Anubis - God of the Afterlife essays

Anubis - God of the Afterlife essays Anubis was the god of embalming of the dead. Since jackals were often seen in cemeteries, the ancient Egyptians believed that Anubis (a god in the form of a Jackal) watched over the dead. Anubis was the god who helped to embalm Osiris, after Osiris was killed by his brother, Seth. Thus, Anubis was the god who watched over the process of mummifying people when they died. Anubis is said to be the son of the god Osiris, the first king or pharaoh on earth, and his sister Nephthys (Isis). After, Osiris was killed by his brother Seth, Anubis embalmed the body and wrapped it in linen bandages making Osiris the first mummy. After his own death, Osiris became ruler of the underworld. Anubis later defended the corps of Osiris against the attacks of Seth. Anubis was one of the most important godly officials when someone died; he guided the deceased through the underworld into the presence of Osiris and oversaw their judgment. In the Book of the Dead, he was depicted as presiding over the weighing of the heart of the deceased in the Hall of the Two Truths. The Ancient Egyptians believed that when you died, you traveled to the Hall of the Dead. There, Anubis weighed your heart against the feather of Maat. First, he steadied the scales to make the weighing fair. If your heart was heavier than the feather then it was eaten by a demon. We still talk of a heart as light as a feather to mean car-free, and heavy-hearted to mean sad. In his role as psychopomp, he was referred to as the Conductor of Souls into the afterlife. ...