The Goddess Nut
Nut the Mother Goddess Of Us All
Her name is pronunced 'Noot'. 'Nuit' means 'night.' Nut was originally a mother-goddess who had many children. The
hieroglyph for her name, which she is often seen wearing on her head is
a water pot, but it is also thought to represent a womb. She was the daughter of the air god, Shu and water goddesses, Tefnut. She was shown in Egyptian artwork as a dark, star-covered naked woman,
holding her body up in an arch, facing downwards. Her arms and legs
were imagined to be the pillars of the sky, and hands and feet were
thought to touch the four cardinal points at the horizon. Far
underneath her lay the earth god, Geb, sometimes ithphallyic, looking
up at his sister-wife. She was also described as a cow goddess, taking
on some of the attributes of Hathor. Geb was described as the "Bull of
Nut" in the Pyramid Texts. As a great, solar cow, she was thought to
have carried Ra up into the heavens on her back, after he retired from
his rule on the Earth.
She is also pictured as a giant sow, suckling many piglets. These
piglets represented the stars, which she swallowed each morning before
dawn. Nut was considered to be the mother of the sun and the moon.
During the day, Nut and Geb are separated, but each evening Nut comes
down to meet Geb and this causes darkness. If storms came during the
day, it was believed that Nut had some how slipped closer to the Earth.
Nut is the barrier separating the forces of chaos from the ordered
cosmos in this world. Her fingers and toes were believed to touch the four cardinal points or directions.
The sun god Re was said to enter her mouth after setting in the evening
and travel through her body during the night to be reborn from her
vulva each morning.
She gives birth to the sun in the east and swallows the sun in the
west.
In one myth Nut gives birth to the Sun-god daily and he passes over her
body until he reaches her mouth at sunset. He then passed into her
mouth and through her body and is reborn the next morning. Another myth
described the sun as sailing up her legs and back in the Atet (Matet)
boat until noon, when he entered the Sektet boat and continued his
travels until sunset. As a goddess who gave birth to the son each day,
she became connected with the underworld, resurrection and the tomb.
She was seen as a friend to the dead, as a mother-like protector to
those who journeyed through the land of the
dead. She was often painted
on the inside lid of the sarcophagus, protecting the dead until he or
she, like Ra, could be reborn in their new life.
In the Book of the Dead, Nut was seen as a mother-figure to the sun god
Ra, who at sunrise was known as Khepera and took the form of a scarab
beetle (at noon he was Ra at his full strength, and at sunset he was
known as Tem (Temu, Atem) who was old and weakening):
The gods rejoice greatly when they see my beautiful appearances from
the body of the goddess Nut, and when the goddess Nut bringeth me
forth.
She was also called on to help the deceased in one of the spells of the
Book of the Dead:
There were many festivals to Nut through the year, including the
'Festival of Nut and Ra' and the 'Feast of Nut'. But, despite being a
protector of the dead, she was a personification of the sky - a cosmic
deity - and no temples or specific cult centers are linked to her.
She was thought to be the mother of five children on the five extra
days of the Egyptian calendar, won by Thoth - Osiris who was born on
the first day, Horus the Elder on the second, Set on the third, Isis on
the fourth, and Nephthys the last born on the fifth day. The days on
which these deities were born were known as the 'five epagomenal days
of the year', and they were celebrated all over Egypt:
1. Osiris - an unlucky day
2. Horus the Elder - neither lucky nor unlucky 3. Seth - an unlucky day
4. Isis - a lucky day, "A Beautiful Festival of Heaven and Earth." 5. Nephthys - an unlucky day
How to pray to Nut. Let her as the mother of us all help us remember we
are all brothers and sisters in this world. Let Nut come into your life
and teach you to love your brothers and sister as yourself for we are
all one.
References:
Ancient Egyptian Books of the Afterlife, The Hornung, Erik 1999 Cornell
University Press ISBN 0-8014-3515-3 Gods of the Egyptians, The (Studies in Egyptian Mythology) Budge, E. A.
Wallis 1969 Dover Publications, Inc. ISBN 486-22056-7 Traveler's Key to Ancient Egypt, The West, John Anthony 1995
Theosophical Publishing House, the ISBN 0-8356-0724-0 Valley of the Kings Weeks, Kent R. 2001 Friedman/Fairfax ISBN
1-5866-3295-7
About the Author: Judi Singleton publishes both the free edtion and the
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http://www.motherearthpublishing.com
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