Ancient Egyptian lore states that when you die, your soul begins the journey of Duat. When the Osiris cult became predominant, Anubis, the former lord of the underworld, became its guardian, its guide, and the weigher of souls.
If your soul could not pass judgement - if it weighed heavier than the feather of Ma'at, you would be fed to Ammit. Ammit was purely fearsome to the ancient culture, it was made of everything the people feared. It was a chimera - forged of hippos, crocodiles, leopards... it was a thing from their very nightmares. It's not much of a stretch to relate this to fearing your past, being faced with every dark memory, every failure, every thing that weighs upon you. And if you don't stand up to its gaze, well, it just breaks your dumb butt in half and leaves you in a tree somewhere. Sorry, Eko.
This is supported by the temple carving of Anubis in a common 'weighing' position with Smokey sitting opposite, in some cases where Ammit could commonly sit.
If you decide to doublecheck me and look Ammit up on wikipedia, you'll notice, as a bonus, a nice little notation (I haven't checked the sources on it yet, so, wiki alert) about how Ammit was also portrayed in a form that replicates a very early chakra system, thereby helping the link we see in the show between Hindu and Egyptian cultures.
I'll add in a bonus theory and say, yep, time or something snapped very tall ears off the four-toed statue just so that the COMPLETE OBVIOUSNESS of it being Anubis got avoided until a better time to reveal it.Theory by MDS
If your soul could not pass judgement - if it weighed heavier than the feather of Ma'at, you would be fed to Ammit. Ammit was purely fearsome to the ancient culture, it was made of everything the people feared. It was a chimera - forged of hippos, crocodiles, leopards... it was a thing from their very nightmares. It's not much of a stretch to relate this to fearing your past, being faced with every dark memory, every failure, every thing that weighs upon you. And if you don't stand up to its gaze, well, it just breaks your dumb butt in half and leaves you in a tree somewhere. Sorry, Eko.
This is supported by the temple carving of Anubis in a common 'weighing' position with Smokey sitting opposite, in some cases where Ammit could commonly sit.
If you decide to doublecheck me and look Ammit up on wikipedia, you'll notice, as a bonus, a nice little notation (I haven't checked the sources on it yet, so, wiki alert) about how Ammit was also portrayed in a form that replicates a very early chakra system, thereby helping the link we see in the show between Hindu and Egyptian cultures.
I'll add in a bonus theory and say, yep, time or something snapped very tall ears off the four-toed statue just so that the COMPLETE OBVIOUSNESS of it being Anubis got avoided until a better time to reveal it.Theory by MDS
