Winning Five Days
The sun god Ra cursed Nut so she could give birth on no day of the year. Thoth stepped in and played draughts with the moon god, winning a little moonlight at a time until he had five days that had never existed — days not among the three hundred and sixty the curse governed. In these "days outside the year" Nut bore Osiris and his generation of gods. Thoth opened a seam in the rules of time by intellect, not brute force: his way of solving a problem is always calculation, negotiation, and words — the very mark of the god of wisdom.
The Scribe of Truth
In the hall of judgment in the underworld, the heart of the dead is placed on the scales and weighed against the feather of Maat, which stands for truth. Thoth, holding his reed pen and palette, stands by the scales and records the reading faithfully — he does not favor, does not judge, only writes down the result. The Egyptian awe of writing reaches its height here: the written word is not merely a tool of record but part of the order of the cosmos, and Thoth, who governs writing, is the god by whom truth is confirmed and preserved.