In the New Empire period, the Sun became identified with the dung beetle, whose spherical ball of dung was identified with the Sun. In the form of the sun disc Aten, the Sun had a brief resurgence during the Amarna Period when it again became the preeminent, if not only, divinity for the Pharaoh Akhenaton. In Proto-Indo-European religion, the Sun was personified as the goddess "*Sehul". Derivatives of this goddess in Indo-European languages include the Old Norse "Sól", Sanskrit "Surya", Gaulish "Sulis", Lithuanian "Saulė", and Slavic "Solntse". In ancient Greek religion, the sun deity was the male god Helios, but traces of an earlier female solar deity are preserved in Helen of Troy.
Religious aspects
Sun
Sun | Religious aspects
Proto-Indo-European religion,  ancient Greek religion, ancient Sumerians. Ancient Egyptian religion Egyptian In Ancient Egypt.
where is sedna located in the solar system
user
In the outer reaches of the Solar System.
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who discovered it?
user
Michael Brown (Caltech), Chad Trujillo (Gemini Observatory), and David Rabinowitz (Yale University).
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who gave it it's name?
user
Michael Brown.
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what does it look like?
user
It is a large planetoid, surface is redd.
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the system mentioned above, what does it consist of?
user
Sun, the giant planets, four terrestrial planets, the dwarf planets, moons, asteroids, and comets.
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the first thing mentioned, does it have any religious inclusion?
user
Yes, the Sun was worshipped as the god Ra, personified as the goddess.
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which religion did they worship him as the above?
user
There was no cult devoted to Khepri, and he was largely subordinate to the greater sun god Ra. Often, Khepri and another solar deity, Atum, were seen as aspects of Ra: Khepri was the morning sun, Ra was the midday sun, and Atum was the sun in the evening.
Khepri | Religion
At an early period in Egyptian history his influence spread throughout the whole country, bringing multiple representations in form and in name. The most common form combinations are with Atum (his human form), Khepri (the scarab beetle) and Horus (the falcon). The form in which he usually appears is that of a man with a falcon head, which is due to his combination with Horus, another sky god. On top of his head sits a solar disc with a cobra, which in many myths represents the eye of Ra. At the beginning of time, when there was nothing but chaos, the sun god existed alone in the watery mass of Nun which filled the universe.
Ra | The sun as a creator
Also in Egypt, there was a religion that worshipped the Sun directly, and was among the first monotheistic religions: Atenism. Sun worship was prevalent in ancient Egyptian religion. The earliest deities associated with the Sun are all goddesses: Wadjet, Sekhmet, Hathor, Nut, Bast, Bat, and Menhit. First Hathor, and then Isis, give birth to and nurse Horus and Ra. Hathor the horned-cow is one of the 12 daughters of Ra, gifted with joy and is a wet-nurse to Horus. From at least the 4th Dynasty of ancient Egypt, the Sun was worshipped as the deity Re (pronounced probably as Riya, meaning simply the sun), and portrayed as a falcon headed god surmounted by the solar disk, and surrounded by a serpent.
Solar deity | Africa
In the New Empire period, the Sun became identified with the dung beetle, whose spherical ball of dung was identified with the Sun. In the form of the sun disc Aten, the Sun had a brief resurgence during the Amarna Period when it again became the preeminent, if not only, divinity for the Pharaoh Akhenaton. In Proto-Indo-European religion, the Sun was personified as the goddess "*Sehul". Derivatives of this goddess in Indo-European languages include the Old Norse "Sól", Sanskrit "Surya", Gaulish "Sulis", Lithuanian "Saulė", and Slavic "Solntse". In ancient Greek religion, the sun deity was the male god Helios, but traces of an earlier female solar deity are preserved in Helen of Troy.
Sun | Religious aspects
Solar deities play a major role in many world religions and mythologies. The ancient Sumerians believed that the sun was Utu, the god of justice and twin brother of Inanna, the Queen of Heaven, who was identified as the planet Venus. Later, Utu was identified with the East Semitic god Shamash. Utu was regarded as a helper-deity, who aided those in distress, and, in iconography, he is usually portrayed with a long beard and clutching a saw, which represented his role as the dispenser of justice. From at least the Fourth Dynasty of Ancient Egypt, the Sun was worshipped as the god Ra, portrayed as a falcon-headed divinity surmounted by the solar disk, and surrounded by a serpent.
Sun | Religious aspects
"I am Atum when he was alone in Nun, I am Ra when he dawned, when he began to rule that which he had made." This passage talks about how Atum created everything in human form out of the chaos and how Ra then began to rule over the earth where humans and divine beings coexisted. He created the Shu, god of air, and the goddess of moisture, Tefnut. The siblings symbolized two universal principles of humans: life and right (justice). Ra was believed to have created all forms of life by calling them into existence by uttering their secret names.
Ra | The sun as a creator
In some accounts humans were created from Ra's tears and sweat. According to one myth the first portion of Earth came into being when the sun god summoned it out of the watery mass of Nun. In the myth of the Celestial Cow (the sky was thought of as a huge cow, the goddess Meht-urt) it is recounted how mankind plotted against Ra and how he sent his eye as the goddess Sekhmet to punish them. Extensions of Ra's power were often shown as the eye of Ra, which were the female versions of the sun god. Ra had three daughters Bastet, Sekhmet, and Hathor who were all considered the eye of Ra who would seek out his vengeance.
Ra | The sun as a creator
The sun is the giver of life, controlling the ripening of crops which were worked by man. Because of the life giving qualities of the sun the Egyptians worshiped the sun as a god. The creator of the universe and the giver of life, the sun or Ra represented life, warmth and growth. Since the people regarded Ra as a principal god, creator of the universe and the source of life, he had a strong influence on them, which led to him being one of the most worshiped of all the Egyptian gods and even considered King of the Gods.
Ra | The sun as a creator
During this period, references to pagan gods disappeared from royal inscriptions and texts on public buildings, and were replaced by references to a single deity. Inscriptions in the Sabean language, and sometimes Hebrew, called this deity "[[Rahmanism|Rahman]]" (the Merciful), “Lord of the Heavens and Earth,” the “God of Israel” and “Lord of the Jews.” Prayers invoking Rahman's blessings on the “people of Israel” often ended with the Hebrew words "shalom" and "amen". There is evidence that the [[solar goddess]] [[Shams (goddess)|Shams]] was especially favoured in Himyar, being the national goddess and possibly an ancestral deity.
Himyarite Kingdom | Religious culture
The chief cultic center of Ra was "Iunu" "the Place of Pillars", later known to the Ptolemaic Kingdom as Heliopolis (, "Sun City") and today located in the suburbs of Cairo. He was identified with the local sun god Atum. As Atum or Atum-Ra, he was reckoned the first being and the originator of the Ennead ("The Nine"), consisting of Shu and Tefnut, Geb and Nut, Osiris, Set, Isis and Nephthys. The holiday of "The Receiving of Ra" was celebrated on May 26 in the Gregorian calendar. Ra's local cult began to grow from roughly the Second Dynasty, establishing him as a sun deity.
Ra | Worship
Ra (; or "rˤ;" also transliterated "rˤw" ; cuneiform: "ri-a" or "ri-ia") or Re (; , "Rē") is the ancient Egyptian deity of the sun. By the Fifth Dynasty in the 25th and 24th centuries BC, he had become one of the most important gods in ancient Egyptian religion, identified primarily with the noon sun. Ra was believed to rule in all parts of the created world: the sky, the Earth, and the underworld. He was the god of the sun, order, kings, and the sky. Ra was portrayed as a falcon and shared characteristics with the sky god Horus.
Ra | Introduction
Re supposedly gave warmth to the living body, symbolised as an ankh: a "T" shaped amulet with a looped upper half. The ankh, it was believed, was surrendered with death, but could be preserved in the corpse with appropriate mummification and funerary rites. The supremacy of Re in the Egyptian pantheon was at its highest with the 5th Dynasty, when open air solar temples became common. In the Middle Kingdom of Egypt, Ra lost some of his preeminence to Osiris, lord of the West, and judge of the dead. In the New Empire period, the Sun became identified with the dung beetle, whose spherical ball of dung was identified with the Sun.
Solar deity | Africa
Therefore, the sun was no independent deity yet. The first definite proof of the existence of the sun-deity Ra occurs at the beginning of the 3rd dynasty during the reign of king Djoser in the names of high officials such as Hesyre. And the first definitive detectable proof for a fully established royal sun cult occurs under king Radjedef, the third ruler of the 4th Dynasty. He was the first king who connected his birth name with the name of Ra, starting the great religious belief that Egyptian kings were the living representation of the sun alongside Horus and Seth.
Nebra (pharaoh) | Name sources
As the cult of Amun grew in importance, Amun became identified with the chief deity who was worshipped in other areas during that period, namely the sun god Ra. This identification led to another merger of identities, with Amun becoming Amun-Ra. In the "Hymn to Amun-Ra" he is described as
Amun | Identification with Min and Ra
He was also a solar deity, associated with the primary sun god Ra. Atum was linked specifically with the evening sun, while Ra or the closely linked god Khepri were connected with the sun at morning and midday. In the Book of the Dead, which was still current in the Graeco-Roman period, the sun god Atum is said to have ascended from chaos-waters with the appearance of a snake, the animal renewing itself every morning.
Atum | Role
Sun worship is deep rooted in the Vedas of the Hindu religion and its antiquity also relates to several mythologies of the world such as that of China, Egypt and Mesopotamia. The Gayatri Mantra jap – the sacred Vedic chants to Savitr (Sun god) – is recited by the Hindus every day with great reverence. As the puranic Hinduism evolved, the worship of Sun was established. In the Rig Veda , the sun god's bride seated on a chariot pulled by two steeds is mentioned. This symbolism is therefore common to both Norse mythology and Vedic history. The relevant verses (translated from Sanskrit by Ralph Griffith) are as follows:
Ratha Saptami | Background
She was one of many goddesses to take the role of the Eye of Ra, a feminine personification of the disk of the sun and an extension of Ra's own power. Ra was sometimes portrayed inside the disk, which Troy interprets as meaning that the Eye goddess was thought of as a womb from which the sun god was born. Hathor's seemingly contradictory roles as mother, wife, and daughter of Ra reflected the daily cycle of the sun. At sunset the god entered the body of the goddess, impregnating her and fathering the deities born from her womb at sunrise: himself and the Eye goddess, who would later give birth to him.
Hathor | Solar goddess
The Hittite king worshiped the Sun goddess with daily prayers at sun set. The Hittite texts preserve many prayers to the Sun goddess of Arinna: the oldest is from Arnuwanda I, while the best known is the prayer of Queen Puduḫepa, cited above.
Sun goddess of Arinna | Royal ideology
Thus, Userkaf's pyramid would be isolated in Saqqara, not even surrounded by a wider cemetery for his contemporaries, while the sun temple would serve the social need for a solar cult, which, while represented by the king, would not be exclusively embodied by him anymore. Malek similarly sees the construction of sun temples as marking a shift from the royal cult, which was so preponderant during the early Fourth Dynasty, to the cult of the sun god Ra. A result of these changes is that the king was now primarily revered as the son of Ra.
Userkaf | Significance
When Ra was in the underworld, he would visit all of his various forms. Apophis, the god of chaos, was an enormous serpent who attempted to stop the sun boat's journey every night by consuming it or by stopping it in its tracks with a hypnotic stare. During the evening, the Egyptians believed that Ra set as Atum or in the form of a ram. The night boat would carry him through the underworld and back towards the east in preparation for his rebirth. These myths of Ra represented the sun rising as the rebirth of the sun by the sky goddess Nut; thus attributing the concept of rebirth and renewal to Ra and strengthening his role as a creator god as well.
Ra | In the underworld
During the Middle Kingdom, Ra was increasingly affiliated and combined with other chief deities, especially Amun and Osiris.
Ra | Worship
The Abusir Papyri, a collection of administrative documents from later in the Fifth Dynasty, indicates that the cultic activities taking place in the sun and mortuary temples were related; for instance, offerings for both cults were dispatched from the sun temple. In fact, sun temples built during this period were meant to play for Ra the same role that the pyramid played for the king. They were funerary temples for the sun god, where his renewal and rejuvenation, necessary to maintain the order of the world, could take place. Rites performed in the temple were thus primarily concerned with Ra's creator function as well as his role as father of the king.
Userkaf | Function
Geraldine Pinch suggests that the Distant Goddess may have originally been a personification of the wild deserts of Nubia, whose myth was absorbed into a complex of myths surrounding the Eye of Ra. Toby Wilkinson says that in Early Dynastic times she may have been a protector goddess, associated with holy places.
Mehit | Introduction
Sekhmet was the Eye of Ra and was created by the fire in Ra's eye. She was violent and sent to slaughter the people who betrayed Ra, but when calm she became the more kind and forgiving goddess Hathor. Sekhmet was the powerful warrior and protector while Bastet, who was depicted as a cat, was shown as gentle and nurturing.
Ra | The sun as a creator
As with most widely worshiped Egyptian deities, Ra's identity was often combined with other gods, forming an interconnection between deities.
Ra | Gods merged with Ra
In later times, Helios was syncretized with Apollo.
Sun | Religious aspects
It has also been mentioned that because of the dual religious and administrative purposes, that the Sun cult might have held the surrounding lands to keep llamas for sacrifice like a similar site called Mayobamba.
Raqch'i | Layout
Solar deities are usually thought of as male while the lunar deity is female, but the opposite case is also seen. The cobra (of Pharaoh Son of Ra), the lioness (daughter of Ra), the cow (daughter of Ra), the dominant symbols of the most ancient Egyptian deities, carried their relationship to the sun atop their heads; they were female and their cults remained active throughout the history of the culture. Later a "sun god" (Aten) was established in the eighteenth dynasty on top of the other solar deities, before the "aberration" was stamped out and the old pantheon re-established. When male deities became associated with the sun in that culture, they began as the offspring of a mother (except Ra, King of the Gods who gave birth to himself).
Solar deity | Female and male
The sun disc appears in connection to one of the state patrons (for example, under Peribsen's predecessor Raneb the sun was connected to Horus); under Peribsen it was connected to Seth. Under king Khasekhemwy the sun finally received its own name ("ra") and, at the time of throne change between Khasekhemwy and his follower Djoser, several priests and officials also connected their name to Ra.
Seth-Peribsen | Religious changes
The solar Aten was extensively worshipped as a god in the reign of Amenhotep III when it was depicted as a falcon-headed man much like Ra. In the reign of Amenhotep III's successor, Amenhotep IV, the Aten became the central god of the Egyptian state religion, and Amenhotep IV changed his name to Akhenaten to reflect his close link with the new supreme deity. The principles of Aten's religion were recorded on the rock tomb walls of Akhetaten. In the religion of Aten (Atenism), night is a time to fear. Work is done best when the sun, Aten, is present.
Aten | Religion
The high priests of Ra are not as well documented as those of other deities, although the high priests of Dynasty VI () have been discovered and excavated. During the Amarna Period of Dynasty XVIII, Pharaoh Akhenaten introduced a kind of henotheistic worship of Aten, the deified solar disc. As part of his construction projects, he built a Heliopolitan temple named "Elevating Aten" (' or "Wetjes Atum"), whose stones can still be seen in some of the gates of Cairo's medieval city wall. The cult of the Mnevis bull, another embodiment of the Sun, had its altar here as well.
Heliopolis (ancient Egypt) | Egyptian
Ra gave rise to his daughter, the Eye goddess, who in turn gave rise to him, her son, in a cycle of constant regeneration. The Eye of Ra protected the sun god from his enemies and was often represented as a uraeus, or rearing cobra, or as a lioness. A form of the Eye of Ra known as "Hathor of the Four Faces", represented by a set of four cobras, was said to face in each of the cardinal directions to watch for threats to the sun god. A group of myths, known from the New Kingdom (c. 1550–1070 BC) onward, describe what happens when the Eye goddess rampages uncontrolled.
Hathor | Solar goddess
Early Egyptian myths imply the Sun is within the lioness, Sekhmet, at night and is reflected in her eyes; or that it is within the cow, Hathor, during the night, being reborn each morning as her son ("bull"). Mesopotamian Shamash plays an important role during the Bronze Age, and "my Sun" is eventually used as an address to royalty. Similarly, South American cultures have a tradition of Sun worship, as with the Incan Inti. Proto-Indo-European religion has a solar chariot, the Sun as traversing the sky in a chariot. In Germanic mythology this is "Sol", in Vedic Surya, and in Greek Helios (occasionally referred to as Titan) and (sometimes) as Apollo.
Solar deity | Overview
In other cities, two goddesses were worshipped as the belligerent and peaceful forms of the Eye, as with Ayet and Nehemtawy at Herakleopolis or Satet and Anuket at Aswan. In another temple ritual, the pharaoh played a ceremonial game in honor of the Eye goddesses Hathor, Sekhmet, or Tefnut, in which he struck a ball symbolizing the Eye of Apep with a club made from a type of wood that was said to have sprung from the Eye of Ra. The ritual represents, in a playful form, the battle of Ra's Eye with its greatest foe. The concept of the solar Eye as mother, consort, and daughter of a god was incorporated into royal ideology.
Eye of Ra | Worship
The most important temple of the Sun goddess was in the city of Arinna; there was another on the citadel of Ḫattuša. The goddess was depicted as a solar disc. In the city of Tarḫurpa, several such discs were venerated, which had been donated by the Hittite queens. King Ulmi-Teššup of Tarḫuntašša donated a Sun disc of gold, silver and copper to the goddess each year, along with a bull and three sheep. She was also often depicted as a woman and statuettes of a sitting goddess with a halo may also be depictions of her. The deer was sacred to the Sun goddess and Queen Puduḫepa promised to give her many deer in her prayers.
Sun goddess of Arinna | Cult
Under the reign of the Fourth Dynasty king Djedefre, the cult of the sun-god Ra reached a new peak. Egyptian pharaohs now believed that they were the actual sons of Ra, since Ra himself had just become the greatest of all gods. This would later change and Ra merged symbolically with the god Amun.
Nomen (Ancient Egypt) | Symbology
Userkaf may have been a high-priest of Ra before ascending the throne, and built a sun temple, known as the "Nekhenre", between Abusir and Abu Gurab. In doing so, he instituted a tradition followed by his successors over a period of 80 years. The "Nekhenre" mainly functioned as a mortuary temple for the setting sun. Rites performed in the temple were primarily concerned with Ra's creator function and his role as father of the king. Taken with the reduction in the size of the royal mortuary complex, this suggests a more concrete separation between the sun god and the king than in the preceding dynasties.
Userkaf | Introduction
At the western end of the rectangular court was a giant obelisk, a symbol of the sun god Ra. It was built on a pedestal with sloping sides and a square top, like a truncated pyramid, which was high and was constructed of limestone and red granite around the base. The obelisk topping it was another high, built entirely of limestone.
Nyuserre Ini | Sun Temple
Pharaohs took on the role of Ra, and their consorts were associated with the Eye and the goddesses equated with it. The sun disks and uraei that were incorporated into queens' headdresses during the New Kingdom reflect this mythological tie. The priestesses who acted as ceremonial "wives" of particular gods during the Third Intermediate Period (c. 1059–653 BC), such as the God's Wife of Amun, had a similar relationship with the gods they served. Amenhotep III even dedicated a temple at Sedeinga in Nubia to his wife, Tiye, as a manifestation of the Eye of Ra, paralleling the temple to Amenhotep himself at nearby Soleb.
Eye of Ra | Worship
Upon her return, the goddess becomes the consort of Ra or of the god who has retrieved her. Her pacification restores order and renews life. As Ra grows older and weaker, humanity, too, turns against him. In an episode often called "The Destruction of Mankind", related in "The Book of the Heavenly Cow", Ra discovers that humanity is plotting rebellion against him and sends his Eye to punish them. She slays many people, but Ra apparently decides that he does not want her to destroy all of humanity. He has beer dyed red to resemble blood and spreads it over the field.
Egyptian mythology | The reign of the sun god
Ra was represented in a variety of forms. The most usual form was a man with the head of a falcon and a solar disk on top and a coiled serpent around the disk. Other common forms are a man with the head of a beetle (in his form as Khepri), or a man with the head of a ram. Ra was also pictured as a full-bodied ram, beetle, phoenix, heron, serpent, bull, cat, or lion, among others. He was most commonly featured with a ram's head in the Underworld. In this form, Ra is described as being the "ram of the west" or "ram in charge of his harem.
Ra | Iconography
The concept of the sun in Pre-Islamic Arabia, was abolished only under Muhammad. The Arabian solar deity appears to have been a goddess, Shams/Shamsun, most likely related to the Canaanite Shapash and broader middle-eastern Shamash. She was the patron goddess of Himyar, and possibly exalted by the Sabaeans and early Bedouin.
Solar deity | Arabia
Ra is the Sun-god of Ancient Egypt. Ra or RA may also refer to:
Ra (disambiguation) | Introduction
By the Fourth Dynasty, pharaohs were seen as Ra's manifestations on earth, referred to as "Sons of Ra". His worship increased massively in the Fifth Dynasty, when Ra became a state deity and pharaohs had specially aligned pyramids, obelisks, and sun temples built in his honor. The rulers of the Fifth Dynasty told their followers that they were sons of Ra himself and the wife of the high priest of Heliopolis. These pharaohs spent much of Egypt's money on sun temples. The first Pyramid Texts began to arise, giving Ra more and more significance in the journey of the pharaoh through the Duat (underworld).
Ra | Worship
The Samis considered the Sun as Sala Niejta and Rana Niejta were two different goddesses, which, together with
Rana Niejta | Sala Niejta and Rana Niejta
During the Amarna period, this synthesis was seen as the invisible source of energy of the sun god, of which the visible manifestation was the Aten, the solar disk. Thus Ra-Horus-Aten was a development of old ideas which came gradually. The real change, as some see it, was the apparent abandonment of all other gods, especially Amun-Ra, prohibition of idolatry, and the debatable introduction of quasi-monotheism by Akhenaten. The syncretism is readily apparent in the Great Hymn to the Aten in which Re-Herakhty, Shu and Aten are merged into the creator god. Others see Akhenaten as a practitioner of an Aten monolatry, as he did not actively deny the existence of other gods; he simply refrained from worshipping any but the Aten.
Aten | Royal Titulary
This also underscores the dependent position of the king with respect to Ra, as offerings were made to the sun god and then to the deceased king.
Neferirkare Kakai | Sun temple
One of the examples of this can be seen in three spells, which originally mentioned Ra (as it can be seen from 18th dynasty copies of the text), but here they mention Osiris. Another hymn, originally belonging to Osiris, was enriched with solar elements.
Gautseshen | Description
Then, when he beheld the sun rising in all its splendor, he said; "This is my Lord, (is it)? This one is the greatest of all!" But when it set, he said: "O my people! Surely I am free from your association of partner with God and from whatever you associate with Him as partners." This verse hints at an important reality through a grammatical rule which is impossible to render in translation according to Unal: The sun is a feminine word in Arabic; whereas prophet Abraham, used a masculine pronoun when pointing to it. This means that his people, like almost all other polytheist peoples, considered their greatest deity as being male.
Al-An'am | Q6:78 hints at an important reality
The gods were believed to manifest in many forms. The Egyptians had a complex conception of the human soul, consisting of several parts. The spirits of the gods were composed of many of these same elements. The "ba" was the component of the human or divine soul that affected the world around it. Any visible manifestation of a god's power could be called its "ba"; thus, the sun was called the "ba" of Ra. A depiction of a deity was considered a "ka", another component of its being, which acted as a vessel for that deity's "ba" to inhabit. The cult images of gods that were the focus of temple rituals, as well as the sacred animals that represented certain deities, were believed to house divine "ba"s in this way.
Ancient Egyptian deities | Manifestations and combinations
Nyuserre was the penultimate Egyptian pharaoh to build a sun temple. In doing so, he was following a tradition established by Userkaf that reflects the paramount importance of the cult of Ra during the Fifth Dynasty. Sun temples built during this period were meant to play for Ra the same role that the pyramid played for the king: they were funerary temples for the sun god, where his renewal and rejuvenation necessary to maintain the order of the world could take place. Cults performed in the temple were thus primarily concerned with Ra's creator function as well as his role as father of the king.
Nyuserre Ini | Sun Temple
However, Martinelli argues that, when considered as a whole, one can discern a unified world view that draws upon many sources, but is also unique to Sun Ra, writing: He drew on sources as diverse as the Kabbalah, Rosicrucianism, channeling, numerology, Freemasonry, Ancient Egyptian Mysticism, and Black nationalism. Sun Ra's system had distinct Gnostic leanings, arguing that the god of most monotheistic religions was not the creator god, not the ultimate god, but a lesser, evil being. Sun Ra was wary of the Bible, knowing that it had been used to justify slavery. He often re-arranged and re-worded Biblical passages (and re-worked many other words, names, or phrases) in an attempt to uncover "hidden" meanings.
Sun Ra | Philosophy
Maat was the goddess of harmony, justice, and truth represented as a young woman. Sometimes she is depicted with wings on each arm or as a woman with an ostrich feather on her head. The meaning of this emblem is uncertain, although the god Shu, who in some myths is Maat's brother, also wears it. Depictions of Maat as a goddess are recorded from as early as the middle of the Old Kingdom (c. 2680 to 2190 BCE). The sun-god Ra came from the primaeval mound of creation only after he set his daughter Maat in place of Isfet (chaos).
Maat | Goddess
"Riosi" is thought to be the indigenous deity "Onoruame" ("Great Father"), and the Virgin Mary is "Iyeruame" ("Great Mother"). The indigenous counterparts of Father-Sun and Mother Moon overlap, respectively, with these concepts of God and God's wife. Another reported variation is that God has a wife who lives with him in heaven, along with their sons, the so-called "sukristo" (from Spanish "Jesucristo") and their daughters, the "santi". These beings have a direct link with the physical world through Catholic iconography, crucifixes and saints’ medallions, respectively.
Rarámuri | Religious beliefs
Because of the great importance of the sun in Egyptian religion, this emblem is one of the most common religious symbols in all of Egyptian art. Although Egyptologists usually call this emblem the "sun disk", its convex shape in Egyptian relief sculpture suggests that the Egyptians may have envisioned it as a sphere. The emblem often appears atop the heads of solar-associated deities, including Ra himself, to indicate their links with the sun. The disk could even be regarded as Ra's physical form. At other times, the sun god, in various forms, is depicted inside the disk shape, as if enclosed within it.
Eye of Ra | Solar
His consort is the Hattic solar deity. This divine couple were presumably worshipped in the twin cellas of the largest temple at Hattusa. In the 13th century BC some explicit gestures toward syncretism appear in inscriptions. Puduhepa, a queen and priestess, worked on organizing and rationalizing her people's religion. In an inscription she invokes: Sun-Goddes of Arinna, my lady, you are the queen of all lands! In the land of Hatti you have assumed the name of Sun-Goddess of Arinna, but in respect to the land which you made of cedars, you have assumed the name Hebat.
Hittite mythology and religion | Deities and their myths
Once Rahu approached with his mouth agape to eclipse the Sun, he became very angry when he saw the burning rays of the Sun. He began to emit poisonous breath in his serpent form, blackening the face of the Sun. Having lost his glorious face by Rahu's poisonous breath, the Sun sought the favor of Lord Shiva and worshiped him on the northern banks of the Kudamurutti River, a tributary of the Kaveri, under a Bilwa Tree. First Goddess Parvathy Devi blessed Sun, and then Lord Shiva himself joined her and the divine couple blessed him. Lord Shiva relieved the Sun of the evil effects of Rahus's poison and the Sun regained His charm and brightness.
Vishahareswara Temple | Mythology
Along with Ahura Mazda, Mithra was the most important deity in the ancient Iranian pantheon. He may have occupied a position almost equal to him. In the Achaemenid inscriptions, Mithra is along with Anahita the only deity specifically mentioned. In the ancient Iranian pantheon there was an individual sun god called Hvar Khshaita. In the eastern Iranian traditions laid out in the Avesta, Mithra also appears to have a connection to the sun, especially with the first rays of sunrise as he drives forward in his chariot. In the western Iranian tradition Mithra was thoroughly associated with the sun and his name became the common word for "sun".
Ancient Iranian religion | Mithra
From the Sun came fire and spirit." According to Dunlap, "this was the astronomical religion of the Chaldeans, Jews, Persians, Syrians, Phoenicians and Egyptians."
Seven rays | Syncretistic interpretations
According to a tale from Middle Kingdom period, "Tale of Djedi and the Magicians", the first few kings of the Fifth Dynasty were triplets and the actual progeny of the sun god Ra. There appears to be some truth behind this myth: not only were the second and third kings of the fifth dynasty brothers, but these rulers also started an unusually strong devotion to Ra that lasted throughout the V and VI Dynasties.
Egyptian sun temple | Mythology and factual basis
Ra was the solar deity, bringer of light, and thus the upholder of Ma'at. Apep was viewed as the greatest enemy of Ra, and thus was given the title "Enemy of Ra", and also "the Lord of Chaos". Apep was seen as a giant snake or serpent leading to such titles as "Serpent from the Nile" and "Evil Dragon". Some elaborations said that he stretched 16 yards in length and had a head made of flint. Already on a Naqada I (c. 4000 BC) C-ware bowl (now in Cairo) a snake was painted on the inside rim combined with other desert and aquatic animals as a possible enemy of a deity, possibly a solar deity, who is invisibly hunting in a big rowing vessel.
Apep | Development
However, the present image of the deity is made of neem wood. Legend further says that Lord Jagannath was originally worshiped by a Savara raja (an aboriginal tribal chieftain) named Viswabasu. Having heard about the glory of the deity, Raja Indradyumna sent a Brahmin priest called Vidyapati to discover the exact location of the deity who was then secretly worshipped by Viswabasu inside the cave of a dense forest. Vidyapati tried his best, but could not locate the place of worship. Finally, he could manage to marry Lalita, the daughter of Viswabasu. At repeated request of Lalita, Viswabasu took his son-in-law blind-folded to a cave wherein Lord Neelamadhaba was being worshipped.
Sora people | Religion
Therefore, Nebra's Horus name is problematic regarding its translation and meaning. The typical translation of Nebra's name as "Ra is my lord", which would be read "Raneb", is questionable, as this would assume that the Sun was already being worshiped as an independent deity. Consequently, Egyptologists have proposed the translation "Lord of the sun (of Horus)" which is read "Nebra" and implies the pharaoh's rule over the Sun (as a celestial body), which was indeed also under Horus' or Seth's control. Any solar religion or solar symbolism were not yet established in any useful form and it is now thought that king Nebra might actually have been the first king who adopted extended religious thought about the sun and the sky.
Nebra (pharaoh) | Name sources
Following a tradition which started with Userkaf, the founder of the Fifth Dynasty, Menkauhor built a temple to the sun god Ra. He was the last pharaoh to do so. His successors, Djedkare Isesi and Unas, abandoned this practice as the cult of Ra declined at the expense of that of Osiris. Given the paucity of documents relating to Menkauhor's sun temple, it probably functioned for only a short time or was never completed. Menkauhor's sun temple was called "Akhet-Ra", which is variously translated as "The Horizon of Ra" or "The Place where Ra Issues Forth". The temple has yet to be located and could be lying under the sands of Saqqara or Abusir.
Menkauhor Kaiu | Sun temple
At times the two deities were merged as Ra-Horakhty, "Ra, who is Horus of the Two Horizons". In the New Kingdom, when the god Amun rose to prominence he was fused with Ra into Amun-Ra. The cult of the Mnevis bull, an embodiment of Ra, had its center in Heliopolis and there was a formal burial ground for the sacrificed bulls north of the city.
Ra | Introduction
Hathor was a solar deity, a feminine counterpart to sun gods such as Horus and Ra, and was a member of the divine entourage that accompanied Ra as he sailed through the sky in his barque. She was commonly called the "Golden One", referring to the radiance of the sun, and texts from her temple at Dendera say "her rays illuminate the whole earth." She was sometimes fused with another goddess, Nebethetepet, whose name can mean "Lady of the Offering", "Lady of Contentment", or "Lady of the Vulva". At Ra's cult center of Heliopolis, Hathor-Nebethetepet was worshipped as his consort, and the Egyptologist Rudolf Anthes argued that Hathor's name referred to a mythical "house of Horus" at Heliopolis that was connected with the ideology of kingship.
Hathor | Solar goddess
The German Egyptologist Hartwig Altenmüller writes that for an Egyptian of the time "the [...] afterlife no longer depends on the relationship between the individual mortal and the king, [...] instead it is linked to his ethical position in direct relation to Osiris". In contrast, the cult of the sun god Ra was in apparent decline, even though Ra was still the most important deity of the Egyptian pantheon. Thus, Djedkare Isesi and Unas did not build a sun temple in contrast with most of their Fifth Dynasty predecessors. In addition, the names of Menkauhor Kaiu and Unas do not incorporate any reference to Ra, in rupture with a tradition which held since the reign of Userkaf, about a century earlier.
Unas | Evolution of religion and kingship
In Proto-indo-European mythology the sun appears to be a multilayered figure, manifested as a goddess but also perceived as the eye of the sky father Dyeus.
Solar deity | Overview
Hathor is commonly depicted as a cow goddess with head horns in which is set a sun disk with Uraeus. Twin feathers are also sometimes shown in later periods as well as a necklace. Hathor may be the cow goddess who is depicted from an early date on the Narmer Palette and on a stone urn dating from the 1st dynasty that suggests a role as sky-goddess and a relationship to Horus who, as a sun god, is "housed" in her. Hathor had a complex relationship with Ra, in one myth she is his eye and considered his daughter but later, when Ra assumes the role of Horus with respect to Kingship, she is considered Ra's mother.
Horned deity | Horned goddess Hathor
Christianity and Islam are the two major religions among the Afizere but some Afizere still choose to adhere to their traditional beliefs. In traditional Afizere religion, there is a supreme deity called Adakunom meaning father of the sun who is considered the creator and source of life and health. A few minor gods exist to act as mediators to Adakunom. Father of the sun is the literal translation of Adakunom but can be translated as "father, the sun" or "mighty sun" (the almighty sun). Then there are the spirits or witches who are the source of both good and evil.
Afusari | Religion
The Eye of Ra was invoked in many areas of Egyptian religion, and its mythology was incorporated into the worship of many of the goddesses identified with it. The Eye's flight from and return to Egypt was a common feature of temple ritual in the Ptolemaic and Roman periods (305 BC – AD 390), when the new year and the Nile flood that came along with it were celebrated as the return of the Eye after her wanderings in foreign lands. The Egyptians built shrines along the river containing images of animals and dwarfs rejoicing at the goddess' arrival. Scholars do not know how well developed the myth and the corresponding rituals were in earlier times.
Eye of Ra | Worship
Religious festivals did certainly take place in sun temples, as is attested to by the Abusir papyri. In the case of the "Setibre", the festival of the "Night of Ra" is specifically said to have taken place there. This was a festival concerned with Ra's journey during the night and connected with the ideas of renewal and rebirth that were central to sun temples. The temple played an important role in the distribution of food offerings which were brought everyday from there to the mortuary temple of the king. This journey was made by boat, indicating that the "Setibre" was not adjacent to Neferirkare's pyramid.
Neferirkare Kakai | Sun temple
Amun-Ra in this period (16th to 11th centuries BC) held the position of transcendental, self-created creator deity "par excellence"; he was the champion of the poor or troubled and central to personal piety. His position as King of Gods developed to the point of virtual monotheism where other gods became manifestations of him. With Osiris, Amun-Ra is the most widely recorded of the Egyptian gods.
Amun | Introduction
In the form of the sun disc Aten, the Sun had a brief resurgence during the Amarna Period when it again became the preeminent, if not only, divinity for the Pharaoh Akhenaton.
Solar deity | Africa
Proclus's version suggests that the goddess conceived and gave birth to the sun without the participation of a male deity, which would reflect Egyptian myths about Neith as the mother of the sun god Ra. Another possible explanation, suggested by the Egyptologist Jan Assmann, is that the latter part of the Egyptian inscription said "There is nobody except me", proclaiming that the all-encompassing goddess was unique, and was mistranslated into Greek as "there is nobody who opened [or: uncovered] my face."
Veil of Isis | The statue and inscription at Sais
The Eye goddess, sometimes in the form of Hathor, rebels against Ra's control and rampages freely in a foreign land: Libya west of Egypt or Nubia to the south. Weakened by the loss of his Eye, Ra sends another god, such as Thoth, to bring her back to him. Once pacified, the goddess returns to become the consort of the sun god or of the god who brings her back. The two aspects of the Eye goddess—violent and dangerous versus beautiful and joyful—reflected the Egyptian belief that women, as the Egyptologist Carolyn Graves-Brown puts it, "encompassed both extreme passions of fury and love".
Hathor | Solar goddess
1631 are Muslims and seven did not answer.
Račak | Religion
During the Hittite New Kingdom, she was identified with the Hurrian-Syrian goddess Ḫepat and the Hittite Queen Puduḫepa mentions her in her prayers using both names:
Sun goddess of Arinna | Origin and development
The arms are supporting two praying goddesses named West and East in a reverse orientation. It is believed that the upper register of this part ends with a line containing a title of this work, though it is still unknown. The middle register begins with the solar barque again. It is towed by fourteen ram-headed gods with all of their bas. Next, a god stands in his cave, surrounded by twelve star goddesses who are extending discs to him. The following scene, which is scattered around the tomb of Ramesses VI, shows five burial mounds with a head and arms emerging from it.
Book of the Earth | Part A
The Hurrians worshipped a great number of gods derived from various different cultures, especially Mesopotamia and Syria. Many gods were syncretised with Mesopotamian and Syrian deities over time; for example, Šauška was identified with Ishtar of Nineveh, Teššub with the , Kušuḫ with the moon god and the Sun god Šimige with Šamaš of Sippar. This syncretism also embraced the native partners of the gods, like the Syrian Ḫebat as wife of Teššub among the western Hurrians, Nikkal as wife of the moon god, and Aya as wife of the sun god. The chief god of the Hurrians was the weather god Teššub.
Hurrian religion | Gods
Ravana was deemed fit because this ceremony was performed in order to achieve victory in the war to follow. In order to defeat a warrior like Ravana, the performer had to be a Brahmin who performed the ritual of Trisandhya everyday without fail. At that time, Ravana was the only such Brahmin in all of Creation. After Lord Rama left, the stone idol was worshiped by the local tribes. Thus the ancient tribal goddess was described as a Hindu goddess.
Maa Tarini | Mythological origin of the goddess
The Eye goddess drinks the beer, becomes drunk, and ceases her rampage. Ra then withdraws into the sky, weary of ruling on earth, and begins his daily journey through the heavens and the Duat. The surviving humans are dismayed, and they attack the people among them who plotted against Ra. This event is the origin of warfare, death, and humans' constant struggle to protect "maat" from the destructive actions of other people.
Egyptian mythology | The reign of the sun god
Not all aspects of existence were seen as deities. Although many deities were connected with the Nile, no god personified it in the way that Ra personified the sun. Short-lived phenomena, such as rainbows or eclipses, were not represented by gods; neither were fire, water, or many other components of the world. The roles of each deity were fluid, and each god could expand its nature to take on new characteristics. As a result, gods' roles are difficult to categorize or define. Despite this flexibility, the gods had limited abilities and spheres of influence. Not even the creator god could reach beyond the boundaries of the cosmos that he created, and even Isis, though she was said to be the cleverest of the gods, was not omniscient.
Ancient Egyptian deities | Roles
Despite his alignment with Seth, numerous deities were worshipped by the populace under Peribsen. Numerous clay seal impressions and jar inscriptions mention the gods Ash, Horus, Nekhbet, Min, Bastet and Kherty. The depictions of the deities are followed by the name of the place or town where they had their principal cult center. On the Cairo stone, a statue of Ash and a fetish of Seth are credited to Peribsen, complementing the clay seal impressions. Curiously, several seal impressions show a sun disc over the Seth chimera atop the royal serekh: the ancient symbol for the god Ra. There is no archaeologic proof that the sun god Ra was part of the Egyptian pantheon at this early date; the appearance of the disc may be the first evidence of the evolving sun cult and theistic change.
Seth-Peribsen | Religious changes
Distinguishing the various solar deities in the texts is difficult since most are simply written with the Sumerogram UTU (Solar deity). As a result, the interpretation of the solar deities remains a subject of debate.
Sun goddess of Arinna | Introduction
Many of the world's sacrificed godmen, such as Osiris and Mithra, have their traditional birthday on 25 December. During this time, people believed that the "sun god" had "died" for three days and was "born again" on 25 December. After 25 December, the Sun supposedly moves 1 degree north, foreshadowing longer days. The three days following 21 December remain the darkest days of the year where Jesus (the sun) dies and remains unseen for three days.
Solar deity | Christianity
It served primarily as a place of worship for the mortuary cult of Ra and was supposed to relate it to the royal funerary cult. Structurally, the sun temple and the royal mortuary complex were very similar, as they included a valley temple close to the Nile and a causeway leading up to the high temple on the desert plateau. In other ways their architectures differed. For example, the valley temple of the sun temple complex is not oriented to any cardinal point, rather pointing vaguely to Heliopolis, and the causeway is not aligned with the axis of the high temple.
Userkaf | Function
The Tiv people consider the Sun to be the son of the Moon Awondo's daughter and the supreme being Awondo. The Barotse tribe believes that the Sun is inhabited by the sky god Nyambi and the Moon is his wife. Some Sara people also worship the Sun. Even where the sun god is equated with the supreme being, in some African mythologies he or she does not have any special functions or privileges as compared to other deities. The ancient Egyptian god of creation, Amun is also believed to reside inside the sun. So is the Akan creator deity, Nyame and the Dogon deity of creation, Nommo.
Solar deity | Africa
The upper temple comprised a large rectangular courtyard entered via five granite doorways located on its eastern side. An altar was located in the center of the courtyard, which can still be seen today. It was constructed from five large blocks of alabaster, one shaped like the hieroglyph for Ra and the others shaped like the glyph for "hotep". They were arranged so as to read "Ra Hotep", that is "May Ra be satisfied", from the four cardinal points. The sign for "Hotep" also means "offering" or "offering table" in Ancient Egyptian, so that the altar was literally an offering table to Ra.
Nyuserre Ini | Sun Temple
Kaplony has proposed that Shepseskare started to build a sun temple named "Ḥtp-jb-Rˁ", reading "Hotepibre" and meaning "Satisfied is the heart of Ra". Although all the kings of the early to mid-Fifth Dynasty, from Userkaf to Menkauhor Kaiu, did build sun temples, Verner regards Kaplony's hypothesis as "sheer speculation" since it is based on the tentative reconstruction of a single clay seal. Verner first argues that this seal is not inscribed with Shepseskare's name but rather bears traces of a Horus name which could equally well be that of Djedkare Isesi. Second, Verner notes that the name of a sun temple is rarely found with that of the king who built it: more often it is found with the name of another king during whose reign the seal was made.
Shepseskare | Sun temple
Thus, Nuha was the name of the sun goddess in Northern Arabia, while the name of the sun goddess in Southern Arabia was Shams. As Nuha, Shams was also worshipped in a trinity alongside the male gods of the Moon and Venus. In Saba', the sun goddess Shams was worshipped with the god of the planet Venus, Athtar, and Almaqah, the god of the Moon. In Hadhramaut, Shams was worshipped with Athtar and the moon god Syn. Shams was described as the spouse of Athtar. She was given votive offerings in the shape of horses.
Shams (deity) | Introduction
The Egyptians portrayed the god Ra as being carried across the sky in a solar barque, accompanied by lesser gods, and to the Greeks, he was Helios, carried by a chariot drawn by fiery horses. From the reign of Elagabalus in the late Roman Empire the Sun's birthday was a holiday celebrated as Sol Invictus (literally "Unconquered Sun") soon after the winter solstice, which may have been an antecedent to Christmas. Regarding the fixed stars, the Sun appears from Earth to revolve once a year along the ecliptic through the zodiac, and so Greek astronomers categorized it as one of the seven planets (Greek "planetes", "wanderer"); the naming of the days of the weeks after the seven planets dates to the Roman era.
Sun | Early understanding
He recognizes that uneducated Hindus worshiped a multiplicity of idols yet points out that even some Muslims (such as the Jabiriyya) have adopted anthropomorphic concepts of God.
Al-Biruni | History of religions
It has also been argued that the worship of Attis drew on Hurrian myth. In addition to the myths, there are also narratives and legends, like the history of Appu and his two sons, "Wrong" and "Right", and the account of the Sun god and the cow. In both legends, the Sun god appears as a young man. There are traces of heroic epics among this category.
Hurrian religion | Mythology
In late antiquity mysticism, the sun god Helios is sometimes equated to the Judeo-Christian God.
Interpretatio graeca | Application to the Jewish religion
The Egyptians often referred to the sun and the moon as the "eyes” of particular gods. The right eye of the god Horus, for instance, was equated with the sun, and his left eye equated with the moon. At times the Egyptians called the lunar eye the "Eye of Horus", a concept with its own complex mythology and symbolism, and called the solar eye the "Eye of Ra"—Ra being the preeminent sun god in ancient Egyptian religion. However, in Egyptian belief, many terms and concepts are fluid, so the sun could also be called the "Eye of Horus". The yellow or red disk-like sun emblem in Egyptian art represents the Eye of Ra.
Eye of Ra | Solar
Egyptians worshipped a sun god under several names, and solar worship had been growing in popularity even before Akhenaten, especially during the Eighteenth Dynasty and the reign of Amenhotep III, Akhenaten's father. During the New Kingdom, the pharaoh started to be associated with the sun disc; for example, one inscriptions called the pharaoh Hatshepsut the "female Re shining like the Disc," while Amenhotep III was described as "he who rises over every foreign land, Nebmare, the dazzling disc." During the Eighteenth Dynasty, a religious hymn to the sun also appeared and became popular among Egyptians. However, Egyptologists question whether there is a causal relationship between the cult of the sun disc before Akhenaten and Akhenaten's religious policies.
Akhenaten | Atenism
In the New Kingdom, Amun became successively identified with all other Egyptian deities, to the point of virtual monotheism (which was then attacked by means of the "counter-monotheism" of Atenism). Primarily, the god of wind "Amun" came to be identified with the solar god Ra and the god of fertility and creation Min, so that Amun-Ra had the main characteristic of a solar god, creator god and fertility god. He also adopted the aspect of the ram from the Nubian solar god, besides numerous other titles and aspects. As Amun-Re, he was petitioned for mercy by those who believed suffering had come about as a result of their own or others' wrongdoing.
Amun | Theology
Userkaf is the first pharaoh to build a dedicated temple to the sun god Ra in the Memphite necropolis north of Abusir, on a promontory on the desert edge just south of the modern locality of Abu Gurab. Works might have started during Userkaf's fifth or sixth year of reign. The only plausible precedent for Userkaf's sun temple was the temple associated with the Great Sphinx of Giza, which may have been dedicated to Ra and may thus have served similar purposes. In any case, Userkaf's successors for the next 80 years followed his course of action: sun temples were built by all subsequent Fifth Dynasty pharaohs until Menkauhor Kaiu, with the possible exception of Shepseskare, whose reign might have been too short to build one.
Userkaf | Significance
The Neolithic concept of a "solar barge" (also "solar bark", "solar barque", "solar boat" and "sun boat", a mythological representation of the Sun riding in a boat) is found in the later myths of ancient Egypt, with Ra and Horus. Predynasty Egyptian beliefs attribute Atum as the sun-god and Horus as a god of the sky and Sun. As the Old Kingdom theocracy gained power, early beliefs were incorporated with the expanding popularity of Ra and the Osiris-Horus mythology. Atum became Ra-Atum, the rays of the setting Sun. Osiris became the divine heir to Atum's power on Earth and passes his divine authority to his son Horus.
Solar deity | Overview