They think that the risings of the Nile have
some relation to the illuminations of the moon ; for
[p. 105]
the greatest rising,1 in the neighbourhood of Elephantinê, is twenty-eight cubits, which is the number of its
illuminations that form the measure of each of its
monthly cycles ; the rising in the neighbourhood of
Mendes and Xoïs, which is the least, is six cubits,
corresponding to the first quarter. The mean rising,
in the neighbourhood of Memphis, when it is normal,
is fourteen cubits, corresponding to the full moon.
The Apis, they say, is the animate image of Osiris,2
and he comes into being when a fructifying light
thrusts forth from the moon and falls upon a cow in her
breeding-season.3 Wherefore there are many things
in the Apis that resemble features of the moon, his
bright parts being darkened by the shadowy. Moreover, at the time of the new moon in the month of
Pharnenoth they celebrate a festival to which they
give the name of ‘Osiris's coming to the Moon,’ and
this marks the beginning of the spring. Thus they
make the power of Osiris to be fixed in the Moon, and
say that Isis, since she is generation, is associated
with him. For this reason they also call the Moon the
mother of the world, and they think that she has a
nature both male and female, as she is receptive and
made pregnant by the Sun, but she herself in turn emits
and disseminates into the air generative principles.
For, as they believe, the destructive activity of
Typhon does not always prevail, but oftentimes is
overpowered by such generation and put in bonds, and
then at a later time is again released and contends
against Horus,4 who is the terrestrial universe ; and
this is never completely exempt either from dissolution or from generation.
[p. 107]