A monograph on the reflection of the cult of the deities Osiris and Amon in ancient Egyptian art. The author is the prominent German Egyptologist Eberhard Otto (1913-1974).
The Egyptians worshiped many gods throughout the long centuries of their civilization, but behind the multiplicity of their divinities lies hidden a very human conception of God. He embodied the idea of divine powers; his actions were directed toward a human world, and in return he expected certain acts and attitudes from man. In order to receive man's worship, the divine power needed both a form and a place where men could come to offer their adoration. Among the Egyptian gods, the greatest were Osiris, paradoxically death-god and fertility-god, and Amon, the god of sky and sun; they were the inspiration for the country's most impressive monuments and works of art. The cult of Amon centered on Thebes, the "hundred-gated of Homer, where the mighty temples of Karnak and Luxor were built. In Abydos, many miles to the northwest, were the sites sacred to Osiris. Paintings, statues, painted relief sculptures, poetical texts written and illustrated on papyrus scrolls - all these forms were used to decorate or furnish the sumptuous temples of the Egyptian gods.