Man’s first
experience of anarchy – the collapse of the state – was in Egypt.
Egypt is
one of the world’s oldest continuous civilisations. Some time about 3100 BC,
Upper and Lower Egypt were united perhaps by a king named Menes. This
unification ushered in an efflorescence of cultural achievement and began an
almost unbroken line of native rulers that lasted nearly 3000 years. Historians
divide the ancient history of Egypt into Old, Middle and New Kingdoms, spanning
31 dynasties.
The
internal struggle which caused the fall of the Old Kingdom developed at last
into a convulsion, in which the destructive forces were for a time completely
triumphant. The magnificent mortuary works of the greatest of the Old Kingdom
monarchs fell victims to a carnival of destruction in which many of them were
annihilated. The temples were not merely pillaged and violated, but their
finest works of art were subjected to systematic and determined vandalism. The
nation was totally disorganised.
The picture
of a real upheaval is painted in one of the most curious and important pieces
of Egyptian literature that have survived the hazards of time. The extremely
tattered papyrus in the Leyden collection dates from no earlier than Dynasty
XIX, but the condition of the country which it discloses is one which cannot be
ascribed to the imagination of a romancer, nor does it fit into any place of
Egyptian history except that following the end of the Old Kingdom. Here are a
few excerpts.
The bowman is ready. The
wrongdoer is everywhere. There is no man of yesterday. A man goes out to plough
with his shield. A man smites his brother, his mother’s son. Men sit in the
bushes until the benighted traveler comes, in order to plunder his load. The
robber is a possessor of riches. Boxes of ebony are broken up. Precious
acacia-wood is cleft asunder.
The general
upheaval has reversed the status of rich and poor:
He who possessed no property is now a man of
wealth. The poor man is full of joy. Every town says: let us suppress the
powerful among us. He who had no yoke of oxen is now possessor of a herd. The
possessors of robes are now in rags. Gold and lapis lazuli, silver and
turquoise are fastened on the necks of female slaves. All female slaves are
free with their tongues. When their mistress speaks it is irksome to the
servants. The children of princes are dashed against the walls.
Other works harp on the same theme:
Men shall fashion arrows of copper, that
they may beg for bread with blood. Men laugh with a laughter of disease.
As a result of these conditions :
Great and small say : “I wish I were dead!”
Some thinkers reflected, rather than
merely reacted, to the anarchy:
I am meditating upon what has happened, on the things that have come to
pass throughout the land. Changes take place; it is not like last year, and one
year is more burdensome than the other. The land is in confusion...Maat [justice
championed by king] is cast out and
iniquity sits in the council chamber. The plans of the gods are destroyed and
their ordinances transgressed. The land is in misery, mourning is in every
place, towns and villages lament.
The reference to maat is significant: for the Egyptian of antiquity, the Pharaoh
was the state, as well as the descendent of the creator. The divinity of the
Pharaoh precluded the consideration on the part of his subjects as being
slaves. He ruled by divine right – not as later monarchs, like Louis XIV were
to rule, but in a deeper, subconscious sense. Over three thousand years, no
hint of revolution has been recorded in ancient Egyptian history. Consequently,
when the Pharaoh failed to protect his people from injustice and lawlessness,
the Egyptian was shaken to the core of his spirit by a supernatural terror.
This kind of terror is not uncommon in history as well as contemporary history:
when order breaks down, people turn away from this world.
(In Greece, for instance, the deus ex machina of the Delphic oracle
and the Eleusinian mysteries were psychic poultice during the revolt of the
underprivileged against the nobles. Tellingly, it was the coincidental
tyrannies which, as auxiliary to the aphoristic endeavours of the oracle
enjoining one to ‘Know thyself’ and ‘Be moderate’, succeeded in mending the fracture sociale – a very close
approximation of Hellas to oriental ‘despotism’ and piety.)
The conception of Maat expresses the Egyptian belief that
the universe is changeless and that all apparent opposites must, therefore,
hold each other in equilibrium. Such a belief has definite consequences in the
field of moral philosophy. It puts a premium on whatever exists with a
semblance of permanence. It excludes ideals of progress, utopias of any kind,
revolutions, or any other radical changes in existing conditions. It allows a
man ‘to strive after excellence until there be no fault in his nature,’ In this
way the belief in a static universe enhances the significance of established
authority.
The Dispute of a Man, Weary of Life, - an
internal debate regarding suicide, ‘to be or not to be’ - betrays a terribly
disappointed reliance on the State. Instead, the writer turns to the other
world where finally he will have justice.
To
whom can I speak today?
The
gentle man has perished,
The
violent man has access to everybody.
To
whom can I speak today?
There
are no righteous men,
The
earth is surrendered to criminals.
... ... ...
Death
stands before me today
Like
the recovery of a sick man,
Like
going outdoors again after being confined.
Death
stands before me today
As
a man longs to see his house,
After
he has spent many years held in captivity.
... ... ...
Nay,
but he who is yonder
Shall
be a living god,
Inflicting
punishment upon the doer of evil.
Nay,
but he who is yonder
Shall
be a man of wisdom,
Not
stopped from appealing to Re when he speaks.
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