d then a counter-revolution swept Aten away and
reinstated the Theban Amon in all his former dignity and powers--but its
very existence is a testimony to the direction of thought of educated
minds in Egypt about the year 1400 B.C. The Aten revolution appears to
have been distinctively Egyptian--there is no trace of foreign influence
in its construction. It has been suggested that Amenophis got his idea
from Semites of Western Asia or particularly from the Hebrews. But
neither the Hebrews nor any other Semitic people of that period were
monotheistic, nor do we find in Egyptian history at the time such social
intercourse as might produce a violent upturning of the religious usage.
We can only suppose that Amenophis was a religious genius who put into
definite shape a conception that was in the air, and by the force of his
enthusiasm made it for the moment effective. Such geniuses have arisen
from time to time in the world, and though the revolution of this
Egyptian king may seem to us to have sprung up with abnormal abruptness,
it is more reasonable to suppose that the way had been prepared for it
in Egyptian thought. He was a man born out of due time; but it cannot be
said that his attempt was without influence on succeeding generations.

+990+. Passing now to the oldest Semitic civilizations, we find in
Babylonia and Assyria many local deities, one or another of whom comes
to the front under the hegemony of some city or state. Here we are met
by the fact already referred to that the gods are interchangeable--it is
practically a matter of indifference whether one deity or another is
elevated to headship. In the great empires the gods of the capital
cities naturally became preeminent; so Marduk in Babylonia and Ashur in
Assyria. The royal inscriptions speak of these gods as if they were
all-powerful and all-controlling. In both countries the goddess Ishtar
appears as the supreme director of affairs, and other deities are
similarly honored. What might have been the issue if the later
Babylonian kingdom had continued for a long time it is impossible to
say, but the impression made by the words of the devout king
Nebuchadnezzar II (605-562 B.C.) is that he would have been content with
Marduk as the one object of worship. Babylonia produced no such radical
reformer as the Egyptian Amenophis--there is no formulation of
monotheism; but the general tone of the Babylonian religion of the sixth
century is not very different from th