What differentiates a cult from a religion?

[Proteus_MST]

To the contrary.
The weighting of the heart seems to have been accompanied by the dead person being forced to recite 42 negative confessions,
which more or less meant that the dead person had to tell Anubis and his accessors, that it didn't violate 42 commandments (similar to the 10 commandments in christian religion)

See here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maat#42_Negative_Confessions_.28Papyrus_of_Ani.29

Also, regarding mummification, don't underestimate how widespread mummification was.
It seems like, at least from the upper middle class, a majority people underwent the process of mummification ... andeven for the lower classes there was a cheaper method of mummification that was described by Herodotus ... just that the mummiees of the common folks are not as well known as the mummies of the pharaohs (as, of course, there was a significant quality difference between the procedures that Pharaoh could afford and those of craftsmen/architects/public officials or even the lower classes. And of course they didn't have this rich wealth of grave offerings ... or the protection mechanisms to actually save their grave offerings from tomb raiders.

Actually, during european colonial times, so widespread were the mummies in egypt, that most apothecaries in europe were able to offer their clients mummia ... powder from ground egyptian mummies. And it is even said that, trains in british colonial egypt sometimes have used mummies to power their steam engines.
With this careless attitude europeans destroyed more historical treasures, than IS with their targeted vandalism.

Archaeologists actually found a gravesite with ~1 million mummies, just 2 years ago:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2877855/Cemetery-one-MILLION-mummies-unearthed-Egypt-1-500-year-old-desert-necropolis-largest-found.html

To um it up:
Getting mummifieed in order to try to get into the egyptian afterlife seems to have been rather widespread and not a rare exception that was reserved only for a few members of the elite.

And, as depicted, the 42 negative confessions point to a moral codex that bore lots of similarities to christianities list of sins and commandments.
Just that the punishment (for commiting one of the 42 sins) was not eternal suffering, but just your soul getting devoured by Ammit.

[grumbler]

This is fascinating stuff, of which I was not aware. Thanks for sharing.

[Bereta_Eder]

indeed very interesting


the greek gods (romans were a copy more or less) indeed had whimps were acting like little children lots of times and the idea was among others not to piss them off or to gain their favor. But sometimes things were so random you were often a victim of the circumstances. (even having a nice booty could potentially put you in god-danger)
That's not to say that there was not a sense of right and wrong. Bu they didn't have a lot to do with the christian god who is authoritative and has a very clear cut of what is right or wrong (good or evil)

This manichaistic duality could be a characteristic of the aramaic religions? who knows. I don't

And yep, there was no "hell" in the ancient world. you paid the ferry man and entered the underworld. everything was toned down, emotions, feelings etc (logical, you were dead)

but in rare occasions, the living could even visit.... (like ulysses with his mother iirc)

[Ben Kenobi]

Actually, during european colonial times, so widespread were the mummies in egypt, that most apothecaries in europe were able to offer their clients mummia ... powder from ground egyptian mummies. And it is even said that, trains in british colonial egypt sometimes have used mummies to power their steam engines.
With this careless attitude europeans destroyed more historical treasures, than IS with their targeted vandalism.

Fascinating, but wrong. When Muslims ran out of Mumia, they decided to desecrate the Mummies and sell the powder to unsuspecting Europeans.

[Proteus_MST]

Fascinating, but wrong. When Muslims ran out of Mumia, they decided to desecrate the Mummies and sell the powder to unsuspecting Europeans.

Wrong ... it were actually the europeans themselves who bought mummies and pepared them for pharmaceutical use.
Actually Merck, the well known pharmaceuticl company, which offerred mumia vera egyptiana-powder till 1905, still has mummy parts in its possession (although nowadays, of course, they aren't used for meical purposes anymore, just exhibited as part of the companies history.

http://www.magazine.emerck/darmstadt..._medicine.html

The lack of respect for the deceased (exhibited by europeans) can also be seen in the so called mummy unwrapping parties of the 19th century in which, as the name already reveals, an egyptian mummy, supplied by the host, would get unwrapped, one part after aother, in front of the parties guests

http://all-that-is-interesting.com/m...apping-parties

You cannot blame the muslims for this

[Ben Kenobi]

I'm not talking about the 19th, I'm talking about the 13th and 14th centuries. There was European demand for Mumia but there was insufficient supply to meet the European demand. So Muslims ground up mummies and sold that to Europeans who didn't know better.

[giblets]

What the heck is mumia? I googled "mumia" and all I got was some guy who murdered a police officer.

[Ben Kenobi]

It's actually what we would call asphalt. Mummia/Mummiah are other spellings. Bituminous pitch. It was considered to have a wide variety of medical applications, in it's pure form.

[Proteus_MST]

I'm not talking about the 19th, I'm talking about the 13th and 14th centuries. There was European demand for Mumia but there was insufficient supply to meet the European demand. So Muslims ground up mummies and sold that to Europeans who didn't know better.

Well, I explicitely referred to the "colonial times" in my postings (which, when we think of european colonialism (and not of the times of the Ottoman Empire) began for egypt in the 18th century (with Napoleons expedition)).
And at this time the apothecaries weren't deceived by any muslim traders, who sold them mummies instead of bitumen, but actually consciously prepared and sold powdered mummies

What the heck is mumia? I googled "mumia" and all I got was some guy who murdered a police officer.

Originally it as an old word for Bitumen (which was used in early medicine for several medicinal mixtures)
Later on however it referred actually to powdered mummies

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mummia

[Ben Kenobi]

And at this time the apothecaries weren't deceived by any muslim traders, who sold them mummies instead of bitumen, but actually consciously prepared and sold powdered mummies

After four hundred some odd years of Muslims grinding up Egyptian mummies, it seems rather odd to blame Christians...

[Proteus_MST]

After four hundred some odd years of Muslims grinding up Egyptian mummies, it seems rather odd to blame Christians...

According to the Wikipedia entry I linked, the mistake was from the beginning on rather on the european side, due to mistranslations:

...
The Arab physician Serapion the Younger (fl. 12th century) wrote about bituminous mumia and its many uses, but the Latin translation of Simon Geneunsis (d. 1303) said, "Mumia, this is the mumia of the sepulchers with aloes and myrrh mixed with the liquid (humiditate) of the human body".^[12] Two 12th century Italian examples: Gerard of Cremona, mistakenly translated Arabic mumiya as "the substance found in the land where bodies are buried with aloes by which the liquid of the dead, mixed with the aloes, is transformed and it is similar to marine pitch",^[13] and the physician Matthaeus Platearius said "Mumia is a spice found in the sepulchers of the dead.... That is best which is black, ill-smelling, shiny, and massive".^[14]
...
The second step was to confuse and replace the rare black exudation from embalmed corpses with the black bitumen that Egyptians used as an embalming preservative. The Baghdad physician Abd al-Latif al-Baghdadi (1162–1231) described ancient Egyptian mummies, "In the belly and skull of these corpses is also found in great abundance called mummy", added that although the word properly denoted bitumen or asphalt, "The mummy found in the hollows of the corpses in Egypt, differs but immaterially from the nature of mineral mummy; and where any difficulty arises in procuring the latter, may be substituted in its stead." ^[15]
...
The third step in misinterpreting mummia was to substitute the blackened flesh of an entire mummy for the hardened bituminous materials from the interior cavities of the cadavers.^[16] The ancient tombs of Egypt and the deserts could not meet the European demand for the drug mumia, so a commerce developed in the manufacture and sale of fraudulent mummies, sometimes called mumia falsa.^[17] The Italian surgeon Giovanni da Vigo (1450-1525) defined mumia as "The flesh of a dead body that is embalmed, and it is hot and dry in the second [grade], and therefore it has virtue to incarne [i.e., heal over] wounds and to staunch blood", and included it in his list of essential drugs.^[18]
---

So, from at least the 15th century on, the european apothecaries actually meant powdered mummies when they refered to (and sold) mumia

[Kidlicious]

Since Islam is a political movement it should be treated as a cult.

[Kidlicious]

It's alt-right hate opinion, not news. Typical Kid.

I hope one day that you will stop being an idiot.

[Ming]

I hope one day that you will stop being an idiot.

Kid doubling down....
So are you claiming it wasn't just an opinion piece?

[Aeson]

Since Islam is a political movement it should be treated as a cult.

Since MAGA is a political movement with a God-Emperor ... it is a cult.

[Kidlicious]

Kid doubling down....
So are you claiming it wasn't just an opinion piece?

Typical idiot. You didn't claim it was an opinion piece. You said it was fake news. Then I asked you why and you said because it's alt-right.