Talk:Thoth

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I expect this to indeed be edited mercilessly, as it will be a welcome improvement to what was there before. I just covered it up with the first informative site I could find; http://www.pantheon.org/articles/t/thoth.html

Hieroglyph not found

Just wanted to alert people that there're 3 "(hieroglyph not found)" in the alternate names for Thoth box. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 24.60.196.46 (talk) 04:07, 22 April 2007 (UTC).

The hieroglyphs in the alternate names box are rubbish - they don't transliterate to the names given at all. I am not sure what the point of this is - I want to delete unless someone fixes it properly.Apepch7 (talk) 19:02, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

IPA

Am I insane/finally going blind from using this 'pedia too much, or is there no IPA pronounciation guide in this article? I can't figure out why 999 is removing the admittedly imperfect pronunciation guide with "IPA is all that is needed" when there's no IPA code on the page - right? Or is the unicode Egyptian somehow doing double-duty? I freely admit I don't speak IPA, but I had to ask... -- nae'blis 20:51, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

Yes, it is unusual. There is a page somewhere about transcription in Afro-asiatic languages that shows traditional transcription compared to IPA. I'll try to find it, ans write an IPA transcription of the name in the article. The ikiroid (talk·desk·Advise me) 18:16, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

Ah, the comparison is at Proto-Semitic language. The ikiroid (talk·desk·Advise me) 18:42, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

Depictions of Gods

"These forms are all symbolic and are metaphors for Thoth's attributes. The Egyptians did not believe these gods actually looked like humans with animal heads."

Is this absolutely true? Or is it merely representative of "official teachings" or the beliefs of the priestly class/religiously educated? Sort of like how Catholicism has teachings with regards to the status of the saints, or Buddhism has teachings about Buddha not being a "god," but you see local variations of "folk practice" which may be different than the official doctrine.

In other words, I could see a bunch of Egyptian priests emphatically insisting the depictions are merely symbolic, while at the same time there's some Egyptian merchant driving his caravan along the roads, worrying that he might do something to offend the giant almighty aardvark-headed demi-human who rules the desert. Macroidtoe 21:43, 4 August 2007 (UTC)

This is more a modern interpretation created by modern scholars to deal with the fact that many of them (like the ancient Greeks and Romans) find it inconceivable that such a great civilisation would worship animals; the truth is probably much more complicated. I know of no Egyptian text which actually states that the gods did not look the way they were depicted, and various scholars (from Plutarch to te Velde in his 'A Few Remarks upon the Religious Significance of Animals in Ancient Egypt', 1980) have pointed out that Egyptians had a generally higher opinion of animals that most moderns, and certainly than the 19th and early 20th scholars who came up with the idea that the part-animal forms of gods were just hieroglyphs, and not meant to literally represent the gods. The most obvious point to make is that they had numerous sacred animals, treated like living gods. On the other hand, they did recognise that the true nature of the gods was complicated and perhaps unknowable; there are many hymns which refer to this idea, and in the (early CE) story of Setna and the Mummies Thoth comes to the magician Setna in his 'secret form' (which unfortunately he doesn't describe). The best summary I've seen is in Eric Hornung's Conceptions of God in Ancient Egypt, where he says something to the effect that while the true nature of the gods might be unknowable, the animal, human and half-and-half forms are among those they could (and did) inhabit. In the one description I can think of where a human meets a god and the god is described, The Tale of the Shipwrecked Sailor, the god is a terrifying half-man, half snake. Fievos (talk) 12:48, 9 November 2009 (UTC)

Etymology

Could it be that his name evolved into the English word "thought"? 24.4.131.142 20:26, 13 October 2007 (UTC)

"Thought" is the past participle of think which comes from Old English thencan - ultimately with an Indo-Eurpean root of *tong meaning 'to know'. I can't see any link to AE. The name Thoth is a Greek version of the name which was probably something like Djehut or Djehuti.Apepch7 22:47, 13 October 2007 (UTC)

Merging

This page should not be merged with the Taautus page, they aren't similar enough. And Thoth is an Egyptian god, and Taautus is a Phoenician god, and those are two completly different countries. Yugiohguy1 (talk) 17:18, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

A bit of a mess

I've had to revise the lede as Thoth's counterpart is not Ma'at (and someone has copied this to other articles). This is probably because virtually all of the article seems to come from one source, Budge (the etymology comes from an even older source, someone must have written on it since the 19th century! I'll slap a tag on it of some sort. (talk)

Do you have an alternative source? The best known information to Wikipedia at this time is Budge, if a better source comes up that contradicts it, then that's the time for a switch. The goal is to find a better source. Now where do you get your information from that this is not the truth, that would be a good start. KV(Talk) 20:30, 4 April 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia doesn't know any sources, it's editors who do. And it must be obvious that people have written on Thoth, etc. during the last 100 years, editors should try to get recent sources and never rely on century old ones for archaeology, Egyptology, etc unless they are doing a history of the subject or something like that. Good thing the author of the Sheshat article had something better although they didn't provide a reference. Anyway, see my revision of the lede with a modern day source.Doug Weller (talk) 21:27, 4 April 2008 (UTC)

By Wikipedia, I mean the community, and the best that was put on the page to reflect that the community knows of it. Of course, I just saw you place the tag and post here; I had not seen you add the source yet. However, I believe it was without a page number, mind adding it? I'm the one who put all the Budge stuff up because it's all I had at the time, especially the only thing that went into depth on any of the deities. I don't know where Budge got the asertion, but he is a great source for finding basic bio information. It wasn't until the past week or so that I had access to academic papers that might provide a larger variety. I'm also going to just post your name there to sign the original statement for you. I am curious though as to the change in thought over who was the feminine counterpart, I suppose I'll look into that later. KV(Talk) 22:11, 4 April 2008 (UTC)

Fair enough. There is a page number there, isn't there? I've ordered a book on the subject. WHere did you post my name?

Working together hopefull we can improve some of this. Budge was working very early in the history of Egyptology, a lot has happened since and Budge's translations aren't always the best. Maybe together we can get something better, although I admit that Egyptian religion isn't a strong point of mine -- it varies so much over time and between localities. However, I am on a couple of good mailing lists and have a friend who is an Egyptologist. I found the Thoth/Ma'at stuff in an article on Egyptian astrology, evidently copied from here. The stuff on Egyptian astrology in Wikipedia seems to be sourced from Western astrology books with no knowledge of Egyptology, so not exactly good. :-) Doug Weller (talk) 06:38, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

Yes, Hopefullyl we can imiprove it, though I do have commitment to fixing up a deleted article before looking up more on Djehuty. The problem with sourcing seems to be that most on this subject is rather obscure and Egyptology doesn't sell unless it's a complete overview or a picture book these days. :/ KV(Talk) 15:26, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

Two reliable books on Egyptian Gods are 1) The Routledge Dictionary Egyptian Gods and Goddesses by George Hart ISBN 0-415-34495-6 (paperback) and 2) The Complete Gods and Goddesses of Ancient Egypt by Richard H. Wilkinson ISBN 0-500-05120-8. Budge is old hat as is the monotheism thing - most people subscribe to the idea of henotheism and the best explanation of this is in Hornung's Conceptions of God in Ancient Egypt 'The One and the Many" ISBN 0-7100-9481-7. You also have to be careful with the idea of female 'counterparts' - the Egyptian gods were not all married off in happy families like the Greek pantheon. They were very ancient and changed with time. There is an obvious association between Thoth and Ma'at (wisdom and truth) and as the text mentions there is also Seshat who was to do with measurement. I agree most Egyptology books are coffee table books with pretty pics and not much detail. But Budge did publish a lot with hieroglyphic texts and so on which is why he is still much quoted despite his rather old fashioned idea. Apepch7 (talk) 12:46, 6 April 2008 (UTC)

The bit about Derrida towards the bottom first of all doesn't make much sense (grammatically, semantically) and is also unclear to the point of being wrong. It is perhaps worth noting Derrida's reading of Thoth, but it should be improved. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 170.140.15.228 (talk) 20:31, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

Why are there no citations in the Mythology section? A lot of its claims seem a bit dubious. It's reference to the Osiris myth is cursory and vague, and the reference to Judeo-Christian religious tradition seems rather irrelevant. It also gives the impression that Apep was a god, and its claim that in the Ogdoad tradition, Thoth creates Re is both rather vague (which Ogdoad tradition? Which text?) and sounds a little unlikely. If no-one else wants/can clear this up, I'll rummage around in some secondary texts and translations and see if I can't scrounge up a better section. 92.25.110.71 (talk) 10:57, 10 June 2010 (UTC)Nefertum

Symbolic Heads?

I think the bit saying that the Egyptians didn't think that Thoth had an ibis head needs citation.Tutthoth-Ankhre (talk) 20:14, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

During my previous studies and in my visions contrary to the depiction of the animal-headed form; ibis were kept in Thoth's temple in cages and his followers would offer fruits and other gifts to baboons and discourage harming them, the sacred animals were considered spirit helpers of Thoth Himself. It seems the animal-headed depictions were probably just renderings and not the actual form, although I suppose Thoth can theoretically manifest in whatever form He wishes. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Anwanka (talk • contribs) 19:13, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

Deleted

I took the liberty of deleting the following:

A text entitled The Emerald Tablets of Thoth-The-Atlantean has been claimed to have been translated by a man named Doreal. The introduction claims them to be written by an Atlantean Priest-King named Thoth, who settled a colony in Egypt after Atlantis sank. Doreal further claims the texts are 36,000 years old.

I personally believe the lost continent of Atlantis existed and it quite possibly influenced the ancient Egyptians. But Egyptologists almost unanimously in reject these theories as no evidence supports them. Until such evidence surfaces in sufficient quality and quantity to contradict them, I suggest such connections be omitted from Wikipedia except in articles written as speculation. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.177.30.232 (talk) 18:36, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Female counter part.

This page says it is Seshat, but on the page for Ma'at it says she is Thoth's female side. 67.5.156.26 (talk) 21:28, 13 August 2008 (UTC)

Hermes, Thoth and Enoch

Some have linked Thoth with Hermes, and Hermes with the mysterious Judeo-Christian figure of Enoch. I don't know this works out, but comparisons may be appreciated if they can proven to be relevant. ADM (talk) 20:16, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

Exodus story

It would be interesting of we could connect Thoth to the Exodus story. For instance, if we accept the idea that Thoth is close or related to Enoch/Hermes, then Thoth would also be of special value for the Jews, because the Jews also had a veneration for Enoch. Accordingly, Thoth could have helped the Jews flee Egypt and enter the land of Canaan, which is also known as the Promised Land. ADM (talk) 19:09, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

This sounds like a program of original research to me. Robert A.West (Talk) 22:25, 15 August 2009 (UTC)