DeConick A.D

320
PLEASANTVILLE RELIGIONS
Liturgies of the Dead for the Living
The first and second books of Jeu complement each other in that they are
Gnostic liturgical handbooks. Each contains directions for ritual activities
that release the soul from the body and assist its ascent through the star
gates. The final stop is the highest and innermost treasury of light, the
house of Jeu.
The journey is very similar to what was envisioned for the Egyptian
dead, who had to journey through Duat, the Egyptian underworld. The
Book of the Dead comprises liturgical spells that guide the dead through
the gates into underworld realms and lead to Osiris, who lives beyond the
final gate. On the way to Osiris, however, the deceased is met at the gates
by horrible guardians with hippopotamus faces and snake bodies, watchers
who must be appeased with the correct spells.
These spells include calling out the guardians’ names and displaying
the guardians’ symbols. Failure to do so would result in immediate annihilation
of the deceased, who is swallowed by the frightening beast-like
gods. The deceased hoped to make it through all the gates safely and to
be brought under Osiris’s protection when he or she was admitted to his
court as a devotee. It was only the pharaohs, the royalty, who might look
forward to an afterlife sailing on Rê’s boat through the stars.
In Hellenistic times, however, the stellar afterlife became the prerogative
of people beyond the royal household. They thought it possible for
their souls to catch a ride on Rê’s bark, too. The liturgies in the books of
Jeu reflect this trend. The people who used these liturgies were trying to
make certain that their souls would not get stuck in the afterlife purgatories
but would be prepared to journey successfully through all the star
gates and make their final resting place with Jeu, the sun god.
The liturgies are systematic and instructional, ultimately leading the
initiates through the sixty treasuries with directives like “When you reach
the X realm, the rulers of that realm will come and stand in front of you.
Seal yourselves with the seal. Y is its name. Say it once. Hold this cipher in
your hands. When you have finished sealing yourself with this seal and you
have said its name once only, say these defenses too: ‘Withdraw! Because
we call upon Z.’ ”
The instructional nature of these liturgies strongly suggests rehearsal
and performance in a communal setting where a leader assists initiates