If you have visited one of the tourist bazaars in Luxor and Aswan in Egypt, you have certainly seen a small statue of the fertility god of the ancient Egyptians (Min).
Min, known as the god of fertility by the ancient Egyptians, has many imaginative and strange stories surrounding him, which are often interesting, which made him present on many temple walls, perhaps the most prominent of which is the Karnak Temple. On the wall of the Hypostyle Hall, you can see pictures of a huge god with an erect penis, standing in front of the ancient Egyptian as if in a state of worship, offering him offerings, sometimes of lettuce and fish.
Many legends revolve around (Min), but the most realistic story remains that in ancient times a decision was issued for all capable men to go out to war, leaving only one man to guard, and it was said that the war continued for many years; Which made the man covet the women of the village, so he had sex with all of them for years, and they all became pregnant and gave birth several times, and the statements differed regarding the number of his children. Some of them said that they were 550 males, and some of them said that they far exceeded a thousand,
when the men returned from the war, they found that there was an army. Another is waiting for them; They became angry with Min and cut off his arm and leg, but his sons stood united with their father, and since the wars were successive, the sons refused to enter the new war until the story of their father’s life was immortalized on the temples, and he was installed as a god of fertility, and indeed the story of the god Min was immortalized. He was given the title "Amun Min", and he was drawn in the form of a statue highlighting his penis, and the women beneath him were submissive, carrying their cups to receive fertility.
James Allen's book "Introduction to the Egyptian Language and Hieroglyphic Symbols" claims that the Egyptian god Min, pronounced Menu in ancient Egyptian, was worshipped before the dynastic period and that the "Encyclopedia Britannica" dates its depiction of the god to the fourth millennium BC.
But most often he was depicted in the form of a human male with an erect penis, holding in his right hand a “switch.” He was also known as “Khem,” and he represented a god of reproduction and fertility. Jaroslav Czerny, a famous Egyptologist from Czechoslovakia, mentions in his book “Religion” The ancient Egyptian god Min, like the god Khnum, was considered by the Egyptians to be the creator of everything, and in this sense, he was the “maker of gods and men,” as he was called.
Egyptologist François Demas adds another dimension to the image of the Pharaonic god of fertility, mentioning that his worship was strongest in Qift and Akhmim, according to his book “The Gods of Egypt,” where his solemn celebrations were held with a public procession, and many sacrifices were made.
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Flinders Petrie, the British Egyptologist, led excavations of two of his large statues in Qift, which are now in British museums, and some believe they belong to the pre-dynastic period.
The importance of "Min" increased in the era of the Middle Kingdom when he became more closely linked to "Horus" in the image of the god "Min-Horus", and by the era of the New Kingdom he had become completely fused with the god of the kingdom, and the ruler of the gods "Amun" in the image of the god "Min-Amun". -Kamutev, Min's shrine is crowned with a pair of bull horns.
Adolf Ehrmann mentions in the book “The Religion of Ancient Egypt” that because “Min” is the main god of fertility, and perhaps of sexual rituals; The Greeks united him with the god Pan, and his worship was linked to the sanctification of Egyptian lettuce and saw lettuce, two plants that the Egyptians rumored could stimulate sexual desire, and a rubbery juice flowed from them when they were cut. Perhaps the reason for this belief was the white color of the juice, which was associated with the mind of the ancient Egyptians, there was an image of semen.
After the Egyptian era of decline, the god Min suffered from the distortion of some of his statues and images in temples, because he was depicted with an erect penis, and Victorian Egyptologists only depicted him from the middle up, or found some way to cover his visible penis.
However, the image of the god Min with his erect penis did not constitute a shameful or shameful thing for the ancient Egyptians. They had much more relaxed standards regarding the naked body. The ancient Egyptians, especially peasants, officials, artists, and workers, often carried out their work with partially naked bodies. Completely, especially in hot climates, and children do not wear clothes until after puberty.
Egyptian antiquities are frequently defaced by some visitors who are not interested in the importance of ancient Egyptian and Pharaonic antiquities. Therefore, according to Egyptian customs and traditions in the current era, many have defaced the dimensions of the walls in the temples in which Min appears to remove his penis from the walls. But there are also many other factors, such as natural factors, such as erosion factors, such as the wind and its fluctuations in the atmosphere, including Nile floods, because most of these temples were drowned.