Gehenna is an Egyptian word
Gehenna
is famously known to be derived from Hebrew
גֵי־הִנּם "Ge Hinnom", "
Sha – en –ammu
Ancient
Egyptians have recorded something different from this Hebrew Bible
claim. It seems from ancient Egyptian texts that Gehenna is originally
an Egyptian word, and its meaning is (lake of fire), (sea of fire) or
(valley of fire). It Has no link to the Hebrew word (Hinnom) or (bin
Hinnom).
Scholars of Egyptology didn’t notice this Egyptian word (Sha – en –ammu) which they have discovered and printed in their books, and no scholar linked it to Gehenna. Instead, for example, Wallis Budge repeated the old famous claim about the etymology of Gehenna1
Sources
An
Egyptian hieroglyphic dictionary, By E. A. Wallis Budge, Sir Ernest
Alfred Wallis Budge, page 720:
A
hieroglyphic vocabulary to the Book of the dead By Sir Ernest Alfred
Wallis Budge, page 390:
Original source
(Papyrus of Nu)
The Book
Of The Dead, the chapters of coming forth by day, E. A. Wallis Budge,
page 203:
Etymology the Egyptian word
(Sha-en-ammu)
Quoted
from the book: An Egyptian Hieroglyphic Dictionary
، E.A.Wallis Budge,
(1)
Sha,She
(Page 720)
(2)
n
(Page 339)
(page 348)
(3)
Amu,
ammu
(fire)
(Page 6)
,
,
(page 20)
(page 49)
,
,
(page 50)
.
Sentences which contain
ammu
From The
Egyptian Book of the Dead, E.A.Wallis Budge.(The Papyrus Of Ani).Dover
Publications, Inc., New York: pages :21, 55, and 56 respectively:
Pictures of Pool of fire
We notice
that these 2 pictures of (pool of fire) are almost similar to the
writing of the word
.
In
picture below "plate 32"2 , we see the pool of fire
which
is represented in writing by the symbol
or
.
Also we see the tongue of fire
as
it appears in writing
.
In
picture below3, we see the pool of fire
,
with tongues of fire
surrounding
the pool.
Conclusion
It seems that the word Gehenna is originally an ancient Egyptian word
which means (sea of fire , valley of fire , lake of fire , etc. The
Ancient Egyptians meant a valley or a sea of fire in the Duat
(the Egyptian Afterworld), i.e.,(after death).(Sha-en-ammu) has
nothing to do with a certain specific valley south of Jerusalem or a man
named Ben Hinnom or people named Bene Hinnom
בְּגֵי בני- הִנֹּם. Israel have
been made as people in Egypt, they knew the Egyptian tongue including
this word (Sha-en-ammu). But the
later Jewish writers of the Bible were totally ignorant of the original
meaning of the Egyptian word, so they invented the ("ben or Bene"
Hinnom) part.
(1) The gods of the Egyptians: or, Studies in Egyptian mythology, Volume
1 By Sir Ernest Alfred Wallis Budge, page 273: The commonest of the
names which the Hebrews gave to the abode of the damned is Ge Hinnom,
or Gehenna, which was originally the Valley of Hinnom,
that lay quite near to Jerusalem," where children were sacrificed
to the god Moloch ; this name passed into the New Testament under the
form, and into Arabic literature as " Jahannam."
(2) Faulkner, Raymond O. The Egyptian Book of the Dead, The Book of
Going forth by Day. The First Authentic Presentation of the Complete
Papyrus of Ani, Translated by Raymond Faulkner. Edited by Eva von Dassow, with contributions by
Carol Andrews and Ogden Goelet.
(3) The
Book of the dead: the papyrus of Ani in the