Temple of the Cosmos: Ancient Egyptian Experience of the Sacred [Paperback]

The importance of this book cannot be underestimated. The
author has gone to great lengths to provide the reader with
the conceptual tools necessary to begin to understand the
world view of the ancient Egyptian religion. From my own
personal research experience, the serious student needs to
step away from limitations imposed by contemporary language
and the way that we view time, space and the experience of
the sacred from our own culture. The author, Jeremy Nadler,
has provided the conceptual tools necessary to awaken a
valid understanding of Ancient Egyptian religion.

For example, the author provides the reader with a very
good introduction into "Egyptian magic". Until and unless
one has some understanding of the importance and relevance
of "magic" (within the ancient Egyptian context), the entire
subject of Egyptian religion is completely closed. In
another area, the author provides one of the best studies on
the psycho-spiritual components associated with one's being:
the Ka, the Ba, and the Akh.

I was particularly impressed with the attention of the
author to describe the experience of space, time, and the
expression of the Sacred that are associated with ancient
Egyptian worldview. Without an understanding of space, time,
the Sacred context (including the ultra-critical aspects of
the Temple), the Egyptian system remains incomprehensible,
an alien culture that cannot be understood and which
therefore can be ignored as having no direct relevancy to
modern man. But the problem does not lie within in Pharonic
Egypt: the problem lies within our minds. And this book is
perhaps the best introduction yet written that provides
keys to understanding the true foundation of Western
Civilization.

The only complaint (and it is minor) is that the author
could have provided a more extensive bibliography for
serious readers to have access.

This is an ambitious book which attempts to explore the controversial issue of the Ancient Egyptian consciousness, their thought processes and patterns, and how it manifested itself in both their daily lives and the material remains. In recounting this 'sacred culture,' the author also looks at their medical abilities. Many authors have contended that the origins of Western civilisation and beliefs did not lie in classical Greece and in Judeo-Christianity, but in ancient Egypt. This book has black and white illustrations, with footnotes providing both orthodox and unorthodox bibliographic references. It is recommended for the open-minded and the interested.

Ancient Egypt's connection to the Sacred shoots through from the past to the present like lightning. The energy of its ancient structures is absolutely palpable. That ancient people, to my sense of things, is the most connected to the Way Things Are and if you surrender to its treasures and monuments it is obvious. So I came back home after my second and extended trip to Egypt wanting to know what They knew. I have a personal sense of the Sacred that I humbly believe is a fairly complete picture of God and the idea that an Ancient People also were in tune, and harmonizing with, the Universe meant that I had to know more. If nothing else, I needed to know where I was in my personal understanding. I felt a deep connection to this millenia old culture and was desperate for a translation of the Sacred texts and imagery of Egypt.

I can tell you that most all of them are terrible. And here I am speaking of the academic, Egyptological cast. Their works have sucked the juice right out of Ancient Egyptian religious belief. The typical scholar has no personal connection to the esoteric and sacred and so they cannot begin to understand what it is that they are claiming to understand. On the other side of things you have ungrounded and unfounded New Age belief that comes across more as wishful thinking than actual connection to what the Ancient Egyptians believed themselves. Frankly, it has been a frustrating search for a work that harmonizes with my encounters with Ancient Egypt.

Enter "Temple of the Cosmos" by Jeremy Naydler, which is the 43rd book that I have read about Ancient Egypt since returning home (!). As I said, I have been looking for the appropriate translation of the Sacred Texts so that I could have a fuller understanding of Ancient Egypt's Understanding. Thank you Mr. Naydler for your excellent tome! This book is what I was looking for and had not found. Temple of the Cosmos evolves as it should, beginning with First Principles and then working its way through the Ancient Texts and Images as an aspiring Ancient Egyptian initiate would. This approach provides the underlying logic and unifying themes that help to elucidate and illuminate that which has been lost for so long. That is to say there is a wholly natural progression in Temple of the Cosmos's structure that serves the material and the reader equally well.

The book's Contents are as follows:

1 A Metaphysical Landscape
2 Interpenetrating Worlds
3 Myths of Cosmogenesis
4 The Marking of Time
5 The Marriage of Myth and History
6 The Theology of Magic
7 The Practice of Magic
8 The Soul Incarnate
9 The Soul Discarnate
10 Orientating in the Underworld
11 The Travails of the Underworld
12 The End of the Underworld Journey

Chapters 1-3 lay the foundations for an understanding of how the Egyptians viewed their world. Naydler does an excellent job of explaining the ancient consciousness as compared to the modern consciousness. He then provides essential language that allows the reader to reconnect one's mind with the ancient mind. This is no small achievement! Chapters 4-5 describe how the Ancient Egyptians' beliefs interacted with the Cosmos and their perception of the Cosmos. Chapters 6-7 describe the world of psychic phenomena as understood by Ancient Egyptians and how they used their connection to the Powers That Be in order to have better, more enlightened lives. The final chapters, 8-12 reenact the path walked by initiates into the Sacred Science of the Ancient Egyptians. These latter chapters sew everything in Temple of the Cosmos together into a beautiful, scintillating, multi-dimensional tapestry. The essence of the Ancient Egyptian Sacred as been effectively restored. Furthermore, these latter chapters have the most clear explanation I have ever read of the khat, ka, ba, akh and of Maat. For deeply personal reasons the explanations of the ka and Maat were absolutely essential and exquisite.

The majesty of Mr. Naydler's accomplishment is such that it, in my mind, should serve as the basis for all future understanding and scholarly research into Ancient Egyptian belief. Unlike the other tomes that I have read, I have no disagreements with any of its contents. There was nothing contained within that did not "feel right." I must add that there are other excellent texts, including the works of R.A. Schwaller de Lubicz and Rosemary Clark, too. However, for sheer "cut to the chase" readability Temple of the Cosmos is the best.

To describe Mr. Naydler's work the best I want to rely upon his own words. From page 277:

"One of the reasons why ancient Egyptian religion has been so frequently misunderstood is because the gods have been conceived as almost entirely removed from the domain of human experience. Once it is grasped that the gods are interwoven with states of consciousness, and that they accompany and guide the development of consciousness, the religion of ancient Egypt assumes something of its original power. The Book of the Dead and the many other texts that concern the Underworld are not the products of some wishful fantasy about life after death, but are guides to the unfolding of ever more refined and elevated levels of spiritual awareness."

And from page 283:

"...the way in which the ancient Egyptians saw their world has been misunderstood. For example, modern scholarship can describe ancient Egyptian cosmology as if it were the outcome of a similar aspiration to that which lies behind modern cosmology but has simply been proved false, thereby ignoring the question of how such a cosmology could be true for the ancient Egyptians. Ancient Egyptian history is studied as if it were possible to extraploate our modern reality principle backward in time ad infinitum, without any conception that the very nature of a historical event might have been different in ancient times from what it is today. In much modern Egyptology there is both a lack of psychological sophistication and an ignorance both of metaphysics and esotericism, which has the inevitable consequence that the spirituality of the ancient Egyptians must remain a closed book."

If I may conclude by humbly thanking Mr. Naydler for his loving and masterful "Temple of the Cosmos" and by saying to the author: the book is no longer closed! Thank you!

Jason Voss