Which Egyptian ritual was performed to restore a deceased person's senses for the afterlife?

The Opening of the Mouth was the Egyptian ritual performed to restore a deceased person’s senses for the afterlife.

Priests carried out the ceremony on a mummy or statue representing the deceased. Using ritual instruments, they symbolically opened the mouth and sometimes touched the eyes, ears, nose, and other parts of the body. The purpose was to let the dead breathe, eat, speak, see, and hear again in the next world.

The rite was part of a wider funerary program that included mummification, offerings, prayers, and burial. It transformed the deceased from a preserved body into an active spirit capable of participating in the afterlife.

The ceremony was not the same as the weighing of the heart. That judgment tested moral worth, whereas the Opening of the Mouth prepared the deceased for continued existence. Anubis appears in funerary religion around these rites, but the ritual’s goal was restoration of vital functions.