777 ears, with millions upon millions of eyes," (Klotz 2006, 167, 169f).
The conjunction of Amun's association with sexuality and his self-sufficiency
results in the epithet of Kamutef, `bull of his mother', given to his
ithyphallic form, which signifies that Amun has conceived himself upon his
mother and is thus his own father. BD spell Pleyte 167 calls upon the phallic
potency of Amun to protect the body of the spell's possessor. The Kamutef
concept is also embodied in Amun's complex relationship to the Gods of the
Hermopolitan Ogdoad. Amun is a member of this group of precosmic Gods but also
transcends them in two ways: first, at Thebes Amun is identified with Kematef
(`He who has completed his time') and Irta (or Iri-ta) (`Earth-maker'),
mysterious primordial serpents that preexist the Ogdoad; second, Amun is
identified with the light which the Ogdoad bring forth into the world.
Hiddenness (Amun) is thus at once the origin of the cosmos, the medium through
which it comes to be, and that which expresses itself in the splendor of
phenomena. A hymn to Amun (P. Leiden J 350) which traces the involvement of Amun
at each successive stage of the generation of the cosmos says that after the
creation of the heavens and Amun's withdrawal into occultation or concealment,
"You returned in the fathers as creator of their sons." Two rulers of the 18th
Dynasty, Hatshepsut and Amenhotep III, claim to have been conceived by the union
of their mothers with Amun. In a hymn from Hibis to the "ten Ba`s," or
manifestations, of Amun, the sixth is "the Living Royal Ka," that is, the divine
potency in the king deriving from Amun's impregnation of the king's mother
(Klotz 2006, 35f).
The alliance of the chief deities of Thebes and Heliopolis in the compound deity
Amun-Re, although it clearly served political ends, is not without theological
subtlety. Re, as preeminent solar deity, embodies all that is manifest, while
Amun is that which is concealed. Their combination results in a divine potency
distinct from either alone. In a variant of BD spell 15, Amun-Re crosses the
sky, "everyone seeing thee," as would be expected of the sun. But the author
adds "thou prosperest; (and so do) they that row thy Majesty, (for) thy rays are
in their faces, though unrecognized." The `rays' of Amun-Re are not simply
sunlight, therefore, for those rays are hardly unrecognized. The author goes on
to explain that "no tongue could understand its fellow except for thee,"
indicating that the light which is bestowed by Amun-Re is, rather, a light of
understanding. In a sunrise hymn to Amun from Hibis temple, the Aten, the sun's
visible disk, is said to "represent" or "stand in for" Amun, through a pun on
itn, the sun's disk, and idn, to represent or replace (Klotz 2006, 165-167).
Amun's hiddenness is the condition of his ubiquity, and vice versa. In another
hymn from the Hibis temple, it is said that Amun "hides himself with his eyes,"
with his "brilliant visible forms," (Klotz 2006, 82-83) because "one sees
through his seeing," (ibid., 154). Because Amun allows us to participate in his
power of sight, we see everything but his essential nature, which is precisely
hiddenness. Thus vision itself is Amun's invisibility. Amun is called "protector
of that which is and that which is not," (ibid., 129) because hiddenness is
common to both: that which is, has come to be from the state of nonbeing, in
which it was `hidden', and it is through the concept of absence or hiddenness
that the nonexistent as such is conceivable. "You support them ['that which is
made'] as you create them," the same hymn says, for during the whole of the
process by which things come into being, they are guided and supported by their
hidden potential.
http://henadology.wordpress.com/theology/netjeru/amun/
