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XIII

Bare not your soul to everybody nor damage thereby respect for you. Spread not your words among others nor associate yourself with those who bare their heart. Better are those whose knowledge remains inside them, than those who talk to their disadvantage. One does not run to reach perfection. And one does not create it in order to destroy it.

XIV

Laugh not at the blind, nor make fun of a dwarf, nor interfere with the plans of the lame. Do not harass those who are in the hands of God, nor be fierce of face against them if they err. Surely, humans are clay and straw, and God is the builder. God tears down and builds up daily. God makes a thousand humble as He wills. It is God who makes thousands into overseers when they are in their hour of their life. Blessed are those who reach the West while they are safe in the hands of God.

XV

If you see a person your senior outside, walk behind him or her respectfully. Give also a hand to elders filled with beer. And respect them as their children would. The strong arm is not weakened by being uncovered. And the back is not broken by bending it in respect. Better is a poor person who speaks pleasant words than a rich person whose words are as harsh and dry as straw. A pilot who sees far ahead will not wreck the ship on rocks.

XVI

Do not expose a widow if you catch her in the field. Nor fail to be understanding of her reply. Do not refuse your oil jar to a stranger to double it for your friends and family. God loves those who respect the poor more than those who revere the rich.

In spite of the erroneous biblical depiction of ancient Egypt as a land of bondage and the uncritical scholarship which supported these contentions, many scholars now concede there was no large-scale slavery in early Egypt in the modem sense or even Greek sense of the word, that essentially domestic service is a more accurate category, and that temporary conscription, not slavery, was the nature of labor recruitment for building the pyramids. T.G.H James contends that “Herodotus may have been chiefly responsible for the belief that the pyramids were built by slave labour.” But the Hebrew myth and narrative of bondage in and exodus from ancient Egypt in Judeo-Christian literature was also contributive to this charge.

*James, T.G.H. (1972). The Archaeology of Ancient Egypt. New York: Henry Z. Walch, Inc.

Bierbrier states that “it cannot be emphasized too strongly that these men (who worked on the pyramids) were not slaves but temporary conscripts.” In fact, what one has here is a mandatory national service on national building projects similar to mandatory military service. “Every Egyptian citizen was in theory required to lend a hand in this effort and had to provide the state with a certain number of days of labor”. Bierbrier tells us that “The organization of manpower would have been straightforward. During the time of the Nile flood when land would have been covered with water and unfit for agriculture, the farmers could be conscripted to work on the royal pyramid complex.” In addition to these workers, professional craftsmen were also employed.

*Bierbrier, Morris. (1982). The Tomb Builders of the Pharaohs. New York: Charles Scribners Sons.