Akhenaten: Dweller in Truth

Bek

I met Bek, the sculptor, in his house on one of the islands of the Nile two miles south of Thebes. He lived in virtual isolation in a small but elegant house in the center of his modest farm. Bek was widely known to have excelled in his vocation above any other sculptor, but when our country was being rebuilt after the wars he was not summoned to participate as were many others of his standing. Bek was known for his loyalty to his former king, Akhenaten. In fact he was occasionally accused of being a heretic himself. Now he was almost forty years old, a strong, dark man, tall, slender, and full of energy. But his gaze was overcast by melancholy. He greeted me with a warm smile as he opened the letter that my father had given me. When he finished reading, he began.

Beauty and peace vanished when Akhenaten left our world, and I no longer find pleasure in color or in music. I first knew him when I was still a young boy learning the basics of my vocation at the school of my father, Menn, the sculptor of King Amenhotep III. One day a young boy, carried on a sedan chair, visited us at school. My father whispered to me, “The crown prince.”

I saw a lad of my own age, then, frail, unassuming, but with a piercing look. He seemed fascinated by the mere encounter of the chisel and the rock, as though it were a miracle. He came to watch and learn, and he engaged us in conversation with such friendliness that we soon forgot he was a member of the pharaoh's family. He continued to visit the school regularly, and we became friends. I was extremely happy with our friendship. My father took pride in our acquaintance and granted us his blessing.

“Akhenaten is a young boy with the wisdom of a man, my son,” my father would say.

Indeed he was. Even the high priest of Amun acknowledged his wisdom and his maturity at such an early age. The priests interpreted it as an evil force that had taken hold of Akhenaten. That was not true, Meriamun. The evil force dwelt in the hearts of the priests. My king knew no evil. Perhaps that was his tragedy. Once, when we were young men, my father was absorbed in carving a sculpture for King Amenhotep III, and Akhenaten was watching him as he worked with his assistants.

“Master Menn,” Akhenaten said, “you insist on all these traditional methods. I find them stifling.”

“Tradition is power, Your Highness. With tradition we can overcome the passage of time,” my father answered with pride.

“Every sunrise brings a new kind of beauty,” Akhenaten said ecstatically. Then he turned to me. “Bek, my friend, this sculpture may be beautiful but it will not be truthful. Where is the truth?”

Akhenaten lived for the truth, and because of the truth he died. From a very young age his soul was inspired with all that was mystical, as though he had been born from the womb of spirituality. He said to me once, “I am very fond of you, Bek. If you master your art I will entrust to you all matters of art and aesthetics when I become king.”

The truth is that I owe Akhenaten everything, religion and art together. First he taught me the religion of Aten, then he showed me the path of the One God. I was filled with peace when I heard him recite with faith and love:

One day, as we were walking from the quarry to school, I said, “My Prince, I believe in your God.”

He was overjoyed. “You are the second believer after Meri-Ra; but our enemies will be plentiful.”

I learned later that Nefertiti had joined the faith at the same time, while she was still at her father's palace. Akhenaten used to talk to me occasionally about the difficulties he faced because of his religion. Despite my isolation in the quarry, I was able to acquire some understanding of the events that transpired.

It was from my father that I learned the fundamentals of my vocation, but Akhenaten gave me the spirit. He committed himself to the truth, both in life and in art. Because of that he provoked those who lived only for this transient life, those who swarmed around every banquet like vultures and crows.

“Bek,” he told me once, “do not let the teachings of the dead shackle your hands when you work. Let your stone be a harbor for truth. It is God who created everything, so be loyal to him in your representations. Do not allow fear or greed to influence your work. When you make a sculpture of me, let it show every flaw on my face and body so that the beauty of your work will be in its honesty.”

That was Akhenaten, who rejected the old ways and was fascinated by novelty.

He renounced the idols and pulled out timeworn tradition by the root. Akhenaten found ecstasy in truth.

When he became king, I declared my faith again before him and he appointed me first sculptor of the king. When God inspired him to build the new city and move his throne to it, I was in charge of eighty thousand workers, building the most beautiful city ever known, the city of light and faith, Akhetaten.

We built the largest roads, the finest palaces, and the most beautiful of gardens and ponds. It was an artist's masterpiece, but in the end it fell prey to the malice of the priests.

Bek remained silent for a while, unable to conceal his grief for his most cherished creation, which was now slowly vanishing into the dust of the earth. I, too, remained silent out of respect for him, until finally he continued.

Akhenaten was an artist himself. He recited poetry, painted, and even tried his slender hand at carving stone. I will tell you a secret that few people know. He carved a sculpture of Nefertiti that was by all standards an ideal of beauty. It may still be in the abandoned palace, or in Nefertiti's palace, or perhaps it was destroyed with everything else. When the queen abandoned him unexpectedly, he took out the left eye of the sculpture to express his disappointment, but left the rest of it intact as a token of eternal love.

The queen and Akhenaten were a symbol of the God who was father and mother in one. They were united by a deep love that weathered many storms. I still do not understand why she left him at the very end. Her enemies accused her of leaving the sinking ship. They said she wanted to find herself a place in the new nation. But she did not try to win anyone over after that. Of her own will, she remained isolated in her palace, until it became her prison. It was not true that she had been nursing her own interest. I believe that her faith might have been shaken when God did not come to their aid at the time of those painful events. In a dark hour she deserted both the throne and her religion. As for Akhenaten, he was determined until the end. How could he give up his faith when it was he who had heard the heavenly voice of God call him his dear son? After that Akhenaten could not hear any other voice, nor did he care for any other opinion or listen to anyone's advice as a person should when he seeks the truth. It was not he who was defeated, but us. I, too, had my doubts, particularly when they asked him to relinquish the throne, and even more when everyone abandoned him. I saw him once standing alone, calmly watching everyone leave. When he saw me approach he said, “You must go with them, Bek.”

“No one dared speak to me of this, my King,” I said agitatedly.

“But you will go,” he replied with a smile.

“I will remain by my king forever.”

“Bek,” he said gently, “you will go, whether willingly, or by force.”

I remained silent for a moment, then asked, “My Master, can evil overcome?”

He seemed to disappear in his thoughts for a moment, then I heard him say, “Evil can never overcome. What we are witnessing is only a fleeting moment. Only death can keep us from seeing the truth.”

Then he began to sing:

In the same way that he never gave up his faith, he never stopped loving either. Even when he saw the pyramid he built destroyed, and saw his own men join his enemies and his beloved wife desert him without explanation, even then his heart did not know a moment of hatred or spite. He was above punishment; he had nothing but love for man, animal, and even inanimate matter. When he first took the throne, Egypt was a vast empire with loving, obedient subjects. He could have chosen to indulge in worldly comforts: women, wine, food. But he looked away from such temptations and gave himself to the truth, challenging the powers of greed and selfishness. So he sacrificed everything, without ever losing the smile on his face.

“Why don't you use force to defend love and peace?” I asked him one day after the seeds of evil had started growing.

He replied, “Vicious people and criminals always find an excuse to justify their thirst for blood, and I am not one of those, Bek.”

I will never forget his kindness when he sensed that I liked Mutnedjmet, his sister-in-law. He tried to pave the way for me to ask her hand in marriage. When she refused me he consoled me: “Do not be sorry, she is like a vulture waiting for her chance to attack.” I asked him what he meant, but he did not answer.

When everyone else had left, I insisted on remaining with him, as did Meri-Ra, the priest of the One God. But the sage Ay met with us and said, “We are only leaving to protect him from an attack that we cannot ward off. It is the only way we can save his life. Believe me, if anyone was to remain with him I would have chosen to be that one. I am the father of his wife, and his first teacher.”

“But Ay, my staying with him will not change the course of events anyhow.”

“The agreement between us and the priests was that Akhenaten would not be harmed, on the condition that none of his followers and men remain in the city with him. The priests will assign a few servants to watch over him.”

My heart was seared with pain as I was forced to join everyone else. I still have doubts, for I, too, cannot understand why God abandoned him. Sometimes I pray to God and sometimes not. When I received the news of his death, I wept until my eyes exhausted their tears. I had a deep feeling that he did not just die but that they killed him by sorcery or in some other brutal way. Now, here I am living without purpose or a trace of happiness, waiting for death to take me, as it took my beautiful city.