THE AFTERLIFE

The Egyptians believed that every person was composed of
three essential elements: body, ba, and ka.
The body is the physical body and is unique to each
individual. As a person gets older, so the body ages and
changes - the Egyptians' expressed the idea of growing up as
a process of "making changes" - and death is the last change.
Each person also has a ba. Though the ba is also unique to
each individual, it is not a physical entity. Ba is sometimes translated as
"manifestation,"
and can be
thought of as
the sum total
of all the
non-physical
things that
make a
person
different from
others. In this
sense, ba is very similar to what we call "personality" or
"character." In the afterlife, the ba is represented as a bird,
often with a human head.
Each person also has what is called a ka, or life-force, and it
is the ka which is the difference between being alive and
being dead. Unlike the ba, the ka is not individual, but
common to all living people and the gods: in the beginning,
the creator made ka, and ka enters each person's body at
birth. Like the ba, the ka is not a physical entity, though it
has a definite physical connection. In the plural, ka means
"sustenance," linking it to the idea of food. In fact, ancient
Egyptians would bring food to a dead person's tomb as an
offering to his or her ka. But since the ka is not strictly
physical, the food was not there to be literally eaten by the
deceased or the deceased's ka, but it was the life-preserving
force in the food that was being offered.

When a person dies, so the Egyptians believed, the ba and ka
become seperated from the body, though they do not die. In
the New Kingdom period and after, the Egyptians effected
this seperation through the Opening of the Mouth ritual, in
which the ba and ka are released to go to the next world.

In the next world, or underworld, the goal is to live with ones
ka. In order for this to happen, the ka needs to be summoned
back to the body and recognize it. But since the body is
bound in its wrappings, it must rely on its ba to seek out its
ka. During the nightime, when the sun god, Ra, is said to visit
the underworld, the ba may roam freely in the underworld, or
to popular places in this world, but it's anchor in this world,
where it must return when Ra leaves the underworld, is the
body, because together they are part of the same whole
being.

In seeking a union with the ka, the ba must overcome many
potential dangers in the underworld. But if it does succeed, it
will reunite with the ka and form what is called akh. The
Egyptian's believed that there are only three kinds of beings
that inhabit the hereafter: the dead, the gods, and akhs. Akhs
are those who have successfully made the transition to new
life in the next world, where they live with the gods. The
dead are those who have failed to make the transition. It is
said that they have "died again," with no hope of renewed
life.