A God Against The Gods
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A God Against The Gods
''A God Against the Gods'' is a 1976 historical novel by political novelist Allen Drury, which chronicles ancient Egyptian Pharaoh Akhenaten's attempt to establish a new religion in Egypt. It is told in a series of monologues by the various characters. Drury wrote a 1977 sequel, ''Return to Thebes'', and a 1980 nonfiction book about Egypt. According to Drury the political struggles of Egypt resembled those of Washington, D. C. Both ''A God Against the Gods'' and ''Return to Thebes'' were reprinted in 2015 by WordFire Press. Plot summary The ancient Egyptian empire, which stretched from modern day Syria across northern Africa, has reached its apex under the House of Thebes, the ruling family of the 18th dynasty. However, though the long-reigning Pharaoh Amenhotep III is popular, he is not very active, and the day to day rule of the empire is actually performed by his wife, Queen Tiye, who is beloved and is known as the Great Wife. The chief counselor to the Pharaoh is her broth ...
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Allen Drury
Allen Stuart Drury (September 2, 1918 – September 2, 1998) was an American novelist. During World War II, he was a reporter in the Senate, closely observing Presidents Franklin D. Roosevelt and Harry S. Truman, among others. He would convert these experiences into his first novel ''Advise and Consent'', for which he won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1960. Long afterwards, it was still being praised as ‘the definitive Washington tale’. His diaries from this period were published as ''A Senate Journal 1943–45''. Early life and ancestry Drury was born on September 2, 1918, in Houston, Texas, to Alden Monteith Drury (1895–1975), a citrus industry manager, real estate broker, and insurance agent, and Flora Allen (1894–1973), a legislative representative for the California Parent-Teacher Association. The family moved to Whittier, California, where Alden and Flora had a daughter, Anne Elizabeth (1924–1998). Drury was a direct descendant of Hugh Drury (1616–1689) and ...
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Amenhotep III
Amenhotep III ( egy, jmn-ḥtp(.w), ''Amānəḥūtpū'' , "Amun is Satisfied"; Hellenized as Amenophis III), also known as Amenhotep the Magnificent or Amenhotep the Great, was the ninth pharaoh of the Eighteenth Dynasty. According to different authors, he ruled Egypt from June 1386 to 1349 BC, or from June 1388 BC to December 1351 BC/1350 BC, after his father Thutmose IV died. Amenhotep was Thutmose's son by a minor wife, Mutemwiya. His reign was a period of unprecedented prosperity and splendour, when Egypt reached the peak of its artistic and international power. When he died in the 38th or 39th year of his reign he was succeeded by his son Amenhotep IV, who later changed his name to Akhenaten. Family and early life Amenhotep was the son of Thutmose IV and his minor wife Mutemwiya. He was born probably around 1401 BC. Later in his life, Amenhotep commissioned the depiction of his divine birth to be displayed at Luxor Temple. Amenhotep claimed that his true father was the g ...
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Monotheistic
Monotheism is the belief that there is only one deity, an all-supreme being that is universally referred to as God. Cross, F.L.; Livingstone, E.A., eds. (1974). "Monotheism". The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church (2 ed.). Oxford: Oxford University Press. A distinction may be made between exclusive monotheism, in which the one God is a singular existence, and both inclusive and pluriform monotheism, in which multiple gods or godly forms are recognized, but each are postulated as extensions of the same God. Monotheism is distinguished from henotheism, a religious system in which the believer worships one God without denying that others may worship different gods with equal validity, and monolatrism, the recognition of the existence of many gods but with the consistent worship of only one deity. The term ''monolatry'' was perhaps first used by Julius Wellhausen. Monotheism characterizes the traditions of Bábism, the Baháʼí Faith, Cheondoism, Christianity,Christianity's ...
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Sequel
A sequel is a work of literature, film, theatre, television, music or video game that continues the story of, or expands upon, some earlier work. In the common context of a narrative work of fiction, a sequel portrays events set in the same fictional universe as an earlier work, usually chronologically following the events of that work. In many cases, the sequel continues elements of the original story, often with the same characters and settings. A sequel can lead to a series, in which key elements appear repeatedly. Although the difference between more than one sequel and a series is somewhat arbitrary, it is clear that some media franchises have enough sequels to become a series, whether originally planned as such or not. Sequels are attractive to creators and to publishers because there is less risk involved in returning to a story with known popularity rather than developing new and untested characters and settings. Audiences are sometimes eager for more stories about p ...
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Smenkhkare
Smenkhkare (alternatively romanized ''Smenkhare'', ''Smenkare,'' or ''Smenkhkara''; meaning "'Vigorous is the Soul of Re") was an ancient Egyptian pharaoh of unknown background who lived and ruled during the Amarna Period of the 18th Dynasty. Smenkhkare was husband to Meritaten, the daughter of his likely co-regent, Akhenaten. Very little is known of Smenkhkare for certain because later kings sought to erase the Amarna Period from history. Because of this, perhaps no one from the Amarna Interlude has been the subject of so much speculation as Smenkhkare. Origin and family Smenkhkare's origins are unknown. It is assumed he was a member of the royal family, likely either a brother or son of the pharaoh Akhenaten. If he is Akhenaten's brother, his mother was likely either Tiye or Sitamun. If a son of Akhenaten, he was presumably an older brother of Tutankhamun, as he succeeded the throne ahead of him; his mother was likely an unknown, lesser wife. An alternative suggestion, base ...
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Horemheb
Horemheb, also spelled Horemhab or Haremhab ( egy, ḥr-m-ḥb, meaning "Horus is in Jubilation") was the last pharaoh of the Eighteenth dynasty of Egypt, 18th Dynasty of Egypt (1550–1295 BC). He ruled for at least 14 years between 1319 BC and 1292 BC. He had no relation to the preceding royal family other than by marriage to Mutnedjmet, who is thought (though disputed) to have been the daughter of his predecessor Ay (pharaoh), Ay; he is believed to have been of common birth. Before he became pharaoh, Horemheb was the commander in chief of the army under the reigns of Tutankhamun and Ay (pharaoh), Ay. After his accession to the throne, he reformed the Egyptian state and it was under his reign that official action against the preceding Amarna Period, Amarna rulers began. Due to this, he is considered the ruler who restabilized his country after the troublesome and divisive Amarna Period. Horemheb demolished monuments of Akhenaten, reusing the rubble in his own ...
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Amarna
Amarna (; ar, العمارنة, al-ʿamārnah) is an extensive Egyptian archaeological site containing the remains of what was the capital city of the late Eighteenth Dynasty. The city was established in 1346 BC, built at the direction of the Pharaoh Akhenaten, and abandoned shortly after his death in 1332 BC. The name that the ancient Egyptians used for the city is transliterated in English as Akhetaten or Akhetaton, meaning " the horizon of the Aten".David (1998), p. 125 The site is on the east bank of the Nile River, in what today is the Egyptian province of Minya. It is about south of the city of al-Minya, south of the Egyptian capital, Cairo, and north of Luxor (site of the previous capital, Thebes). The city of Deir Mawas lies directly to its west. On the east side of Amarna there are several modern villages, the chief of which are l-Till in the north and el-Hagg Qandil in the south. Activity in the region flourished from the Amarna Period until the later Roman era ...
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Mystery Religion
Mystery religions, mystery cults, sacred mysteries or simply mysteries, were religious schools of the Greco-Roman world for which participation was reserved to initiation rite, initiates ''(mystai)''. The main characterization of this religion is the secrecy associated with the particulars of the initiation and the ritual practice, which may not be revealed to outsiders. The most famous mysteries of Greco-Roman antiquity were the Eleusinian Mysteries, which predated the Greek Dark Ages. The mystery schools flourished in Late Antiquity; Julian the Apostate in the mid 4th century is known to have been initiated into three distinct mystery schools—most notably the mithraism, mithraists. Due to the secret nature of the school, and because the mystery religions of Late Antiquity were Persecution of Pagans by the Christian Roman Empire, persecuted by the Christian Roman Empire from the 4th century, the details of these religious practices are derived from descriptions, imagery and cro ...
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Nefertiti
Neferneferuaten Nefertiti () ( – c. 1330 BC) was a queen of the 18th Dynasty of Ancient Egypt, the great royal wife of Pharaoh Akhenaten. Nefertiti and her husband were known for a radical change in national religious policy, in which they promoted a form of proto-monotheism centred on the sun god Aten. With her husband, she reigned at what was arguably the wealthiest period of ancient Egyptian history. Some scholars believe that Nefertiti ruled briefly as Neferneferuaten after her husband's death and before the ascension of Tutankhamun, although this identification is a matter of ongoing debate.Dodson, Aidan, Amarna Sunset: ''Nefertiti, Tutankhamun, Ay, Horemheb, and the Egyptian Counter-Reformation''. The American University in Cairo Press. 2009, . If Nefertiti did rule as Pharaoh, her reign was marked by the fall of Amarna and relocation of the capital back to the traditional city of Thebes. She was made famous by her bust, now in Berlin's Neues Museum. The ...
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Aten
Aten also Aton, Atonu, or Itn ( egy, jtn, ''reconstructed'' ) was the focus of Atenism, the religious system established in ancient Egypt by the Eighteenth Dynasty pharaoh Akhenaten. The Aten was the disc of the sun and originally an aspect of Ra, the sun god in traditional ancient Egyptian religion. Akhenaten, however, made it the sole focus of official worship during his reign. In his poem "Great Hymn to the Aten", Akhenaten praises Aten as the creator, giver of life, and nurturing spirit of the world. Aten does not have a creation myth or family but is mentioned in the '' Book of the Dead''. The worship of Aten was initially dismantled by Tutankhamun and later eradicated by Tutankhamun's former military general Horemheb. Etymology and origin The word ''Aten'' appears in the Old Kingdom as a noun meaning "disc" which referred to anything flat and circular; the sun was called the "disc of the day" where Ra was thought to reside. By analogy, the term "silver aten" was s ...
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Thutmose (prince)
Thutmose ( egy, ḏḥwti-msi(.w)) was the eldest son of Pharaoh Amenhotep III and Queen Tiye, who lived during the Eighteenth Dynasty of Egypt. His early death led to the reign of Akhenaten, his younger brother—as the successor to the Egyptian throne—and the intrigues of the century leading up to Ramesses II, the start and ultimately the failure of Atenism, the Amarna letters, and the changing roles of the kingdom's powers. Life Prince Thutmose served as a priest of Ptah in ancient Memphis. His full royal titles were "''Crown Prince'', ''Overseer of the Priests of Upper and Lower Egypt'', ''High Priest of Ptah in Memphis'' and ''Sm-priest'' (of Ptah)." He is known from a relatively small number of objects. A small schist statuette in the Louvre Museum shows the prince as a miller and another small schist statue in Berlin depicts him as a mummy lying on a bier.Aidan Dodson & Dyan Hilton, The Complete Royal Families of Ancient Egypt, Thames & Hudson (2004), p.157 The mi ...
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Anen
Anen or Aanen was an ancient Egyptian official during the late 18th Dynasty of Egypt. Biography He was the son of Yuya and Thuya and the brother of Queen Tiye, the wife of Pharaoh Amenhotep III. Under the rule of his brother-in-law, Anen became the Chancellor of Lower Egypt, Second Prophet of Amun, and sem-priest of Heliopolis, and acquired the title Divine Father., p. 157 A surviving statue of Anen is now in the Museo Egizio, Turin (Inv. No. 5484 / Cat. 1377). A shabti of his is now in The Hague. Inscriptions on Anen's own monuments do not mention that he was Amenhotep III's brother-in-law. However, this relationship is established by a short but clear reference to him in his mother Thuya's coffin, which stated that her son Anen was the second prophet of Amun. It is likely that he died before Year 30 of Amenhotep III, since he is not mentioned in texts relating to the pharaoh's Sed festival;Aldred: Akhenaten, p. 220 in the last decade of Amenhotep's reign another man, Simu ...
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