This post is a tribute to HouseofCantor’s appreciation of Set.
Plutarch in his “On Isis and Osiris” writes in section 371B:
And the name "Set," by which they call Typhon, (“Tbn”) denotes this: it means "the overmastering" and "overpowering," and it means in very many instances "turning back," and again "overpassing." Some say that one of the companions of Typhon was Bebon (“bibi”), but Manetho says that Bebon was still another name by which Typhon was called. The name signifies "restraint" or "hindrance," as much as to say that, when things are going along in a proper way and making rapid progress towards the right end, the power of Typhon obstructs them.
The opening passage of Chapter 93 of the Book of the Dead apart from being unique in the information it conveys, reveals the identity of Bebon and, as a consequence, the identity of Set. The text is found in the Papyrus of Any.
Said Any: “O phallus of Re, this which turned aside and destroyed the abnormalities responsible for the features of the primitive ones which were created by Bebon in the course of millions of years.”
Set is responsible for the creation of the primitives (in the course of millions of years!) whose abnormalities the pure and perfect god Ra came to correct by means of his phallus!!
Of course, the above translation cannot be found among the translations approved by the …Academia, for this reason I am supplying below the transliteration of the hieroglyphic text with all the necessary information regarding those words that the translators failed to translate correctly.
The symbol of Set is an unnatural animal that never existed:
![[Image: 220px-Sha_%28animal%29.jpg]](https://images.weserv.nl/?url=upload.wikimedia.org%2Fwikipedia%2Fcommons%2Fthumb%2F5%2F5a%2FSha_%2528animal%2529.jpg%2F220px-Sha_%2528animal%2529.jpg)
The Egyptologist Maria Carmela Betró writes:
The name of the god whom the Egyptians associated with confusion and cosmic and social disorder is often expressed by the hieroglyph of a god with a human body and an animal’s head. This is the famous animal of Seth, itself a writing of the name, about whose zoological identity many theories have been put forward: ass, antelope, giraffe, okapi, and so on. It seems more probable that the animal is chimerical, a member of the fabled desert fauna.
The zoomorphic variant is encountered frequently as determinative to a broad series of words, all connected to the idea of suffering, violence, and perturbation, including the atmospheric: even the words for tempest, rare occurrences in the stable Egyptian climate, carry this determinative.
There is one more unnatural creature present in the hieroglyphic signs. It is the lapwing bird, the symbol of the plebs, of the lower class common people, which is sometimes depicted with its wings twisted round one another. The common people are regarded primitive and for this reason unnatural. The companions or confederates or accomplishes of Set are the ones found to be subhuman creatures at their judgment, deemed animals and killed.
A passage in the same papyrus (of Any) that belongs to the 18th Chapter of the Book of the Dead reads:
When the confederates of Set come and change their forms into animals, they are slain in the presence of these gods as they are being smitten down and their blood flows among them. These things are caused by the judges who are in the city of Busiris.
Here follows the transliteration of the passage regarding the… omnipotent phallus of Ra
“j”… O
“Hnnw”…phallus
“nwy”…this
“n”… of
“ra”…Ra
“nwd”…turned aside
“Hdi”…destroyed
“=f”…he
“Xnnw”…abnormalities. (In Faulkner’s dictionary this word is rendered as “tumult”, “uproar”, in the German dictionary is found as “troublemaker”, “quarrelsome” and when determined by the animal of Set as “disturbance”, “disruption”, “disorder”, “revolt”, “rebellion”)
“xpr”…created
“xt”…traits, features (this word is translated as “things”, “matters”, “affairs” but also –possibly originally- means “traits”, “features” because there are: traits negative, xt Dwt, which the gods do not like, xt m nw bwt nTrw, traits that the gods detest, xt n xftyw nw nb r Dr traits of the enemies of the Lord of All, xt it =f wsir, traits of his father Osiris. What gods detest in those they kill it is not their things, matters or affairs but their features, their bodily traits).
”nnw”…primitive, primordial (this word is determined by an ideogram depicting a tired, slothful man and thus it is translated as “weary”, “tired”, “exhausted”, "inert," but according to the Myth of Creation “nnw” are called the people who were first created.
The Lord of All says:“Ts =j im =sn m nw m nnw”, I created (brought together) those in there in the primordial waters as nnw)
”m”… during
“HH”…thousand [of years]
”m” …by
”bibi”…Bebon
At the time of W.Budge the lexicography was poor but, as you will realize, if the meanings of certain words are changed his rendering can be fully accepted. It is a word for word translation:
“Hail phallus of Re advancing he destroyeth opposition (Xnnw). Come into existence things (xt) inert (nnw) during millions of years from the god Baba.
R.O.Faulkner’s translation / interpretation reads:
“O you phallus of Re, this which is injured by uproar, whose inertness came into being through Babai”
The above …interpretation appears in Faulkner’s translation of the “Book of the Dead” which bears the signature of the University of Texas, published in cooperation with British Museum Press.
A beautiful Anglo American blunder!
Plutarch in his “On Isis and Osiris” writes in section 371B:
And the name "Set," by which they call Typhon, (“Tbn”) denotes this: it means "the overmastering" and "overpowering," and it means in very many instances "turning back," and again "overpassing." Some say that one of the companions of Typhon was Bebon (“bibi”), but Manetho says that Bebon was still another name by which Typhon was called. The name signifies "restraint" or "hindrance," as much as to say that, when things are going along in a proper way and making rapid progress towards the right end, the power of Typhon obstructs them.
The opening passage of Chapter 93 of the Book of the Dead apart from being unique in the information it conveys, reveals the identity of Bebon and, as a consequence, the identity of Set. The text is found in the Papyrus of Any.
Said Any: “O phallus of Re, this which turned aside and destroyed the abnormalities responsible for the features of the primitive ones which were created by Bebon in the course of millions of years.”
Set is responsible for the creation of the primitives (in the course of millions of years!) whose abnormalities the pure and perfect god Ra came to correct by means of his phallus!!
Of course, the above translation cannot be found among the translations approved by the …Academia, for this reason I am supplying below the transliteration of the hieroglyphic text with all the necessary information regarding those words that the translators failed to translate correctly.
The symbol of Set is an unnatural animal that never existed:
The Egyptologist Maria Carmela Betró writes:
The name of the god whom the Egyptians associated with confusion and cosmic and social disorder is often expressed by the hieroglyph of a god with a human body and an animal’s head. This is the famous animal of Seth, itself a writing of the name, about whose zoological identity many theories have been put forward: ass, antelope, giraffe, okapi, and so on. It seems more probable that the animal is chimerical, a member of the fabled desert fauna.
The zoomorphic variant is encountered frequently as determinative to a broad series of words, all connected to the idea of suffering, violence, and perturbation, including the atmospheric: even the words for tempest, rare occurrences in the stable Egyptian climate, carry this determinative.
There is one more unnatural creature present in the hieroglyphic signs. It is the lapwing bird, the symbol of the plebs, of the lower class common people, which is sometimes depicted with its wings twisted round one another. The common people are regarded primitive and for this reason unnatural. The companions or confederates or accomplishes of Set are the ones found to be subhuman creatures at their judgment, deemed animals and killed.
A passage in the same papyrus (of Any) that belongs to the 18th Chapter of the Book of the Dead reads:
When the confederates of Set come and change their forms into animals, they are slain in the presence of these gods as they are being smitten down and their blood flows among them. These things are caused by the judges who are in the city of Busiris.
Here follows the transliteration of the passage regarding the… omnipotent phallus of Ra
“j”… O
“Hnnw”…phallus
“nwy”…this
“n”… of
“ra”…Ra
“nwd”…turned aside
“Hdi”…destroyed
“=f”…he
“Xnnw”…abnormalities. (In Faulkner’s dictionary this word is rendered as “tumult”, “uproar”, in the German dictionary is found as “troublemaker”, “quarrelsome” and when determined by the animal of Set as “disturbance”, “disruption”, “disorder”, “revolt”, “rebellion”)
“xpr”…created
“xt”…traits, features (this word is translated as “things”, “matters”, “affairs” but also –possibly originally- means “traits”, “features” because there are: traits negative, xt Dwt, which the gods do not like, xt m nw bwt nTrw, traits that the gods detest, xt n xftyw nw nb r Dr traits of the enemies of the Lord of All, xt it =f wsir, traits of his father Osiris. What gods detest in those they kill it is not their things, matters or affairs but their features, their bodily traits).
”nnw”…primitive, primordial (this word is determined by an ideogram depicting a tired, slothful man and thus it is translated as “weary”, “tired”, “exhausted”, "inert," but according to the Myth of Creation “nnw” are called the people who were first created.
The Lord of All says:“Ts =j im =sn m nw m nnw”, I created (brought together) those in there in the primordial waters as nnw)
”m”… during
“HH”…thousand [of years]
”m” …by
”bibi”…Bebon
At the time of W.Budge the lexicography was poor but, as you will realize, if the meanings of certain words are changed his rendering can be fully accepted. It is a word for word translation:
“Hail phallus of Re advancing he destroyeth opposition (Xnnw). Come into existence things (xt) inert (nnw) during millions of years from the god Baba.
R.O.Faulkner’s translation / interpretation reads:
“O you phallus of Re, this which is injured by uproar, whose inertness came into being through Babai”
The above …interpretation appears in Faulkner’s translation of the “Book of the Dead” which bears the signature of the University of Texas, published in cooperation with British Museum Press.
A beautiful Anglo American blunder!
