Saturday, August 9, 2025

Rudolf Anthes (July 1959) on outstretched wings representing the heavens or the sky

  

The heavenly Horus was a star as well as the sun, and perhaps also the moon. It seems as if he was that celestial body which appeared conspicuous either at day or night. The idea that his wings represented the sky does not well fit into this concept of Horus, which was borne out by speculation rather than by observation. Horus was called “the lord of the sky,” “the one who presides over the sky,” and he was the permanent ruler of the sky, who unlike the sun did not vanish at night-time. (Rudolf Anthes, “Egyptian Theology in the Third Millennium B.C.,” Journal of Near Eastern Studies 18, no. 3 [July 1959], 171)

 

Compare the above with Joseph Smith’s comment that the winged figure in figure 4 of facsimile 2 “Answers to the Hebrew word Raukeeyang, signifying expanse, or the firmament of the heavens.”