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Pyramids - Oh Holy Liberty
Part 3 of five articles
Anybody guessed what the Holy Family saw on their way to the Nile from Wadi Natron?
Following was the only part I told you in "Last article":
"Then suddenly one morning something unbelievable rose in east together with the sun. It was the White House - house...".
First, if we want to be exact we have to say that there never lived any Pharaohs in Ancient Egypt!
Reason for this is that the word "Pharaoh" is not an Egyptian title, but comes from the Biblical transcription of the Ancient Egyptian title: Per-eo. Translate "Per-eo" and you get the meaning "Large House", or "White House".
"White" most likely used as the walls around Per-eo's palace in early Old Kingdom was white!
"House", as a the last ruling god of Ancient Egypt - the falcon god Horus - had to incarnate in a human being to share his power and wisdom with the Nile kingdom. In other words, Horus ruled Egypt via Per-eo, "His Highness the White House".
Just think it all over again, what is the original "White House"?
The White House in Russia, the White House in US - or the ruling "white house" in Egypt who let build the large pyramids in the desert outside today's Cairo?
Egyptian reflection in US is in fact quite amazing, we have here mentioned the White House, but just think about the dollar bill with the pyramid and a grand obelisk with it's highly symbolic location. As if that is not enough, what about the Statue of Liberty?
Allow me to get side tracked once again, as many have asked for this story. It's a story I was first told by the Egyptian journalist and brilliant artist, Hassan Osman.
It all started when Khedive Ismail, who was involved in the building of the Suez channel - made the decision that the Suez Channel had to have a large statue at its north entrance. He took contact with a French sculptor named Frederic Auguste Bartholdi, and the artist started the work on the statue, which should represent an Egyptian Farmer woman holding a torch in her hand to guide the seafarers safely to the gate of the channel.
Frederic Auguste Bartholdi finished the model in time (not as Verdi who was a year late to the opening of the Suez Channel with his Opera Aida). Problem was that Khedive Ismail was mildly speaking a "big spender" - as Alan Moorehead states quite clearly in his book "The White Nile":
"It was not only honest men like Baker and Gordon who were attracted to his service; a plague of speculators descended upon Egypt as well and the easily contrived to get rid of Ismail's money even faster than he borrowed it. In round figures the Egyptian national debt was £3,000,000 at Ismail's accession, and before long he managed to convert his into a deficit of £100,000,000 - and this at a time when the pound was worth two or three times what it is today."
Add to above facts that Khedive Ismail also had political conflicts with France and England and did not get another loan to build the statue. The correspondence between Egypt and the artist show that when the Suez Channel was opened in 1869 the sculpture was still a model in the artist studio.
When Bartholdi later was asked to design a sculpture to celebrate the American Declaration of Independence, to be ready in the year 1876 - funds was again a problem. So the statue made for Khedive Ismail was used, the torch changed hand and some other small alterations where made.
The result is that it's an Egyptian farmer women who stand in New York as the symbol of Liberty. Another example of Egyptian reflections in US.
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Map showing the road through Sinai, the Nile delta and to Babylon (Cairo).
See full map
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Back to the Holy family who for sure must have met many a Egyptian farmer women as well during their journey. Little did they know that one of these would end up in New York, but I'm sure they must have been amazed seeing grand religious buildings rising up from the horizon.
Passing the pyramids and the Sphinx they came to what thousand years later should be named the "Victorious City", El Qahira. In the time the Holy family came here "On" or "Heliopolis" where on the east bank of the Nile, and "Memphis" on the west bank. Close to the river bank of the Nile on the east side was a large Roman fortress - and this is most likely what was called Babylon.
For the pilgrims travelling to the Holy Lands during the medieval times, a sycamore tree where the holy family rested under was the most visited place (still standing in al-Matariya district of Cairo, and said to be the same tree). Today known as the Tree of the Holy Virgin Mary.
In the next and fourth article, His Holiness in Black we will go to a garden party - along with following the Holy Family and the donkey in to Babylon in today's "Old Cairo".
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HIS HOLINESS IN BLACK
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Text & photo, Arnvid Aakre
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First Published June 1999
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