Thoth

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Thoth

Thoth (thŏth, tōt), in Egyptian religion, god of wisdom and magic. A patron of learning and of the arts, he was credited with many inventions, including writing, geometry, and astronomy. Perhaps originally a moon god, Thoth was also a messenger and scribe for the gods. He was identified by the Greeks with Hermes and as such was specifically named Hermes Trismegistus (see Hermetic books). He was variously represented as an ibis, as an ibis-headed man, or as a baboon.

Thoth

(religion, spiritualism, and occult)

In Graeco-Roman times, the Egyptian Moon God Djehuti, or Zehuti, took the form Thoth (pronounced "Toe-th"). He was associated with Hermes. In Egypt, Thoth was patron of literature, science, wisdom, and inventions. He was also the spokesman for the gods and Keeper of the Records.

Thoth is depicted with the head of an ibis and, many times, wearing a solar disk sitting on a crescent on his head. Thoth also was occasionally depicted as a dog-headed ape, suggesting that he may have been derived from a fusion of two earlier lunar deities. He is usually counted as the oldest son of Ra but sometimes as the child of Geb and Nut.

Thoth had all knowledge and wisdom. He invented mathematics, astronomy, magic, medicine, music, and all the arts and sciences. He was also the inventor of hieroglyphs and, as such, became known as "Lord of Holy Words." As Moon God, it was his job to measure time.

A tarot deck designed by Aleister Crowley, with the art executed by Frieda Hariss, is known as the Crowley Thoth Tarot.

The following article is from The Great Soviet Encyclopedia (1979). It might be outdated or ideologically biased.

Thoth

in Egyptian mythology, the god of the moon, as well as of wisdom, writing, and reckoning. He was also the patron of the sciences, of scribes and sacred books, and of sorcery. The cult center of Thoth was Hermopolis Magna. Myths relate that as Osiris judged the dead, Thoth would record their deeds. He was worshipped in the form of an ibis or a baboon or as a man with the head of an ibis. In Greek mythology, Thoth was identified with Hermes.

REFERENCE

Turaev, B. A. Bog Tot. Leipzig, 1898.

Thoth

record-keeper of the dead. [Egyptian Myth.: Leach, 1109]

See: Death

References in periodicals archive ?

[Philo] This account was found written in the cosmogony of Thoth and in his hypomnemata, based on conjectures and indications which his intellect saw and found out and made clear to us.

Ab ovo: Orpheus, Sanchuniathon, and the origins of the Ionian world model

The compound T word presented the ultimate indignity to the chief god, Ptah; it relegated him, the so-called creator of all things, including the lesser gods, to second place, following the name of his scribe, Thoth.

The etymology of Totafot

"It is the first time that a statue of Thoth, depicting him as a monkey, of this magnitude has been discovered," Mansur Boraik, head of Pharaonic antiquities in Luxor, told AFP.

Colossal statue of ancient monkey god found in Luxor

Aside from allowing Moses to assert the superiority of masculine authority via the feminine as vessel, the Book of Thoth in Hurston's novel is the Center itself insofar as the book is a tool with which men communicate with the eternal.

National socialism and blood-sacrifice in Zora Neale Hurston's Moses, Man of the Mountain

The figure of Hermes Trismegistos, Hellenistic name for the Egyptian god Thoth (considered by his followers to be the inventor of writing), might at first seem a slender thread for linking the work of two Spanish-American poets whose writings span nearly three hundred years of literary history.

Narciso hermetico: Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz y Jose Lezama Lima

Recent publications include A Comparative Daimon (Prest Roots, 1990), Thoth's Bay (Spectacular Diseases, 1996), Communicator (Prest Roots, 1997) and The Polidori Perfection (Spectacular Diseases, 1998).

Roxy

"In the beginning was the word," may be a loose translation, but it does serve as genesis for the people of the book, and ibis-headed Thoth is god both of speech and its scribes.

SCRIBBLE, SCRIBBLE, SCRIBBLE

The most definitive of these texts was the Tabula Smaragdina or Emerald Tablet, which, according to legend, had been discovered by Alexander the Great in the Egyptian tomb of Hermes Trismegistos (`thrice-great'), the Greek counterpart of the Egyptian god of wisdom and magic, Thoth. The Emerald Tablet was inscribed with thirteen axioms.

A new light on alchemy

- one might almost call them poets - who effectively created Hermes Trismegistus by fathering upon this Hellenized form of the Egyptian god Thoth a body of quasi-philosophical writings.

The dreamer's path: Descartes and the Sixteenth Century

The tau is the monogram of Thoth, the Egyptian Hermes, the god of wisdom.

Cross

The Mummy Original poster - Wikimedia Commons "The Mummy" (1932) revolves around a British archaeologists team led by Sir Joseph Whemple, who discovered the mummified remains of the ancient Egyptian Prince Imhotep, playing his role in the movie Boris Karloff, along with legendary scroll of Thoth. Moreover, when one of the archaeologists declares the scroll aloud, Imhotep returns to life, but manages to escape.

"The Mummy" (1932) original poster to be sold at Sotheby's online auction Oct. 31

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