The Instruction of Ani

Beginning of the educational instruction made by the Scribe Ani of the Palace of Queen Nefertari:

• Take a wife while you’re young, that she make a son for you; she should bear for you while you’re youthful; it is proper to make people. Happy the man whose people are many, he is saluted on account of his progeny.
• Observe the feast of your God, and repeat its season; God is angry if it is neglected. Put up witnesses when you offer (to God) the first time that you do it.
• When one comes to seek your record, have them enter you in the roll; when the time comes to seek your purchase, it will extol the Might of God. Song, dance, incense are His foods; receiving prostrations is His wealth; God does it to magnify His Name, but man it is who is inebriated.
• Do not enter the house of anyone until he admits you and greets you; do not snoop around in his house, let your eye observe in silence. Do not speak of him to another outside, who was not with you; a great deadly crime indeed.
• Beware of a woman who is a stranger, one not known in her town; don’t stare at her when she goes by, do not know her carnally. A deep water whose course is unknown, such is a woman away from her husband. “I am pretty,” she tells you daily when she has no witnesses; she is ready to ensnare you, a great deadly crime when it is heard.
• Do not leave when the chiefs enter, lest your name stink; in a quarrel, do not speak; your silence will serve you well. Do not raise your voice in the House of God; He abhors shouting; pray by yourself with a loving heart, whose every word is hidden. He will grant your needs; He will hear your words; He will accept your offerings.
• Libate for your father and mother, who are resting in the valley; when God witnesses your action, He will say: “Accepted.” Do not forget the one outside; your son will act for you likewise.
• Do not indulge in drinking beer, lest you utter evil speech and don’t know what you’re saying. If you fall and hurt your body, none holds out a hand to you; your companions in the drinking stand up, saying: “Out with the drunk.” If one comes to seek you and talk with you, one finds you lying on the ground as if you were a little child.
• Do not go out of your house without knowing your place of rest. Let your chosen place be known; remember it, and know it. Set it before you as thee path to take; if you are straight, you find it.
• Furnish your station in the valley, for it is the grave that shall conceal your corpse; set it before you as your concern, a thing that matters in your eyes. Emulate the great departed, who are at rest within their tombs. No blame accrues to him who does it; it is well that you be ready too. When your envoy comes to fetch you, he shall find you ready to come to your place of (final) rest and saying: “Here comes one prepared before you.” Do not say: “I am too young to be taken,” For you do not know your death. When death comes, he steals the infant who is in his mother’s arms, just like him who reached old age.
• Behold, I give you these useful counsels for you to ponder in your heart; do it, and you will be happy; all evils will be far from you.
• Guard against the crime of fraud, against untrue words; conquer malice in yourself; a quarrelsome man does not rest on the morrow.
• Keep away from a hostile man, do not let him be your comrade; befriend the one who is straight and true, one whose actions you have seen. If your rightness matches his, the friendship will be balanced.
• Let your hand preserve what is in your house; wealth accrues to him who guards it; let your hand not scatter it to strangers, lest it turns to lose for you. If wealth is placed where it bears interest, it comes back to you redoubled; make a storehouse for your own wealth, your people will find it on your way. What is given small returns augmented; what is replaced brings abundance.
• The wise lives off the house of the fool; protect what is yours and you find it; keep your eye on what you own, lest you end as a beggar. He who is slack amounts to nothing; honored is the man who is active.
• Learn about the way of the man who undertakes to found his household. Make a garden, enclose a patch, in addition to your plowland; set out trees within it, as shelter about your house. Fill your hand with all the flowers that your eye can see; one needs all of them; it is good fortune not to lose them?
• Do not rely on another’s goods; guard what you acquire yourself; do not depend on another’s wealth, lest he becomes master in your house.
• Build a house or find and buy one; shun contention; don’t say: “My mother’s father has a house, a house that lasts, one calls it;” When you come to share with your brothers, your portion may be a storeroom. If God lets you have children, they’ll say: “We are in our father’s house.” Be a man hungry or sated in his house; it is his walls that enclose him.
• Do not be a mindless person; then your God will give you wealth.
• Do not sit when another is standing, one who is older than you or greater than you in his rank. No good character is reproached; an evil character is blamed.
• Walk the accustomed path each day; stand according to your rank. “Who’s there?” So, one always says rank creates its rules; a woman is asked about her husband; a man is asked about his rank.
• Do not speak rudely to a brawler; when you are attacked, hold yourself back; you will find this good when your relations are friendly, when trouble has come, it will help you bear up, and the aggressor will desist.
• Deeds that are effective toward a stranger are very noxious to a brother. Your people will hail you when you are joyful; they will weep freely when you are sad; when you are happy, the brave look to you, but when you are lonely, you find your relations.
• One will do all you say if you are versed in writings; study the writings, put them in your heart, then all your words will be effective. Whatever office a scribe is given, he should consult the writings; the head of the treasury has no son; the master of the seal has no heir. The scribe is chosen for his hand; his office has no children; his pronouncements are his freemen; his functions are his masters.
• Do not reveal your heart to a stranger; he might use your words against you; the noxious speech that came from your mouth, he repeats it, and you make enemies. A man may be ruined by his tongue; beware, and you will do well.
• A man’s belly is wider than a granary and full of all kinds of answers; choose the good one and say it, while the bad is shut in your belly, a rude answer brings a beating, speak sweetly, and you will be loved. Don’t ever talk back to your attacker; do not set a trap for him; it is God who judges the righteous; his fate comes and takes him away.
• Offer to your God; beware of offending Him… kiss the ground in His Name. He gives power in a million forms; he who magnifies Him is magnified… When incense is given as daily food (ritual), the Lord of risings is satisfied.
• Double the food your mother gave you, and support her as she supported you; she had a heavy load in you, but she did not abandon you. When you were born after your months, she was yet yoked (to you) her breast in your mouth for three years. As you grew and your excrement disgusted, she wasted, saying: “What shall I do!” When she sent you to school, and you were taught to write, she kept watching over you daily, with bread and beer from her house, when as mouth you take a wife, and you are settled in your house, pay attention to your offspring. Bring him up, as did your mother. Do not give her cause to blame you, lest she raises her hands to God (crying for help), and He hears her cries.
• Do not eat bread while another stands by without extending your hand to him. As to food, it is here always; it is man who does not last; one man is rich, another is poor, but food remains for him who shares it. As to him who was rich last year, he is a vagabond this year; don’t be greedy to fill your belly; you don’t know your end at all. Should you come to be in want, another may do good to you. When last year’s watercourse is gone, another river is here today; great lakes become dry places; sandbanks turn into depths. Man does not have a single way, for the Lord of life confounds him.
• Attend to your position, be it low or high; it is not good to press forward, step according to rank.
• Do not intrude on a man in his house; enter when you have been called; he may say: “Welcome,” with his mouth, yet deride you in his thoughts. One gives food to one who is hated, supplies to one who enters uninvited. Don’t rush to attack your attacker; leave him to God; report him daily to God; tomorrow being like today, and you will see what God does when he injures him who injured you.
• Do not enter into a crowd if you find it in an uproar and about to come to blows. Don’t pass anywhere nearby; keep away from their tumult, lest you be brought before the court when an inquiry is made.
• Stay away from hostile people and keep your heart quiet among fighters; an outsider is not brought to court; one who knows nothing is not bound in fetters.
• It is useful to help someone you love (friend, relative, spouse, etc.) so as to cleanse him of his faults; you will be safe from his errors; the first of the herd leads to the field.
• Do not control your wife in her house; when you know she is efficient; don’t say to her: “Where is it? Get it!” When she has put it in the right place, let your eye observe in silence, then you recognize her skill; it is joy when your hand is with her- many don’t know this. If a man desists from strife at home, he will not encounter its beginning. Every man who founds a household should hold back the hasty heart. Do not go after a woman; let her not steal your heart.
• Do not talk back to an angry superior; let him have his way; speak sweetly when he speaks sourly- it’s the remedy that calms the heart. Fighting answers carry sticks, and your strength collapses; do not vex your heart. He will return to praise you soon when his hour of rage has passed. If your words please the heart, the heart tends to accept them; choose silence for yourself, submit to what he does.
• Befriend the herald of your quarter; do not make him angry with you. Give him food from your house; do not slight his requests; say to him: “Welcome, welcome here,” No blame accrues to him who does it.

The scribe Khonshotep answered his father, the scribe Ani: Do not proclaim your powers, so as to force me to your ways; does it not happen to a man to slacken his hand so as to hear an answer in its place? … One cannot know his fellow if the masses are beasts; one cannot know his teachings and alone possess a mind if the multitudes are foolish. All your sayings are excellent, but doing them requires virtues. Tell the God who gave you wisdom: “Set them on your path!”

The scribe Ani answered his son, the scribe Khonshotep: Turn your back to these many words that are not worthy of being heard. The crooked stick left on the ground with sun and shade attacking it; if the carpenter takes it, he straightens it, makes of it a noble’s staff, and a straight stick makes a collar. You foolish heart, do you wish us to teach, or have you been corrupted?

“Look,” said he, “you, my father, it is you who are wise and strong of hand: the infant in his mother’s arms, his wish is for what nurses him.”

“Look,” said he, when he finds his speech, he says: ‘Give me bread.”

The Instruction of Ani: Ancient Egyptian Wisdom for Everyday Life

The Instruction of Ani examines a fascinating piece of ancient Egyptian literature, also known as the Instruction of Any. It’s a wisdom text, like a handbook of advice, written around 1500 BCE. The text itself is a bit damaged and challenging to translate, but it offers a unique glimpse into the values and concerns of ordinary Egyptians during the New Kingdom.

Unlike other wisdom texts aimed at the elite, the Instruction of Ani speaks directly to the common people. Here’s a breakdown of what you’ll find inside:

— Fatherly Advice: The text follows the classic format of an older man, Ani (or Any), a scribe working for Queen Nefertari, sharing wisdom with his son.

— Focus on Morality: The core themes revolve around living a good and moral life. Ani emphasizes honesty, respect for religion, especially celebrating festivals correctly, and honoring your parents.

— Practical Tips: The advice goes beyond the philosophical. Ani offers practical pointers on avoiding gossip, managing your temper, and even building your own home.

— A Unique Twist: One interesting aspect is the ending. Unlike typical wisdom texts where the son simply accepts the teachings, Ani’s son questions his father’s advice. Ani then uses reason and argument to defend his positions.

— Ancient Inspiration: The book includes several excerpts from the Instruction of Ani, providing a taste of the original text and its insights.

Whether you’re interested in ancient Egyptian culture, practical life advice, or a different perspective on morality, The Instruction of Ani offers a valuable window into the past.