Page 98 - Perished Nations

(Deeds) after the manner of the people of Fir’awn and those
before them: They treated as false the Signs of their Lord: so We
destroyed them for their crimes, and We drowned the people of
Fir’awn: for they were all oppressors and wrong-doers.
(Surat al-Anfal: 54)

ncient Egyptian civilisation, along with other city states established
in Mesopotamia at the same time, is known to be one of the ol-
A dest civilisations in the world and it is recognised to have been an
organised state with the most advanced social order of its age. The facts
that they discovered writing around the third millennium BC and used it;
that they made use of the River Nile and were protected against overseas
dangers on account of the natural setting of the country, greatly contribu-
ted to the Egyptians improving their civilisation.
But this "civilised" society was one in which "the reign of pharaohs" pre-
vailed the system of denial mentioned in the clearest and most straightfor-
ward way in the Qur’an. They swelled with pride, turned aside and blasp-
hemed. In the end, neither their advanced civilisations, their social and po-
litical orders, or their military successes could save them from being dest-
royed.

The Authority of the Pharaohs

The Egyptian civilisation was based on the fertility of the River Nile.
Egyptians had settled in the Nile valley due to the abundance of water from
this river and the fact that they could cultivate the land with the river wa-

Harun Yahya
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