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( 43 ) to Osiris. The religious calendar of the Egyptians contained a number of fasts, some of which lasted from seven to fortytwo days. Throughout the whole duration of every such period, the priests (or anybody undergoing such fasts) were required to abstain entirely from animal food, from herbs and vegetables and from wine. Their diet on these occasions can have been little more than bread and water. Some of the tenets of non-violence are very subtle and go very deep. Non-eating of vegetables, abstinence from violence to water and fire indicate that the Egyptians considered Vegetable Kingdom, Water-bodies and Fire-bodies to possess life. Greed, expropriation and exploitation are denounced. They believed in freedom from fear, balance of tempers, futility of blasphemy and reviling of others, harms of flattery and illspeaking, help of fellow citizens and purity of speech and conduct. He acquired Right knowledge and was sincerely effective to practically implement it in life. He made supreme efforts to achieve his final attainment.
The Sumerians believed in Soul and its life after death. Purer souls went to the Island of the Blest after death.
The Island of the Blest may be compared to Sumerian Spiri. heaven. The darker souls went to the tualism
Nether Worlds ; a dark, gloomy and damp place meant merely to trouble the living.10 The Sumerians believed in the plurality of souls. They had firm beljef in the immortality of the souls.11 Immortality was the permanent and ever-happy existence of the soul.
The Sumerians are described as pessimisted people unlike the optimistic Egyptians. I do not think the Sumerians to be a pessimistic people. In spite of the lamentation rituals and penitential hymns, they believed in the immortality of soul through self-suffering. The righteous man bore sufferings with joy. Whatever suffering may come and
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