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(More customer reviews)Although now somewhat outdated in certain aspects of interpretation, this book surely will remain as one the pillars for the study of ancient Egyptian religion, and, in fact, is one of the never-absent bibliographic references. I do not agree in toto with Frankfort's ideas about several subjects, but I must confess that it is one of the most interesting studies that I ever read about the matter. There are many thought-provoking ideas! Buy it, read it, learn from it. Both for the learned and the newcomer!
Click Here to see more reviews about: Kingship and the Gods: A Study of Ancient Near Eastern Religion as the Integration of Society and Nature (Oriental Institute Essays)
This classic study clearly establishes a fundamental difference in viewpoint between the peoples of ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia. By examining the forms of kingship which evolved in the two countries, Frankfort discovered that beneath resemblances fostered by similar cultural growth and geographical location lay differences based partly upon the natural conditions under which each society developed. The river flood which annually renewed life in the Nile Valley gave Egyptians a cheerful confidence in the permanence of established things and faith in life after death. Their Mesopotamian contemporaries, however, viewed anxiously the harsh, hostile workings of nature. Frank's superb work, first published in 1948 and now supplemented with a preface by Samuel Noah Kramer, demonstrates how the Egyptian and Mesopotamian attitudes toward nature related to their concept of kingship. In both countries the people regarded the king as their mediator with the gods, but in Mesopotamia the king was only the foremost citizen, while in Egypt the ruler was a divine descendant of the gods and the earthly representative of the God Horus.
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