THE MYTH OF OSIRIS

Insight into these mechanics is provided by the Egyptian myth of Osiris. According to the Hellenistic version of the myth, the god-king Osiris was tricked by his brother Set and Set’s conspirators to try out a specially constructed coffin to see if it would fit.

The coffin was then set afloat on the Nile River, where the currents carried it out into the Mediterranean Sea. It then floated across the sea to the shores of Byblos, an ancient port city on the coast of Lebanon, where the body of Osiris was eventually found and then resurrected. Upon this resurrection, Osiris renounced his worldly kingdom, ascended the stairway to the sky, and attained eternal life among the gods, where he became known as the Lord of Immortality.

This provides an example of the type of childlike myth offered by the sages to educate the unenlightened in their mysterious ways. The story, however, has a deeper meaning. The body of Osiris represents the individual ego (which here ruled over the land of Egypt as its king). The coffin represents the state of pure ignorance, the tomb of the individual ego, where it is destined to die in total silence and darkness. The Mediterranean Sea represents the sea of death, which Osiris had to cross to reach the other shore, the shore of eternal life. The currents in the sea, represent, in the story, the will of God that carries Osiris to the other shore. The currents serve to deliver the soul to eternal life without any action on the part of the soul. The resurrection of the body of Osiris represents the resurrection of the ego not as the individual ego, but as the universal ego—which is possessed by all enlightened souls.

The myth of Osiris therefore presents a spiritual allegory concerning the mechanics by which the soul becomes enlightened and endowed with a universal rather than an individual ego. This qualifies it to ascend the stairway to the sky and realize full immortality in the bosom of the infinite.