The greater part of the text consists of a hymn to Osiris, which was
probably composed under the XVIIIth Dynasty, when an extraordinary
development of the cult of that god took place, and when he was placed
by Egyptian theologians at the head of all the gods. Though unseen in
the temples, his presence filled all Egypt, and his body formed the
very substance of the country. He was the God of all gods and the
Governor of the Two Companies of the gods, he formed the soul and body
of Ra, he was the beneficent Spirit of all spirits, he was himself the
celestial food on which the Doubles in the Other World lived. He was
the greatest of the gods in On (Heliopolis), Memphis, Herakleopolis,
Hermopolis, Abydos, and the region of the First Cataract, and so. He
embodied in his own person the might of Ra-Tem, Apis and Ptah, the
Horus-gods, Thoth and Khnemu, and his rule over Busiris and Abydos
continued to be supreme, as it had been for many, many hundreds of
years. He was the source of the Nile, the north wind sprang from him,
his seats were the stars of heaven which never set, and the
imperishable stars were his ministers. All heaven was his dominion,
and the doors of the sky opened before him of their own accord when he
appeared. He inherited the earth from his father Keb, and the
sovereignty of heaven from his mother Nut. In his person he united
endless time in the past and endless time in the future. Like Ra he
had fought Seba, or Set, the monster of evil, and had defeated him, and
his victory assured to him lasting authority over the gods and the
dead. He exercised his creative power in making land and water, trees
and herbs, cattle and other four-footed beasts, birds of all kinds, and
fish and creeping things; even the waste spaces of the desert owed
allegiance to him as the creator. And he rolled out the sky, and set
the light above the darkness.