Adams, Walter M.: The house of the hidden places: a clue to the creed of early Egypt from Egyptian sources (London, 1895)

VI.] The Supernal Lustre of the Soul. 213

that his sin may be rubbed out, he celebrates
the "festival of the soul passing to his body."
But not immediately may that passage lie
accomplished. Raised though he be in incor-
ruption, glowing as he is in every member
with the immortal light, he cannot yet bear
unveiled the overwhelming glory of the soul.
Therefore, in the teaching of Egypt, around
the radiant being which in its regenerate life
could assimilate itself to the glory of the God-
head, was formed the "Khaibit" or luminous
atmosphere, consisting of a series of ethereal
envelopes, at once shading and diffusing its
flaming lustre, as the earth's atmosphere shades
and diffuses the solar rays. And at each
successive transformation (lxxvii.-lxxxvii.) it
descended nearer to the moral conditions of
humanity. From the form of the golden
hawk, the semblance of the absolute divine
substance, the One Eternal, Self-Existent Beino-,
it passes to the " Lord of Time," the image of
the Creator, since with the Creation time