Customer Reviews

From Light Into Darkness: The Evolution of Religion in Ancient Egypt

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Before I begin a review of this book I'd like to point out that I met both Steve and Hakim in 1992 while on tour in Egypt. Steve has become a lifelong friend as a result of that meeting. Steve and I were on separate tours but we both had the privilege of having Hakim as our guide. Most of you reading my comments have never met Hakim. Not only is he a gentle man but the holder of vast wisdom from his indigenous tradition that stretches back for thousands of years. Many persons have regarded him solely as a kindly and experienced tour guide. But because of his 30 years of personal study attempting learn about ancient Egypt especially the king Ahkenaten, Steve was able to discern that there was much more to Hakim than met the eye. As Steve gained more of Hakim's trust, he soon became the student and eventually the transmitter to the public of the ancient Khemitian tradition that has been passed down to Hakim. As he did in The Land of Osiris and now in From Light into Darkness, Steve is sharing with us invaluably important material not only on the spirituality of ancient Egypt but the cyclical, not linear, nature of human existence. He accomplishes this task in 200 pages and written in an engagingly conversational style. Steve provides a telling account how an oral tradition contains greater truth than the written one. He deftly points out the historical conflict between personal direct spiritual experience (the mystical tradition) and religious life mediated by the hanuti (priestly) caste. Very importantly Steve clarifies who the neters were. They were not deities as mainstream academic Egyptology would have you believe but were divine principles framed into a quasi animal/human presentation. The king Ahkenaten did not invent monotheism with the glorification of Aten but was attempting to revive the enlightened state of Aten which was being swamped by the rising power of the hanuti class and the spiritual darkness that came with it. But most significant of all, Steve focuses our attention on a message of hope. The Age of Amun, the time of darkness, is coming to an end and the dawn of Kheper is on our doorstep. For some this may seen Pollyanish but the forces representing the Age of Amun only appear to be in control. Their power is slipping and a new generation has the opportunity to bring the Dawn into fruition.

The oral traditions of native people, while lacking the stamp of academic "peer review," are of intense importance and interest. Stephen Mehler seeks an understanding of history that includes all points of view, but gives weight to those who describe their own history over the opinion of outsiders. This history is what they learned at the knee of their parents following what their parents learned from their own. These are the stories that are passed down through the millennia as ancestral heritage.

The engineering evidence in Egypt has not been explained by traditional Western accounts of its history. The oral tradition now being passed on by Ab'd El Hakim Awyan and brought to the Western world by Mehler provides a cultural framework that allows for a common-sense scientific understanding of an advanced prehistoric civilization that once flourished, but perished in a great cataclysm.

From Light into Darkness builds on The Land of Osiris, providing more indigenous wisdom and unfolding a spiritual fabric that offers comfort and understanding of the cyclical nature of life on Earth, including inevitable periodic planetary changes.

Mr. Mehler has spent most of his life in the study of ancient Egypt. Part of this study is based on his own observations of Egyption artifacts and research conducted inside the pyramids. In addition he has spent several years of study with the Egyption wisdom keeper Abd'El Hakim Awyan who has passed on oral traditions and radical new interpretations of how religion evolved in prehistoric and dynastic Khemit (Egypt).

The thesis in this book is that the teachings of the form the basis from which Judaism was born to be subquently evolved into Christianity and Islam. He presents some theories that the early Jewish patriarchs and prophets (Joseph, Moses and others) were in fact Egyptian. He also presents some thinking that the Risucrucian Order began in ancient Egypt rather than being a development of much more recent time.

In summary, this book presents an alternative view to the history of religion as it is commonly understood.

This is an excellent follow up to Mehler's first book, The Land of Osiris, and gives a first-hand look of his continuing studies with Egyptian indigenous wisdom keeper Abd'el Hakim Awyan. In this book Hakim reveals to Stephen what the indigenous record keepers of Egypt know about the antiquity of their country going back hundreds of thousands of years. A great read!

This book has to be one of the most complete and informative works on the unknown and hidden history of religion. I especially like the sections on Ancient Egypt. Mehler's information is not drawn from one source, but from many. They include archeological discoveries, scientific data, ancient texts, and interviews with experts.

After reading this book, you will come away with a new and enlightened view of religious history. I highly recommend it.

John DeSalvo, Ph.D.,Director of the Great Pyramid of Giza Research Association

This second book by leading world Egyptologist Stephen Mehler is as fundamental as his first book The Land of Osiris. This one is also based in many aspects on analysis of long discussions Mehler had with Abd'El Hakim Awyan, a keeper of oral tradition of the indigenous people of Egypt. In the book Mehler discloses ways that brought ancient people to different religions known today as ancient Egyptian religion, Judaism, Christianity and Islam. He shows that from the pre-historic period to the beginning of the dynastic one Khemitians (the original name of Egyptians) followed pure spiritual practices when people were looking for fusing of their thoughts and the ascension of their spirit. Then Mehler gives a detailed explanation of the appearance of first churches and priests. He accounts for ways and methods, which those priests used to turn people to new ideas when main aspects of nature and spirit became transformed to notions of gods. A very subtle analysis! Mehler could puzzle out very difficult events that took place in Egypt around 1500 BC, which allowed him to present us persons who decided to resuscitate prehistoric spiritual Khemitian traditions. That dramatic period of ancient Egypt resulted in the migration of 12 tribes of Khemitians to a new land known today as Israel. Mehler uncovers those events to the smallest detail, which so far have been unknown even for researchers.

The reader will learn names of top scientists who have studied that time and see a long line of historical persons, pictures of their statues and mummies. The reader will learn that the Rosicrucian Order also originated in Egypt at that time. What was its goal? Who were its leaders and members? At least the reader will learn the name of the true author of Shakespeare plays who also was a member of the Order. This second book by S. Mehler would be of great benefit to those who are interested in archaeology, Egyptology, ancient history and early religions and those who understand that spiritual practice is much more important than more modern religion concepts that lead only to separation of people.

This is a particularly in depth study of the Wisdom of the Indigenous culture of Egypt that survives today. It, like his work in "Land of Osiris", provide startling insights into many key mysteries of not only Ancient Egyptian History, but that of the Hebrew and Rosicrucian historical traditions that have been untold, or unrevealed, by other scholars either contemporary academics or those who've written in the past. This is an excellent study with profound insights.

I've always found it curious that no matter how hard any historical civilization tried for greatness for the last 5000 years or so, it always ended up going down the tubes. Then again, without a genuine conscious connection to the great creative principle that has brought all that is into being, how could it go any other way?
There's a lot of interesting historical possibilities brought to light in this book. Not the least of which is the great natural cycle of human consciousness that goes from complete conscious immersion in all that is to a deterioration of our perceptions so complete that it leaves only religious dogma, superstion and myth to remind us of what we once were, (and fortunately, will be again). And around and around we go. It makes so much sense that we're just now beginning to awaken once more. For humanity as a whole, it's been pretty dark for the last 5,000 years. But it wasn't, and won't always be so. Call me a guarded optimist.
Great food for thought based on an ancient Egyptian oral tradition. It speaks well for the book that I read it in three days and plan on reading it again, as soon as the friend to whom I loaned it gives it back. If you're a student of higher consciousness, alternative history, and/or ancient Egypt, I think you'll really enjoy this one.

From Light Into Darkness: The Evolution of Religion in Ancient Egypt continues the spiritual and metaphysical offerings of Egyptian wisdom keeper Abd'El Hakim Awyan, as conveyed to the reader through the pen of author and independent Egyptologist Stephen S. Mehler. Chapters muse upon the roots of monotheism - the driving tenet that there is only one God present in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam - in ancient Egypt, and offer a groundbreaking new interpretation of how religion may have evolved in prehistoric and dynastic Khemit (Egypt). Further ruminations upon the teachings of King Akhenaten and the "real" Moses, the genuine identity of the Hyksos, Akhenaten's connections to the Exodus, Judaism, and the Rosicrucian order, and much more are sure to fascinate the reader. Most revolutionary of all, is the revelation of how the spiritual teachings of ancient Khemitians will one day form the foundation of a forthcoming new cycle of consciousness, dubbed The Awakening. An inspirational, and spiritually revolutionary testimony.

The title is the irony of what is happen NOW.
The light is ReTURNing in a Big way.
He shows, explains, story telling from an Oral Truths Master, how we are actually entering a new Light age.
This book explains more of our human history than any book I've ever read (about two thousand to date).
Great freeing Hope is in this book.