Talk:Atum

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Adam?

Could this be another spelling variation of "Adam"? Atum/Adam/Odin of Asia "Lands of the Gods".Dal Riata.

No. Adam is Hebrew, Atum is Egyptian - that, different root meanings, and a couple of thousand years, separate them. PiCo (talk) 08:12, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

Yes. Atum egyptaher, Adam Hu of Pheonetics. all that has been writen, seem's to have come from me by someone else. Thor "The Father" Odin "The Sun/son; Freyja and Freja The "Holy Host" of the Kingdom of Van, Vandaluwians in the "Holy Ground of Mt Ararat.

Yes. Adam/Thor/Arthur/Ra/Odin/Indara/St George/St Andrew etc can all be derived back to the same person. They are all the first recorded hero, founder of Indo-European culture/civilisation in Asia Minor. The Etymology is Thor/Her Thor/ In-Dara(King Thor)/ Od-in(Adam)/ra (th)r/ , St Andrew(indara), St George (Gur/Dur/Dar/Thor) etc. Adam is one of the several epithets of Thor. Ignore Talk:pico as he clearly has no knowledge of Etymology. The Eddas of Iceland hold the oldest version of uncorrupted western history/myth which was subsequently corrupted into the Egyptian/Greek/Roman. The biblical version is reasonably accurate also, although Adam/Thor was simply an historic living man at the dawn of written history, who became deified over the millenia.--158.43.39.218 (talk) 14:07, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

How could the Icelandic Eddas corrupt into Egyptian when Egyptian is far older? Pico is right.Apepch7 (talk) 19:58, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

Out of curiosity regarding the name Atum which as stated means "Atum's name is thought to be derived from the word 'tem' which means to complete or finish" and in contrast when the elohim (Gods) finish creation, Adam was the last thing created and so all was complete and the gods rested of the seventh day, indicating a completion and being finished. Could this some how be connected?216.206.210.36 (talk) 14:27, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

Atem

What about the Sanskrit atma[1] or the likely thence-derived German Atem[2]? Masamafo 18:41, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

Pronounciation?

Is Atum/Atem prounouned "Ah-tum/tem", A-tum/tem" (like in the word "cat") or "Ay-tum/tem?" —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.226.239.31 (talk) 05:01, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

Good question and worth including the IPA in the lead here... but it still needs a source. — LlywelynII 05:50, 8 September 2015 (UTC)

Hugh Nibley

Requesting that we add a sentence or two from Mormon Egyptologist Hugh Nibley. He believed Atum was indeed Adam. I've got the book in hand. I was just wondering if it applied? --CABEGOD 00:48, 25 June 2010 (UTC)

I'm leery of that idea. People on these talk pages frequently try to connect Egyptian deities to other things based on similarities in names. Nibley is certainly more qualified than the typical Internet ranter, but his apparent tendency to draw tenuous parallels between Mormon beliefs and those of other cultures is still concerning. Moreover, "Adam" and "Atum" have quite separate etymologies according to mainstream scholarship—"Atum" comes from the Egyptian tm, meaning "completion" or "totality", while according to my edition of the OAB, "Adam" simply means "man". Nibley's suggestion strikes me as a fringe notion, and therefore we should only cover it in accordance with this guideline. A. Parrot (talk) 02:20, 25 June 2010 (UTC)

Duly noted. I was wondering if perhaps another source would work for connecting Atum with Adam? The Source is the French Egyptologist M Lefebure. --CABEGOD 04:11, 25 June 2010 (UTC)

Eugène Lefébure? He was certainly a qualified Egyptologist, but many of his ideas are probably very out-of-date by now. I suppose this might make it worth a mention. I'm never sure how much weight to give these things. A. Parrot (talk) 05:55, 25 June 2010 (UTC)

Hmm I wonder if that's the same Egyptologist? Anyway... It would only be a sentence. Two at the most. --CABEGOD 06:09, 25 June 2010 (UTC)

With all respect to Mr. Nibley et al. I don't see how we can include this idea unless it stands up etymologically. Here is a link to the accepted derivation of Adam http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?search=adam&searchmode=none and there is no proven link to AE language. Phonetic similarity tempts people into false etymologies (as practiced even by the Egyptians themselves). As a Mormon he has a vested interest in this kind of link. Perhaps the best thing would be to create a page for Mr. Nibley (if it doesn't exist already) or possibly Mormonism and put the idea there and link back to Atum page.Apepch7 (talk) 16:29, 25 June 2010 (UTC)

I can see why Hugh Nibley's belief should be thrown out - because he has a bias toward one belief (right or wrong). I concede on this point, and I won't bring it up again. That being said, I still want to pursue adding an Egyptologist's perspective about Atum possibly being related to the Hebrew Adam. This link has little to do with phonetics (but I can't dismiss it entirely). I was reading a book called Ancient Egypt: The Light of the World by Gerald Massey . In it he says, "Lefebure, who has lately identified Adam with the Egyptian Atum...refers to a scene on the coffin of Penpii in the Louvre, which is similar to the history of Adam in the sub-terrestrial paradise, where a naked and ithyphallique personage called "the Lord of food" (Neb-tefa), is standing before a serpent with two legs and two arms, and the reptile is offering him a red fruit, or at least a little round object painted red. The same scene is again found on the tomb of Rameses VI. And on a statue relatively recent in the Museum of Turin - it is to Atum = Adam that the serpent, as Tempter, is offering the round object, or fruit of the tree." Another link is that Adam in Hebrew means "red earth," while Atum in Egyptian lore wore the red crown, and was called the red God of the Setting Sun. What do you think? - --CABEGOD 02:15, 27 June 2010 (UTC)

Hi. Massey wrote some time ago and his ideas are now disputed. The serpent offering the object (probably a disk symbolic of the Eye of Horus rather than a fruit) is probably Neheb-kau and what he is doing is restoring the eye and not 'tempting' - however I haven't seen the actual illustration you are referring to - if you have a link I would like to see it. As I think I suggested above its not really about censoring out these ideas but rather placing them in the right place - which for Nibley would be the Mormon interpretation of Egyptian religion and Massey the history of approaches to Egyptology IMO. Apepch7 (talk) 13:00, 27 June 2010 (UTC)

I'm trying to find a link for both of us. A lot of Egyptian art is still pretty secret in that it hasn't been posted online. If I cannot find it - I will cease trying to add an Atum-Adam statement. --CABEGOD 03:44, 29 June 2010 (UTC)

In case anyone is still interested in this topic, the picture Massey is referring to can be found in A.S. Yahuda's The Accuracy of the Bible, p. 186 online at https://archive.org/details/accuracyofthebib028016mbp/page/n249/mode/2up I have not been able to find the picture in the Louvre Atlas database. Massey cites Lefébure and his Le mythe osirien is also online, unfortunately in cursive script and therefore difficult to scan for the details of this "coffin of Penpii". Again, the Louvre database has no reference to Penpii, nor to the supposed neb-tefa. In fact, I got to this discussion by looking for nebtefa (sic). I am no egyptologist, but I agree with those who want Wikipedia articles to reflect recognized, current scholarship. Some of the suggestions in this discussion relate to books that do not have this standing. Even recognized Egyptologists of earlier times, such as Lefébure, tended to find connections that were based on similarities, not on hard evidence. DoctorJlem (talk) 15:25, 19 July 2022 (UTC)

Masturbation

masturbation was associated with Atum when he created shu and tefnut. this was a later myth. should it be added as well as him spitting them up? i have not seen one being accepted as correct over the other. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.186.146.218 (talk) 05:27, 28 July 2011 (UTC)

I don't know that either version is later, but both are genuine. A. Parrot (talk) 16:26, 28 July 2011 (UTC)

I don't like the current text where it refers to masturbation as being a metaphor. Masturbation exists in several Egyptian texts (e.g. Isis masturbates her son Horus) and there is no reason to think that they are metaphors. The current text is simply modern prudery. See "Myths and Legends of Ancient Egypt" by Joyce Tyldesley, chapter 1, p38 of the Penguin edition, 2011. Rhysp (talk) 08:50, 6 December 2013 (UTC)

I don't know what Tyldesley's book says, but most scholars of Egyptian religion today argue that Egyptian mythology is inherently metaphorical. In the case of Atum, the text you object to is cited to The Complete Gods and Goddesses in Ancient Egypt by Richard H. Wilkinson, pages 18 and 99, and it reflects a widespread interpretation among Egyptologists. Vincent Arieh Tobin (in Theological Principles of Egyptian Religion, pages 40–41) specifically says that the masturbation is symbolic. It represents how Atum contained both maleness and femaleness within himself, so that he was effectively copulating with himself to conceive the first deities, and by extension the entire cosmos. A major piece of evidence for that interpretation is that the Hand of Atum was sometimes treated as a goddess, representing the female principle within Atum; see Egyptian Mythology by Geraldine Pinch, pages 63 and 111.

As for the episode with Isis and Horus in "The Contendings of Horus and Seth", Pinch suggests that Isis is echoing the role of the Hand of Atum. This episode is part of the conflict between Horus and Set, and the semen Horus produces ultimately impregnates Set with a golden sun that appears on his forehead, whereas in older texts Horus impregnates Set to produce the god Thoth. So this story may have very complex metaphorical meanings of its own, for which the most detailed analysis is probably Seth, God of Confusion by Herman te Velde, pages 32–59.

It might be objectionable to say that the masturbation is only a metaphor, given Tobin's statement elsewhere in his book that uneducated Egyptians—the vast majority of them—may have interpreted myths and symbols literally. But I did not word the text that way. The story certainly has a metaphorical aspect. A. Parrot (talk) 18:31, 6 December 2013 (UTC)

Since my "circumlocution" was promptly cancelled on the Hathor page (and I expect the one about Atum to be cancelled as well) I insist that it not be. In view of the arguments put forward, this seems more than reasonable. Ellbekarym (talk) 22:02, 9 February 2023 (UTC)

Wiki Education assignment: History of Ancient Egypt

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Self creation?

How did they figure atem spoke himself into existence?

I've also seen sources that state atem came from nun, some primal water. 2A01:598:92BC:E9CD:54D7:223:4819:5061 (talk) 21:02, 8 February 2023 (UTC)

"Neb-er-tcher" listed at Redirects for discussion

The redirect Neb-er-tcher has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2024 May 1 § Neb-er-tcher until a consensus is reached. Jay 💬 15:16, 1 May 2024 (UTC)