Editing Isis (section)

==Influence in later cultures==
{{further|Ancient Egypt in the Western imagination}}
[[File:Auguste Puttemans Isis 2.jpg|thumb|right|alt=Statue of a woman on a throne covered by a veil|Isis as a [[veil of Isis|veiled "goddess of life"]] at the [[Herbert Hoover National Historic Site]]]]
The memory of Isis survived the extinction of her worship. Like the Greeks and Romans, many modern Europeans have regarded ancient Egypt as the home of profound and often mystical wisdom, and this wisdom has often been linked with Isis.{{sfn|Hornung|2001|pp=189–191, 195–196}} [[Giovanni Boccaccio]]'s biography of Isis in his 1374 work ''[[De mulieribus claris]]'', based on classical sources, treated her as a historical queen who taught skills of civilization to humankind. Some [[Renaissance]] thinkers elaborated this perspective on Isis. [[Annio da Viterbo]], in the 1490s, claimed Isis and Osiris had civilized Italy before Greece, thus drawing a direct connection between his home country and Egypt. The [[Borgia Apartments]] painted for Annio's patron, [[Pope Alexander VI]], incorporate this same theme in their illustrated rendition of the Osiris myth.{{sfn|Hornung|2001|pp=78, 83–86}}

[[Western esotericism]] has often made reference to Isis. Two Roman esoteric texts used the mythic motif in which Isis passes down secret knowledge to Horus. In ''[[Kore Kosmou]]'', she teaches him wisdom passed down from [[Hermes Trismegistus]],{{sfn|van den Broek|2006|p=478}} and in the early [[alchemical]] text ''[[Isis the Prophetess to Her Son Horus]]'', she gives him alchemical recipes.{{sfn|Haage|2006|p=24}} Early modern esoteric literature, which saw Hermes Trismegistus as an Egyptian sage and frequently made use of texts attributed to his hand, sometimes referred to Isis as well.{{sfn|Quentin|2012|pp=148–149}} In a different vein, Apuleius's description of Isiac initiation has influenced the practices of many [[secret societies]].{{sfn|Hornung|2001|p=196}} [[Jean Terrasson]]'s 1731 novel ''[[Life of Sethos|Sethos]]'' used Apuleius as inspiration for a fanciful Egyptian initiation rite dedicated to Isis.{{sfn|Macpherson|2004|p=242}} It was imitated by actual rituals in various [[Masonic]] and Masonic-inspired societies during the eighteenth century, as well as in other literary works, most notably [[Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart]]'s 1791 opera ''[[The Magic Flute]]''.{{sfn|Spieth|2007|pp=50–52}}

From the Renaissance on, the [[veil of Isis|veiled statue of Isis]] that Plutarch and Proclus mentioned was interpreted as a personification of [[nature]], based on a passage in the works of [[Macrobius]] in the fifth century CE that equated Isis with nature.{{sfn|Hadot|2006|pp=233–237}}{{refn|group="Note"|Early modern illustrations of Isis as nature often showed her with multiple breasts. Originally, the [[Temple of Artemis#Ephesian Artemis|form of Artemis]] that was worshipped at [[Ephesus]] was depicted with round protuberances on her chest that came to be interpreted as breasts. Early modern artists drew Isis in this form because Macrobius claimed that both Isis and Artemis were depicted this way.{{sfn|Hadot|2006|pp=233–237}} }} Authors in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries ascribed a wide variety of meanings to this image. Isis represented nature as the mother of all things, as a set of truths waiting to be unveiled by science, as a symbol of the [[pantheist]] concept of an anonymous, enigmatic deity who was [[immanent]] within nature,{{sfn|Hadot|2006|pp=266–269}} or as an awe-inspiring [[sublime (philosophy)|sublime power]] that could be experienced through ecstatic mystery rites.{{sfn|Assmann|1997|pp=128–135}} In the [[dechristianization of France during the French Revolution]], she served as an alternative to traditional Christianity: a symbol that could represent nature, modern scientific wisdom, and a link to the pre-Christian past.{{sfn|Spieth|2007|pp=91, 140}} For these reasons, Isis's image appeared in artwork sponsored by the [[French First Republic|revolutionary government]], such as the [[Fontaine de la Régénération]], and by the [[First French Empire]].{{sfn|Humbert|2000|pp=175–178}}{{sfn|Quentin|2012|pp=177–180}} The metaphor of Isis's veil continued to circulate through the nineteenth century. [[Helena Blavatsky]], the founder of the esoteric [[Theosophy (Blavatskian)|Theosophical]] tradition, titled her 1877 book on Theosophy ''[[Isis Unveiled]]'', implying that it would reveal spiritual truths about nature that science could not.{{sfn|Ziolkowski|2008|pp=75–76}}

Among modern Egyptians, Isis was used as a national symbol during the [[Pharaonism]] movement of the 1920s and 1930s, as Egypt gained independence from [[history of Egypt under the British|British rule]]. In works such as Mohamed Naghi's painting in the [[parliament of Egypt]], titled ''Egypt's Renaissance'', and [[Tawfiq al-Hakim]]'s play ''The Return of the Spirit'', Isis symbolizes the revival of the nation. A sculpture by [[Mahmoud Mokhtar]], also called ''Egypt's Renaissance'', plays upon the motif of Isis's removing her veil.{{sfn|Quentin|2012|pp=225–227}}

Isis is found frequently in works of fiction, such as a [[Isis (DC Comics)|superhero franchise]], and her name and image appear in places as disparate as advertisements and personal names.{{sfn|Humbert|2000|pp=185, 188}} The name ''Isidoros'', meaning "gift of Isis" in Greek,{{sfn|Donalson|2003|p=170}} survived in Christianity despite its pagan origins, giving rise to the English name [[Isidore]] and its variants.{{sfn|Witt|1997|p=280}} In the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries, "Isis" itself became a popular feminine [[Isis (given name)|given name]].{{sfn|Khazan|2014}}

Isis continues to appear in modern esoteric and [[modern pagan|pagan]] belief systems. The concept of a single goddess incarnating all feminine divine powers, partly inspired by Apuleius, became a widespread theme in literature of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.{{sfn|Hutton|2019|pp=33–34}} Influential groups and figures in esotericism, such as the [[Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn]] in the late nineteenth century and [[Dion Fortune]] in the 1930s, adopted this all-encompassing goddess into their belief systems and called her Isis. This conception of Isis influenced the [[Great Goddess]] found in many forms of [[Neopagan witchcraft]].{{sfn|Hutton|2019|pp=82–84, 191–192}}{{sfn|Adler|1986|pp=35–36, 56}} Today, [[Kemetism|reconstructions of ancient Egyptian religion]], such as [[Kemetic Orthodoxy]]{{sfn|Forrest|2001|p=236}} or the Church of the Eternal Source, include Isis among the deities they revere.{{sfn|Adler|1986|pp=267, 270}} An eclectic religious organization focused on female divinity calls itself the [[Fellowship of Isis]] because, in the words of one of its priestesses, M. Isidora Forrest, Isis can be "all Goddesses to all people".{{sfn|Forrest|2001|p=233}}