their
culture, and the unitary feeling has varied in its degree of
definiteness. In some cases the political predominance of a city or
region has secured preeminence for its deity, or national attachment to
the national god has elevated him above all other gods; where a people
has cultivated poetry or philosophy, the idealizing thought of the one
or the scientific analysis of the other has led in the same direction.

+988+. First, then, we may note the disposition to give substantial
absoluteness to some one god, the choice of the deity being determined
by the political condition as is suggested above, or by local
attachments, or possibly by other conditions which do not appear in the
meager records of early times. Examples of this form of thought are
found in several of the great nations of antiquity. The hymns to the
Egyptian gods Ra, Amon, Amon-Ra, Osiris, and the Nile describe these
deities as universal in attributes and in power. At the moment the poet
conceives of the god whom he celebrates as practically the only one--if
Ra does everything, there is no need of any other deity. At another
moment, however, the same poet may celebrate Osiris with equal
enthusiasm--these high gods are interchangeable. The suggestion from
such fluid conceptions of the divine persons is that the real thought in
the mind of the poet was the supremacy of some divine power which is
incorporated now in one familiar divine name, now in another. It does
not, however, quite reach the point of well-defined monotheism, for
these gods remain distinct, sometimes with separate functions and
duties.

+989+. But this mode of conceiving of the supernatural Power would
naturally pave the way for monotheism, and it is not surprising that
very early in Egypt a definite monotheistic view was developed. King
Amenophis IV, or to give him the name that he adopted in conformity with
his later cult, Khuen-Aten, made a deliberate attempt to elevate the
sun-god Aten to the position of sole ruler and object of worship. Though
the nature of his belief in this deity is not stated in the documents
with the fullness and precision that we should desire, it seems clear,
from the fact that he ordered the destruction of the shrines of the
other deities in the land, that he regarded the worship of this one god
as sufficient. The movement was not a successful one in so far as the
national religion was concerned--it lasted only during his lifetime and
that of his son, an