|
|
 |
 What is the "Third Way?"
The concept of the “third land” shows up repeatedly in ancient Egyptian writing, mostly as a sought after destination. This has to do with the Egyptian understanding of “the two lands,” which refers to the divided kingdoms of the upper and lower Nile valley. It was the goal of nearly every king to unite the two lands, creating “the third land.” In this way, the third land became a metaphor for a sort of promised land, a place that integrates the two known ways of living and makes a third, perfect way.
It is similar to the way we might say we wish we could meld the separate aspects of our modern lives, the living and the dead, or to walk in the past and future at the same time. This ancient Egyptian concept takes the most basic binaries established by Western philosophy, positive and negative, truth and falsehood, good and evil, and struggles to reconcile this with the Eastern conceptions of organic unity, such as the ying and the yang striving to seek oneness. The third way is the middle path, the perfect solution, the dream of reconciliation with all that is right in wrong in this world and in ourselves.
|
