Akh-spirit

About Akh-spirit

The akh-spirit (Egyptian 3ḫ, 'effective one' or 'radiant one') is the transfigured dead person considered as an active supernatural being — an effective spirit capable of moving between the worlds, dwelling among the gods, and intervening in the affairs of the living. Where the broader concept of the akh names the glorified state achieved at the end of the mortuary process, the akh-spirit is that state regarded as a being: a discarnate agent with a surviving personality, a memory, opinions, and the power to help or to harm. The Egyptians wrote letters to their akh-dead, feared the anger of hostile akh-spirits, and built the apparatus of the mortuary cult to ensure that their own dead would become beneficent akhs rather than restless ones.

The akh-spirit was distinct from the other components of the person. The body (khat) decayed or was preserved as a mummy; the ka, the life-force, was sustained by offerings; the ba, the mobile personality depicted as a human-headed bird, left the tomb by day and returned at night. The akh was the fully transfigured spirit that resulted when all the components were successfully integrated through ritual — the effective being the deceased became after passing the judgment and surviving the journey through the Duat. As a creature of the cosmos, the akh-spirit belonged neither wholly to the world of the living nor wholly to the world of the gods, but moved between them, an intermediary power.

The akh-spirit's defining quality was effectiveness. The word's root means 'to be effective' or 'to be radiant,' and the akh was effective because it possessed heka, the magical force of the cosmos, in concentrated form. This effectiveness made the akh a being to be reckoned with. The Letters to the Dead — about a dozen surviving texts from the Old Kingdom through the Late Period, written on bowls, linen, and papyrus and placed in or near tombs — petition akh-spirits for help with lawsuits, illness, and family disputes, treating the dead as conscious agents who could intervene. The same effectiveness made the akh dangerous: an 'angry akh' (akh iker turned hostile) could afflict the living with illness, nightmares, or misfortune, and Egyptian medical-magical texts diagnose certain ailments as the work of a hostile dead spirit.

Becoming an akh was a transformation, not a birthright. The akh did not exist at birth; it was produced when the surviving components of the person were ritually fused. The Pyramid Texts and the Coffin Texts describe the akh as the product of the union of the ba and the ka — the formula ba en akh and the recurring statement that the deceased is 'an akh through his ba' express the conviction that the mobile personality and the sustained life-force combine, under the transfiguring power of the funerary spells, into the effective spirit. To sakh the dead (the causative of the verb, 'to make into an akh,' often rendered 'to glorify' or 'to transfigure') was the precise aim of the recitations performed at the tomb; the spells themselves were called sakhu, 'glorifications.' A successful transfiguration produced an akh iqer, an 'able' or 'excellent spirit' — the cooperative dead honored at the household shrine and, at Deir el-Medina, on the small akh iqer en Ra ('able spirit of Ra') stelae through which villagers venerated effective ancestors. The same effectiveness, turned hostile, made the neglected or wronged dead a being to be feared, and the Letters to the Dead address exactly these two faces of the akh: petitioning the able spirit for aid, or rebuking the angry one to cease its affliction.

The akh-spirit was also luminous and celestial. The earliest references, in the Pyramid Texts (Old Kingdom, c. 2400-2300 BCE), describe the dead king becoming an akh among the imperishable circumpolar stars, shining in the sky as one of the eternal lights. This stellar dimension persisted alongside the underworld destiny: the akh could dwell among the stars, travel with Ra in the solar bark, journey through the realm of Osiris, and return to the tomb to receive offerings. The fullest treatment of the akh-concept as a state appears in the related akh article; here the focus falls on the akh as a being — the effective, surviving spirit with whom the living Egyptians maintained an active and sometimes anxious relationship.

The Story

The akh-spirit comes into being at the end of a long ritual process, and its story as a being begins at the moment of transfiguration. The deceased, mummified and buried, undergoes the funerary rites — the Opening of the Mouth that restores the capacity to see, hear, eat, and speak; the recitation of the spells that provide knowledge and power; the judgment in the Hall of Two Truths where the heart is weighed against the feather of Maat. If the heart balances true and the dead person is declared 'true of voice,' the components of the self are integrated and the deceased becomes an akh — no longer a helpless corpse but an effective, radiant spirit. The transformation is modeled on the resurrection of Osiris, who passed through death and dismemberment to become the lord of the dead, and on the daily rebirth of the sun.

As a being, the akh-spirit was active in several realms at once. In the celestial dimension, attested from the earliest Pyramid Texts, the akh joined the imperishable circumpolar stars — the stars that never set below the horizon — and shone in the sky as one of the eternal lights, or traveled with Ra in the solar bark across the heavens. In the underworld dimension, the akh dwelt in the realm of Osiris, in the Field of Reeds, the agricultural paradise of the blessed dead. And in relation to the living, the akh returned to the tomb to receive offerings and remained a presence in the world, able to act upon it.

It is this last dimension — the akh among the living — that gives the spirit its distinctive character as a being. The Letters to the Dead reveal the relationship with startling directness. In these texts the living write to their dead relatives as to conscious agents who can intervene in earthly affairs. A man petitions his dead father to take his side in a property dispute against rival kin; a widower writes to his dead wife, defending himself against the afflictions she apparently continues to cause from beyond the grave, reminding her of his devotion and demanding that she cease. The Cairo Bowl letter, the Qau Bowl letter, and other examples treat the akh as a being with a surviving personality — with memory, loyalty, grievance, and the power to help or to harm. The dead person has not departed into silence but remains a member of the family, absent in body but present in power, subject to the same social expectations and negotiations that governed relationships among the living.

The akh's power cut both ways. A satisfied akh, maintained by offerings and honored by the living, was a benevolent presence who could protect the family, intercede on its behalf, and avert harm. But an akh that was neglected — whose offerings ceased, whose name went unspoken, whose tomb was violated — could turn hostile, and a hostile akh was a genuine supernatural threat. Egyptian medical-magical texts attribute certain illnesses to the action of a hostile dead spirit, male or female, and prescribe rituals to appease or repel it. Tomb inscriptions threatened that those who violated the tomb would face the akh's retribution, while promising blessings to those who maintained the cult. The akh-spirit was thus a being to be managed: cultivated as a benefactor, feared as a potential affliction, and bound to the living by a reciprocal relationship of offering and protection.

The maintenance of the akh depended on the living, and this dependence structured the relationship. The akh's effectiveness was sustained by the mortuary cult — the offerings of food, drink, and incense, the recitation of the name, the performance of the rites at the tomb. The false doors built into Old Kingdom tomb chapels served as the interface between the akh and the living, the architectural point through which offerings passed from one world to the other. So long as the cult was maintained, the akh remained effective and, if honored, benevolent. When the offerings stopped and the name was forgotten, the akh's power waned, and the spirit risked the 'second death,' the final annihilation from which there was no recovery. The akh-spirit was therefore not a static being but one whose continued existence and disposition depended on an ongoing relationship with the living, a relationship the Egyptians took with great seriousness and sometimes considerable anxiety.

The akh-spirit's nature evolved across Egyptian history. In the Old Kingdom only the king became an akh; the Coffin Texts of the Middle Kingdom extended the transformation to commoners; and by the Late Period the akh had been absorbed into an elaborate soul-doctrine distinguishing many components of the person. Throughout, the akh remained the effective dead — the spirit the deceased became, radiant and powerful, dwelling among the stars and the gods yet present to the living, the being at the heart of the Egyptian conviction that death transformed the person rather than ending them.

Symbolism

The akh-spirit symbolizes the recovery of agency after death — the passage from the inert, vulnerable corpse to the active, effective, self-directed being. The dead body is passive, subject to decay; the akh is luminous, powerful, capable of acting, perceiving, moving, and influencing. The mortuary ritual sequence narrativizes this recovery: mummification preserves the body, the Opening of the Mouth restores the senses, the funerary spells confer knowledge and power, and the transfiguration produces the akh. The akh-spirit is therefore the symbol of the Egyptian refusal to accept that personhood ends with biological death, the dead person who has regained the capacity to act.

The akh's luminosity, carried in the root of its name, symbolizes existence itself. In Egyptian thought, to be visible, to shine, is to exist; to be in darkness is to be threatened with non-existence. The akh 'shines' and dwells among the imperishable stars that never set, so its radiance symbolizes its secure, eternal existence, set against the darkness of annihilation. The stellar dimension of the akh — the dead become a shining, imperishable star — makes the spirit a being of light, its luminosity the visible sign of its effective, undying nature.

The akh's effectiveness symbolizes the power of concentrated heka, the magical force of the cosmos. The akh is effective because it possesses heka in distilled form, drawn through the funerary ritual from the diffuse life-force of the living person into the focused power of the transfigured spirit. The akh thus symbolizes the transformation of ordinary vital force into supernatural power, the dead person become a node of magical effectiveness, able to act upon the world through the same force that animates the gods and the spells.

The akh as a being among the living symbolizes the continuity of social bonds beyond death. The Letters to the Dead treat the akh as a member of the family who remains present and subject to obligation, and this symbolizes the Egyptian conviction that death did not sever relationships but transformed them. The reciprocal exchange of offerings for protection symbolizes a continuing contract between the living and the dead, a relationship of mutual dependence in which the living sustain the akh and the akh guards the living, the bonds of kinship and obligation extending across the boundary of death.

The akh's dual capacity to help or to harm symbolizes the ambivalence of the dead. The same being that protects the family when honored can afflict it when neglected, and this symbolizes the danger as well as the benefit of the dead, the need to manage the relationship with care. The hostile akh — the angry spirit who causes illness and misfortune — symbolizes the consequences of failing the dead, while the benevolent akh symbolizes the rewards of maintaining the cult. The akh-spirit thus symbolizes the dead as a power to be reckoned with, neither safely departed nor wholly benign, but present, effective, and responsive to the conduct of the living.

Cultural Context

The akh-spirit operated within the Egyptian understanding of the person as a composite of distinct components, each with its own fate and needs. Unlike a unitary soul, the Egyptian self was divided into the body, the ka, the ba, the name, the shadow, and others, and the akh was the integrated, effective spirit that emerged when all were properly maintained through ritual. This composite anthropology meant that becoming an akh was a collective achievement, requiring the cooperation of embalmers, priests, tomb builders, and the deceased's living family, and that the akh's continued existence depended on the ongoing maintenance of the several components.

The akh-spirit was central to the Egyptian relationship with the dead, which was active and reciprocal rather than merely commemorative. The Letters to the Dead show ordinary Egyptians addressing their akh-relatives as conscious agents who could intervene in earthly affairs — taking sides in disputes, causing or curing illness, protecting or afflicting the living. This was not abstract ancestor worship but practical negotiation with specific dead persons whose personalities and tempers were believed to survive intact. The dead remained members of the family, and the living maintained relationships with them through offerings, letters, and the cult, expecting benefits and fearing harm in return.

The democratization of the akh across Egyptian history reflects broader social change. In the Old Kingdom, only the king became an akh, the transformation a royal monopoly inscribed in the Pyramid Texts. The Coffin Texts of the Middle Kingdom extended the transformation to commoners, part of the wider opening of the afterlife that followed the collapse of central authority in the First Intermediate Period. By the Late Period the akh had become available to anyone with proper burial, and the relationship with the akh-dead was a feature of religious life across the social range. The akh-spirit thus belonged to popular religion as much as to elite theology, the effective dead a presence in every Egyptian family.

The management of the hostile akh connected the spirit to Egyptian medicine and magic. Egyptian medical-magical texts attribute certain illnesses to the action of a hostile dead spirit, and prescribe rituals, spells, and amulets to appease or repel it. The category of the 'angry akh' was a genuine part of Egyptian demonology, and the fear of the hostile dead shaped both medical practice and funerary provision, since a well-maintained cult kept the akh benevolent. Robert Ritner's The Mechanics of Ancient Egyptian Magical Practice (1993) treats the akh's effectiveness and its role in magic, and the Letters to the Dead, published by Alan Gardiner and Kurt Sethe (1928) and translated by Edward Wente (1990), remain the principal evidence for how the Egyptians related to the akh as a being. The akh-spirit thus stood at the meeting point of theology, family life, medicine, and magic, the effective dead with whom the living maintained a continuous and consequential relationship. The akh-spirit thus belonged at once to the loftiest theology of transfiguration and to the most ordinary domestic religion of the family, the effective dead present in the household shrine and the festival as much as in the spells of the funerary corpus.

Cross-Tradition Parallels

The Egyptian akh-spirit belongs to a family of traditions that treat the dead as active agents retaining personality and the capacity to intervene among the living. The family is smaller than it might seem — most traditions diminish the dead in some way. What differentiates the akh from other effective-dead concepts is that its power is earned through a transformative process and maintained through an ongoing reciprocal relationship, not granted permanently at death.

Roman — Lares and the Household Dead (Plautus, Aulularia, c. 190 BCE)

Roman domestic religion maintained the Lares — spirits of the dead ancestors whose images stood in the lararium, receiving daily offerings of incense, wine, and food. The Lares were active protectors bound to the household, their goodwill maintained by offering and their anger at neglect capable of harming the family. The structural parallel with the akh is precise: the effective dead, maintained by offering, protecting and potentially afflicting the living. The difference is in individuality. The Roman Lar was the ancestor generically — its individual personality was not the cult's focus. The Egyptian akh was a specific person: the Letters to the Dead address named individuals, remember particular disputes and acts of loyalty, argue with the dead as with a particular surviving consciousness. Rome generalized the ancestral dead into protective presences; Egypt maintained them as identifiable persons.

Yoruba — The Egungun Masquerade (oral tradition, attested 18th century CE onward)

Yoruba religious tradition maintains the Egungun masquerade, in which masked performers embody the collective ancestral dead returning to the community to adjudicate disputes, bless, punish, and receive offerings. The parallel with the akh is the active, effectual dead who return to interact. The divergence is in individualism. The Egungun is the collective ancestral dead; the individual identity of a specific dead person is subsumed into the ancestral group. The Egyptian akh is resolutely individual — Letters to the Dead are addressed to named persons about specific grievances. Yoruba tradition returns the dead as community; Egypt returned them as persons.

Japanese — Goryō and the Dangerous Dead (Shinto ritual, codified c. 9th century CE)

Shinto tradition's goryō are spirits of those who died violently or unjustly, their rough soul-force (ara-tama) unresolved and capable of causing disease and disaster. Pacification rituals convert the dangerous spirit into a benign ancestral kami. The parallel with the hostile akh is close: inadequately managed dead become malevolent. Egyptian medical-magical texts diagnose illnesses as the action of an angry akh; Shinto tradition diagnoses epidemics as goryō. Both developed ritual systems for managing dangerous dead. The difference is in what makes them dangerous. The Egyptian hostile akh results from neglect by its family; the Japanese goryō results from the wrong done to the dead person in life. Egypt blames the living for failing their obligation; Japan blames the circumstances of death itself.

Chinese — The Hungry Ghost Festival (Ullambana Sutra, trans. Dharmaraksha, c. 286 CE)

The Chinese Ghost Festival (Zhongyuan Jie) releases hungry ghosts — souls trapped in craving between rebirths — to receive offerings burned to cross into their realm. The parallel with the akh is the ongoing exchange of offerings between living and dead. The structural inversion: the Chinese hungry ghost is pitiable — trapped, craving, unable to act except through the misfortune its distress generates. The Egyptian akh is powerful — effective, radiant, deliberately active. Chinese offering aims to relieve the suffering of the dead; Egyptian offering aims to maintain the power of the dead. In China, offering is charity; in Egypt, offering is contract.

Modern Influence

The akh-spirit has shaped modern understanding of how ancient cultures related to their dead, and the Letters to the Dead in particular have drawn attention from anthropologists and psychologists studying grief. The Egyptian practice of writing to dead relatives as conscious agents who could intervene in earthly affairs is cited as the earliest documented case of 'continuing bonds' — the maintenance of an active relationship with the deceased as a normal rather than pathological dimension of mourning. The Egyptian evidence shows that negotiation with the dead was institutionally supported, ritually structured, and socially expected, a finding that has informed modern grief theory's rejection of the idea that healthy mourning requires 'letting go.'

The akh-spirit as an effective, sometimes hostile dead being has fed the modern fascination with Egyptian mummies and their supposed powers. The 'curse of the mummy' narrative — from the press coverage of Tutankhamun's tomb through the horror films of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries — is a debased reflection of the akh-tradition, the idea that the dead Egyptian retains agency, consciousness, and the power to affect the living. The horror genre replaces the Egyptian conception of a reciprocal relationship with a narrative of violation and punishment, but the underlying structure — that the dead are not inert, and that disturbing them has consequences — derives directly from the belief in the effective akh.

The akh has informed scholarly debate about the nature of the person and the afterlife in comparative religion. The Egyptian model of the dead as an active, effective spirit, distinct from a shadowy shade and from a beatified soul at rest, offers a distinctive conception of postmortem existence, and scholars such as Jan Assmann (Death and Salvation in Ancient Egypt, 2005) have used the akh to argue that Egyptian religion represents a different anthropology from either monotheistic soul-doctrine or materialist dismissal. The akh-spirit's effectiveness — its capacity to act in the world — sets it apart from the passive dead of many other traditions.

The concept of the effective, surviving dead has resonated with modern discussions of personal identity and survival. The Egyptian conviction that the person survives death as an active agent, retaining memory and personality and capable of intervention, has been invoked in debates about what constitutes the self and what might survive its biological death. The detailed Egyptian working-out of the conditions under which the dead remain effective — the dependence on offerings, the maintenance of the cult, the risk of the second death — provides a fully articulated ancient model of survival that maps onto contemporary questions with unexpected precision.

In Egyptology the akh remains central to understanding the relationship between the living and the dead, and the study of the Letters to the Dead, the medical-magical texts on hostile spirits, and the mortuary cult continues to generate new research. The akh-spirit — the effective, radiant dead, dwelling among the stars and the gods yet present to the living — remains a key to how Egyptian civilization conceived the boundary between life and death, and the recognition that the Egyptians related to their dead as active, consequential beings continues to inform both scholarly and popular accounts of the most death-conscious of ancient cultures.

Primary Sources

The Pyramid Texts (Old Kingdom, c. 2400-2300 BCE; ed. R.O. Faulkner, The Ancient Egyptian Pyramid Texts, Oxford University Press, 1969; James P. Allen, The Ancient Egyptian Pyramid Texts, SBL Writings from the Ancient World 23, 2005) contain the earliest appearances of the word akh and of the royal transfiguration it names. Utterances 244, 356, and the long sequences describing the king's ascent identify him as an akh among the imperishable circumpolar stars — the first explicit statement that the dead king has become a luminous, effective being who dwells in the sky. The word's root meaning of 'effective, radiant' shapes its use throughout: the king who becomes an akh is described as shining, imperishable, and capable of action. The term occurs hundreds of times in the Pyramid Texts, making this corpus the foundational source for the akh-concept.

The Coffin Texts (Middle Kingdom, c. 2100-1700 BCE; ed. Adriaan de Buck, 7 vols, Oriental Institute Publications 34-67, University of Chicago Press, 1935-61; trans. R.O. Faulkner, 3 vols, Aris & Phillips, 1973-78) extend the akh-transformation to non-royal owners and develop the theology of the effective dead. Coffin Text Spell 335 (parallel to Book of the Dead Spell 17) and the sequences concerning the ba, the ka, and the conditions for transfiguration elaborate the process by which a commoner could become an akh. The Coffin Texts are the primary source for the democratization of the akh-transformation and for the soul-components whose integration it requires.

The Letters to the Dead, dating from the Old Kingdom through the Late Period, are the principal evidence for the akh as a being who acts among the living. About a dozen texts survive, written on pottery bowls, linen, and papyrus and deposited in or near tombs, in which living people petition their akh-relatives for help with disputes, illness, and family matters, or confront them over harm done. The collection was edited and published by Alan H. Gardiner and Kurt Sethe, Egyptian Letters to the Dead, Mainly from the Old and Middle Kingdoms (Egypt Exploration Society, London, 1928), and translated with commentary by Edward F. Wente, Letters from Ancient Egypt (SBL Writings from the Ancient World 1, Scholars Press, Atlanta, 1990). The Cairo Bowl letter, the Qau Bowl letter, and the Deir el-Medina letters are the most studied examples, each addressing a named dead person about specific grievances.

Egyptian medical-magical texts attributing illness to hostile akh-spirits are assembled and discussed in J.F. Borghouts, Ancient Egyptian Magical Texts (Brill, Leiden, 1978) and Robert K. Ritner, The Mechanics of Ancient Egyptian Magical Practice (Studies in Ancient Oriental Civilization 54, University of Chicago Press, 1993), both of which treat the akh's effectiveness in the context of Egyptian magic and demonology. The Book of the Dead (New Kingdom onward; ed. R.O. Faulkner, British Museum Press, 1985) describes through its spells the process of transfiguration into an akh, particularly Spells 1, 17, and the judgment sequence of Spell 125, which culminates in the vindicated dead being declared 'true of voice' — the precondition for the akh-transformation. Jan Assmann, Death and Salvation in Ancient Egypt (Cornell University Press, 2005), provides the most comprehensive modern account of the akh-concept and the Egyptian relationship with the effective dead.

Significance

The akh-spirit is the Egyptian answer to the question of what kind of being the dead person becomes — not a shadow, not a shade at rest, but a radiant, effective spirit, active among the stars and the gods and present to the living. Its significance lies in this conception of the effective dead, which sets Egyptian belief apart from traditions in which the dead are passive or diminished. The akh is an enhanced version of the living person, luminous and powerful, capable of acting on the world, and the Egyptian conviction that death produced such a being shaped the whole apparatus of mortuary religion.

The akh-spirit is significant for what it reveals about the Egyptian relationship with the dead, which was active and reciprocal. The Letters to the Dead show that the dead remained members of the family, conscious agents who could be petitioned for help and feared for harm, bound to the living by an ongoing exchange of offerings for protection. This relationship — institutionally supported, ritually structured, and socially expected — demonstrates that for the Egyptians death did not end social bonds but transformed them, and it anticipates modern grief theory's recognition of continuing bonds with the deceased.

The akh carries significance for the Egyptian understanding of magic and power. The akh is effective because it possesses heka, the magical force of the cosmos, in concentrated form, drawn through the funerary ritual from the diffuse vitality of the living person into the focused power of the transfigured spirit. The akh thus embodies the Egyptian conviction that ritual could transform ordinary force into supernatural power, and that the dead, properly transfigured, became nodes of effectiveness able to act through the same force that animates the gods.

Finally, the akh-spirit illuminates the Egyptian management of the boundary between life and death. The dual capacity of the akh — to protect when honored, to afflict when neglected — made the dead a power to be managed, cultivated as a benefactor and feared as a potential affliction, and this shaped Egyptian medicine, magic, and funerary provision alike. The akh-spirit, dependent on the living for its continued effectiveness and disposition, stands at the center of the Egyptian conviction that the dead are not gone but present, effective, and responsive to the conduct of the living, the radiant and powerful being at the heart of the most death-conscious religion of the ancient world.

Connections

Osiris — The archetypal akh whose resurrection provides the template for the dead becoming effective spirits, and in whose realm the akh dwells.

Ra — The solar god whose radiance models the akh's luminous nature and whose bark the akh-spirit may join among the imperishable stars.

Thoth — God of wisdom whose knowledge enables the transformation into an akh and who records the judgment that determines its success.

Anubis — Embalmer-god who preserves the body that anchors the soul, the precondition for the akh-transformation.

Isis — Goddess of magic who performed the first transfiguration on Osiris, establishing the prototype for producing an akh.

Maat — Principle of truth against whose feather the heart is weighed in the judgment the dead must pass to become an effective spirit.

Akh — The fuller treatment of the akh as the glorified state achieved at the end of the mortuary process, the concept of which the akh-spirit is the being.

Ba — The mobile personality-component, depicted as a human-headed bird, that integrates with the others to form the akh.

Ka — The vital life-force sustained by offerings, one of the components whose integration produces the effective spirit.

Duat — The underworld through which the deceased journeys to achieve transfiguration, and a realm in which the akh moves.

Field of Reeds — The afterlife paradise where the effective dead dwell among the blessed.

Heka — The magical force the akh possesses in concentrated form, the source of its effectiveness.

Weighing of the Heart — The judgment the deceased must pass to be transfigured into an akh.

Mummification — The preservation of the body that anchors the soul-components, the precondition for the akh-transformation.

Opening of the Mouth — The rite restoring the senses of the dead, enabling the recitation of the spells that produce the akh.

Coffin and Sarcophagus — The container whose spells and images transform the enclosed dead into an effective spirit.

Pyramid Texts — The earliest corpus describing the king's transformation into a shining akh among the imperishable stars.

Hall of Two Truths — The place of judgment the dead must pass to be transfigured into an effective spirit.

Negative Confession — The declaration of innocence required for vindication and transformation into an akh.

Sinuhe — The Middle Kingdom tale whose hero dreads dying abroad without the proper burial that produces an effective, honored akh.

Dispute of a Man and His Ba — The dialogue in which a man fears his ba will desert him and so deny him the union of soul-components needed to become an akh.

Further Reading