Life
This work and other evidence discovered in the 20th century establishes Mani as a historical individual.
Mani was born near Seleucia-Ctesiphon, perhaps in the town Mardinu in the Babylonian district of Nahr Kutha, according to other accounts in the town Abrumya. Mani's father Pātik (Middle Persian Pattūg; Greek Παττικιος, Arabic Futtuq), a native of Ecbatana (modern Hamadan, Iran), was a member of the Jewish-Christian sect of the Elcesaites (a subgroup of the Gnostic Ebionites). His mother was of Parthian descent (from "the Armenian Arsacid family of Kamsarakan"); her name is reported variously, among others Mariam. At ages 12 and 24, Mani had visionary experiences of a heavenly twin of his, calling him to leave his father's sect and teach the true message of Christ. In 240–41, Mani travelled to "India" (i.e. to the Sakhas in modern-day Afghanistan), where he was probably influenced by Greco-Buddhism. Returning in 242, he joined the court of Shapur I, to whom he dedicated his only work written in Persian, known as the Shabuhragan. Shapur was not converted to Manichaeanism and remained Zoroastrian.
Shapur's successor Hormizd I (who reigned only for one year) appears to still have patronized Mani, but his successor Bahram I, a follower of the Zoroastrian reformer Kartir, began to persecute the Manichaeans. He incarcerated Mani, who died in prison within a month, in AD 276 or 277. Mani's followers depicted Mani's death as a crucifixion in conscious analogy to the death of Christ.
Read more about this topic: Mani (prophet)
Famous quotes containing the word life:
“When I wrote the following pages, or rather the bulk of them, I lived alone, in the woods, a mile from any neighbor, in a house which I had built myself, on the shore of Walden Pond, in Concord, Massachusetts, and earned my living by the labor of my hands only. I lived there two years and two months. At present I am a sojourner in civilized life again.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“For some men the power to destroy life becomes the equivalent to the female power to create life.”
—Myriam Miedzian, U.S. author. Boys Will Be Boys, ch. 4 (1991)
“I have given the best of myself and the best work of my life to help obtain political freedom for women, knowing that upon this rests the hope not only of the freedom of men but of the onward civilization of the world.”
—Mary S. Anthony (1827–1907)