el-Yahudîya, or "Mound of the Jews," and the books of the Hebrew
Scriptures were translated into Greek. A copy of the Septuagint, as the
Greek translation was called, was needed for the Alexandrine Library.

Egypt, once the house of bondage, thus became a second house of Israel.
It gave the world a new version of the Hebrew Bible which largely
influenced the writers of the New Testament; it gave it also a new Canon
which was adopted by the early Christian Church. The prophecy of Isaiah
was fulfilled: "The Lord shall be known to Egypt, and the Egyptians
shall know the Lord."

In the course of centuries, however, the monotheistic element in
Egyptian religion had grown clearer and more pronounced in the minds of
the educated classes. The gods of the official cult ceased to be
regarded as different forms of the same deity; they became mere
manifestations of a single all-pervading power. As M. Grébaut puts it:
they were "the names received by a single Being in his various
attributes and workings.... As the Eternal, who existed before all
worlds, then as organiser of the universe, and finally as the Providence
who each day watches over his work, he is always the same being,
reuniting in his essence all the attributes of divinity." It was the
hidden God who was adored under the name whatever the latter might be,
the God who is described in the texts as "without form" and "whose name
is a mystery," and of whom it is said that He is the one God, "beside
whom there is no other." In Ptah of Memphis or Amon of Thebes or Ra of
Heliopolis, the more educated Egyptian recognised but a name and symbol
for the deity which underlay them all.

Along with this growth in a spiritual conception of religion went, as
was natural, a growth in scepticism. There was a sceptical as well as a