Documents of the Rise of Christianity by Kevin W. Kaatz;

Author:Kevin W. Kaatz;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing (ABC-CLIO)
Published: 2019-02-14T00:00:00+00:00

Document 27

Alexander of Lycopolis, Against the Manichaeans

The Manichaeans were a Christian group that originated in Persia. It isn’t known exactly when they started to arrive in Egypt, but it was probably in the middle or late 200s. Rome and Persia had been fighting with each other for centuries, and when the Manichaeans came to the attention of the Roman authorities, they believed that the Manichaeans were trying to infiltrate the Egyptian population with Persian ideas. Julianus, the Proconsul (the governor) of Egypt, sent Emperor Diocletian a letter about the presence of Manichaeans there. Emperor Diocletian then issued an Edict against them in 302 CE, and it appears that his main problem with them was not that they were Manichaean Christians but that they were from Persia, the bitter enemy of Rome. Part of his Edict stated that they were committing crimes and that they might “corrupt men of more innocent nature.” The emperor wanted the Manichaean leaders and their writings to be burned and any money they have, including the money of their followers, to be given to the Roman treasury.

The religion itself started with Mani, a Persian, who was born in 216 and was martyred in 274 or 276. A little is known about his youth—at least if we can believe the Cologne Mani Codex, which tells us a bit about his family life. Mani had a series of revelations and started to convert people to his beliefs. While he was fairly successful at this during the rule of the Persian king Shapur I, according to Manichaean texts, Mani was allowed to travel throughout Persia spreading his religion. But the sons of Shapur did not like the message, and they began persecuting the Manichaeans. Mani was eventually put to death in 274 or 276 CE when the chief priest of the Zoroastrian faith, Kardir, helped convince King Bahram I. In the persecution the Manichaean Christians then went west into the Roman Empire and east into central Asia and eventually making it all the way to China. Quite a bit is now known about the Manichaeans in Egypt, thanks to all the new discoveries of Manichaean texts, particularly in the Dakhla Oasis (see Gardner and Lieu 1996). While the Edict itself sounded bad, it is clear that it didn’t affect all Manichaeans. They were thriving in the fourth century, both in Egypt and in many other parts of the Roman Empire. We know quite a bit about them from Augustine, who was bishop of Hippo in North Africa in the late 300s and early 400s, as well as Pope Leo I in the middle part of the 400s CE.

Alexander, the author of Against the Manichaeans, lived in Lycopolis, Egypt. He was a philosopher, at least according to the description he gives us. He does not appear to be a Christian although he certainly knew quite a bit about it. He wrote Against the Manichaeans out of fear that his philosopher friends were beginning to convert to Manichaeism— implying that Manichaeism was the perfect religion or belief system for philosophers.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.