other writers, the Papyrus buried with the mummy
contained the doctrine of the Divine unity. The name of God was not
given, but instead the words NUK PU NUK, "I am the I am," corresponding
to the name given in Exodus iii. 14, Jahveh (in a corrupt form Jehovah).
This name, Jahveh, has the same meaning with the Egyptian Nuk pu Nuk, "I
am the I am." At least so say Egyptologists. If this is so, the
coincidence is certainly very striking.

That some of the ritualism to which the Jews were accustomed in Egypt
should have been imported into their new ceremonial, is quite in
accordance with human nature. Christianity, also, has taken up many of the
customs of heathenism.[195] The rite of circumcision was probably adopted
by the Jews from the Egyptians, who received it from the natives of
Africa. Livingstone has found it among the tribes south of the Zambesi,
and thinks this custom there cannot be traced to any Mohammedan source.
Prichard believes it, in Egypt, to have been a relic of ancient African
customs. It still exists in Ethiopia and Abyssinia. In Egypt it existed
far earlier than the time of Abraham, as appears by ancient mummies.
Wilkinson affirms it to have been "as early as the fourth dynasty, and
probably earlier, long before the time of Abraham." Herodotus tells us
that the custom existed from the earliest times among the Egyptians and
Ethiopians, and was adopted from them by the Syrians of Palestine. Those
who regard this rite as instituted by a Divine command may still believe
that it already existed among the Jews, just as baptism existed among them
before Jesus commanded his disciples to baptize. Both in Egypt and among
the Jews it was connected with a feeling of superiority. The circumcised
were distinguished from others by a higher religious position. It is
difficult to trace the origin of sentiments so alien to our own ways of
thought; but the hygienic explanation seems hardly adequate. It may have
been a sign of the devotion of the generative power to the service of God,
and have been the first step out of the untamed license of the passions,
among the Africans.

It has been supposed that the figure of the Cherubim among the Jews was
derived from that of the Sphinx. There were three kinds of Sphinxes in
Egypt,--the _andro-sphinx_, with the head of a man and the body of a lion;
the _crio-sphinx_, with the head of a ram and the body of a lion; and the
_hieraco-sphinx_, with the head of a hawk and a lion's bod