O is for Osiris

I’m doing folklore and book review posts to reach and please a larger audience. Previous years have shown select interest in both and to minimise blogging throughout the year, I’m focusing my efforts on April.

If you’d rather check out my book review for today, go here.

I think it was in Smallville when Lois was possessed by Isis that I first heard the myth of her and Osiris.

Folklore

Book of the Dead: Becoming a God in Ancient Egypt [Ancient Egyptian text]

An incarnation of the god Horus in life, the king is directly addressed or otherwise equated with Osiris in death.

Spells known from the Book of the Dead were employed in a variety of temple rituals. Not surprisingly, these spells are particularly common in contexts of Osirian mythology where the deceased and resurrected god Osiris joins the sun god Re in his cycle through the netherworld to be reborn each day.

The Great Decree Issued to the Nome of Silence, states as its purpose “to cause Osiris to rule in the Nome of Silence”. This relates to the burial, conceived as the introduction of Osiris to his future realm.

Ancient Egypt: A Captivating Guide to Egyptian History, Ancient Pyramids, Temples, Egyptian Mythology, and Pharaohs such as Tutankhamun and Cleopatra by Captivating History

Osiris, the mythical ruler of Egypt, is killed by his brother Seth. Osiris’s sisters, Isis and Nephthys, are trying to find his damaged body. Isis finds the body and revives Osiris in order to conceive a son, Horus. The body of Osiris is mummified and protected from Seth’s assaults. Isis, the divine mother, gives birth to Horus in the marshes. The creatures of chaos poison the baby Horus, but he is healed. Horus and Seth fight against each other for the right to rule. Seth ends up with wounded testicles. Horus loses an eye, or both eyes, but another god (usually Thoth) restores the damaged eye(s). Horus avenges the death of Osiris. Seth is overpowered. Horus, as a result, becomes king of the living. Osiris becomes ruler of the underworld and judge of the dead.

The three main gods in ancient Egyptian religion are Osiris, Horus, and Seth. Osiris rules the underworld. According to ancient belief, when a king died, he became Osiris and continued to rule in the afterlife. Ancient art represents him as a mummy with the crook and flail, which demonstrate his permanent role as a king.

*More can be read in the book.

Egyptian Gods: Discover the Ancient Gods of Egyptian Mythology by Stephan Weaver

The god Osiris personified wise rule. Osiris was a god of agriculture, which allowed Egyptian culture to survive. He married his sister, Isis and had one brother, Seth, who slew him… In time, people recognized Osiris as the king of the Underworld, the home of the shades and departed spirits. He represents the triumph of justice over death. All pharaohs were fated to become, or transmute, into Osiris at death.

*More can be read in the book.

Egyptian Mythology: A Guide to the Gods, Goddesses, and Traditions of Ancient Egypt by Geraldine Pinch

The death of Osiris is one of the most important events in Egyptian myth and one of the most obscure. There are no detailed accounts of the murder until the late first millennium BcE, and even these occur in descriptions of Egyptian religion by foreigners. In the Pyramid Texts, Seth is named as the attacker of Osiris and, by implication, as his killer. In Pyramid Texts spell 477, Seth claims to be taking revenge for a kick that Osiris had given him. Later tales loosely based on the Osiris myth make sexual jealousy a motive for the falling out between the two brothers. Some Egyptologists have argued that Osiris was originally a god of the dead rather than a god who died, but once the concept of Osiris’s death was established, a slayer had to be identified.

OSIRIS Osiris, the “great god” who ruled the Egyptian underworld, was the eldest son of the earth god Geb and the sky goddess Nut. He and his sister-consort, Isis, ruled Egypt together until Osiris was struck down by his anarchical brother, Seth. Osiris died and became “the Inert One.” The gods eventually decreed that Osiris should be resurrected as king and judge of the dead and that his posthumous son Horus should be made king of the living. Osiris was usually shown as a mummified king wearing an atef crown and carrying a crook and flail. His skin can be black or green. These colors may originally have indicated putrefaction, but they came to symbolize the connection of Osiris with a cycle of death and regeneration based on plant life.

*More can be read in the book.

The Forest in Folklore and Mythology by Alexander Porteous

In the very early days of Egypt, Osiris was undoubtedly a Tree Spirit, and, as the legend says, his dead body was enclosed in a tree. Many of the ancient Egyptian monuments, particularly some in the Hall of Osiris in Denderah, depict it so.

In Egypt the legend of Osiris tells how he was slain by his brother Set, who placed his body in a coffer and threw it into the Nile. The coffer, after being carried down to the sea, floated for a long time until it was washed up on the coast of Syria at Byblus. Here an Erica tree grew up around it, completely enclosing it. This tree was cut down some time afterwards and made into a pillar. Isis eventually got that pillar and cut out the coffer. She than gave the trunk of the tree to the King and Queen, who placed it in a temple of Isis, where it was worshipped by the people of Byblus.

*More can be read in the book.

Further Reading:

• Osiris myth
• Osiris
• The Egyptian myth of the death of Osiris
• Osiris
• Deities in Ancient Egypt – Osiris
• Osiris
• Osiris in Egyptian Mythology: Myths, Symbols, and Powers
• Osiris: The mythological origins of mummification
• Osiris
• The Outstanding Story of Osiris: His Myth, Symbols, and Significance in Ancient Egypt

Folklore in a Nutshell by Ronel

Osiris was the king of the gods, pharaoh of Egypt, husband of Isis, and all-round good guy. He taught humans about agriculture and ruled them justly. For the most part, everyone liked him. But his brother Set was jealous. He wanted to be king. So he held a lavish party with a chest carved of wood. He said whoever fit into the chest, could have it. The only one who fit perfectly, was Osiris. Set closed the chest, sealed it with lead and threw it into the Nile. It drifted out to sea, finally found land, and a tree grew around the chest. This was then cut down and placed as a pillar in the castle of the land he was in as this was seen as a magical pillar from a magical tree – because Osiris was still trapped within. Isis found him, released him from the tree and returned with his corpse to Egypt. While trying to figure out how to bring him back to life, Set stole Osiris and chopped up his body and spread the pieces over Egypt. Isis, relentless in her pursuit of her one true love, found all the pieces – except for his schlong – and put him back together again. With the help of her sister Nephthys (also Set’s wife) and Anubis, she mummified him and brought him temporarily back to life to conceive Horus – no idea how with the important bit missing, but hey – magic! Osiris then went to the underworld, the Duat, and ruled the dead.

Because of all this, ancient pharaohs believed they were one with Horus in life and became Osiris in death so they could continue ruling in the afterlife. As Osiris was still represented in art with a crook and flail – the symbols of the pharaoh – this was seen as a sign that he was king into perpetuity.

Osiris was typically portrayed with green or blue skin. He was the god of fertility – flooding the Nile so crops could grow – and of the afterlife, underworld and judge of the dead. His followers found reassurance in the myth of his life and death and afterlife that justice would always be dealt.

Osiris in Modern Culture

Marvel comic books

Osiris was a member of the Heliopolitan race of gods who lived in Heliopolis, Egypt.^[1] He was the eldest of Geb, god of earth, and Nut, goddess of the heavens,^[6] the brother of Seth, Isis and Nephthys.^[7] and was the Egyptian benevolent god of the dead.

He married his sister Isis and sired Horus.^[6] With Seth’s wife Nephthys, he also sired Anubis, causing Seth’s resentment.^[8]

As Geb stepped down from rulership, Osiris was chosen to succeed him, to the dismay of Set who wished to rule Heliopolis.

Seeking revenge for impregnating Nephtys, Seth locked Osiris in a coffin and later scattered pieces of his brother throughout Egypt. Osiris’ family^[8] (Isis, Osiris and Anubis)^[6] managed to resurrect him using magic, but after Horus^[8] and Osiris were defeated they and Isis were imprisoned in a pyramid for three thousand years by Seth.^[9] During that period of imprisonment, Thoth ruled over the Ennead.

Learn more here.

SMITE video game

Never has there been, nor shall there be a king more perfect than Osiris. Son of the Earth God, Geb, Osiris was divine royalty by birth, and all the land his birthright. Benevolence and prosperity were the hallmarks of his reign. Would that he had been left to shape the world, but the jealousy of his brother, Set, changed the course of fate.

Seeking to usurp the throne, Set deceived and murdered his brother, tearing his body to pieces and casting them across the land. Eset, Osiris’ wife, secretly fled while Set plunged the kingdom into darkness. For years she toiled to reassemble her husband while his spirit form, his Ba, endured. Yet for all her searching, she could not find every part of him, and Eset was forced to reanimate Osiris without. Though not strong enough to defy Set in this incomplete form, Osiris gave Eset a son that would topple the tyrant Set and restore balance to Egypt.

What remains of Osiris is a fragment of what he once was. Robbed of his crown over the earth, he now governs the realm of the dead with the same benevolence he ruled the living. But darkness looms again, and though broken, Osiris refuses to sit idly by. Mustering the last of his strength and spirit, Osiris seeks to change the course of fate, this time for the light over darkness.

Learn more here.

Kane Chronicles books by Rick Riordan

Osiris is the Egyptian god of the dead and the living. Originally the god of agriculture, Osiris is the son of Geb and Nut as well as the brother of Horus, Isis, Nephthys, and Set. He was later reborn as Horus’ father and Isis’ husband. Osiris succeeded Ra as king of the gods until his death by Set’s hand. After his resurrection, Osiris was made the king of the afterlife. His symbols are the crook and flail.

As part of his plan to restore the gods, Julius Kane attempts to summon Osiris using the Rosetta Stone in the British Museum. Though Julius is successful in becoming Osiris’ host, the release of Osiris also triggers the release of Horus, Isis, Set and Nephthys. Unused to Osiris’ power, Julius proves to be no match for Set and both Julius and Osiris and imprisoned by Set in a casket similar to the one Set had imprisoned Osiris in millennia before.

Learn more here.

Gods of Egypt (2016) film

Osiris and Set were born to the sun god Ra. Upon becoming an adult, Ra decided to test both his sons, giving the crown of Egypt to Osiris, while Set was sent to walk about the desert. Osiris would prove to be a kinh of kindness and great generosity. As a result, Ra allowed him to remain king and allowed him to give life to his only son Horus, with his wife Isis.

Throughout Osiris’ reign as king, Egypt had prospered greatly. He allowed everyone, whether they were rich or poor to equally enjoy the pleasures of the afterlife upon their death. It would be one day that he decided that Horus would take his place as king of Egypt, as he stepped down. On the day of his son’s coronation, Set arrived slightly late, but his brother was secretly bitter towards him and plotted to usurp him at the coronation. When Horus sounded his new hunting horn, thousands of soldiers loyal to Set arrived and Set himself challenged his brother to fight. Osiris refused to fight him and went to embrace his brother, only to be impaled on the blade of his brother’s dagger.

Learn more here.

Osiris in My Writing

Origin of the Fae: Osiris

He had hidden in the Duat for millennia, not ready to face his wife after everything that had happened – the murder, the desecration, the mummification, the temporary resurrection, and him becoming king of the dead. It’s not clear, even to him, why he didn’t want to see the woman he’d loved since before birth, but the other males of the pantheon helped him and kept his secret. Though he loves Isis and never wanted another woman, though he enjoys his job, he just wants to be alone.

To make it up to Isis, this is probably his best chance:

See this immortal in action in my writing:

A Way Back Into Love (Irascible Immortals #9)

They bowed and left. She breathed deeply of the autumn air. Crisp. Clean. She opened her eyes. Tingles ran down her spine. Osiris.

‘I’m sorry.’

She turned around. He stood in the arch between gardens, the wind ruffling his black hair.

‘For what, exactly?’

He wiped his hair out of his face with a sheepish expression.

‘For not fighting harder for you, for us. For allowing the different movement of time to lull me into locking my hopes and dreams away.’

A Way Back Into Love, Irascible Immortals #9, Ronel Janse van Vuuren

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