Verse 2
2. Commanded… to embalm “The Egyptians were famous for their skill in medicine . Homer says that every physician in Egypt ‘knew more than all other men . ’ Odyss . , 4, 229 . Medical specialties were carefully cultivated, and the land abounded with oculists, aurists, dentists, etc . , so that persons of rank and wealth generally had several different kinds of physicians among their servants, as Joseph seems to have had, according to the text . The Persian kings, Cyrus and Darius, had Egyptian physicians at their courts . Herod . , 2: 84; 3:1, 132 . The Theban mummies show that they filled teeth with gold; and Pliny says, that they practised postmortem examinations; while one of the books of Hermes treated of medical instruments, and another of anatomy . The government was very severe upon quacks, and the death of a patient who had not been ‘doctored by the books,’ was held a capital crime . Wilkinson, in Rawl . , Her . , ii, p . 117 .
European medicine came from Egypt through the Arabs, whence the Arab symbols of our chemists, while the very word chem -istry is a souvenir of the land of Ham, or Chem.
“Embalming was practised by several ancient nations, but the art was carried to the highest perfection in Egypt. The materials principally used were cedar oil, natron, (native carbonate of soda,) and various spices. Embalming was the work of a special class, ( Herod., 2: 86,) whom probably Joseph’s physicians employed.” Newhall.
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