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The Book of the Dead

Note 3 — The Judgment of Osiris.

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In the third part of the CXXVth Chapter comes the address which the deceased made to the gods after he had declared his innocence of the sins enumerated before the Forty-Two gods. He says: "Homage to you, O ye gods who dwell in your Hall of Maāti. I know you and I know your names. Let me not fall under your slaughtering knives. Bring not my wickedness to the notice of the god whose followers ye are. Let not the affair [of my judgment] come under your jurisdiction. Speak ye the Law (or truth) concerning me before Neb-er-tcher,3 for I performed the Law (or, truth) in Ta-mera (i.e., Egypt). I have not blasphemed the God. No affair of mine came under the notice of the king in his day. Homage to you, O ye who are in your Hall of Maāti, who have no lies in your bodies, who live on truth, who eat truth before Horus, the dweller in his disk, deliver ye me from Babai4 who liveth upon the entrails of the mighty ones on the day of the Great Reckoning (APT ĀAT, ). Behold me! I have come page 25to you without sin, without deceit (?), without evil, without false testimony (?) I have not done an [evil] thing. I live upon truth and I feed upon truth. I have performed the behests of men, and the things that satisfy the gods.5 I have propitiated the God [by doing] His will. I have given bread to the hungry, water to the thirsty, raiment to the naked, and a boat to him that needed one. I have made holy offerings to the gods, and sepulchral offerings to the beautified dead. Be ye then my saviours, be ye my protectors, and make no accusation against me before the Great God. I am pure of mouth, and clean of hands; therefore it hath been said by those who saw me, 'Come in peace, come in peace.'"

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