A God Against the Gods

by Allen Drury

  So I have done as my lord commanded, though at first it was not easy. Tentatively I began to elongate the body, to broaden the hips, to flab out the belly, to lengthen the neck and the long horse-like head, to slim down the arms and shoulders to their true skinniness, to make the lips as heavy and pendulous as they are.

  I am his to command in all things, to lift up or cast down as he can any citizen of Kemet, but I am also a talented man: I have my own self-respect as an artist. I did as he wanted, but it has not been easy.

  My first such sketch I took to him with a fear and trembling of my own. I knew as an artist that it was good, that it was a long reach on the road he had laid out for me; but I still feared a change of heart, I still thought it might be a whim that could dissolve in terrible anger that would lay me and all my family waste. We have learned in Kemet over many centuries that the will of kings is a capricious thing, working mostly for our good but capable sometimes of frightful transformation. I expected such.

  And what happened?

  He took the sketch. He studied it. He held it at arm’s length. He drew it close. He held it away again. He put that oddly misshapen but, from my artist’s viewpoint, strangely beautiful head first on this side, then on that. His expression remained solemn and thoughtful, no sound emerging from the heavy lips save an occasional, “Hmmm … Hmmm … Hmmm.” I died several thousand deaths but somehow managed to remain as expressionless as he. Finally he shook his head abruptly and said the one thing I could not possibly have imagined:

  “It is not enough.… Here!”—and a joshing, almost playful note came into his voice as he took from my hand (suddenly, I am ashamed to say, quivering with relief) the rush pen, the pot of red ink, the papyrus, and shuffled toward a table at the side of the room. “Hold this steady for me.… Now: this should be more exaggerated here … that should have a broader stroke there.… You have been too timid here.… Let us live in truth, Bek, my belly looks like that, not like that.… My chest is thus.… My private parts are thus.… Take this back and do it as I command you, Bek. And stop trembling: I am different, make me different. You are a great enough artist to do it. I assure you, you would not be Chief Sculptor to the King, else.”

  I am the apprentice of His Majesty, I have been taught by the King. What would you have done, I ask you? Exactly what I did: I did what he said, and I have done so ever since.

  So he and the Chief Wife and their daughters live in truth in a hundred statues, a thousand sculptings, on temple walls and pylons, in bas-relief and paintings the length of Kemet. It has been done as he ordered, and he was right: it has made men marvel, it has made them respect, it has made them fear. And in some curious way that I do not possess the words to define, though I can make it happen with my chisel and my drawing pen, it has made them proud that they have as Pharaoh and Co-Regent one who is unique, and so startlingly different from other men.

  And now come the final challenges: the one here on this great plain, and the three colossal statues he has just commanded me to sculpt for him in the House of the Aten at Karnak. In this place I shall guide, direct, plan, supervise, now and again put my own chisel to the stone when the final niceties are called for, though there will not be too much opportunity for that. Supervisory duties will command much of my time: it is fortunate I have my apprentice Tuthmose and several other excellent aides to assist me, for both these projects are very dear to his heart. The project here is dearest, but he does not wish me to slight the statues, nor do I want to slight them, for in them, perhaps even more than here, I hope to capture for all time Nefer-Kheperu-Ra, Son of the Sun, Amonhotep IV, Prince of Thebes (life, health, prosperity!), that very strange youth who nonetheless commands from me, as he does from many in his court, an awed but quite genuine affection—springing from I know not what exactly, unless it be a combination of fear and respect for his great position … admiration for his great intelligence … and pity and compassion for the terrible vulnerability, springing from his terrible tragedy, that only I as an artist, his family, and perhaps a very few others, see and understand.

  So, the statues. Two are to be complete with crown, uraeus, staff and flail, pectorals, bracelets, jewels, pleated golden kilt, golden sandals—the full imperial regalia. One will stand at the entrance to the temple of the Aten, on a pedestal on which will be carved his own cartouche, the cartouche of the Aten and the words He Who Has Lived Long. The second will stand halfway up the gentle slope that leads, through open pillars filled with sunlight and air (not the dark, hooded, ominous, covered hypostyle halls of Amon), toward the altar. Its pedestal also will bear his cartouche and the Aten’s, equal and side by side, and the words He Who Opens the World for Aten.

  And the third, which I am beginning first, and which does not surprise me, for little he does can surprise me anymore, will stand at the entrance to the inner sanctum containing the Aten’s plain and unadorned altar. It will be stark naked, missing no detail even down to the genitals, reasonably large but, when at rest, almost hidden in the folds of fat from his sagging belly. I shall make them a little more prominent, for I know that he, as the father of three daughters and, please Aten, soon of many sons, will wish it so. And on this pedestal, again with the two cartouches side by side, but in letters half again as large as those of the other two, will be inscribed: He Who Lives in Truth With Aten.

  It is as though he wished to say something with this third colossus, and I am sure he does. He wishes to say:

  I am Pharaoh. I am the protector of my god as my god is the protector of me. I wish you to see me as I am BECAUSE I WILL BE HEARD.

  And he will be heard there—and here, too, on this vast plain where our little group now completes its work and retires to await tomorrow. We hide the rope ends as he has instructed me, we toss on the last concealing shovelfuls of sand, we douse our carefully shielded torches and prepare to return to our tents through the ghostly moonlight that shines down upon us from Khons’ silver boat.

  In the far distance to the west, all along the Nile, can be seen the flickering campfires of the royal party and the Court, of the nobles, and of all those thousands and thousands of common folk who are gathered here to witness what he has planned for tomorrow.

  Around us as we trudge slowly back toward the thin edge of humanity along the river lies the vast and empty plain. It is utterly silent. Only we four and two others, His Majesty and the Chief Wife Nefertiti, know that, beginning tomorrow, it will never be silent again.

  ***

  Tiye

  He baffles me: but then he always has. I do not remember a time since his illness when I have fully understood him, and I am getting beyond the point, and the time in my life and his, when I think it will be possible. We have drifted far apart, particularly in these five years of his co-regency. It saddens me, but I do not know what to do. I am his mother, the Great Wife, Queen Tiye who has been for many years Pharaoh in all but name of the Two Kingdoms—and I do not know what to do. Thus far have we traveled on our separate roads.

  I still say “Pharaoh in all but name of the Two Kingdoms,” but in my heart I know it has become increasingly an empty boast. My husband continues his erratic decline in health, sometimes lapsing, sometimes becoming almost fully himself again—but each time, it seems to me, he falls a little further behind, regains not quite the ground he has relinquished. He still consults me in all things, still takes my advice on most of them, still comes to my bed with loving regularity: it is quite possible I may yet bear another god for the House of Thebes. But what will that matter when, of the three I have borne already, one is murdered and long dead, one is a tenderhearted child who may never live to rule and the third is a malformed giant who has become so obstinate and headstrong that even I, the Great Wife, his mother, have long since ceased to exercise any real control over what he does?

  I think now that the co-regency was a mistake. I think Pharaoh could have continued to rule with my help and guidance until our son succeeded in the natural course of things. I do not thi
nk it was necessary for us to give him such power so precipitously and so soon. We were moved by pity and by what seemed to be my husband’s need.

  But that is hindsight, of course, and neither Amon, whom he is pressing so hard, nor the Aten, with whom he is so besotted, can give even the Great Wife the gift to go back and erase the mistakes of the past.

  So our son has the power, and when I attempt to caution him in the uses of it he turns upon me only that bland and enigmatic smile and says, with a shrug of those sadly emaciated shoulders, “Mother, I thank you for your kindness. No one is less deserving of it than I or appreciates it more.”

  And goes his own way.

  And where does that way lead us? To new temples to the Aten, to greater godhood for the Aten, to greater deification of himself as the spokesman and sole intervener with the Aten—and to an indirect but inescapable challenge to his father’s power, and mine. It seems to me that in these past five years, even though they have included his father’s first Jubilee and the building of the great temple to Amon at Luxor, it has been the young Pharaoh, not the old, who has made things happen in Kemet. And they have not always been good things, in the judgment of his mother.

  There has come, with his increasing absorption in the Aten, what I can only describe as a general loosening throughout Kemet and the Empire. It has been hard enough for me to rule the land with an ailing husband, let alone a willful and wayward son.

  In a sense, my husband has always played at being Pharaoh. He came to the throne at the height of our Dynasty, he had nothing left to conquer, he had nothing to do but enjoy his wealth and magnificence—providing he would do the necessary things to hold it all together.

  These were not, to begin with, very great. When we took power over the Two Lands the administration of the government was in the hands of wise and good men. We are fortunate that many of them surround us still: Ramose—Amonhotep, Son of Hapu—my brother Aye (though him, of late, I am beginning to question, something I never dreamed could be possible)—and many more. The machinery of ruling functioned smoothly throughout Kemet, in all our vassal states, and with those on our distant borders who were dutiful and anxious to be our friends. Pharaoh did not have to do very much to maintain what the gods and the blood of our House had given him. Presently I found that he was forgetful of even that.

  So the glamor passed and the worrisome times, for me, began. “Amonhotep the Magnificent” became enthralled with his own magnificence. He began the great building projects which continue today and will continue to his death, and far beyond, until they are all completed. He acquired two harems, which were his right as Pharaoh and which I accepted without protest, for such is our custom, and I knew he loved me best and would always give me equal power. He contracted various state marriages, most notably with our somber Gilukhipa, who has never liked it here and never will, even though as the symbol of our alliance with Mittani she has received, the gods know, every possible luxury of her own. And in a casual way, he paid some attention to government and the Empire.

  But not enough, I fear: not enough. So it fell upon me to do all for him, in which he acquiesced with unfailing good humor—while he, too, went his own way. I did what I could, but there have been limits to how openly I could order things done. The forms of Pharaoh’s rule are often as important as the rule itself: sometimes the necessity for observing them got in my way. Thus the loosening began, and continues today. And it, too, will continue long after his death, with who knows what consequences for Kemet … unless the Co-Regent changes his ways most drastically and does the task which I appointed him to do.

  And this he will not, of course, as long as he pursues his dream of the Aten, and as long as he keeps the priests of Amon constantly stirred up. My brother Aanen is a tiresome man, increasingly so as we all grow older, but his disaffection has spread throughout the priesthood and everywhere in Kemet. So far, in my judgment, he has been alarmed without much cause. It is true that my son has built fifteen temples to the Aten since he came to power, but aside from the labor involved there has been little competition with Amon. We always have more than enough workmen, particularly at the time of the Nile’s inundation, when our people are idle from July through September while Hapi replenishes the land. In very ancient times it is said that the people were enslaved and forced to work for Pharaoh, but that passed many, many generations ago. Now every ambitious herdsman, felucca pilot or peasant who wishes can find gainful work on Pharaoh’s payroll building temples or tombs or monuments. Labor is no problem for Ramose, or Amonhotep, Son of Hapu, or any of the others who oversee the work for us. Their problem, indeed, is often too many applicants for the work available. When this happens, both Pharaoh and Amon provide food from their granaries, and so the land comes safely through another season.

  Thus the Co-Regent’s temples to the Aten have provided to Amon so far only competition for workers, not for priests, because it is his concept of the god that, as his temples are light, airy and open, so should his priesthood be kept to the absolute minimum. Thirteen of his temples, in fact, have four priests each: they do the minimal housekeeping, sweep the courtyards and accept the daily sacrifices of food on the bare stone altar. My son has no statue like Amon to represent his god, only the many-armed hieroglyph on the walls, and the rays of Ra descending benignly through the open roof. His priests also do very little proselytizing. It seems to be my son’s belief that only those who wish should come to the Aten. Very few have, and that is another reason why Amon, with his swollen temples and millions of worshipers, really need not fear too much.

  Nonetheless, of course, Aanen fumes and fusses and professes to see great threats to Amon everywhere. In Memphis, where my son has built a major temple to the Aten covering many cubits of ground and employing more than a hundred priests, and at Karnak, where his temple is even larger, there is some visible ostentation that Aanen can cite when he makes his complaints to us and to his priesthood. But even in those two temples my son still does not direct his god to gather converts actively. He seems to be quite content that he himself should be the principal worshiper—and the only one through whom the blessings of Aten are to flow to the land.

  For this reason I am as puzzled by my brother Aye as I am tired of my brother Aanen. I can understand my son naming his wife High Priestess of the Aten as he names himself High Priest, but I cannot understand my brother accepting the position of his assistant. It does not make sense to me, and since he has refused to confide in me about it, I am apparently going to remain mystified. I do not like this, but here, too, I am beginning to feel powerless. I am beginning to feel that many things are slipping from my hands. This is not a pleasant sensation for the Great Wife.

  Now we are come down the river on this scatterbrained expedition whose purpose even Aye, I am happy to say, does not know. My son asked us to come, and since he made it very clear that he considered it an affair of such great importance that our absence would be regarded by him as an act almost of personal betrayal, we felt we must comply. But he refused to tell us why, and he refuses still. It is only apparent, most notably in such things as his startling overreaction to his brother’s mild little joke, that he is under very great tension about it. And one thing I have learned about my elder son, which I suppose is one more of those endless ramifications and results of his illness: when he is under very great tension, something drastic is going to happen.

  I can only hope that it will not be something we will all regret, and he most of all; not some foolishness to end all foolishness, some tribute to the Aten which will really turn Kemet upside down, or some further outrageous example of his hectic determination to justify his favorite designation, “Living in Truth.”

  If this were so, then Pharaoh—snoring loudly at my side while I lie awake staring up at the golden tent top and worrying, as always, about my family, my country and my son—might be forced to take very drastic action.

  Would he do so? Could I force him to do so, if it became necessary to save the la
nd? Would he want to do so? Would I want to do so, against my son who has already suffered so much in his short twenty years?

  My son—my son … The Great Wife fears tomorrow and grieves for you thereby. Would that she were not your mother, for then she could be snoring happily too. But, alas, she is.

  ***

  Amonhotep III

  (life, health, prosperity!)

  I snore loudly so that she will think I am asleep: but I am not asleep. I am thinking of our son, and given such thoughts, how can Pharaoh sleep?

  How could any Pharaoh sleep, given such a son as no Pharaoh before has ever had?

  I think back upon my life and I see no cause for this. It cannot be Amon’s further punishment for his mother and me, because we have appeased Amon in many things, and we have given our son every strengthening of love and support that a child could possibly receive. We have made the expressions of our love even deeper and stronger because of his illness. Never have we failed him. Why, then, is he failing us?

  Many years ago, on the day he was born and his brother murdered, I decided I would dedicate him to the Aten: but it has gotten out of hand. The counterweight to Amon, the balance of gods which I thought would restore to the House of Thebes its rightful powers without having to worry about the constant inroads of Amon, has not come about. Instead he has pushed far beyond what I contemplated, and tomorrow, apparently, intends to push even further, toward—what? We do not know. As with everything that goes on behind that secretive face, he does not tell us. Only my niece Nefertiti knows what he really thinks, and I suspect that even she is frequently in the dark. But her strength, of course, is that she believes—still believes, as devoutly as she ever did.