Moses: Against the Gods of Egypt

Chronicles of the Watchers
Book 3

By Brian Godawa

Moses: Against the Gods of Egypt

Chronicles of the Watchers, Book 3
2nd Edition 2.3b

Copyright © 2021 Brian Godawa

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without prior written permission except in the case of brief quotations in critical articles and reviews.

Warrior Poet Publishing
www.warriorpoetpublishing.com

ISBN: 978-1-942858-85-0 (paperback)

ISBN: 9798753965066 (hardback)

ISBN: 978-1-942858-86-7(eBook)

Images of the Tabernacle and Israelite encampment from Logos Bible Software, www.logos.com

The image of the Ark of the Covenant recreated by Pastor Phillip Anthony Missick is used by permission from Dr. Stephen Andrew Missick, pastor of King of Saints Tabernacle, 2228 FM 1725, Cleveland, Texas 77328, www.kingofsaints.net. 

Scripture quotations are taken from The Holy Bible: English Standard Version. Wheaton: Standard Bible Society, 2001.

Chapter 1

The Red Sea

Horus the Great God, Lord of Heaven, faced his nemesis-in-arms on a mountainous ridge near Mew Kedew of Kemet, the Red Sea of Egypt. Horus had contended for a long time with his uncle Set, lord of chaos and storm, over kingship of the Two Lands. Eighty years of such contention—at least that was how the myth presented it. Set had reigned in the land of upper Egypt in the south highlands and sought to rule over Horus’s land of lower Egypt in the north. They tried to settle their dispute like champions.

They assumed their hybrid forms as seven-foot-tall human bodies with zoomorphic heads—Horus with that of a falcon and Set with that of a long-snouted canine creature. Both were bare-chested, wearing light leather battle skirts.

Set swung a gigantic mace that only he, with his massive physique, could lift. Horus dodged and parried with his javelin, drawing blood on Set’s arm, enraging him. As immortal Watchers, they could not die, but as created beings, they could suffer the weapons of their warfare.

Horus shouted in fury, “You murdered my father, you sought to murder me, and now you want kingship over all of Egypt?”

Horus thrust his javelin. Set swatted it away.

“You should be thanking me,” crowed Set. “Osiris now rules Duat, the underworld, as God of the Dead. If it had not been for me, he would still be stuck married to my nagging witch sister.”

Set’s words seemed to empower the swing of his mighty mace. Horus sidestepped it, but the weapon’s metallic head hit the ground with such force that the earthquake threw Horus off his feet and onto his back.

And Set was upon him.

The story went that Osiris was king of all Egypt and had married Isis, his sister, the goddess of magic. Their brother Set was envious of Osiris’s kingship, so he tricked the king and murdered him. Before Isis could recover the body, Set cut the corpse into pieces, sending them to each of the fourteen nomes, or provinces, of Egypt. One for each ruler. Isis tracked down all the pieces and reassembled Osiris to resurrect him. The only piece she could not find was his male member, which she recreated with magic. Before Osiris returned to Duat to rule the dead, husband and wife slept together one last time, and Isis gave birth to Horus, the new heir to the throne.

When Set could not find the infant to kill him, he devoted his life to unending chaos to keep the child Horus from taking his rightful throne. At least that’s how the Egyptian narrative went. Reality was another story, as told in Enoch’s primordial Book of the Watchers.

But now the vengeful Set had Horus on the ground, pinned beneath his mighty strength.

Horus struggled to free his arms. “Let the gods decide.”

“Now you appeal to the assembly,” complained Set, “when you are losing.”

One of Horus’s arms was held down by Set’s hand. The other was pinned beneath Set’s leg.

The canine god snarled maliciously. “If you cannot see things my way, then maybe you should not see anything at all.” Set reached down and dug into Horus’s right eye.

The warrior screamed in pain as Set gouged out his eye, plucking it from its socket.

He held it aloft in victory, showing it to all the land around them. “Get one last good look at everything you will lose.”

But Set’s victory was cut short. The sharp edge of Horus’s dagger slipped from beneath his opponent’s pinning leg and sliced off Set’s private parts. Set rolled off Horus with a high-pitched moan, clutching his groin in agony.

No, the gods could not die. But oh, they could suffer pain.

Horus stumbled to his feet, stood victoriously over his wounded rival, and spoke through his own pain. “I think it is time to let the assembly of the gods decide.”

• • • • •

“Right rules might! Give the office to Horus! He is the rightful heir!” The argument came from Shu, god of the air. He stood before the gods assembled in court at the temple of Ra in the city of On. Though they currently operated in the unseen spirit realm, the gods used the earthly sacred spaces built by their human subjects whose worship spiritually empowered the deities. Ironic since the deities were supposed to be transcendent of their puny earthlings.

The Ennead—the company of ruling gods—had gathered to resolve this most important of decisions—a question whose answer was also reflected in the earthly realm of authority because heaven and earth were linked: Who would rule the united lands of Upper and Lower Egypt, Horus or Set? So too, the human kings of south and north sought to unify their earthly kingdoms, the Red Land of the desert with the Black Land of the fertile Nile. As above, so below.

Though the Ennead was normally nine in number, others of significance were present as well. All of them manifested their humanoid presence as the covenanted Watchers of Egypt in this divine council of the gods. Ra, a solar deity and king of the gods, presided over the court. Thoth, the scribal god of wisdom and secret knowledge, helped facilitate and record the proceedings. 

Isis and Thoth already agreed with Shu that Horus, ruler of the Black Land of the northern delta, should be king of the south as well. No one spoke up for the red-headed Set, ruler of the Red Land of southern desert, so he spoke for himself. “Mighty Ra-Horakhty, the All-Lord, who wears the Red Crown and White Crown of Upper and Lower Egypt, and all the members of this council of shining ones, I am the strongest in this pantheon,” Set paused with confidence, “and you know it.”

Set turned back to Ra and added with a bow, “With the exception, of course, of your glory. But without me guarding the prow of your solar boat every night, you would not get past the sea serpent Apophis to rise every morning.”

That claim was met with silent affirmation. They could not mock the mythology they had crafted for the Egyptians. It was a covenant by which they were bound.

Horus, now wearing an eye patch, guffawed. “You are a brute of strength. I will give you that. But you are also monumentally stupid. I have bested you in all our contests over the years simply through strategy and intelligence. I present my latest evidence of said superiority.” Horus raised his trophy of Set’s organ taken from their most recent skirmish.

A rumble of laughter rolled through the assembly.

“I disagree,” replied Set, raising Horus’s gouged eye in the air, “I am not sure that you are seeing things clearly enough.” The audience response was not quite as enthusiastic. So Set continued, “As for our contests, before you took from me my manhood, I recall the pleasure of taking yours.”

Now the assembly responded with a unanimous gasp of empathy for the violated Horus. The Great God would never forget that horrible experience of rape at the hands of his scheming uncle.

“Enough!” the voice of Ra boomed through the assembly, silencing everyone with his authority. “I have received word from Osiris.” He opened the letter from the Lord of the Dead, still abiding in his underworld realm of Duat.

He read the words with deliberation. “Thus saith Osiris, Bull who dwells in On, Son of Ptah. I give my testimony to the Ennead from my dwelling in the West where Duat resides. Horus is my son and therefore benefactor of my throne on earth. There should be no contention. Set killed me, and Ra brought me back to life to be Lord of the Dead. If you defraud Horus, my rightful heir, for the benefit of my brother and murderer Set, I will unleash the horrors of the underworld upon the land of the living. Do what is right. Grant Horus my son the double crown.”

The words rang through the hall with fierce solemnity. They had spent millennia building their pantheon of gods, enslaving the Egyptian lands beneath their hands. But internecine squabbles like this threatened their unity. If Osiris made good on his promise of underworld invasion, they could lose their power and become prey to the gods of other nations around them: Kush in the south, Assyria in the north, Babylon in the east. 

But Set himself was an unpredictable agent of chaos that also threatened Ma’at, the established order of the cosmos. Placing that agent in control of it all would be more foolish than allowing him to roam free with his disrupting behavior. Set’s claim to the throne was empty, and everyone knew it. He was a murderer and a liar and would be banished to the desert where chaos ruled.

Thus, the contendings of Horus and Set were resolved by the assembly unanimously awarding Horus the white crown of Upper Egypt to be worn with his red crown of Lower Egypt, embodying the unity of the Red and Black Lands. The white crown was a bulbous tall pin shape that fit within the wide circular red crown that graced the Great God’s head.

Ma’at had been restored. The proper order of the cosmos maintained as Horus was again united with the earthly king of all Egypt, north and south. On earth as it is in heaven.

Thoth, the scribal deity, strode up to Set, held out his hand, and commanded, “The eye of Horus.”

Set winced in pain. “Only if he gives me back what is mine.”

Thoth replied, “Only if Horus wills it.”

Set looked around at the eyes of all upon him, enforcing the will of Horus. He might be the strongest of them all, but he could not stand against them all. He reluctantly reached into his pouch and handed the eye of Horus to Thoth, who walked over to the hawk-headed deity. The humiliation burned Set’s soul with the fires of revenge. He was already scheming a new plan.

Thoth reached Horus and gave him the stolen eye. Horus put it back into its socket. Thoth, also a god of healing, spit upon Horus’s replaced eye and gave the Great God back his sight. Horus now gleamed with a golden shine as his power and authority returned. He stood to address the assembly, rising to his full height of eight feet.

“Shining ones, Watchers of the Red and Black Lands, listen to me now. Though we have unity, we do not have the security we need for expanding of our pantheon. For as I speak, our perpetual enemy to the south, the land of Kush, still jeopardizes Egypt’s dominance. They are led by the rebel god Amun and his allies, Satet, Anuket, and Tawaret.” 

Those were the names of various deities over the Kushites, a people of dark skin, who thrived several hundred miles south of Egypt down the Nile. Kush was part of a larger area called Nubia that contained similar tribes. Kushites were a distant people but a powerful one that had cost the kings of Egypt many years and many lives in the pursuit of subjugation.

Horus the golden continued, “We must be united to defeat our foes in the south before we can set our eyes on the northern enemy.” 

He turned to look at Set. “And that is why I will extend the hand of grace to Set, remove his banishment, and return to him what I have taken if he but bends the knee in submission to my rule.”

He stared at Set, waiting his response. The entire assembly went deathly quiet. This could turn the tides of war. But Set was an incorrigible self-centered monstrosity. Horus’s first act was to gamble his newly gained authority on an offer that would surely be rejected and make him look weak before the assembly. It was as if Set had been given the advantage after all. That the power was in his hands.

But Set knelt to one knee and bowed his head in deference to Horus. He announced, “I pledge my allegiance to the Great God, the Lord of Heaven.”

The entire assembly erupted in applause. It was the first moment of unity and hope in a long time for this bickering body of divinities. The feeling of victory was palpable. 

And yet Horus watched his kneeling, defeated opponent with a skeptical eye. Set was a murderer, a liar, and a rebel, the very soul of chaos. Though Horus was obligated to accept outward obeisance, he knew that Set was not to be trusted.

Chapter 2

Kush

Egyptian overseer General Sobekmose led his army of six thousand soldiers up to the mouth of the Uraeus Valley north of the Kushite capital city of Kerma. It was just before dusk with the sun approaching the horizon. Sobekmose was six feet tall with a muscular frame and skill from years of military training. He wore a nemes, the striped cloth headdress that represented the authority of the king, over his tightly cropped dark-brown hair. It could not hide his large bushy eyebrows that gave accent to his unusually bright light-brown eyes. 

As eldest son of King Sobekhotep IV of Egypt, Sobekmose represented the sovereign as his general and successor. He was almost forty years old. But as adopted son of that ruler, Sobekmose always felt the need to prove himself above and beyond what his station required. So when the Egyptian king called upon Sobekmose to push back the invading forces of Kush, the general did not stop pushing until he reached the Kushite capital city of Kerma three hundred miles south of Upper Egypt.

Sobekmose was both relentless and ruthless toward his enemies. He had first recaptured the old Egyptian capital city of Memphis from the Kushite invaders, enslaving the captives for building projects. He then took back the new urban center of Thebes along with its magnificent temple of Karnak that had been desecrated by the abominable foreigners. But the further Sobekmose went south upriver, further away from the Nile delta, the more he would execute captives rather than enslave them. 

After returning the cities and forts along the river back into Egyptian hands, the general kept marching into Kushite territory on his way to Kerma with intentions of retribution. He knew the Kushite king would be expecting him but not from this direction and not this soon. The typical pathway of approach to Kerma was to follow the Nile shoreline and then to cross the water to attack the city on the east bank. But this route was circuitous along the snaking river, taking a week or more, and a riverside attack was perilous for the Egyptian forces. 

So Sobekmose took a short cut by crossing the Nile up north at the third cataract where the waters were rough with rocks and boulders. He then came directly south, avoiding the river, and was about to travel through the Uraeus Valley, which led directly to Kerma’s north city walls. He would arrive at the capital days before the Kushites anticipated him, thus surprising them. And he would also avoid the disadvantage of attacking from the riverside of the fortress.

But there was a dangerous complication to this strategic surprise route. The valley through which they were about to pass was infested with the winged fiery serpent called the uraeus, which could decimate an army with their venomous bites. It was the reason why the Kushites would never expect their attackers to come this way, a natural threat promising mass casualties into which no informed leader would deliberately march their men.

But Sobekmose was more than informed. He was also prepared. He stood in his chariot looking into the valley before them. His lieutenant and loyal bodyguard Khanethothes rode a chariot beside the general and eyed him for a command. He was the general’s physical and mental equal though in some ways his opposite. Khanethothes was bald with white eyebrows and lashes, light-blue eyes, and whitish skin. He was an albino Nubian who had an otherworldly hybrid presence.

Sobekmose gestured, and the trumpeters called forward a special regiment. A hundred wagons carrying large baskets made from papyrus reeds came wheeling to the front of the army. Another command and the baskets were opened.

A flurry of thousands of birds burst out of their baskets and into the valley like a storm cloud. They were ibises, large birds, mostly light-feathered, with hearty bodies, long curved necks, and even longer beaks. Ibises were sacred for their connection to Thoth, the scribal god of wisdom. 

And they were snake killers.

Sobekmose smirked at Khanethothes as they watched the flurry of birds descend upon the valley like a regiment of avian mercenaries, hunting and killing a multitude of serpents hidden from the setting sun in the rocks and crevices.

Some of the flying serpents burst out of their hiding places to fight back, their leathery wings allowing them the ability to glide for short distances. They were normally a frightening sight to human victims. But they didn’t have the strength or agility of their feathered adversaries, who were swooping and soaring from superior positions. The sounds of ibises screeching echoed against the valley walls like attacking war cries. The soldiers cheered behind Sobekmose.

Khanethothes leaned toward his general with a return grin. “It appears that your tactic worked, General. The soldiers think you are Thoth incarnate. You should have no trouble getting them to storm the impossible fortress of our enemy.”

The lieutenant was being a bit ironic. The general was concerned about the Kushites’ mighty defenses. Military forces could not fully surround their walled city because of its location on the shore of the Nile, and those walls were tall and deep. 

It had taken almost a year for Sobekmose to recapture Upper Egypt. But now they were in the enemy’s territory far from home and reinforcements. And it was going to be a long siege.

The standard bearers were the first to step into the cleared valley. They carried the military banners of the king, images of golden winged uraeus serpents on poles just like the serpents that had been killed in this valley. The uraeus was a symbol of the king’s own power, thus their presence on many of the headdresses and crowns worn by royalty. But Egyptians believed that the standards were not merely symbols. They were actual repositories of the king’s divine power. The attacking soldiers hoped that the divine power of the king contained in his standards would repel any surviving serpents.

As Sobekmose led his army through the cleared Uraeus Valley, his only thought was to pray to the gods that this surprise attack might gain him the upper hand he needed to achieve a most difficult conquest.

His prayers were answered when an Egyptian scout met them just before reaching the end of the valley at dusk. He brought information that the Kushite army, about four thousand strong, was encamped just outside the walls of Kerma a mere half-mile from the invading forces. And they had no clue what was coming for them.

Sobekmose mused over the relative parity of battle skills between his people and his enemies. Egyptian and Kushite soldiers were similarly dressed and equipped for war. Both wore battle skirts, the Egyptians of white linen with a loin cloth covering, the Kushites of animal skins like panthers or lions. Both tended to be bare-chested with sandals or bare feet, and both used similar weapons of arrows, spears, and swords. Both carried animal skin-covered shields, but the Egyptian version was tall and square with a rounded top while the Kushite version was smaller and round.

Though the Egyptians outnumbered the Kushite forces and had the element of a surprise night attack, his enemies had one advantage in that scenario. They were ebony-skinned, rendering them difficult to see in the dark of evening. 

So Sobekmose prayed to Thoth, the moon god of Egypt, to grant them the light to see their enemy as the ibises had seen the serpents in the hidden crevices of the Uraeus Valley. And he planned the attack for the hour just before dawn so that by the time fighting was engaged, the light of day would be their ally.

Sobekmose and Khanethothes led the Egyptian chariots out of the valley and onto the field where the Kushites were quartered. The cloud of dust churned up around them, making Sobekmose think of Set, the storm god, riding on clouds of judgment. Lightning was in his hands and thunder on his lips as his chariot forces crashed into the unsuspecting camp of enemy soldiers in tents. 

Most of the Kushites were at ease, sleeping or cleaning up from their dinner meal. They were brutal warriors, but few were able to gather their weapons in time to fight Egypt’s mighty swift sword that came down upon their heads.

Chariots first crashed through the camp, trampling everything beneath their war hooves and wooden wheels until chaos led to panic. The Egyptian infantry followed, cutting down the unprepared Kushites trying to muster a fighting force. 

Blood ran through the streets as high as a horse’s bridle that night. The Kushite army was slaughtered without mercy as the stars fell from the sky and the moon turned to blood. Such was the symbolic language of military destruction. It was swift justice in Sobekmose’s mind. 

But not swift enough.

About a quarter of the Kushite soldiers had escaped behind the walls of the city and were able to shut the gates before the Egyptians could catch them. Sobekmose led a battery of a hundred Egyptians up to the gates with logs to batter their way in before the Kushites could reinforce the gateway. 

The morning sun was rising in the sky at the Egyptians’ backs. Ra’s rays blinded the eyes of the Kushites facing them. Sobekmose jumped off his chariot in complete disregard for his own safety and engaged in hand-to-hand combat with two Kushite warriors left outside the gates. 

He used his khopesh sickle sword to hack one warrior to the ground. But when the other tripped over his fallen comrade, Sobekmose allowed him the dignity to stand back up before returning to battle with him. He didn’t do so for the sake of fairness. The point, after all, was to win the battle and kill the enemy. But he had a deep-seated sense of pride that wanted all his achievements to be won by superior skill, not from mere luck or favor. 

He cut down his opponent with his superior skill. 

The Egyptian soldiers began pounding away at the gate’s creaking timber with several battering rams, thirty men to a log. But in their haste, they failed to concern themselves with what was going on over their heads. Large cauldrons of boiling pitch came pouring down, scalding many to death. As the survivors sought to rescue their fellow burned, a fiery arrow hit the oily black liquid and caused a firestorm to consume everyone in its fury. 

Virtually all the Egyptian warriors involved in the gate offensive perished in the conflagration. Sobekmose tried to drag one of his wounded soldiers to safety, but the heat was unbearable, so he watched in horror, hearing his own men screaming in pain as they were burned alive in the flames.

That moment of dread pause allowed an archer on the precipice to take aim with his bow right at the back of Sobekmose. But the Kushite arrow went askew when an enemy dart hit the archer in the sternum—a dart launched by the bow of Khanethothes, who was guarding his lord and overseer. Sobekmose thanked him with a gesture of his fist over his heart and jumped back onto his chariot. The two rode back to their camp, leaving the Kushites safely behind their impenetrable walls.

Sobekmose and Khanethothes rode their chariots up to a ledge overlooking Kerma with a good vantage point about a hundred yards out. The morning sun illuminated the massacre below. 

Sobekmose stared at the main tower. In that rising light, he could see a Kushite woman guarded by warriors standing at the top of the rampart and looking his way. She was dressed in what appeared to be royal garb with gems and golden jewelry sparkling in the sunlight. She stood with a regal posture that betrayed a high status, maybe that of a princess. She turned away quickly and was escorted back into the dark tower.

Khanethothes said, “I saw her watching you at the gates. I trust we sufficiently inspired her with fear.”

Sobekmose responded with a shrug. “More importantly, the king.”

They returned to their stronghold. Sobekmose did not look forward to the long siege that was sure to follow.