Karnak Temple is one of the greatest architectural structures of the ancient world. The Karnak temple complex includes buildings erected over several centuries by many pharaohs.
Each of them strove to give the temple buildings greater grandeur and splendor than its predecessor. This competition lasted for 2000 years, in which the rulers did not always treat the buildings of their predecessors with sufficient respect: the temples were rebuilt, the inscriptions were rewritten anew. The temple served as the main sanctuary of Ancient Egypt throughout the history of the New Kingdom.
Karnak Temple is a huge temple complex that includes 33 different temples and halls. The alley of majestic ram-headed sphinxes once connected the Karnak and Luxor Temples, creating a majestic corridor of Light.
The most prominent builders of the Karnak temple were Thutmose I, Thutmose III, Hatshepsut, Amenhotep III, Ramses I, II and III, the Libyan kings of the XXII dynasty and the Ptolemies, who ruled Egypt before the arrival of the Romans.
On the walls of Karnak, the text of the treaty of Ramses II with the Hittite king Hattusili III, which was signed several years after the famous battle of Kadesh, is immortalized. The treaty was originally drawn up on a silver tablet in cuneiform, then it was translated into Egyptian.
The pharaohs contributed to the construction of the temple complex, but each tried to immortalize his name in it, erasing the name of his predecessor. From the beginning of earthly history, after the reign of the Gods in Egypt, there were 134 pharaohs - a sacred number that means "the visible world" in the language of the priests of Egypt. The temple at Karnak was erected not only as a Divine House, but also intended for the consecration of neophytes.
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The most impressive place in the Karnak Temple is the Column Hall of Pharaoh Seti I - a real forest of mighty pillars covered with bas-reliefs. Once they propped up a gigantic vault; on the flat tops of any of these columns, fifty people could be accommodated. 134 columns, each 16 meters high, are painted from top to bottom with colored bas-reliefs. The columns are arranged in 16 rows, forming a sacred corridor, all the bas-reliefs on them depict the ascent of the pharaoh to the Gods.
As the "Temple of the Chronicles" and their mysteries, which the initiate had to guess, the Karnak Temple was a kind of labyrinth of time. The number 134 was the key to the "gate of the visible world" or "the key to reality."
A well-known ancient saying says that numbers rule the world, and numbers rule destinies. Numbers come from scientific knowledge of the world, and images and forms - from religious and mystical. In all temple buildings in Egypt, there are two main elements of sacred geometry - a circle and a square, expressed in pi and phi. Temple geometry has always been created according to the principle of the Golden Ratio and orientation by the stars. The central courtyard of the Karnak Temple is oriented towards Sirius, and its central axis is directed towards the point of the winter solstice.
Hatshepsut, a woman-pharaoh of the New Kingdom, erected a "Red Sanctuary" in Karnak for the ceremonial boat of the god Amun, by order of the queen, giant pink granite obelisks were erected, the VIII pylon was erected in the temple of Amun, the sanctuary of Amun was erected, the temple of Amon's wife, the goddess Mut, was significantly expanded.
Two obelisks of Hatshepsut, about 30 meters high, next to the pylon of the temple of Amun-Ra at Karnak were the highest of all previously built in Egypt, until they were laid with masonry by Thutmose III. One of the obelisks has survived to this day.
The covered pillared hall at the far end of the main axis of the Temple - the festivities hall of Thutmose III, was built in honor of heb-sed - a holiday that was celebrated with pomp by the pharaohs in the thirtieth year of their reign and then, as a rule, every three years of their reign. The hall's columns in the form of huge painted poles have no analogues in Egyptian architecture; in this hall rituals of initiation into the Priests of the God Amun were held. To the side of the main hall is a room, on the walls of which are depicted the offerings of Thutmose III to his 61 ancestors.
On the south side, the Sacred Lake adjoins the Karnak Temple, on its shore there is a granite column with a huge scarab beetle on top. The Egyptians considered it sacred and called it Khepri - "self-arising". In ancient times, the lake served for the mysteries; Amon's golden boat and the boats of his retinue glided over it.
One of the legends says that the column with the scarab beetle is an ancient clock that measures the time of our world. Slowly, a millimeter a year, the column goes into the ground, and when the sacred scarab - the symbol of the reviving Amon-Ra - disappears, the end of the world will come.
The Karnak Temple was the House of Light dedicated to Amun-Ra. Legend has it that in ancient times the Temple contained the Ipet Sout stone - “Mother of the Universe”. An ancient altar named by this name has survived to this day; the Solar axis of the Temple passes through it, which starts from the Sphinx Alley.
According to legend, the Ipet Sout stone was brought to Egypt from Atlantis, then it was transported to the Himalayas, to the mysterious land of Shambhala. In sacred Tibetan texts, the stone is called the "Treasure of the World". The Tibetans say that the mystical power of the stone connects three points of the world - three mountains: Kanchenjunga, Kailash and Belukha, united into a single space - the World Mandala.
Author: Valentina Zhitanskaya
