The being who sometimes came to Mani like a ‘flash of lightening’ was an angel – one he regarded as a manifestation of his own higher identity and referred to variously as his ‘Light-Self’ and as al-Taum, ‘the Twin’ .75 When Mani was 12 years old the Twin appeared to him in a vision and informed him that he was to be responsible for transmitting a great teaching to mankind. In order to do this, he would have to leave the Elchasaitans at some time in the future. Thereafter the young Mani lived a quiet and studious life, out of the limelight, gathering knowledge in secret, tutored by divine revelations and by his angel: With the greatest possible ingenuity and skill I went about in that Law [of the Elchasaitans], preserving my hope in my heart; no one perceived who it was that was with me, and I myself revealed nothing to anyone during that great period of time. But neither did I, like them, keep the fleshly custom … I revealed nothing of what happened, or of what will happen, nor what it is that I knew, or what it is that I had received …76
It was probably during this same period of learning that Mani honed the skills as a painter, which traditions say he later used to illustrate his teachings, and acquired the knowledge of astronomy and mathematics for which he would also be renowned .77
When Mani reached the age of 24, the Twin appeared to him and announced: The time has now come for thee to manifest thyself publicly and to proclaim thy doctrine aloud.78
Next, says Mani, the Twin: … delivered, separated and pulled me away from the midst of that Law in which I was reared. In this way he called, chose, drew, and severed me from their midst, drawing me to the divine side.79
He also initiated Mani into a gnosis: Concerning me, who I am, and who my inseparable Twin is … And who my Father on high is; or in what way, severed from him, I was sent out according to his purpose; and what sort of commission and counsel he has given me before I clothed myself in this instrument [the body], and before I was led astray in this detestable flesh … Moreover, concerning my soul, which exists as the soul of all the worlds, both what it itself is and how it came to be. Beside these he revealed to me the boundless heights and the unfathomable depths;80 he revealed mysteries hidden to the world which are not permitted for anyone to see or hear …81 He showed me all. 82
Mani and the Magi
It was at this point, around AD 240, that Mani – a sleeper at last awakened – began his preaching mission.83 What he was preaching was distinctly not Zoroastrianism, and Ardeshir I, champion of the Zoroastrian faith as the official religion of Persia, was still on the throne. Mani seems to have fallen foul of the Magi almost immediately and to have been forced into exile.84 He travelled to India, by all accounts propagating his teaching with great success there,85 and returned via the Persian Gulf in 241, the year of Ardeshir's death. Somehow Mani managed to convert Firuz, Ardeshir's youngest son and, through him, obtained a personal audience with the eldest son Shapur – who shortly afterwards succeeded to the throne as King Shapur I. 86 At the coronation Mani was permitted to come forward to proclaim his own spiritual message – an unprecedented honour. 87 And on either 21 March 242 or 9 April 243 (the date is disputed by historians) Shapuhr issued a letter authorising Mani to preach as he wished and protecting him throughout the Persian Empire.88
Thereafter, freed of all obstructions, Manicheism won converts at a phenomenal rate causing intense resentment and jealousy amongst the Zoroastrian priesthood. There was a backlash and later in Shapur's reign it seems that the Magi persuaded the king to exile Mani a second time.89 But in 272, following Shapur's death, Mani returned to Persia and was welcomed by the latest successor to the throne, King Hormuzd, who once again extended royal favour to him.90
Hormuzhd's reign lasted barely a year and Bahram I, who succeeded to the throne in 273, was a strong supporter of the old Zoroastrian faith. He reversed the policy of tolerance towards Manicheism and began to persecute its leaders and followers. In 276 his officers arrested Mani at Gundeshapur in southwestern Persia. The self-styled ‘Apostle of God’ was then subjected to four days of Inquisition-style interrogation by the Magi, and declared to be zandic – a ‘heretic’. A month of imprisonment in heavy chains followed after which he was flayed alive and then decapitated. His head was impaled on the city gate, from which his skin, stuffed with straw, was also suspended; what remained of his body was thrown to the dogs.91
No doubt the level of brutality in his execution was commensurate with the level of the threat that the Magi saw in Mani's new religion which was everywhere overtaking them. And just as was the case with the destruction of Catharism by the Roman Catholic Church a thousand years later, a determined attempt was also made by the Zoroastrians to wipe out Manicheism completely. 92
They did not succeed. Before his imprisonment and execution Mani had already sent out his 12 disciples, and hosts of followers, to all the corners of the known world.93 In addition the continuing persecutions by the Zoroastrian state after 276 prompted a large-scale migration of Manichean communities. Some travelled deep into China – where Mani's religion would survive in remote enclaves until as late as the 16th century. Others infiltrated Eastern parts of the Roman Empire, the Roman colonies in North Africa, and eventually all the immense territories under Rome's control as far west as Britain.
Though at times violently opposed by Rome (even before its conversion to Christianity) Manicheism won immense popularity throughout the empire and was particularly well represented in its North African colonies. It was in North Africa that it acquired its most famous acolyte, Augustine – later Saint Augustine of Hippo. Born in AD 354, the son of a pagan father and a Christian mother, he became a Manichean auditor or hearer in AD 377 – equivalent to joining the Cathar class of credente. He held to the Manichean faith for nine years then abandoned it in 386 and was baptized as a Christian in 387. He returned to North Africa where he formed a religious community and was appointed bishop of Hippo in 396. He lived to see the fall of Rome to the Vandals in 410. When he died in 430 Vandal forces had crossed the Mediterranean and were besieging Hippo itself.94
Like many converts Augustine zealously detestated his former faith. During his long and influential career as one of the great doctors of the Church he wrote extensively condemning Manicheism and the Manicheans. His anti-Manichean tracts survived the ages and played an important part in shaping the attitudes of medieval Roman Catholics to the Cathar heresy. As we saw in Chapter Two Catharism was frequently identified in the 12th and 13th centuries as a resurgence of the same Manicheism that Augustine had censured in the fourth century – a conclusion that modern scholars reject. Nevertheless the Cathar and Manichean religions were, in our view, similar enough in their essentials to make the medieval identification understandable and worth further consideration.
The Cosmos according to Mani
One of the notions upon which Manicheism is founded is that there existed from the beginning of time ‘two gods, uncreated and eternal and everlastingly opposed to each other.’95 One is the God of Evil and Darkness, the other the God of Good and the Light.96 The realm of Light was the uppermost and was ‘without bounds in height and on each side.’ The realm of Darkness lay below it similarly boundless in depth and on each side .97 For untold ages neither was aware of the other's existence, but in the bowels of the Darkness was Satan, with his ‘disorderly, anarchical, restless brood’ of demonic powers.98 There was constant agitation, chaos and turmoil, as in the heart of a black thunderstorm, and at some point the Prince of Darkness rose up through the abyss, perceived the Light from the upper world and conceived a hatred for it. Returning to the depths he prepared his forces: Then again springing upwards, he invaded the realms of Light with the intention of there spreading calamity and destruction. 99
Like the later Cathars and Bogomils Mani saw the human body as part of the evil creation within which sparks of the Light had been imprisoned. Like the Cathars and the Bogomils he taught that sexual reproduction and reincarnation are the mechanisms by which the cycle of imprisonment is perpetuated. And also
like the Cathars and Bogomils he believed that by abstinence and prayer this imprisoned Light could gradually be released, but that we must pass through many incarnations, and much pain, before that would happen.100
Such resemblances to the religion of the medieval dualists become all the clearer when we realise, as Yuri Stoyanov confirms, that Light and Darkness in Manichean cosmology are metaphors for spirit and matter.101 It was the fusion of these two contrary principles, at the beginning of the present cycle of time, which caused the imprisonment and suffering of the soul in the first place.102 The details of exactly how the imprisonment was achieved – how fragments of the Light came to be trapped in Darkness, how Good ended up mixed with Evil, how souls were enwrapped in matter – may have more to do with the inspiration of individual storytellers than anything else. We know that this was a tradition that made broad use of colourful symbols, myths and parables as teaching aids. But the point, in the final analysis, is that the medieval dualists of Europe, exactly like the Manicheans of Persia centuries earlier, envisaged man as a ‘mixed’ creature who must fight a constant war within himself in order to subdue his baser elements, and to perfect and liberate his soul.
It was to get this point across that the Cathars and Bogomils told stories of angels who had fallen downwards from the pure spiritual realm of heaven to the impure material realm of earth. In the parallel Manichean myth the Prince of Darkness with his demons rushed upwards out of the abyss to attack and destroy the Light. So forceful and impetuous was this onslaught that the Evil One, wielding the ‘malign’ powers of Smoke, Fire, Wind, Water and Darkness as his weapons, broke through the defences and encroached upon the Light. The Father of Light defended his realm by evoking a proxy – the ‘Primal Man’ – and arming him with the ‘luminous’ powers of Air, Wind, Light, Water and Fire. Battle was joined, Satan was victorious, the Primal Man lay in a deathlike trance, and elements of the luminous powers that he had been armed with were now engulfed or ‘eaten’ by the forces of darkness.103
Next the Father of Light created further emanations or proxies – amongst them the ‘Living Spirit’, identified with the pre-Zoroastrian Iranian god Mithra, and a figure called the ‘Great Architect’ .104 Together they revived and rescued the Primal Man and began the work of recovering for the Light the luminous powers that had been consumed by the forces of Darkness – a task described as saving the ‘Living Soul’ from the ‘burning house’ of matter. 105
The diabolical counter-attack against the works of the Living Spirit and the Great Architect involved the creation of Adam and Eve ‘to fortify’, as Stoyanov puts it, ‘the imprisonment of the Light elements through the lust and reproduction of the human species.’ But the realm of Light sent a saviour to Adam who made him aware of the Light existing within himself – i.e. his immortal soul – and caused him to rebel against the Evil One who had fashioned his body. Ever since the human race has ‘remained the principal battleground between the forces of Light and Darkness.’106
The saviour sent to Adam is called ‘Jesus the Splendour’ in the Manichean texts .107 As time passes other saviours are sent, each of them to renew the gnosis needed to awaken man to his true condition. Earlier we listed some of the household names amongst these saviours – Zoroaster, Hermes, Plato, Buddha, Jesus Christ, and last but not least Mani. Other lists echo the spread of Manicheism in Hebraic cultures and feature Seth, Enoch (like Hermes frequently identified with the ancient Egyptian wisdom god Thoth), Noah, Abraham, and again Mani.108 Similarly the eastwards expansion of Manicheism is reflected in other formulations that refer to Mani as the Buddha of Light or as a reincarnation of Lao-Tsu, the founder of Taoism.109
In all cases and in all lists Mani is extolled as the ‘Seal of the Prophets’ .110 It is he who brings the final message, the final revelation and the final gnosis through which mankind is to complete the great work of freeing the last elements of Light from the prison of Darkness. This work, as described, is almost alchemical in character – an intricate, gradual process of distillation down the ages, incarnation after incarnation, channelling the Light away from the Dark, purifying the soul from its contamination with matter. The denouement is our realisation that the physical earth on which we live was brought into existence as the theatre or laboratory in which this process of endless, painstaking refinement could unfold – and for no other purpose.111 Finally, using all the Light thus reclaimed, the Great Architect and the Living Spirit, assisted by the souls of the Manichean elect, are to construct a ‘New Paradise’ and a spiritual earth to replace the dark, leaden husk of the old material creation that will fall away at the completion of the project.112
If it looks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck … then it probably is a duck …
Although the Manicheans, Bogomils and Cathars told different stories about the human predicament, we suggest that closer examination shows that they share a deep and abiding theme. At the heart of it all, for every credente and perfectus, for every hearer and elect, was a desire to live in the world in such a way as to minimise spiritual pollution and to improve, strengthen, purify and ultimately (after great struggle) liberate the soul. In all cases this involved accepting and following a system and working within a structure, and these were remarkably the same from the early days of Manicheism in the third century AD to the final crushing of medieval dualism in Europe more than 1,000 years later.
Just like the Bogomil and the Cathar Churches, the Manichean Church was divided into two principal categories. There were the ordinary the rank and file adherents who could marry, have children, own property, eat meat and drink wine. And there was a small highly-committed elite of celibate teetotal vegetarians who lived in personal poverty and renounced all the material pleasures of life.113 The rank and file were known as the hearers and the elite as the elect – concepts identical in all respects to the credentes and perfecti of the medieval dualists. Indeed amongst the Manicheans the term perfecti was used interchangeably with elect. 114
Like the Cathar and Bogomil perfecti the Manichean elect could be men or women and always travelled in adept-disciple pairs. Also like the perfecti, the elect passed through a strict process of initiation culminating in a ceremony comparable to the consolamentum. Following this initiation they were considered to be ‘full of the Light’ and thenceforward must do nothing to contaminate their inner light with the dark of earthly things. 115 For the Manichean elect that included doing no agricultural work and not even such a simple task as breaking bread. It involved leading a wandering, penniless existence, possessing only ‘food for a day and clothes for the year’, completely dependent upon the charity of the hearers who, by joining the Manichean Church, took on an obligation to care for the elect.116 Although the Cathar and Bogomil perfecti did break bread for themselves, they too led wandering, penniless lives and were dependent on the charity of the credentes who likewise had a duty to care for them. Moreover even Bernard Hamilton, though not normally a fan of the ‘continuing tradition’, has to admit that: The Manicheans had required their elect to observe an ascetic rule of life, and their reasons for doing so were identical to those of the Bogomils, springing from a conviction that the material creation was evil.117
Mani taught that messengers like Zoroaster, Buddha, and Jesus – to whose line he also claimed to belong – had been sent to earth out of sympathy for mankind, to remove the clouds of ignorance from our minds, to teach us Truth, and to rescue the Light in us (i.e. our shining souls) from Darkness and Evil.118 Again these are themes that are entirely familiar from the dualism of the Cathars and the Bogomils.
The reader will recall that the Cathars and Bogomils, believing Jesus to have been a spiritual emanation of the Good God, could not accept that he had ever been born in the flesh and therefore concluded that he must have been an apparition sent down directly from the heavenly realms. The identical idea was voiced by Mani who preached, centuries earlier, that Jesus was not born of woman but came forth from the Father of Light and desc
ended from heaven in the form of a man aged about 30. The body in which he appeared was an illusion and so, accordingly, was his Crucifixion.119 In one Manichean text he even appears afterwards to his disciple John who is grief-stricken at the supposed death of his master and informs him that the Crucifixion was a spectacle, a phantasmagoria, in short a kind of miracle play performed to impress the masses.120
Despite their conviction that material life is evil the Cathars, Bogomils and Manicheans all showed great respect for life and opposed causing pain or suffering of any kind to fellow creatures whether human or animal.121 All believed in reincarnation. 122 All forbade the use of images and worshipped only through prayers and hymns.123 We know that the Cathars and the Bogomils looked with horror on the Old Testament and regarded its God, Jehovah, as the Devil. So too did the Manicheans 124 and Mani himself had declared: It is the Prince of Darkness who spoke with Moses, the Jews and their priest. Thus the Christians, the Jews, and the Pagans are involved in the same error when they worship this god. For he led them astray in the lusts that he taught them, since he was not the God of Truth.125
Connecting the Cathars to the first century AD
Until the early 20th century scholars were obliged to rely almost exclusively on the works of the persecutors of Manicheism in order to reconstruct the ‘lost’ Manichean religion that those very persecutors had destroyed. But intact ancient Manichean texts discovered in the Far East in the 1920s and in Egypt in the 1970s have added greatly to our store of knowledge. In consequence it is now generally accepted that Christian Gnosticism, hitherto allocated a relatively minor role in the intellectual parentage of Manicheism, may in fact have been the single most decisive influence on Mani's thinking. H. J. W. Drijvers goes so far as to suggest that even the term ‘Christian Gnosticism’ is misleading: It has usually been assumed that the Christian elements in Manicheism reached Mani through a Gnostic filter … It is rather more in agreement with the historical situation and development during the third century … to assume that Mani and Manicheism heavily drew upon the whole of Christian tradition and literature extant in that time without any restriction to a supposedly Gnostic strain.126
The Master Game: Unmasking the Secret Rulers of the World Page 14
