Tell el Amarna and the Bible :: II THE RESTLESS PHARAOH

II THE RESTLESS PHARAOH

Although Pharaohs of the third millenium B.C. exploited Sinai copper mines, and Middle Kingdom rulers sent trading expeditions to Punt on the African coast, opposite Aden, Egypt alone was considered to be a civilized land and foreigners could be dismissed as uncouth barbarians. Egypt lived in splendid isolation, annoyed at times by Semites who had infiltrated the fertile Nile Valley since prehistoric times, but never seriously involved in life beyond her borders. Her land appeared to be particularly favored of the gods, and the Egyptian could not think of it otherwise.

Yet the blessings of life along the Nile did not insure to Egypt a government that could meet challenges from without and guarantee peace and prosperity within the Nile Valley and Delta. By about 1700 B.C., Egypt experienced the weakening of central authority which permitted the invading Hyksos (“rulers of foreign lands”) to seize control of the country and establish their own dynasty. The prosperous Middle Kingdom was at an end, and the hard hand of alien rule was evident throughout the land. It was not until 1570 B.C. that Ahmose, founder of the Eighteenth Dynasty, succeeded in driving the Hyksos back into Asia and establishing native control over Egypt.

The New Kingdom

The Hyksos invasion left one lesson: Never again could Egypt adopt a policy of isolation. The best defense is offense. As Asiatic Hyksos rulers had marched upon Egypt, so Egypt would march her armies into Asia. Thutmose I (1525-1494 B.C.) campaigned successfully in Asia, and under Thutmose III (1490-1435 B.C.) western Asia was brought under the control of Egyptian arms. During his seventeen campaigns in Palestine and Syria, Thutmose III took Megiddo in the Valley of Esdraelon and Carchemish on the Euphrates. Egyptian authority extended from the Sudan to the Euphrates, and the reigning Pharaoh was suzerain of Syria and Palestine. The king list at Karnak lists one hundred nineteen towns taken by Thutmose III. Often the Egyptians were content to allow a native prince to remain in power as long as he was willing to provide tribute and manpower to the Egyptian commissioner. Important cities were ruled directly by an Egyptian governor.

In theory the Pharaoh was a god with absolute power whose word was law. The Egyptians have left us no law codes, and it may be that they sensed no need of such codified law as we find in Sumer, Babylon, Assyria, and among the Hittites (as well as the Biblical Hebrews). The presence of a living god in the land might render such written codes unnecessary.

In practice, however, as Egypt extended her Empire the personal involvement of the Pharaoh became progressively less. The priesthood of Amon-Re, god of Thebes and chief god of the Egyptian pantheon, developed enormous power. Before any important decision it was expected that the Pharaoh would consult the oracle of Amon-Re. Hundreds of civil servants were required to care for the needs of a great Empire, and most of these were drawn from a few powerful families. The result was a bureaucracy which, like the priesthood, could serve as a power block. The army, and particularly its commander, was a third factor that could not be ignored by Egyptian officialdom. While the Pharaoh was theoretically the head of church and state—god and king in Egypt—in practice he might find himself frustrated at every turn by religious, civil, and military bureaucracies.

From the campaigns of Thutmose III until late in the reign of Amenhotep III (ca. 1360 B.C.) the Egyptian Empire seems to have functioned with maximum efficiency. The riches of Nubia, Crete, western Asia, and even distant Mycenae poured into Thebes, the Egyptian capital. A Mitannian princess graced the harem of Thutmose IV (1414-1406 B.C.). Amenhotep III caused his name and that of his wife to be cut into a group of scarabs with the inscription, “She is the wife of the victorious king whose territory in the south reaches to Karei (=Napata, at the Fourth Cataract of the Nile) and on the north to Naharin (=Mitanni).”[1]

Commemorative Scarab of Amenhotep III. Issued on the occasion of the construction of a pleasure lake for Queen Tiy: (above) side view, and (below) inscription.

Inscription.

Amenhotep III. The brown quartzite head depicts the Pharaoh with an enigmatic smile.

Amenhotep III was responsible for the immense colonnades at Luxor and a great funerary temple which has disappeared except for two immense seated statues of the Pharaoh now known as the Colossi of Memmon (supposedly representing an Ethiopian hero who fell on the battlefield at Troy). Although the harem of Amenhotep III included daughters from the kings of Mitanni, Assyria, Babylon, and the Hittites, he was devoted to his wife Tiy for whom he built an artificial lake a mile long and over a thousand feet wide south of the Medinet Habu temple.

The decline in Egyptian power may be traced to the latter half of the reign of Amenhotep III. While the Pharaoh was sick, his wife Tiy seems to have exercised considerable power. The balance of power in Asia was upset by the rise of Suppiluliumas (1375-1340 B.C.), a Hittite ruler who sought to carve out an empire for himself. Egypt avoided military action, with the result that the loyal princes were left to defend themselves or make their own terms with the enemy.

Young Amenhotep IV

When Amenhotep III died he was succeeded by his eleven year old son Amenhotep IV (1370-1353 B.C.), and the queen mother Tiy continued to act as regent. In addition to the influence of his mother, young Amenhotep IV was educated by the priest, Eye, who was the husband of his childhood nurse. No doubt Amenhotep was early married to the fair Nofretete who may have been his sister. Brother-sister marriages were common in ancient Egypt, but we cannot be certain concerning the parentage of Nofretete. Under the tutelage of his mother, his wife, and a favored priest, young Amenhotep could hardly be expected to have developed an interest in military affairs. His interest turned toward religion and, in the words of Breasted, “the philosophizing theology of the priests was of more importance to him than all the provinces of Asia.”[2]

Amenhotep IV is depicted as having a thin face, narrow sloping shoulders, and unusually large hips and abdomen. His skull seems to have been deformed, and he may have been an epileptic. These handicaps did not affect his mind, however, for he was one of history’s creative thinkers. Breasted (with considerable hyperbole, to be sure), calls him “the first individual in human history.”[3] Unfortunately the international tensions of the day were such that Egypt needed a warrior rather than a philosopher king. The idealism of Amenhotep IV was largely lost on his own generation, and entirely lost on the generation that followed him.

Nofretete was devoted both to her husband and to the religious reforms to which he dedicated his life. She bore him six daughters and appears to have been her husband’s constant companion and confidant. Nofretete was, understandably, a favored subject in Amarna art. Reliefs depict her playing with her daughters, and one shows her seated on her husband’s knee, blowing him a kiss at a chariot procession.

During the early years of his reign, Amenhotep IV clearly favored the god Aton, but he was tolerant of the various deities worshiped in Egypt. In this he continued the policy of his father, Amenhotep III, and his mother, Queen Tiy. The preference for the god Aton is evident in the name of the first child of Amenhotep IV, Merit-aton (“Beloved of Aton”).

The priests of Amon in Thebes must have looked with apprehension upon the youthful Pharaoh whose devotion to the chief god of Egypt seemed to be compromised by religious innovation. We can only guess their reaction when Amenhotep IV decided to build a temple to Aton within the sacred precincts of the city of Amon. Orders were given to quarry sandstone at the Silsila quarries, forty miles north of Aswan. Here a monument was erected to mark the beginning of the quarrying operation:

First occurrence of His Majesty’s giving command to muster all the workmen from Elephantine to Samhudet, and the leaders of the army, in order to make a great breach for cutting out sandstone, in order to make the sanctuary of Harakhti in his name, “Heat which is in Aton,” in Karnak. Behold the officials, the companions, and the chiefs of the fan bearers were the chiefs of the quarry service for the transportation of stone.[4]

Amenhotep IV was twenty-one when he created the Aton temple at Thebes. He was still attempting to form a synthesis of old and new elements in his religious faith, for the old god Re-Harakhti of Heliopolis is identified with Aton. The Silsila stele depicts Amenhotep IV worshiping Amon, yet it also shows Aton (the sun) with rays of light which hold the Egyptian sign of life (ankh). Amon, Re-Harakhti, and Aton all figure in the Silsila stele.

Akhenaton and Nofretete. A limestone plaque from Akhetaton depicts the Pharaoh and his beautiful wife.

The Break with Amon

Amenhotep IV, however, was unable to stop with half-way measures. In his devotion to Aton he felt that his god alone was worthy of worship. The Theban temple area was renamed, “The Brightness of the Great Aton,” and the city itself became, “The City of the Brightness of Aton.” In an obvious break with the past, Amenhotep IV determined to change his own name, which meant “Amon is satisfied” to Akhenaton, meaning, “he who is serviceable to Aton.”

From this time on, Akhenaton’s zeal knew no bounds. He banished the mention of Re-Harakhti from the descriptive title of Aton, and had the very names of Amon and the Egyptian pantheon chiseled out of the monuments at Thebes. The Amon temples were closed, and Atonism became the only sanctioned religion of Egypt. The reform, however, did not have a popular base, and it probably did not penetrate far beyond the royal family and retainers. Akhenaton, like the earlier Pharaohs, believed in his own divinity, esteeming himself the son of Aton. As such he would be worshiped by his faithful subjects.

Seated Figure of Akhenaton. The young king is depicted in a conventional pose at Thebes before he moved his capital to Akhetaton.

Seated Figure of Akhenaton—detail. The young Akhenaton is presented with a crook and flail in his hand, symbolizing authority, and the uraeus, symbol of royalty, at his head. The uraeus is a stylized representation of an enraged female cobra, poised as though prepared to strike an enemy.

The reasons for Akhenaton’s break with the religious traditions of his day are complex. In part the revolt certainly represents the desire of a young Pharaoh to free himself from the yoke of a firmly entrenched priestly class. Yet the break was far more than an act of political expediency. The influence of the priesthood of Heliopolis, perennial rivals of the Theban priests, and the development of Atonism in the years preceding his accession to the throne are all factors that cannot be overlooked. Perhaps the “petticoat government” into which he moved at the age of eleven with the strong influence of his mother, Queen Tiy, had something to do with it. There may even be a measure of compensation for physical inadequacies in the vigorous measures he took to establish Aton as the sole god of Egypt. Whatever historical or psychological motivations may be suggested, Akhenaton’s whole life gives evidence of the fact that he was piously devoted to Aton, the god whose beneficent rays bring life to all mankind.

While the priests of Amon were bitterly antagonistic to Akhenaton, he found allies in the priests from Memphis who had long resented the dominating position of the Theban priesthood. The army was divided. Conservative elements sided with the Theban priests, but a bright young general, Horemhab, saw in Akhenaton’s revolt an opportunity for personal advancement and threw in his lot with the new king. There is a suggestion that a counter revolution was planned, for the Amon priests claimed that the Pharaoh had abandoned his people, and was himself abandoned by his father Amon.

The New Capital

Akhenaton did abandon Thebes. As tensions grew he came to realize that his new faith could not flourish in the city of Amon. There were theological reasons, too, for Aton had no city that was distinctly dedicated to his worship. Akhenaton decided to build a new capital, dedicated to the god Aton, with the name Akhetaton, “the horizon of Aton.”

The move to Akhetaton, modern Amarna, three hundred miles north of Thebes, must have been welcome both to Akhenaton’s court and the Theban priesthood. The city seems to have been built in haste, and when Akhenaton left Thebes it was for good. Was life at Akhetaton all that Akhenaton envisioned? The inscriptions and the paintings from the rock tombs suggest that the royal family enjoyed a few happy years in devotion to Aton and to one another. True, the envoys from distant lands and subject peoples noted the growing gulf between Akhenaton and the people, and the empire suffered as the Egyptian Pharaoh lived in the seclusion of his capital. Tragedy entered the lives of Akhenaton and Nofretete when their second daughter Meketaton died and was buried in the family tomb east of Akhetaton.

The End of an Era

The closing years of the lives of Nofretete and Akhenaton are largely a blank. Their third daughter Meritaton married Smenkhkare, a young architect who was much favored by Akhenaton and occupied the throne for a short time after his death. Another daughter Ankhsenpaton, married Tutankhaton, a loyal follower of her father. His brief reign left no impress on Egyptian history. The discovery of his tomb, however, in the Valley of the Kings, has made him the best known of all Pharaohs.

A Princess at Akhetaton. A limestone relief showing one of the daughters of Akhenaton and his wife Nofretete discovered at Amarna.

Princess Manyet-aton. A representation of the princess was adapted for use as the lid of a canopic jar used in the burial of Akhenaton. Discovered in the tomb of Smenkhkare in the Valley of the Kings, Thebes.

The circumstances concerning the deaths of Nofretete and Akhenaton are not known, although we do know that Akhenaton died in the seventeenth year of his reign, when he was but thirty years of age. Atonism did not long survive its most loyal adherents. Meritaton became Meritamon, and the famed King Tut is known by his later name, Tutankhamon, rather than the earlier Tuntankhaton. In many ways Akhenaton seems to have been a man whose life was a failure. All for which he stood was quickly obliterated during the scant generation after his death. Yet this judgment is too hasty. Even the priests of Amon could not wholly turn back the reforms in art and literature which Akhenaton encouraged. While such terms as “monotheist” and “pacifist” when applied to him bear a different connotation from their meaning in contemporary life, still his meditation upon the Aton bringing blessing to all men has within it the seed of something that finds its highest expression in the prophetic spokesmen of ancient Israel. Akhenaton went too far for his own generation in Egypt, but the Biblical affirmation of God as creator of heaven and earth and redeemer of mankind was hardly apprehended by Akhenaton.

King Tutankhamon. Under the famed “King Tut” the religious reforms of Akhenaton were renounced and Amon was restored to his place as the principal god of Egypt. Statue from Medinet Habu.

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