The Egyptian by Mika Waltari

Posted by admin_akashic on Mar 4th, 2022 in Stories

“I suffer from a headache that makes me sleepless at night,” he said touching his forehead with his hand. “A terrible headache takes over me often when something happens against my will, and my doctors are unable to help me. They can numb my pain with drugs but I do not want drugs because my thoughts must be clear like water for the sake of my god, and I am also weary of the doctors of the accursed god. Horemheb, the son of falcon, has told me about your skill, Sinuhe. Maybe you can help me. Do you know Aten?”

This was a difficult question to me, and I weighed my words carefully before I answered in front of Pharaoh, “I know Aten if it is him who is that something in me and beyond my knowledge, beyond and above all human knowledge. In any other way I do not know him.”

He got excited, and his face started glowing, and he said enthusiastically, “You talk about Aten like my best students for a man can know Aten only in his heart, not with his reason. Only I know him with my reason for I am his son, and in the brightness of my visions I have seen him face to face, even if his essence is facelessness. There is no other god than Aten, and the gods erected by men are illusions before him. The other gods are only shadows before him, and that is why I deposed the accursed god for his shadow prevented the light from shining to my people’s hearts. Sinuhe, if you want, I give you the cross of life.”

I said to him, “Last night I saw men crush the head of a wounded man with stones for the sake of your cross of life, and women around him were jumping and crying Aten’s name. I also saw women rejoicing with black men and praising Aten.”

His face became grim, and he frowned, and the bony reddish cheeks rose ever higher in his thin face. Lamenting, he touched his head, a grey film covered his eyes, and he shouted, “Also you, Sinuhe, make my head ever more pained by telling me things that do not please me.”

I said to him, “You have proclaimed that you live by the truth, Pharaoh Akhenaten. Therefore I tell you the truth although I understand well that for the sake of your sickness the courtiers and Aten worshippers wrap the truth from you in soft fabrics and seal it in leather. For truth is an exposed knife in a man’s hand which can turn against its carrier. The truth will turn against you, Pharaoh Akhenaten, and cause you pain. I can cure you easily, if only you want to close your ears from truth.”

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He approached me and grabbed my arm tightly and squeezed it and said passionately, “No, no, Sinuhe. Akhenaten lives only by the truth, and that is the purpose of his life. But it is not a crime if an Egyptian woman finds delight in a black man in the name of Aten for all people and complexions are equal before Aten.”

Horemheb spat and wiped the spit to the floor with his foot, then he sniffed his golden whip with a disgusted look on his face. Pharaoh looked at him offended, and I realised Pharaoh lacked ability to smile and laugh. He was a person of truth, but he did not know how to laugh, and that made him an unhappy person who caused misfortunes around him. I said to him:

“Truth does not make a man happy. Recently, I opened the skull of an old woman who believed she was Queen Hatshepsut, but once cured, she was just a poor old wife and not as happy when she believed she was Queen Hatshepsut.”

Akhenaten asked, “Could you really cure me by opening my skull?”

I contemplated a long time but finally said, “You know that I am familiar with your holy sickness, Pharaoh Akhenaten, and I have seen you having a seizure when you were still a youth. Sometimes these seizures do not recur if the patient’s skull is opened, but sometimes they do. I think this depends on if the sickness is due to an external damage or to nature — for a natural sickness cannot be cured by opening the skull. However, your recurring headaches signal a damage in your head, and I note how your cheeks and arms twitch when you talk. Therefore, I think that opening your skull might relieve your ailment if any doctor would dare perform it. You have to remember that if a doctor opens your skull and his skill cures you, you probably lose the gift of your visions and what your heart regards as truth. As a doctor, I may say that your god Aten is created by your sick head, but this does not diminish the greatness of your idea when I think of it as a man.”

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