|
In Egyptian mythology,
Bakha (also spelt Bakh, Buchis, and Bukhis) was the manifestation
of the Ka (power/life-force) of the war god Menthu,
worshipped in the region of Hermonthis. The name is simply Ba-Kha,
which is a reference to the Ba and Akh (Akh is sometimes referred
to as Khu), the components into which the Ka was split, after
death (a characteristic of war). As Ka is also the Egyptian
word for bull, Bakha was said to manifest in a living bull,
which, since Bakha was an aspect of a war-god, was said to be
a wild bull, since these are aggressive when slightly provoked.
A wild bull was chosen and said to be the Bukhis incarnation
of Menthu, in which position it was
worshipped as such. Over time, the criteria for choosing the
bull became more rigid, fixing themselves on what had been
simply the general appearance of bulls in the region, being
a white body and black face. When these bulls, or their mothers,
died, they were mummified, and placed in a special cemetery
known as the Bucheum.
Eventually, the Bakha was identified as a form of the Apis,
and consequently became considered an incarnation of Osiris.
The worship of the bull in this form lasted until about 362
AD, when it was destroyed by rising Christian fundamentalism,
in the Roman empire.
Gods
and Goddesses Menu
This article is copied from
an article on Wikipedia.org
- the free encyclopedia created and edited by online user
community. Although the vast majority of the wikipedia encyclopedia
articles provide accurate and timely information please do
not assume the accuracy of any particular article. This article
is distributed under the terms of GNU
Free Documentation License.
|
