Benson, Margaret; Gourlay, Janet: The temple of Mut in Asher: an account of the excavation of the temple and of the religious representations and objects found therein, as illustrating the history of Egypt and the main religious ideas of the Egyptians (London, 1899)

ii6

THE TEMPLE OF MUT.

[part nr.

" The West is a land of sleep and of heavy shadows; a place
wherein its inhabitants, when once installed, slumber on in their
mummy forms, never more waking to see their brethren ; never
more to recognise their fathers or their mothers ; with hearts for-
getful of their wives and children. . . Since I came into this
funereal valley, I know not where nor what I am." *

The ghost exhibits the same limitation of physical
powers ; powers of speech not being absent, certain
abnormal but unmuscular powers in the physical
sphere being present; the story of a ghostly branding
hand being thus comparable to Na-nefer-ka-ptah's
powers with combined draught board and spell, but
any exercise of muscular force being similarly de-
barred. Na-nefer-ka-ptah cannot resist Setna when
he would snatch the magic roll, as the perpetually
recurring; p-host of a man who has mislaid a will can
lead people to the place where it is, but can never
itself move the will into sio-ht.

The ethereal or astral body of the Theosophists —
an intangible replica of the real body which can be
projected during life and endures for a time near
the real body after death—is to some extent parallel
to the Ka theory; the extraordinary length of time
during which the body is preserved by embalmment
giving to the Ka, in comparison with the others, a
quasi-immortal existence.

The consideration of theories more or less parallel
indeed may give help in deciding whether the Ka
is a theory of immortality of a lower order than
those before mentioned, or whether it should be

* 'The Dawn of Civilisation,' p. 113.