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Pyramid Texts

Egyptian Funerary Spells

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Chapter Spell 204

Cobra, to the sky! Horus’s centipede, to the earth!⁠ Horus’s sandal is treading on the enclosure’s lord, the cavern’s bull. Shunned snake, I cannot be shunned: Unis’s sycamore is his sycamore, Unis’s environs are his environs. Anyone Unis finds in his way he will devour.

Texts in conversation

Compare Pyramid Texts Spell 204 and Genesis 3:14

Ancient Near East, Egyptian · Hebrew Bible

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Summary

Genesis 3 curses the serpent to crawl on its belly and promises its head will be struck. The Egyptian Pyramid Texts contain spells using similar language, commanding snakes to fall down, crawl away, and be trampled underfoot by the gods.

Passages

Pyramid Texts Spell 204

Ancient Near East, Egyptian · Egyptian Funerary Spells
Cobra, to the sky! Horus’s centipede, to the earth! Horus’s sandal is treading on the enclosure’s lord, the cavern’s bull. Shunned snake, I cannot be shunned: Unis’s sycamore is his sycamore, Unis’s environs are his environs. Anyone Unis finds in his way he will devour.
2350 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in the Pyramid Texts

Genesis 3:14

Hebrew Bible
14 The Lord God said to the serpent, “Because you have done this, cursed are you above all the cattle and all the living creatures of the field! On your belly you will crawl and dust you will eat all the days of your life. 15 And I will put hostility between you and the woman and between your offspring and her offspring; he will strike your head, and you will strike his heel.” 16 To the woman he said, “I will greatly increase your labor pains; with pain you will give birth to children. You will want to control your husband, but he will dominate you.”
750–400 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in Genesis

References

“... The Egyptian Pyramid Texts were designed to aid the pharaohs of the Old Kingdom (end of the third millennium) on their journey to the afterlife. Among the over 700 utterances are several dozen spells and curses on snakes that may impede the king’s progress. These utterances contain phrases that are reminiscent of the curse on the serpent in Genesis 3. For instance, the biblical statement that the serpent will ‘crawl on your belly’ is paralleled by frequent spells that call on the snake to lie down, fall down, get down, or crawl away (Pyramid Text 226, 233, 234, 298, 386). Another says that he should ‘go with [his] face on the path’ (Pyramid Text 288). ... Treading on the serpent is used in Pyramid Texts 299 as an expression of overcoming or defeating it. Specific statements indicate that the ‘Sandal of Horus tramples the snake underfoot’ (Pyramid Text 378), and ‘Horus has shattered [the snake’s] mouth with the sole of his foot’ (Pyramid Text 388). This reflects a potentially mortal blow to this deadly enemy. There is no suggestion that the Israelites are borrowing from the Pyramid Texts, only that these texts help us to determine how someone in the ancient Near East might understand such words and phrases. ...”
John H. Walton, The Lost World of Adam and Eve: Genesis 2–3 and the Human Origins Debate (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity, 2015), 107–108.

References are not endorsements of their contents. Read each reference in full to understand its author's intentions in using these texts.

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Pyramid Texts Spell 204 and Genesis 3:14

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