Isis and the Resurrection of Osiris

In the earliest days of Egypt, Osiris ruled as a wise and benevolent king, teaching humanity agriculture, law, and the arts. His brother Set, consumed by jealousy, devised a cunning plot. He commissioned a magnificent chest fitted exactly to Osiris's measurements. At a great banquet, Set declared that whoever fit perfectly inside the chest could keep it. One by one the guests tried, but none fit. When Osiris lay down inside, Set's accomplices slammed the lid shut, sealed it with molten lead, and cast it into the Nile. The chest drifted to the shores of Byblos, where a sacred tamarisk tree grew around it. Isis, Osiris's devoted wife and a powerful sorceress, searched the land tirelessly. She tracked the chest to Byblos and, through her magic, retrieved her husband's body. But Set discovered her and, in a rage, tore the corpse into fourteen pieces, scattering them across Egypt. Undeterred, Isis traveled the length and breadth of the land. With the help of her sister Nephthys and the jackal-headed Anubis, she recovered every piece — save one. Using her formidable magic, she reassembled Osiris and, for the first time in history, performed the rites of mummification. She breathed life back into him just long enough to conceive their son, Horus. Osiris then descended to the underworld, where he became its lord and judge of the dead, offering eternal life to those who had lived justly. Isis raised Horus in secret among the papyrus marshes, and when he came of age, he challenged Set for the throne of Egypt, reclaiming his father's legacy.