MAGIC, ‘RELIGION’ AND THE CONVERSION OF

EGYPT TO CHRISTIANITY∗

Norman Ricklefs

T his paper aims to provide a general introduction to the practice of

‘magic’ in Egypt and to briefly illustrate the manner in which these
practices continued after Egypt was Christianised in the later Roman Empire
period. It is partly a response to questions about these topics from
undergraduate students. Egyptian magic was distinctive in a number of ways
and it is vital to keep this in mind when investigating topics related to
Egyptian history. Moreover the continuation, almost unchanged, of magical
practices which found their origin in the pre-dynastic period raises questions
about the process of religious conversion. Thus the question arises as to the
extent of conversion—what difference did Christianity really make to the
spiritual lives of ordinary Egyptians?

What is ‘magic’?
At this point it might be worthwhile to make an attempt to define ‘magic’,
especially in relation to that term against which it is normally juxtaposed—
‘religion’. ‘Magic’ is not easy to define. The term has normally been used in
a pejorative sense; thus it is usually seen as a form of practice or belief which
is not ‘correct’, especially in its relationship with the divine world and its
denizens. ‘Magic’ is clearly not ‘religion’.1 Indeed in most people’s minds
magic is defined by its opposition to correct religious practice. The
Macquarie Dictionary defines magic as (amongst other things): “the art of
producing effects claimed to be beyond the natural human power and arrived
at by means of supernatural agencies or through command of occult forces of
nature”.2 ‘Religion’, however, is defined as: “the quest for the values of the

∗
This paper is the result of several different drafts, but first saw light as parts of two different
chapters in my 1995 Macquarie Honours thesis. In its several different forms the ideas
presented in this paper have been read and commented upon by Professor Edwin Judge, Dr
Boyo Ockinga, Dr Ted Nixon and Professor Alanna Nobbs. Without their comments this
paper would be much poorer, but needless to say none should be held responsible for any
mistakes which remain. I am likewise very grateful to the anonymous reviewer whose
comments helped to sharpen my approach to pagan Egyptian thought and practice.
1
Whatever ‘religion’ is. See the convincing case put by Edwin Judge in ‘The Beginning of
Religious History’, Journal of Religious History 15.4 (1989) 394-412.
2
s.v. ‘Magic’ in A. Delbridge et al. (eds), The Macquarie Dictionary (North Ryde, Sydney
2001). This definition owes much to James Frazer’s definition in The Golden Bough: a
study in comparative religion (London 1890). For other definitions of magic broadly
consistent with this definition, see B. Malinowski, Magic, Science, and Religion and other
178 Ricklefs: Magic, ‘religion’ and the conversion of Egypt to Christianity

ideal life, involving three phases, the ideal, the practices for attaining the
values of the ideal, and the theology or world view relating the quest to the
environing universe”. It is also defined as: “recognition on the part of man of
a controlling superhuman power entitled to obedience, reverence, and
worship.”3 These two definitions minimise the correspondences which often
exist in ritual behaviour which could be characterised as either religion or
magic: for instance the practice of rituals in an institutional religious setting
which are aimed at achieving personal (and often quite selfish) goals, such as
eternal life. They do, however, offer a starting point for the study of magic.
Religion is, or should be, focused upon offering veneration to the divine, the
focus is thus upon the divine, not humanity. Magic, however, is concerned
with manipulating the divine for our own ends. It is focused upon and
devised for human beings; the divine is simply a tool for the realisation of
human needs and wants. Religion is theocentric; magic is anthropocentric.

The application of this definition of religion to the study of Egyptian culture

indicates my strong preference for what might be termed a ‘magical’ (thus,
anthropocentric) approach to the divine rather than a ‘religious’ approach.
Magic was deeply ingrained in the Egyptian spiritual world.

The Relationship between the Egyptian magician and the divine

Magic in Egyptian religion can be characterised as an impersonal force that is
available for the use of both gods and men. Indeed it blurs the distinctions
between the two.4 Heka (magic)5 could give a powerful magician superiority
over even the gods. An illustration of this is the story of Pharoah Unås. The
story is preserved in a very ancient text, which, although found in the
Pyramid Texts of the Fifth Dynasty (2,600 BC), is probably pre-dynastic, and
demonstrates the antiquity of Egyptian magical practices. The story concerns
Unås, who, upon death, ascends to the sky and, due to his command of the
magical forces, is able to hunt down the gods, kill and then eat them, in order

Essays (Boston 1948) and S.J. Tambiah, Magic, Science, Religion, and the Scope of
Rationality (Cambridge 1990).
3
s.v. ‘Religion’ in The Macquarie Dictionary (n.2).
4
This contrasts with other systems of magic that see it as a power unique to members of a
particular cultural group rather than as a ritual technique available to everyone, i.e., as a
uniquely cultural possession rather than an impersonal force. Cf. E. Evans Pritchard,
Witchcraft, Oracles, and Magic among the Azande (Oxford 1976) 2-4.
5
For the word in Middle Egyptian, see A. Gardiner, Egyptian Grammar (3rd ed.; Oxford
1976) 583a & 617b; in Bohairic and Sa’idic Coptic, see W.E. Crum, A Coptic Dictionary
(Oxford 1939) 661. Also, David Frankfurter, Religion in Roman Egypt: Assimilation and
Resistance (Princeton 1998) 211, and cf. 38-39 wherein he describes a personification of
heka.
 Ancient History 37:2 2007 179

to absorb their heka.6 Moreover, whilst practising magic, the ancient

Egyptian magician was not only potentially able to command the gods, he
could even take the identity of a god (often Thoth as he was the creator of
writing and a practitioner of magic). Thus in a text written during the time of
Nektanebos II (360-342 BC) a magician declared:

I am Thoth, master of the divine words, he who acts as an interpreter to all the
gods.7

This attitude towards the divine survived well into Christian times. For
instance, in the Coptic magic book from the second half of the tenth century
entitled The Praise of Michael The Archangel the magician says:

Listen to me today, father of light. I am Michael; my name is god and

humankind.8

In another tenth century text the magician declares that “I myself am God.”9

Traditional Egyptian magic was thus characterised by the utilisation of heka:

a power that could make the magician lord over even the gods and goddesses
of the Egyptian pantheon. The polymath E.A.W. Budge10 summed up this
Egyptian approach to magic:

... one great distinction must be made between the magic of Moses and that of
the Egyptians among whom he lived; the former was wrought by the

6
R.O. Faulkner, The Ancient Egyptian Pyramid Texts translated into English (Oxford 1969)
80-83, 273-4; also Alan W. Shorter, The Egyptian Gods (Oxford 1981) 95-6.
7
For the Metternich Stela, see C.E. Sander-Hansen, Die Texte der Metternich-Stele
(Analecta Aegyptiaca VII; Copenhagen 1956); translation in Christian Jacq, Egyptian
Magic (trans. Janet M. Davis; Wiltshire 1985) 6-7. It has been argued that the mystic
visions involved in Jewish Merkabah and Apocalyptic mysticism also involve the
transformation of the mystic into an angelic “likeness of that Glory or divine image”; so
Gilles Quispel, ‘Transformation through Vision in Jewish Gnosticism and The Cologne
Mani Codex’, Vigiliae Christianae 49.2 (1995) 189, quoting C.R.A. Morray-Jones, Journal
of Jewish Studies 43.1 (1992). Yet Quispel attributes this to “Hellenic and Greek
mysteriosophic” influence rather than Egyptian, claiming that this notion was later
imported into the Egyptian Hermetic tradition (190).
8
The Praise of Michael The Archangel, 2, ll. 29-30, in Marvin Meyer and Richard Smith
(eds), Ancient Christian Magic: Coptic Texts of Ritual Power (San Francisco 1994) 327;
Coptic text: Angelicus M. Kropp (ed.), Der Lobpreis des Erzengels Michael (vormals P.
Heidelberg Inv. Nr. 686) (Brussels 1966).
9
Louvre, E.14.250, l. 33, in Meyer and Smith (n.8) 221.
10
See the brief biography of Budge at: <http://www.mnsu.edu/emuseum/
information/biography/abcde/budge_eawallis.html>.
180 Ricklefs: Magic, ‘religion’ and the conversion of Egypt to Christianity

command of the God of the Hebrews, but the latter by the gods of Egypt at the
command of men.11

Indeed Egyptian Magic is characterised by the ability to compel the gods,

through magic and, in particular, threats, to act.12 A spell from the Middle
Kingdom contains just such a threat:

But if Osiris doesn’t know his name, I will not permit him to travel down to
Busiris, I will not permit him to sail up to Abydos, I will tear out his soul and
destroy his corpse, and I will set fire to every tomb of his.13

The practice of using threats to compel supernatural figures to act survived

into the Christian period. If Michael did not perform the deed required the
Coptic magician would:

... restrain [the sun] in the east, the moon in the west, the Pheides [in the]
middle of the sky, until Michael comes [and] places his power upon my power
and upon [my] right arm.14

Magic was also valuable in the afterlife, and contrasts with the high moral
tone of much of high Egyptian pagan theology. The Egyptian judgment scene
is a perfect illustration of this. In a rather farcical episode the deceased is
described coaching his heart before it appears in court to make sure that it
attests to the high moral standards of the defendant. The assumption behind
this episode seems to be that it was the manner in which the defendant
represented themselves that was important, not the facts of his or her deeds.15

11
E.A.W. Budge, Egyptian Magic (New York 1971) 6.
12
Garth Fowden, The Egyptian Hermes, A Historical Approach to The Late Pagan Mind
(Cambridge 1986) 8; Geraldine Pinch, Magic in Ancient Egypt (Austin 1995) 73-75.
13
Chester Beatty Papyrus VIII, in A. Roccati, ‘Nuovi paralleli torinesi di testi magici
ramessidi’, Aegyptus 49 (1969) 7-11; translations in J.F. Borghouts Ancient Egyptian
Magical Texts (Leiden 1978) 7 and Shorter (n.6) 103-4.
14
Berlin 8322, ll. 12-16, translation in Meyer and Smith (n.8) 232-33; original Coptic text
found in Walter Beltz, ‘Die Koptischen Zauberpapyri der Papyrus-Sammlung der
Staatlichen Museen zu Berlin’, Archiv für Papyrusforschung und verwandte Gebiete 29
(1983) 72-74 and Angelicus M. Kropp, Ausgewählte koptische Zaubertexte (Brussels 1931)
16-19.
15
Papyrus of Ani, §30B, pl. 3 in Raymond O. Faulkner (trans.), The Egyptian Book of the
dead: the Book of going forth by day: being the Papyrus of Ani (San Francisco 1994). Note
that the high moral tone of some ancient Egyptian texts contrasts with the magical approach
generally taken to religion in Egypt. Cf. E.A.W. Budge, Osiris and The Egyptian
Resurrection I (New York 1971), x-xi and H. Idris Bell, Cults and Creeds in Greco-Roman
Egypt (Liverpool 1953) 13-14. This was commented on at the time by Porphyry, Epistula
ad Anebonem, II, 8-9: “It troubles me very much how they (the gods), although invoked as
superiors, can yet receive orders as if they were inferiors ... although requiring the
worshipper to be just, they yet submit when commanded to do injustice themselves” (trans.
 Ancient History 37:2 2007 181

Indeed the entire afterlife experience was characterised by the magic

associated with it. The deceased was given, in the Book of The Dead (or as
the Egyptians called it, the Coming To Light By Day), the words of power
used by Osiris and spells to prevent the monster Sui and the other crocodile
gods stealing those words and the magical power associated with them.16
Likewise the secret, magical names of the gatekeepers and the magical ‘open
sesame’ phrases required were revealed to allow the deceased to pass through
the gates,17 and in chapter 24 the deceased is described receiving magical
power to assist him in the rest of his journey through the underworld.18

Consequently, in Egyptian thought there was no clear distinction between

magic and religion; these two approaches existed in a symbiotic relationship
to each other.19 Much of the practice of Egyptian ‘religion’ involved practices
we might define as ‘magic’.20

The Practice of Magic

The ability to perform magic was often based upon knowledge of names and
words of power, voces magicae.21 As we have seen above, the deceased
needed to learn words of power, and, in particular, names of various
supernatural beings in order to reach the afterlife. The task of the magician
was to discover these names so that he could compel the gods to act.22 The
correct pronunciation of these names was vital for the efficacy of the spell.
This perfectionist attitude has been suggested as one of the important
motivations behind the development of Coptic; the suggestion is that the
Egyptian magician who was performing a Greek spell needed to make sure
that the names of the Egyptian gods were said correctly, hence he combined
Greek and Demotic letters in order to more closely render the Egyptian
names.23

in P.W. Van der Horst, Chaeremon, Egyptian Priest and Stoic Philosopher [Leiden
1984] 13).
16
The Theban recension of the Book of the Dead §§ 31, 32, in Faulkner (n.15); see also
E.A.W. Budge, The Book of The Dead (London 1969) cx and civ.
17
Papyrus of Ani, §§146, 147, pl. 11, in Faulkner (n.15).
18
Papyrus of Ani, §24 in Faulkner (n.15) l15. These are simply representative examples—the
whole of the Book of the Dead is replete with references to magic of various kinds. It is not,
however, possible to include all of them here.
19
See Pinch (n.12) 12-14.
20
Pinch (n.12) 12-14.
21
On the importance of names and words of power in traditional Egyptian magic, see Jan
Assmann, The Search for God in Ancient Egypt (trans. D. Lorton; Ithaca 2001) 83-95.
22
Pinch (n.12) 30-32, 68, 72, 87-88.
23
See the comments of Edmund Meltzer, in Meyer and Smith (n.8) 20.
182 Ricklefs: Magic, ‘religion’ and the conversion of Egypt to Christianity

Egyptian Multiculturalism
Under Greek and Roman hegemony some changes occurred in the practice of
Egyptian religion, whilst at the same time a new synthesis of the dominant
religious traditions of the land arose, the sources for which are embodied in
the magical papyri, both Greek and Coptic. Importantly, the old priestly
religion began slowly to decline.24 While the attraction of Hellenistic ideas
was no doubt a partial cause of this, a more proximate cause was the efforts
by Egypt’s Roman rulers to undermine the economic support base for the
temples, particularly through the confiscation of temple estates and the
resultant reliance upon state funds.25 At the same time degeneration in
ancient cultic practices can be seen. Thus mummies from the Roman period
were not as well kept as previously, the religious ornamentation on caskets
was misunderstood and the art of writing hieroglyphs degenerated.26 A
watershed moment came in the early 3rd century AD with the reforms of
Septimius Severus, as the temples came under the economic aegis of local
town councils, which showed less willingness or ability to support temples
than had the imperial authorities.27 It has been argued that whilst the older,
priestly religion was declining ‘superstition’ was, it seems, on the rise, and
syncretism was leading to a type of monotheism.28 This is, however, a
simplification and it is now acknowledged that much of the increase in the
production of magical literature in Roman Egypt was caused by the changing
fortunes of the temple priesthoods;29 magical spells once preserved in
inscriptions or oral tradition were perforce committed to papyrus as a means
of preserving beliefs and practices that were under threat with the closure of
the temples.30 Hence, the ideas of the pharaonic priestly religion were
diffused to an even greater extent through Egyptian society and came into
close contact with pagan Greek, Roman and Judaeo-Christian beliefs.

24
Idris Bell (n.15) 65.
25
S. Davis, Race Relations In Ancient Egypt: Greek, Egyptian, Hebrew, Roman (London
1951) 62.
26
Davis (n.25) 64; Heike Sternberg el-Hotabi, ‘Der Untergang der Hieroglyphenshcrift’,
Chronique d’Egypte 69 (1994) 218-248; Sternberg el-Hotabi, Untersuchungen zur
Überlieferungsgeschichte der Horusstelen. Ein Beitrag zur Religionsgeschichte Ägyptens
im 1. Jahrtausend v. Chr. (Ägyptologische Abhandlungen, vol. 62, Wiesbaden 1999).
27
Frankfurter (n.5) 198-200.
28
Davis (n.25) 65.
29
See Roger S. Bagnall, Egypt in Late Antiquity (Princeton 1993) 261-289. Cf. David
Frankfurter’s review of Bagnall: Bryn Mawr Classical Review 94.03.19
<http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/bmcr/1994/94.03.19.html>. Frankfurter has long argued that
while the temples may have declined somewhat, the religion itself remained vital; see
Frankfurter (n.5) 200-201.
30
On the strong connection between the Egyptian pagan temple and the magical literature, see
David Frankfurter, ‘Native Egyptian Religion in its Roman Guise’, Numen 43 (1996) 311–
12; and Frankfurter (n.5) 228-229.
 Ancient History 37:2 2007 183

Yet within this syncretist magical religious scene Egyptian gods were
recovering ground in the early Christian period. For example Osiris began to
reassert his position over the Hellenistic syncretist cult of Sarapis.31 Indeed
the Osirian family (Osiris, Horus, Isis, Seth, Nephthys) as a whole was much
more important in the field of magic than the Greek gods.32 According to
Betz there were two types of magicians. One was attached to the temples and
was thus devoted to the ‘purer’ form of the ancient Egyptian religion, the
other was the wandering, syncretist magician, often uneducated and
superficial in his approach.33 Yet it was this syncretist magician who was
becoming more important as the old religion declined, and is represented in
many of the magical papyri, and thus in popular religion. Moreover Betz
argues that, in a time of decline and religious ferment, this corpus of
syncretist magical papyri represents a whole new type of religion, a religion
for which the underworld (and thus also its deities) was very important.34
This typically Egyptian concern is well illustrated by the different aims of the
cults of Isis and Osiris in Egypt and the rest of the Greco-Roman world.
Whilst elsewhere the emphasis of the Isis and Osiris cults was on the living
gaining contact with the divine, in Egypt the emphasis was on death and the
powers of Isis and Osiris in relation to the needs of the deceased.35

‘Christian’ Magic?
There is little doubt that Egyptian Christians had contact with writings that
were heretical; that is, writings that were gnostic or magical. Athanasius in
his 39th festal letter of AD 367 warned against the reading of apocryphal
works.36 He had reason to do this, for there is evidence to suggest that gnostic
texts were possibly still being read in the orthodox monasteries of Upper
Egypt as late as the fifth century.37 It is also possible that the Nag Hammadi
codices were originally from a monastery, even though they contain
references to an evil creator god, and extreme ascetic and docetic
viewpoints.38 At least one Coptic magical book has been discovered buried

31
Davis (n.25) 66.
32
Aziz Atiya (ed.), The Coptic Encyclopedia VI (New York 1991) 1502.
33
H.D. Betz (ed.), The Greek Magical Papyri in Translation (Chicago 1986) xlvi.
34
Betz (n.33) xlvi.
35
Siegfried Morenz, Egyptian Religion (trans. Anne E. Keep; Ithaca, New York 1973) 250.
36
Athanasius, Epistula festalis xxxix in Louis-Théophile Lefort, S. Athanase: lettres festales
et pastorales en copte (CSCO 151; Scr. copt. 20; Louvain 1955) 31-40.
37
D.J. Kyrtatas, The Social Structure of Early Christian Communities (London 1987) 174.
38
For the most up-to-date summary of the debate, see the updated edition of Philip
Rousseau’s Pachomius: The Making of a Community in Fourth-Century Egypt (Berkeley
184 Ricklefs: Magic, ‘religion’ and the conversion of Egypt to Christianity

under a monk’s cell.39 Likewise Besa, the biographer of Shenoute, records

him making violent attacks on ‘Greeks’. It has been suggested that these may,
in fact, have been heretic Christians, as is suggested in the tale of Shenoute
driving some Greeks from their ‘church’ and destroying it after discovering
they had buried some magic books.40

The Archangel Michael in the Magical Papyri: A Case in Point

The Judaeo-Christian archangel Michael plays a very important role in the
magical papyri and a brief examination of Egyptian beliefs concerning him
illustrates well the process of syncretism in the magical texts of early
Christian Egypt.

In the magical material from the third and fourth centuries AD Michael is
often mentioned along with the other archangels, Gabriel, Souriel and
Raphael. He usually takes the prominent position (except in PGM VII.1009-
16 where Gabriel, unusually, seems more important). For instance in the
fourth century spell, PGM XC, Michael is mentioned three times as a vox
magica,41 whilst the other angels are only mentioned once each.42 Likewise in
a love spell of attraction from the third or fourth centuries Michael is
mentioned twice, along with another angelic name ‘ABRIĒL’, as a vox
magica.43 So, too, Michael is mentioned in the fourth century spell, PGM
IV.1716-1870, as a vox magica along with other angelic names, canonical
and otherwise.44

and Los Angeles 1999) xix-xxv; see also Charles Wilfred Griggs, Early Christianity in
Egypt, From its Origins to 451 AD (Leiden 1993) 176-180.
39
Meyer and Smith (n.8) 270.
40
The text is found in J. Leipoldt (ed.), Sinuthii Archimandritae, Vita et Opera Omnia
(CSCO; Scr. copt. II, 2; Paris and Leipzig 1906; repr. Louvain 1951), §83-84 (p. 41). See
Griggs (n.38) 198 and James M. Robinson, The Nag Hammadi Library in English (New
York 1990) 19. Note, however, that it has also been well argued that this incident referred
to pagans, not Christians; see H. Behlmer, Schenute von Atripe: De iudicio, Catalogo del
Museo Egizio di Torino Serie Prima – Monumenti e Testi vol. VIII (Torino 1996)
LXXXIX-XCI.
41
A magical word, designed to invoke supernatural power.
42
PGM XC.1-13. All PGM references are found in the original languages in Karl
Preisendanz, Papyri Graecae Magicae. Die griechischen Zauberpapyri (2 vols, Stuttgart
1973-1974) and in translation in Betz (n.33). Capital letters indicate voces magicae.
43
PGM VII.973-80.
44
PGM IV.1716-1870.
 Ancient History 37:2 2007 185

There are at least eight other Greek magical papyri that use Michael as a
magical name.45 In PGM LXXXIII.1-20 Michael is mentioned once as an
archangel, and then later as a vox magica ‘MIGAĒL’.46 Furthermore, in PGM
III.1-164 on line 149 he is mentioned first as a vox magica and then called
“the god Michaēl”.47 On a syncretist, probably Judaeo-Egyptian, amulet from
the second century AD, which pictures Khnum the creator god on the front,
the names ΜΙΧΑΗΛ (MICHAEL) and ΟΥΡΙΗΛ (OURIEL) appear on the
back.48 Likewise on an amulet also from the second century, ΙΑΟ, the gnostic
form of the Jewish God (attested at Nag Hammadi and Qumran)49 appears
fully armoured, standing above a scarab. Around the edge of the amulet
Michael is joined with two other magical names to form ΑΚΡΑΜΑΧΑΜΑΡΕΙΑΒ
50
ΛΑΝΑΘΑΝΑΛΒΜΙΧΑΗΛ (ΑKRAMACHAMAREIABLANATHANALBMICHAEL).

Thus the figure of the archangel Michael passed from Judaism to the
Egyptian popular magical tradition as a figure of great importance, Michael’s
name being regarded as a powerful form of magic. Indeed his name seems
much more powerful than the names of the other archangels. In terms of its
magical significance the name Michael can thus be compared to the Gnostic
ΑΒΡΑΣΑΞ (ABRASAX), the letters of which added up to 365 according to
the Greek system of gematria.51 Unfortunately due to its Jewish origins the
Egyptian use of Michael’s name as a word of power cannot be explained by
Greek gematria.52 Why then is Michael’s name regarded as such a powerful
form of magic?

45
Among them, PGM I.262-347, PGM III.187-262, PGM VII.593-619, PGM X.36-50, PGM
XXVI.161-77, PGM LXXX.1-5 and PGM LXXIX.1-7 (identical spells).
46
PGM LXXXIII.1-20.
47
PGM III.1-164.
48
Erica Zwierlein-Diehl (ed.), Magische Amulette und Andere Gemmen des Institutes für
Altertumskunde der Universität zu Köln (Köln 1992) 71-2.
49
Betz (n.33) 335.
50
Zwierlein-Diehl (n.48) 65-66. Both are popular magical names, usually invoked for
beneficent purposes, ΑΒΛΑΝΑϑΑΝΑΛΒΑ (ABLANATHANALBA) probably being the
most common of all the magical names, and also a palindrome (though not a complete
palindrome in the case mentioned above); cf. Betz (n.33) 331 and 333. It is interesting to
note that Michael and the other archangels appear with YHWH and YHWH epithets
alongside pagan gods, such as Hermes, on Mesopotamian Jewish magic bowls, though
never on Palestinian Jewish magic bowls, reflecting the pressure of syncretism faced by the
Jews outside Palestine; Joseph Naveh and Shaul Shaked, Amulets and Magic Bowls.
Aramaic Incantations of Late Antiquity (Jerusalem 1985) 36.
51
Gematria is the practice of finding numerological significance in words by treating the
letters as numbers. Cf. Lucien Janssens, ‘La datation néronienne de l’isopsephie’, Aegyptus
68 (1988) 103-115 and Franz Dornseiff, Das Alphabet in Mystik und Magie (Leipzig 1980)
85.
52
Although it is interesting to note that the names of the three canonical archangels add up to
900, as does the Greek Χριστος (Christos).
186 Ricklefs: Magic, ‘religion’ and the conversion of Egypt to Christianity

Biblical notions of Michael as God’s right-hand man were imported into

Egypt along with his name. Thus Michael, in the fourth century spell PGM
XIII.734-1077, is described as:

The great commander-in-chief Michael, lord, the great archangel of IEOY,

AĒ AIŌ EYAI IĒ IĒ IŌA IĒIĒ AIŌ EĒ AIŌ.53

So, too, in PGM I.262-347 Michael is mentioned as a vox magica along with
the other angels, the gnostic ABRASAX and the Hebrew-derived ADONAI.
Here also he is described as the ruler of heaven’s realm.54 In PGM IV.1-25
Michael is described as the “mighty angel who is with God.”55 In the
adaptation, moreover, of Jewish ideas to an Egyptian framework, confusion
can be seen in the understanding of Michael’s role as commander-in-chief in
heaven and as psychopomp since sky deities and chthonic deities were not
usually synonymous in either Greek or Egyptian cosmologies (Dionysus
being a notable exception, although as a foreign deity introduced into Greece
he was always seen as being outside the normal Olympic hierarchy).56 Thus
in PGM III.1-164 Michael is mentioned in a spell designed to conjure
chthonic deities, such as Hermes, and possibly also DAMNAMENEU CHEU
CHTHŌ[NIE]—or Zeu Chthonie, a syncretic deity, Mithras merged with
Hades.57 Yet, in the aforementioned PGM IV.1-25, when faced with a similar
problem, as to whether Michael is a chthonic or sky deity, the writer decides
he is of the sky and contrasts him with the usual underworld deity Sabaoth:

So let him who is in the underworld join him who is in the air ... bring unto
me Sabaoth ... bring unto me Michael, the mighty angel who is with God.58

53
PGM XIII.734-1077.
54
PGM I.262-347.
55
PGM IV.1-25.
56
Note, however, some exceptions to this rule. For instance, Violet MacDermot, The Cult of
The Seer In The Ancient Middle East. A Contribution to Current Research on
Hallucinations Drawn from Coptic and Other Texts (Berkeley and Los Angeles 1971) 66
argues that by the Saite period Osiris and Re were syncretised, thus providing some
precedent within the Egyptian milieu for a figure that spanned the underworld and heaven.
Yet this seems to me to indicate the ascendancy of Osiris over all the other gods and thus,
according to ancient practice, they came to be seen as aspects of him, rather than Osiris
actually becoming a solar god. There is also the case of the Anatolian deity ‘Men’ who was
ruler of both the heavens and the underworld, a lunar god and ruled the growth of plants;
Franz Cumont, Oriental Religions in Roman Paganism (New York 1956) 61. In spell 69 of
the Book of The Dead Osiris is explicitly described assimilating with the other gods; see
Faulkner (n.15) 71.
57
PGM III.1-164.
58
PGM IV.1-25.
 Ancient History 37:2 2007 187

Thus Michael’s importance in the magical papyri came largely from Judaeo-
Christian theological notions imported into Egypt; notions that were then
adapted to a Greco-Egyptian framework. For Michael in the syncretist
magical papyri was not the Michael of rabbinic Jewish theology. Michael
exhibits the characteristics of an Egyptian deity and can be manipulated in
the same way. PGM VII.593-619 (a fetching spell for an unmanageable
woman) contains an example of the gods being cynically manipulated by
humans. Thus, in order to move the gods to act on behalf of the man in
question he is told by the author of the spell to tell the gods of the evil slander
that the woman he desires has spread about the deities:

... for she has said: ‘IAO does not have ribs.’ [She, NN, has said,] ‘ADONAI
was cast out because of his violent anger.’ [She, NN, has said,] ‘SABAOTH
emitted three cries.’ She, NN, has said, ‘PAGOURE is by nature a
hermaphrodite.’ She, NN, has said, ‘MARMAROUTH was castrated.’ She,
NN, has said, ‘IAEŌ was not entrusted with the ark.’ She, NN, has said,
‘MICHAEL is by nature a hermaphrodite.’ I am not the one who says such
things, master, but she, the godless NN. Therefore bring her to me, her
inflamed with passion, submissive, let her not find sleep until she comes to
me.59

St Michael plays a very prominent role not only in Egyptian magic but also in
more mainstream Egyptian Christianity. Michael’s name, in particular, has
special power and can be invoked for all kinds of beneficent purposes.

There was a pre-existing biblical tradition concerning Michael and his

possession of a particular name of power that may well have influenced
Coptic Christians in their interest in the name ‘Michael’. In the Ethiopic Book
of Enoch (1 Enoch, 2nd or 3rd BC), the fallen angel Kasbeel asks Michael to
give him the ‘name’, the name that is contained in the oath that governs
creation. This name is the name of God that Michael and the other archangels
bear (and the angel of the Lord bears in the Bible, Ex. 23:21) and is thus the
magical key to the maintenance of creation.60 It is probable that Semjaza
(which possibly means “he sees the Name”), the chief of the fallen angels in
other sectarian Jewish literature, is the same figure as Kasbeel.61 Thus in 1

59
PGM VII.593-619.
60
The Ethiopic Book of Enoch, 69.14; cf. 69.13-25, 67.8, 6.7, in Michael A. Knibb, The
Ethiopic Book of Enoch: A New Edition in the Light of the Aramaic Dead Sea Fragments
II. Introduction, Translation, and Commentary (Oxford 1978). According to Gilles Quispel
(cited in Jarl Fossum, The Name of God And The Angel of The Lord: Samaritan and Jewish
Concepts of Intermediation and the Origins of Gnosticism [Tübingen 1985] 24) the
principal angel is described throughout the apocryphal and mystical literature as possessing
God’s name; see also Quispel’s comments on p. 258.
61
Fossum (n.60) 257.
188 Ricklefs: Magic, ‘religion’ and the conversion of Egypt to Christianity

Enoch (although the text is ambiguous) it is possible that Kasbeel was

understood to be the former governor of creation, a role he lost to Michael,
who gained possession of the name, and thus power over creation, when he
defeated the rebellious Semjaza.62

Humans, too, could use St Michael’s name. In his Discourse on St Michael

The Archangel, Timothy, Archbishop of Alexandria63 recommends that
Christians use St Michael’s name in a number of different magic-type ways.
They should write the name of Michael on all four corners of their house,
inside and out, and on the edge of their garments, on their food platters and
on their cups, to prevent drunkenness.64 Charitable deeds gave great merit
when performed in the name of St Michael, even into the afterlife. Further on
Timothy writes that if someone gives to the poor in the name of St Michael,
makes an offering, lights a lamp, gives a loaf of bread or burns incense in
Michael’s name,

whether he be the greatest of sinners ... [and he is borne to the places of]
punishment he shall not feel the torture of the place of punishment wherein he
shall be, because of the deeds of charity he did in the name of the archangel
Michael.65

Likewise if someone, in Michael’s name, makes a New Testament, and gives

it to a church, or even keeps it, neither sickness, pestilence nor any ill will
enter his house; nor shall he suffer problems with his crops and his children
shall not suffer for up to four generations after this deed of generosity and
piety.66 So, too, Michael is described giving St John magic letters, which
arranged in pairs and triads and placed in certain parts of the house protect
the owner from danger and human enemies.67

Thus magical practices of varying sorts survived into the early Christian
period in Egypt, even within the Church, beliefs about the spiritual power
associated with the archangel Michael being a particularly germane example
of this.

62
That both Michael and the chief of the fallen angels played (at different times) the same
role is perhaps illustrated by the fact that the Orphites confused Samael (the serpent) and
Michael, saying that they were one and the same; Irenaeus, Adversus Haereses I.xxx.9.
63
Budge attributed this text to Timothy I (AD 380-385); Michael van Esbroeck attributes the
text to Timothy II (457-477), and his argument is supported by the text’s anti-Chalcedonian
leanings; see ‘Michael the Archangel’ in Atiya (n.32) 1616-1620.
64
Archbishop Timothy of Alexandria, Discourse on St Michael The Archangel, in E.A.W.
Budge, Coptic Texts V (New York 1977) fol. 74a.
65
Budge (n.64) fol.72b-73a.
66
Budge (n.64) fol.73a.
67
Budge (n.64) fol.73a-b.
 Ancient History 37:2 2007 189

Transmission of ideas and the conversion of Egypt to Christianity

The question of the transmission of the veneration of Michael from Jewish to
Egyptian Christian sources can now be examined; and based upon that case
study, conclusions concerning the practice of magic and the conversion of
Egypt to Christianity may be suggested.

St Michael’s name was obviously used as a vox magica from an early period
in non-Christian practice. The earliest dates are from the two second century
A.D. Judaeo-Egyptian amulets, and thus pre-date the earliest truly Christian
references by over two hundred years. The magical papyri that mention
Michael, however, are from roughly the same period as the rise of orthodox
Christianity.

The magical papyri are evidence, at least in part, of the survival in Egypt of
pre-Christian traditions and practices. Moreover these are clearly both
popular and elite practices and beliefs. The rise of Christianity in the Roman
empire was long characterised as the triumph of popular over elite culture,
the victory of the forces of the irrational over the rational.68 Averil Cameron,
among others, challenged this view, claiming that Christianity simply
embraced and encompassed a greater range of the elements of Greco-Roman
society than did elite pagan religion.69 The evidence of the survival of
popular magical beliefs within mainstream Christian discourse which has
been presented in this article suggests that Cameron’s view of Christianity as
a religion prepared to include beliefs and practices from a wide range of
socio-economic strata, both elite and popular, is more accurate than the view
that sees the rise of Christianity as the victory of vulgar popularism.

Whilst the previous discussion has demonstrated that magical ideas and a
magical cosmology continued to exist within the Egyptian Church, they were
not, however, usually welcomed by the Church hierarchy. Indeed orthodox
Christianity in Egypt obviously saw the magical tradition as a rival to its own
position. See, for instance, Origen’s attempts to distance Christ from his role

68
Cf. Edward Gibbon, The History of The Decline and Fall of The Roman Empire (London
and New York 1954) II.257 and III.146-47.
69
A. Cameron, Christianity and The Rhetoric of Empire (Berkeley and Los Angeles 1991) 8.
Cf. Alexander Murray, ‘Peter Brown and the Shadow of Constantine’, Journal of Religious
Studies 73 (1983) 192, who argues that Brown has also tried to go beyond the traditional
notions of rise and fall (and the implication that the great pagan culture was falling as
Christianity was rising) when discussing the period of the later Roman Empire.
190 Ricklefs: Magic, ‘religion’ and the conversion of Egypt to Christianity

as a magician by emphasising his eschatological and ethical roles.70

Examples of negative depictions of magicians and magical practices abound
in Coptic literature. For instance in the Coptic Apocalypse of Paul (4th
century AD and probably written in Egypt)71 magicians are depicted up to
their knees in pools of blood in Hell.72 In the Martyrdom of St Mercurius the
General it is emphasised that after his torture by the emperor he is healed by
St Michael, not by magic, for

The dealers in magical drugs and those who use enchantments and the
worshippers of idols, are strangers unto Him.73

Such explicit treatment of magic indicates that it posed a challenge to the

Church and lends credence to Betz’s belief that it constituted a rival. Thus the
age old conflict between ‘high’, moral religion and the ‘low’, popular,
magical and thus amoral religion of the Egyptian people was still being
played out in the Christian era in Egypt. Paradoxically, the only way that
Christianity could establish what Cameron calls a “totalizing discourse”,74 in
other words establish itself as the dominant cultural form of Egyptian society,
was to allow popular magical practices to continue within a Christian context,
even if the principles of Christianity and the magical tradition were often
incompatible, for example in the belief that the utterance of a name of power
could excuse sinners from damnation. Thus, although mainstream Christian
writers and doctrine opposed magical practices, these practices nonetheless
continued amongst Christian Egyptians.

In the individual case of the use of ‘Michael’ as a word of power it seems

likely that this was an element of popular religion that was carried over into
Christianity from pagan and Judaeo-Christian syncretist magical practices
largely intact. This was due both to the inability of leading churchmen to
resist what was probably a very popular piece of folk religion and to their
unwillingness to jettison an element of folk religion that would predispose
the common people to view Christianity, or, at least, Judaeo-Christian ideas,
in a positive light. Thus the syncretist magical papyri could play dual, and
contradictory, roles: on the one hand acting as a rival to Christianity, while
on the other predisposing Egyptians to accepting Christianity by introducing
to them its ideas and characters.

70
See Morton Smith, Jesus The Magician (London 1978) 84; also Francis C.R. Thee, Julius
Africanus and The Early Christian View of Magic (Tübingen 1984).
71
MacDermot (n.56) 170. Cf. Sozomen, Historia Ecclesiastica, vii.19.
72
Budge (n.64) fol.13b.
73
Budge (n.64) fol.12b.
74
Cameron (n.69) 58, cf. 5.
 Ancient History 37:2 2007 191

In the particular case of the archangel Michael it seems highly probable that
Michael’s name was first popularised among Egyptians as a word of power
by gnostic-type Christians who were operating within a largely Jewish
religious scene. As Pearson pointed out, much of Gnosticism can be
characterised as a reinterpretation of Jewish scripture, a reinterpretation that
is largely negative.75 Thus Pearson argues that Gnosticism quite possibly
grew from groups of Hellenistic Jewish intellectuals reacting against
orthodoxy. The notions of the “foibles and machinations” of the creator
indicate a negative attitude to history,76 quite in keeping with the probable
mood of the Jewish community in Alexandria after AD 70 and, especially, in
the disastrous revolt culminating in the events of AD 117.77 Fossum calls this
“protest exegesis”.78 The introduction of the name of a Jewish angel to
Egyptian popular religion at a time when Gnosticism was probably in its
active proselytizing stage is understandable for spiritual or angelic
hierarchies acting as intermediaries between man and the divine are a
characterising feature of Gnosticism.79

It must be recognised that the appearance of similar functions in both magic

and Christianity indicates that both had to fulfil certain similar needs of their
adherents. Working out of the same cultural milieu it is hardly surprising that
they came up with similar solutions and borrowed from each other.80 There
were three main religious streams influencing Egyptian popular religion,
cultic practices and thought in this period: 1) orthodox Christianity; 2) Jewish
apocalyptic and sectarian literature; and 3) Gnosticism, all containing
elements that allowed them to be absorbed into the framework of ancient
Egyptian magic at a popular level. The mixture of these three streams in the
material discussed above shows how difficult it is to differentiate Gnosticism
and Orthodoxy in an Egyptian context (as they were of roughly equal
importance in the conversion of Egypt to Christianity) and argues for an
examination of late antique Egyptian popular religion in terms of the

75
Birger A. Pearson, Gnosticism, Judaism and Egyptian Christianity (Minneapolis 1990)
133-34. Fossum (n.60) 20, argues that Gnosticism largely grew from sectarian Judaism, in
particular Samaritan religion.
76
Pearson (n.75) 133-34.
77
Discussed by Cassius Dio LXVIII.32.1-3, Eusebius, Historia Ecclesiastica IV.2.2-5 and in
the anonymous accounts of the revolt and the subsequent massacres of Greeks by Jews
found in M. Stern, Greek and Latin Authors on Jews and Judaism III (Jerusalem 1974) 26.
78
Fossum (n.60) 12.
79
See Michael Allen Williams, Rethinking ‘Gnosticism’. An Argument For Dismantling a
Dubious Category (Princeton 1996) 107, 220-221.
80
Cf. B.R. Rees, ‘Popular Religion in Greco-Roman Egypt ii. The Transition to Christianity’,
Journal of Egyptian Archaeology 35 (1950) 86-100.
192 Ricklefs: Magic, ‘religion’ and the conversion of Egypt to Christianity

overwhelming power of ancient Egyptian forms and structures, in particular

the ancient traditions of Egyptian magic.

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