Who said that the Egyptians did not question their world, and thus, they did not produce philosophy?
Ancient Egyptian philosophy is seen as the earliest recorded form of African philosophical thought.
Obenga (2004, 31-49) states that the Egyptians had developed concepts showing they questioned things, and even reached advanced philosophical concepts. These are “rekhet” (‘science,’’ in the sense of ‘‘philosophy,’’ that is, inquiry into the nature of things), “upi” (judgment after dissecting), “sat” (wisdom), and “tep-heseb”. The former happened even though Egypt was an authoritative society, with the Pharaoh as an absolute divine monarch.
They also had a tradition of recording philosophical content, in the form of teachings (“sebayit”) of different sages, who lived as early as 2700 BCE. One of those sages was Imhotep, traditionally the architect of the Step Pyramid of Saqqara, who was worshipped across time as a wise man and a doctor. These procedures have been widely researched.
Through these texts and also those of religious literature, it is known that the Egyptians had developed a form of phenomenology. They used concepts such as “wnn” (to exist, being), “kheper” (to become), “maa” (something being visibly real/ true) and by extension “maat” (cosmic order) and different versions of the invisible qualities of all people, or the soul, (ka, ba, akh, ha, shut). These concepts are seen, in full development, in funerary texts (Pyramid Texts, Coffin Texts, Book of the Dead, and the Books of the Afterlife), but also in literature. In a text known as “The Dispute between a Man and His Ba”, the story’s hero is disputing with his spirit on whether to take his own life or come to terms with life’s difficulties.
Finally, it is worth mentioning their concept of linear and circular time (djet / neheh).