Luxor

I have just one more final left and I'm a little tired of studying so I figured I'd finally get something started for family and friends. In fact, by doing this it's actually helping me study for my last final, so everyone is happy! I'm going to try to finish up some more of the main sites of Egypt. A place that I traveled to a more than a month ago . . . But the memory fades fast so a month later is better than a year later right? Bear with me. :)

I'm still amazed at everything we were able to see in Egypt. So much crammed into a week. Well, after Cairo we boarded a plane and headed south to Luxor. Which oddly enough pulls us into "Upper Egypt." Luxor had such a different feeling from Cairo and had a ton to offer. This is not only where we stayed in a hotel right on the Nile and took the falucca and camel safari, but we were also able to visit one of the main reasons why I wanted to come to Egypt: KARNAK!Karnak is the largest temple complex in the world. Ever since I took an art history class in high school, I have been dying to see this place. This was also a beloved site of Hugh Nibley. Being one of the few LDS scholars who could read Egyptian heiroglyphs, Nibley had a lot of commmentary to make about this Egyptian temple and the ordinances or ceremonies performed there. Every pharaoh from the 18th Dynasty onward contributed something - whether a building or a relief - to the complex. The oldest parts of the temple date to the Middle Kingdom (2040-1700 BC). Amun, an Egyptian fertility god was the main focus of worship in its initial stages. We were able to enter into the holy of holies there where the rock or altar supposedly exudes an enourmous amount of rejuvinating energy. We toured the large sacred lake in which priests would purify themselves. There was also an ancient mud-brick retaining wall. This is evidence of the Israelites captivity in Egypt, that this was indeed a building technique that the Egyptians used.

One of the most impressive things there is the great hypostyle hall. It consists of 134 large columns representing the papyrus flower. These are enormous. The hall was built by Seti I and finished by Ramses II. Just around the time of Moses. :) Moses was born in Egypt and was raised as an Egyptian. He was exposed to and may have even participated in some of the goings-on at Karnak. A civilization still dazzling to people even today, Egypt showed Moses much of the power and greatness that man was capable of.

Yet when Moses is called as a prophet, his idea of Egypt's "glory" begins to change. He "saw God face to face, and he talked with him, and the glory of God was upon Moses." After beholding the glory of God, Moses says, "Now, for this cause I know that man is nothing, which thing I had never supposed"(Moses 1:1,10). This was a very humbling thing to ponder as I walked through this enormous structure. The glory and love of God is beyond any mortal comprehension we could ever conjure up or create. Moses was deeply impressed by it and I am the more I live, experience, and open up my eyes to see it.