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the Egyptians considered these concepts as having not less than three major components:
the Ka, the Ba, and the Akt.
The Ka enters the body at birth. It animates the body and derives nourishment from
the food ingested by the body. According to some accounts, it is the Ka's need for life's
necessities, such as shelter, warmth, rest, food, and comfort, that drives the body to sleep,
eat, seek shade, and so on. When the body is asleep and when the sleeper dreams of moving
about or traveling, such dreams are the Ka's roaming outside the body.
The Ba also enters the body at birth, and it shapes and defines individual personality.
It imparts to the body a style of speaking, observing, and a manner of moving. A restless
energy, the Ba flies between the living and the land of the dead, keeping in touch with gods,
ancestors, and possibly the future. The Ba is often represented by a great bird with arms
outstretched and bearing the face of a lovely woman.
The Akt is the third vital component of the body's soul and spirit. Its mystery is vividly
conveyed in texts dealing with the dead and in pictures on tomb walls. The Akt departs the
body at the moment of death, never to return. It searches for the land of the reeds, and when
it arrives there at Osiris's domain, it may catch sight of ancestors and gods, but entry is
denied pending a final trial. Toth, the bird-god of wisdom, presides, along with Anubis, the
jackal-god of death. The Akt places the dead person's deeds, sometimes depicted as his or
her heart, on a balance scale, weighed against the heft of cosmic order. This anguish-filled
moment is often pictured as a goddess, feather in hand, preparing to examine the scale, or
perhaps to let the feather tip the balance.
After the weighing, Toth conducts the Akt to a table. On one side of the table sits
Osiris. On the other side is a demon-dog. If the weighing of deeds has been favorable to the
deceased, the Akt will be presented to Osiris, who will welcome the Akt to the realm of the
favored dead. If the weighing has been unfavorable, the demon-dog will carry the Akt to a
second death, to be eaten or consumed by demons!
WHY DID THE EGYPTIANS PRESERVE THE BODIES OF THE DEAD?
As death is understood in everyday experience, every corporeal body will someday die, but
the Ka has eternal longings. If the body can be physically preserved, the Ka can keep its
home; otherwise it will slip into nothingness. The Ba, too, has eternal longings. It seeks to
rejoin the Ka by reposing in the preserved body. So, when the body is preserved, the Ka
and the Ba can continue their existence, and in this way, these components of the soul-spirit
will dwell in eternity even when the Akt has achieved its own eternity in Osiris's pleasant
domain.
Ka, Ba, Akt, and the body itself are four components of the soul-spirit. To these, a fifth
might be added: the name that the deceased carried in life. The name will help to guide the
Ka and Ba to their rightful body-home. For that reason, the preserved corpse usually had its
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