Surrounded by the ambulatory with its chapels, the deity was enthroned in its shrine (or "naos") on most sacred ground, the "holy of holies" or "inner sanctum", to be accessed by Pharaoh or his representatives or High Priests alone. Each morning, an elaborated ritual was performed, intended to "wake up" the deity and invite its Ka-doubles and Ba-souls to dwell in its statue, hidden in its shrine, in this inner sanctum of the temple. In this naos, the high priest faced the deity directly and in total solitude. Meanwhile, in the chapels around the rectangular, most holy space around this "great seat", hymns were intoned & rituals were performed. Doing so would bless the Two Lands with the magical presence of the deities (felt everywhere in the temple precinct), restoring all sympathetic links of the souls of light, broken during the night. Facing this divine presence, Pharoah would then offer truth & justice to his father, the great god alife in his central shrine. The ultimate transformation implied a deification. The "great god" came only face to face with another deity. The human "hid", but Pharaoh "flew". When he opened the doors of the naos, the divine Pharaoh confronted the source of all possible divinity alone. The lesser god (on Earth) worshipped the great god (in the sky) : above and below met. As soon as the aspirant had entered the sanctuary, he had become "a soul", i.e. integrated his Anima. Self-realization, the next step, involved the inner sanctum with its central shrine.

The "souls" of associated deities form a protective, mandala-like circle around the "spirit" hidden (even for the other deities) within the central shrine, the "great seat". The ambulatory, with its 13 chapels around the inner sanctum, represented, in henotheistic fashion, the insignia and divine family or constellation of the deity, hidden in its shrine.

In the qabalah, "Atziluth", the world of Divine Presence (cf. the first three supernal "sephiroth" of the "Tree of Life" and the "shekinah") pertained to the same mystical "nearness" as Pharaoh's central shrine rituals in the inner sanctum of the Egyptian temple.

 

Carl Gustav Jung (1875 - 1961)