The Importance Of The Pyramids At Giza

Spirits of the dead were also able to guide the living. There were numerous gods, but the most prevalent and lasting gods were Ra, Ma’at, Isis, Horus, Osiris, Bast, and Bes (Gods and Mythology). The Egyptians believed that Ra, the Sun God, was the creator of the world, and the sun was viewed as the symbol of creation. Ra became greatly associated with the pharaoh during the late 2nd Dynasty and the 5th Dynasty. The pharaoh ruled the mortal realm, while Ra ruled the greater universe, which made them “a mirror image of each other.” Ma’at was Ra’s closest ally; she was the “personification of the fundamental order of the universe.” Order and justice was revered and even the gods were known to worship Ma’at.

For the Egyptians, art was made to serve a particular purpose, usually a religious one. Religious beliefs largely dictated what artists created, especially the paintings that filled Egyptian temples and tombs. Temples were decorated with paintings and filled with statues of gods and kings in the belief that doing this served the gods, showed devotion to the king, and maintained the order of the universe. The Egyptian belief in life after death was perhaps the most important part of their culture and probably helped to stabilize their society for so many centuries. The laws and rules of code the ancient Egyptian’s lived by daily also helped them to understand the seemingly ambiguous nature in The Tale of Sinuhe (1875 BC).

It is thought that King Djoser's stone tomb started out having the standard shape of a mastaba. Then, as construction progressed, a concept evolved. Imhotep began to place one flat-topped stone structure atop another until he had created six steps by which the king could ascent to the heavens after death. The Egyptians had a firm belief in an afterlife and viewed their pharaohs as gods. These beliefs were a strong force that led to the piling up of stones to such a monumental scale.

Thus, the art and architecture of Ancient Egypt stemmed directly from their religion. Egyptian theology, with its deified pharaohs and strange animal-headed gods, was complicated, but the most important belief was that survival after death depended upon the preservation of the body. This belief would influence the architectural design of the tomb, where the corpse was ultimately sealed (Silverman:142, 1997). Immortality was only for privileged royal and priestly beings (Stierlin:54, 1983).This implies that their tombs would be somewhat prestigious and not just and ordinary burial site. At the day of resurrection the Ka or soul would re-enter the dead body; this meant that it must be there, intact, ready for that moment.

In order to please the gods and ensure their continuing goodwill toward the people, kings built splendid temples and provided priests to maintain them. The deepest rooms of these temples contained representations of the gods in various forms some were human, other animals, and some combinations of the two. The well-known pyramids of Egypt were erected to honor the gods. The angles sides may have been meant to represent the slanting rays of the sun and writings on the walls tell of past kings ascending those rays to join the sun god. 1

From this the sun became their most important god Ra; he became their chief god and was the center of their culture. The pyramids, though tombs for the pharaohs are also monuments to Ra. He became associated with pharaohs, because it was believed that pharaohs were picked by Ra to rule over the land.

Shown below is a typical temple flood plan with the purposes of each section given. The priests duty was to care for the gods and attend to their needs. The priests had many duties such as funeral rites, teaching school, supervising the artists and works, and advising people on problems. Death and Funerals The Egyptians saw death as a transitional stage in the progress to a better life in the next world. They believed they could only reach their full potential after death.

This strongly implicates that the ancient Egyptian civilisation believed in a spiral realm. At the beginning of the New Kingdom, pharaohs and highly ranked officials were often buried with the ‘Book of the Dead’, which contained magic spells and information to assist and transition the dead to the underworld and afterlife. This symbolised that the magic and divinity were an important part in the Egyptians religion. Tomb paintings and statues of thousands of gods and goddesses as well as their animal manifestations demonstrated that ancient Egyptians had practised in polytheism. Osiris, the god of the dead and the afterlife, and the goddess Ma’at were widely illustrated in tombs.

When Egyptian architects learned of the burial mounds of royals of the past it sparked a historic event that created the largest stone structures in the Neolithic age. The pharaohs and people of Egypt were completely engrossed with the thought of death and the thought of being reincarnated. They created these monuments to themselves to become like gods. The construction of the pyramids were more impressive then the monument itself with the height of 60 meters and a width of 120 meters by 180 meters wide. The pyramids were built for the pharaohs and some priests in Egypt.

They were iconic symbols of the absolute power one person had over an entire empire and above all, they were divine monuments where the pharaoh would be transformed into a god in the afterlife. The most important Egyptian myth tells the story of an ancient king named Osiris, who was murdered by his evil brother, who in turn was dethroned by the rightful heir, Horus, Osiris’ son. In the afterlife, ancient Egyptians pharaohs would take the role of Osiris, ruler of the underworld, while their heir would assume the kingship. To complete the divine process, where former kings would join the eternal life and to legitimize the rule of the heir, magnificent pyramids were built. Not only was each pyramid built unique, each one had it’s own divine meaning.