Johann Christoph "Jan" Assmann (7 July 1938 – 19 February 2024) was a German Egyptologist, cultural historian, and religion scholar.

Life and works

Assmann studied Egyptology and classical archaeology in Munich, Heidelberg, Paris, and Göttingen. In 1966–67, he was a fellow of the German Archaeological Institute in Cairo, where he continued as an independent scholar from 1967 to 1971. After completing his habilitation in 1971, he was named a professor of Egyptology at the University of Heidelberg in 1976, where he taught until his retirement in 2003. He was then named an Honorary Professor of Cultural Studies at the University of Constance.

In the 1990s, Assmann and his wife Aleida Assmann developed a theory of cultural and communicative memory that has received much international attention. He is also known beyond Egyptology circles for his interpretation of the origins of monotheism, which he considers as a break from earlier cosmotheism, first with Atenism and later with the Exodus from Egypt of the Israelites.

Assmann died on 19 February 2024, at the age of 85.

Writings on Egyptian and other religions

Assmann suggested that the ancient Egyptian religion had a more significant influence on Judaism than is generally acknowledged. He used the term "normative inversion" to suggest that some aspects of Judaism were formulated in direct reaction to Egyptian practices and theology. He ascribed the principle of normative inversion to a principle established by Manetho which was used by Maimonides in his references to the Sabians. His book The Price of Monotheism received some criticism for his notion of The Mosaic Distinction. He too no longer held this theory, at least not in its original form (specifically, the mosaic aspect).

Awards

Jan and his wife Aleida Assmann at the October 2018 Frankfurt Book Fair.

Publications

  • Re und Amun: Die Krise des polytheistischen Weltbilds im Ägypten der 18.-20. Dynastie (Orbis Biblicus et Orientalis 51). Fribourg and Göttingen 1983.
  • Ägypten: Theologie und Frömmigkeit einer frühen Hochkultur (Urban-Bücherei, vol. 366, Stuttgart 1984). The Search for God in Ancient Egypt trans. David Lorton (2001) ISBN 0-8014-8729-3
  • "Maât: l'Égypte pharaonique et l'idée de justice sociale" in: Conférences, essais et leçons du Collège de France. Paris: Julliard, 1989.

German: Ma`at: Gerechtigkeit und Unsterblichkeit im alten Ägypten. Munich 1990 (Arabic Translation 1996).

  • Stein und Zeit: Mensch und Gesellschaft im Alten Ägypten. Munich 1991.
  • Das kulturelle Gedächtnis: Schrift, Erinnerung und politische Identität in frühen Hochkulturen. Munich 1992. ISBN 3-406-36088-2 ASIN

trans.: Cultural Memory and Early Civilization: Writing, Remembrance, and Political Imagination. Cambridge University Press, 2011. ISBN 978-0-521-18802-9

  • Monotheismus und Kosmotheismus (1993) ISBN 3-8253-0026-9
  • Egyptian Solar Religion in the New Kingdom: Re, Amun, and the Crisis of Polytheism (Studies in Egyptology) (1995) [Translation into English by Anthony Alcock of the German 1983, Re und Amun] ISBN 0-7103-0465-X
  • Ägypten: Eine Sinngeschichte (Munich: Hanser 1996; Frankfurt: Fischer, 1999); trans. The Mind of Egypt: History and Meaning in the Time of the Pharaohs (New York : Metropolitan Books, 2002; Harvard University Press, 2003).
  • Moses der Ägypter: Entzifferung einer Gedächtnisspur. Munich 1998.

Moses the Egyptian: The Memory of Egypt in Western Monotheism (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1997; 1998) ISBN 0-674-58739-1

  • Weisheit und Mysterium: Das Bild der Griechen von Ägypten. Munich 2000. ISBN 3-406-45899-8
  • Herrschaft und Heil: Politische Theologie in Altägypten, Israel und Europa. Munich 2000. ISBN 3-596-15339-5
  • Religion und kulturelles Gedächtnis: Zehn Studien (Munich: C.H. Beck, 2000). ISBN 3-406-45915-3

Religion and Cultural Memory: Ten Studies (Cultural Memory in the Present) trans. Rodney Livingstone, SUP (2005) ISBN 0-8047-4523-4

  • Der Tod als Thema der Kulturtheorie (2000) ISBN 3-518-12157-X
  • Tod und Jenseits im Alten Ägypten (Munich 2001). ISBN 3-406-49707-1

Death and Salvation in Ancient Egypt, trans. David Lorton (2006) ISBN 0-8014-4241-9

  • Altägyptische Totenliturgien, Bd.1, Totenliturgien in den Sargtexten (2002) ISBN 3-8253-1199-6
  • Die Mosaische Unterscheidung oder der Preis des Monotheismus. Munich 2003.

trans. Robert Savage: The Mosaic Distinction or The Price of Monotheism (SUP, 2009) ISBN 0-8047-6160-4

  • Ägyptische Geheimnisse (2003) ISBN 3-7705-3687-8
  • Theologie und Weisheit im alten Ägypten (2005) ISBN 3-7705-4069-7
  • Die Zauberflöte (2005) ISBN 3-446-20673-6
  • Thomas Mann und Ägypten: Mythos und Monotheismus in den Josephsromanen (Munich 2006).
  • Monotheismus und die Sprache der Gewalt (2006) ISBN 3-85452-516-8
  • Of God and Gods: Egypt, Israel, and the Rise of Monotheism (University of Wisconsin Press, 2008)
  • From Akhenaten to Moses. Ancient Egypt and religious change (The American University in Cairo Press 2014).
  • Exodus: Die Revolution der Alten Welt (Munich 2015) ISBN 978-3-406-67430-3

Books in English

  • Egyptian Solar Religion in the New Kingdom, trans. Anthony Alcock (1994) ISBN 0-7103-0465-X
  • Moses the Egyptian: The Memory of Egypt in Western Monotheism (Harvard University 1997)
  • trans. (Cornell University Press 2005)
  • The Mind of Egypt: History and Meaning in the Time of the Pharaohs, trans. Andrew Jenkins (2003) ISBN 0-674-01211-9
  • Of God and Gods: Egypt, Israel, and the Rise of Monotheism (2008) ISBN 0-299-22554-2
  • Cultural Memory and Early Civilization: Writing, Remembrance, and Political Imagination (Mũnchen 1992; Cambridge University 2011)
  • From Akhenaten to Moses: Ancient Egypt and Religious Change (American University in Cairo 2016)
  • . Princeton University Press. 2018. ISBN 9780691157085.

Articles

  • , in Religion and Philosophy in Ancient Egypt, editor W.K Simpson (1989), pp. 55–88
  • in: W.K.Simpson (Hrsg.), Religion and Philosophy in Ancient Egypt, Yale Egyptological Studies 3, 1989, pp. 135–159
  • , in Studies in Egyptology, Presented to Miriam Lichtheim, ed. S.I. Groll (Jerusalem, 1990), pp. 1–45
  • , JEA 78 (1992): pp. 149–162
  • , Proceedings of the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, VII 4, Jerusalem 1992, pp. 143–176
  • in Shlomo Biderstein, Ben-Ami Scharfstein (Hrsg.), Interpretation in Religion (Philosophy and Religion 2), Leiden 1992, pp. 87–109
  • in Oculare desire. Sehnsucht des Auges (Jahrbuch für Religiöse Anthropologie/Yearbook of Religious Anthropology) 1, 1994, pp. 13–29
  • in Irene. A. Bierman (Hrsg.), Egypt and the Fabrication of European Identity (UCLA Near East Center, Colloquium Series), Los Angeles 1995, pp. 35–83
  • , in Bärbel Köhler (Hrsg.), Religion und Wahrheit. Religionsgeschichtliche Studien; Festschrift für Gernot Wießner zum 65. Geburtstag, Wiesbaden 1998, pp. 33–44
  • in Orient 33, 1998, pp. 130–149
  • in Johann Figl (Hrsg.), Handbuch Religionswissenschaft. Religionen und ihre zentralen Themen, Innsbruck-Wien 2003. pp. 104–117
  • in Gary N. Knoppers, Antoine Hirsch (Hg.), Egypt, Israel, and the Ancient Mediterranean World. Studies in Honor of Donald B. Redford, Leiden/Boston 2004. pp. 179–191
  • in Manfred Oeming, Konrad Schmid, Michael Welker (Hg.), Das Alte Testament und die Kultur der Moderne (Altes Testament und Moderne 8), Münster 2004, pp. 147–155
  • in Maria Hlavajova, Sven Lütticken, Jill Winder (Hg.), The return of religion and other myths: a critical reader in contemporary art, Utrecht 2009. pp. 16–30
  • , in Das Erzählen in frühen Hochkulturen I: Der Fall Ägypten (München: 2009), pp. 221–236
  • , in Memory in a Global Age. Discourses, Practices and Trajectories], Palgrave Macmillan Memory Studies (New York: 2010), pp. 121–137
  • in Thomas E. Levy, Thomas Schneider, William H. C. Propp (Hg.), Israel’s Exodus in transdisciplinary perspective. Text, archaeology, culture and geoscience, Cham; Heidelberg; New York; Dordrecht; London 2015. pp. 3–15
  • in Aleida Assmann, Ines Detmers (Hg.), Empathy and its limits, Basingstoke, Hampshire 2016. pp. 187–201
  • in Pirner, Manfred L.; Lähnemann, Johannes; Haussmann, Werner; Schwarz, Susanne (Hg.): Public Theology, Religious Diversity, and Interreligious Learning. Contributing to the Common Good Through Religious Education (Routledge Research in Religion and Education), New York; London 2018, pp. 94–104
  • in in: Speight, C. Allen; Zank, Michael (Hg.): Politics, religion and political theology (Boston studies in philosophy, religion and public life 6), Dordrecht 2017, S. 151-164; Online-Veröffentlichung auf Propylaeum-DOK (2022), DOI: OnlineVeröffentlichung auf Propylaeum-DOK (2022), DOI:
  • in Gilad Sharvit, Karen S. Feldman (Hg.), Freud and Monotheism. Moses and the Violent Origins of Monotheism, New York 2018, pp. 138–156; OnlineVeröffentlichung auf Propylaeum-DOK (2022), DOI:

External links