Panarion (Against Heresies) 1 part 47/82

For these men arose in the times of the emperor Aurelian, around the fourth year of his reign.

This heresy is much talked about and renowned in many parts of the earth, having received, as I said, its spread into [various] parts of the earth from a certain Manes.

This Manes set out from the land of the Persians.

He was at first called Cubricus, but he gave himself the name Manes—perhaps, I think, by God's providence drawing to himself a name suggestive of madness.

And as he himself supposed, he gave himself this name, which allegedly meant 'vessel' in the Babylonian tongue.

For the name 'Manes,' when carried over from Babylonian into Greek, signifies 'vessel.'

But as the truth reveals, he bears a name derived from 'madness,' on account of which this pitiable man was struck senseless, so as to sow evil teaching in the world.

Now this Cubricus was the slave of a certain widow, who, dying childless, left to him an incomparable quantity of wealth—gold, silver, spices, and other goods.

And she herself had received the succession of this inheritance from a certain Terebinthus, who had likewise been a slave, and had been renamed Buddas in the Assyrian tongue; he in turn had been the slave of a certain Scythianus,

who came originally from Saracen territory, but was raised at the borders of Palestine, that is, in Arabia.

This Scythianus, having been educated in the aforesaid places in the Greek language and in the learning of Greek letters, became skilled in the vain notions of the world.

He constantly set out on journeys to the land of the Indians for business, conducting extensive trade.

...traveling about the world, and also through the Thebaid; for there are various harbors of the Red Sea, distinguished according to the outlets toward the territory of Rome—one at Aila, which in Holy Scripture is called Ailon;

there it was that Solomon's ship, arriving every three years, used to bring gold and ivory tusks, spices, peacocks, and other goods; the second harbor is at the Fortress of Clysma, and another, still further up, is called Berenice, through which [goods] are carried to the Thebaid, and the wares coming from India are distributed there in the Thebaid, or else carried to Alexandria by way of the river Chrysorrhoas—I mean the Nile, which is also called Geon in the Scriptures—and are carried over the whole land of Egypt, even to Pelusium.

And thus, passing by sea into other homelands, those [merchants] from India trade with the Roman territory.

I have taken pains to relate these matters in careful detail for the sake of the history, so that those who wish to study each subject might not be deprived of [knowledge of] its roots.

For whoever undertakes any narrative must undertake it to the best of his ability, and make his introduction from the root;

from this the truth of the matter is also discovered, and even if the speaker lacks eloquence of speech and felicity of expression, nevertheless, through the true account, what is sought will be demonstrated to those of understanding.

At first, then, this Scythianus, puffed up with great wealth and possessions of spices and other goods from India, came to the Thebaid, to a city called Hypsele, and there found a most depraved little woman, conspicuous for bodily beauty, who dazzled his foolish heart; and taking her down from the roof—for such a woman stands exposed in that common shamelessness—he took up with the woman, and having freed her, he joined himself to her in marriage.

As much time passed, because of the excess of the luxury he enjoyed, this accursed man could not restrain himself, but being idle and habituated to evil, out of the surfeit of his wanton extravagance, began to devise in his mind something newer to introduce into life; and having thought it up from himself, he fabricated such words—not having found them from the divine Scripture or the utterance of the Holy Spirit, but speaking from the reasonings of a wretched human nature:

'By what reasoning do the opposites lie unequal in every visible frame of creation—black and white, red and green, wet and dry, heaven and earth, night and day, soul and body, good and evil, just and unjust—unless it is because all these are altogether composed of two certain first principles?' And the devil implanted this dreadful notion in his mind, having warred against him yet further, against human nature, so that he should suspect what does not exist and fail to recognize what does exist, in order to set up a kind of war in the minds of the deceived—those who suppose there to be something alongside him who truly is, and, so to speak, that all things are brought about from two roots or two first principles.

which is the most impious and most wicked of all [notions].

But I will speak about this again later.

For in these matters the aforementioned Scythianus, blinded in his understanding, having taken his pretexts from Pythagoras, came to hold this view, and fashioned for himself four books, giving to the first the title 'Mysteries,' to the second 'Chapters,' to the third 'Gospel,' and to the fourth 'Treasury.'

In these, having yoked together the equal and balanced pairs of the two first principles into persons for each topic, this wretched man supposed [things] in this way, and in this respect fancied himself as though he had discovered something great for [human] life;

and indeed he did discover a great evil for life, against himself and against those led astray by him.

[He set out] on a journey to Jerusalem around the time of the apostles, ostensibly to hold discourse there with those who preached the sole sovereignty of God and of God's creatures.

And this wretched man, having gone up, began to dispute with the elders there, who lived according to the legislation of God given to Moses and according to the prophetic teaching of each of the prophets, saying:

'How can you say there is one God, who made both night and day, both flesh and soul, both dry and wet, both heaven and earth, both darkness and light?' But they demonstrated the matter clearly—for the truth is not hidden away—yet the one arguing against them was not ashamed.

Though unable to accomplish anything, he nevertheless persisted, carried along by the shamelessness of his obstinacy.

But since he could not manage to accomplish anything, but rather came off the worse, he attempted, by means of the magical books he possessed—for he was also a sorcerer, having traded for the dreadful and destructive arts of sorcery out of the mythic wisdom of the Indians and Egyptians and other nations—to work a certain deception:

for having gone up onto a roof and attempted [his sorcery], he nevertheless accomplished nothing, but fell from the roof and met the end of his life.

He had spent a good many years there.

He had with him only one disciple, the aforementioned Terebinthus, to whom he entrusted his own affairs, as being most trustworthy and one who served him out of goodwill;

and when Scythianus died, this man buried him most affectionately, and having buried him, he resolved not to return to the woman who had been joined to Scythianus—one who had originally come from prostitution or captivity—but instead fled, taking all that he had, gold and silver and other goods, into the land of the Persians, changing his own name so that he might not be discovered, and, instead of Terebinthus, as I have already shown above, taking for himself the name Buddas.

This man, in turn, received as an evil inheritance the succession of Scythianus's four books, and the practices of magic and sorcery.

For he too had been most carefully educated in letters.

And how he himself too, while disputing in the land of the Persians, having lodged with a certain old widow, and having debated the two principles with the temple-wardens and priests of the idol of Mithras, and with a certain prophet named Parcus and Labdacus, and being unable even to hold discourse with the chief men of idolatry, but rather being refuted and put to shame by them and carrying away disgrace — holding the same opinions as the aforementioned Scythianus — went up onto the roof-chamber and set about practicing some sort of magic, ostensibly so that no one might contradict him, but was cast down by an angel and fell, and so died on account of the magical operation he had intended to attempt.

And the old woman, having laid out his body for burial, took possession of his money, and having no child nor any relative, she remained thus for a long time.

But afterward she purchased and took to herself Cubricus, who was also called Manes, to serve her.

And when she died, she left to him the inheritance of that evil, like venom left behind by an asp, unto the corruption and destruction of many.

So then Cubricus, who renamed himself Manes, lived among them and disputed among them.

And since no one believed him, but rather all who heard the teaching of Manichaeus were troubled and regarded it as a strange thing, on account of its novelty and its dreadful myth-making and empty deceit, he, seeing that the very compacts of his own words — the contrivances of his wickedness — were being overturned, being befuddled in mind, devised for himself some pretext by which he might establish the fabrication of this his dreadful device.

And having taken the audacity, he made known things about himself, professing to be of benefit.

But the fancy of his hope did not succeed for the sorcerer.

For he failed of his eager expectation, having administered certain kinds of medicinal art to the king's son who was sick.

In the end, then, the boy died in his hands, so that all his lying and vain professions might be exposed and refuted.

And when this turned out thus, by royal command he was thrown into prison.

For the kings of the Persians do not straightway inflict punishment on those responsible for the greater crimes and calamities, but rather they devise some more elaborate sentence of death, so as to deal with those under such threat by means of tortures.

So Manes, who was also Cubricus, remained continuing in the prison, and was visited by his own disciples.

For already the charlatan had gathered for himself, so to speak, an army of those whom indeed he called disciples, already numbering about twenty-two.

From among whom, having chosen three — a certain one called Thomas, and Hermeias, and Addas — he formed a plan, having heard about the sacred books in Judea and in the whole world, I mean the Christian ones, of the Law and the Prophets, the Gospels and the Apostles.

Giving gold, then, to the aforementioned men, he sent them to the region of Jerusalem.

Now he did this before he was shut up in prison, at the time when, disputing with many, he was unable to establish his own doctrine;

but having heard about the name of Christ and his servants — I mean the Christians — he had determined, by means of the name and the pretext of Christ, to deceive those who were already led astray.

And they, having gone, purchased the books.

But when they returned, since they no longer found him in the free air but in prison, they went in there too and showed him the books.

And he, taking them and searching through them, played the knave, weaving his own falsehood together with the truth, wherever he found some figure of speech or term capable of producing a resemblance to his own opinion; and from this point on, then, he strengthened the fraudulent character of his fabricated flock.

Moreover, in the meantime, having earnestly pressed the matter with silver, he gave much money to the man in charge of the prison and got away as a fugitive, leaving the land of the Persians, and made his way to the Roman territory.

But being now in the middle, between Mesopotamia and Persia, still in the desert regions, and having heard about a certain great man distinguished for the utmost piety, Marcellus by name, dwelling in the city of Cascar in Mesopotamia, who was a man Christian in every respect and most admirable in works of righteousness — providing for widows and the poor, orphans and those in need — he formed the plan to attach himself to the man, so that, having gained control over him, he might through him be able to hold sway not only over Mesopotamia but over the whole region toward Syria and the Roman Empire.

So he writes him a letter through a certain Turbo, one of his own disciples, from the far bank of the river Stranga, from a fort called Arabion; and this letter contained the following:

Take, then, and read for me the contrivance of this deceiver's depravity.

Manichaeus, apostle of Jesus Christ, and all the saints and virgins with me, to Marcellus, beloved child:

Grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ; and may the right hand of the light preserve you from the present evil age and its mishaps, and from the snares of the evil one. Amen.

Perceiving that the love in you is very great, I rejoiced exceedingly; but perceiving that your faith is not in accordance with right reason, I was grieved.

Wherefore, having been sent for the correction of the human race, and sparing those who have given themselves over to deceit and error, I have deemed it necessary to send this letter to you.

The teachers of the more simple-minded instruct them, saying that good and evil are borne from the same source, and introducing a single first principle, in no way distinguishing or separating light from darkness, the good from the evil and base, and the outward man from the inward, as we have said before; but rather they never cease mingling and commingling the one with the other.

But you, O child, do not, like the majority of men, unite the two things thoughtlessly and simply, just as it might happen, nor attribute both to the God of goodness.

For they refer the beginning and the end, and the father of these evils, to God — men whose end is near to a curse.

For they do not even believe the things said in the Gospels by our very Savior and Lord Jesus Christ himself, that a good tree cannot produce bad fruit, nor indeed can a bad tree produce good fruit.

And how they dare to call God the maker and creator of Satan and of his evil deeds, it comes upon me to marvel.

And would that their vain labor had reached only this far, and that they did not say that the Only-Begotten, Christ who came down from the bosom of the Father, was the son of a certain woman Mary, begotten from blood and flesh and the rest of the foulness of women.

And so that, by writing many things in this letter, I may not for a long time try your forbearance, not having the natural power of expression for it, I shall content myself with these things.

But you will know the whole matter when I am present with you, if indeed you still have regard for your own salvation.

For I do not cast a snare upon anyone, as the more foolish among the many do.

Understand what I say, most honored child.

Having read this letter, that most estimable and most God-fearing and eminent man Marcellus was amazed and astonished.

For it happened that Archelaus, the bishop of the city, was together with him at home on that very day on which the servant of God had taken the letter of Manichaeus into his hands.

But Archelaus, upon learning the reason and reading the letter, gnashed his teeth, roaring like a lion, and, seized with zeal for God, sought rather to hasten to him in person and to lay hold of such a man — an interloper from the barbarians — from whose region he had likewise set out, having risen up for the destruction of the sons of men.

But the prudent Marcellus, having entreated the bishop, calmed him down, and urged Turbo to complete his journey to Manes at the fort of Arabion, where he was waiting for Turbo; and this fortress is midway between the Persians and Mesopotamia.

But he declined to go to Manichaeus himself, and, not compelling Turbo, he sent one of his own couriers, having written him a letter such as this:

Letter of Marcellus to Manichaeus

Marcellus, a man of distinction, to Manichaeus, who has made himself known through his letter, greeting.

I have received the letter written by you, and I welcomed Turbo with my characteristic friendliness; but the meaning of your writing I have not understood at all, unless you yourself come and explain to us each point in plain prose, as you promised in the letter.

When Manes learned this, he considered that the absence of Turbo — who had been held back — was not a good sign; yet he often deceived himself too, reckoning things to be other than they were, for the sake of reassuring his own mind.

Nevertheless, taking the pretext from the letter, he came running in haste to Marcellus.

Archelaus, having within himself, along with reasoned argument, also the zeal of the faith, deliberated whether it might be possible, on that occasion, to hunt down the man — as one would a leopard or a wolf or some other wild beast — and hand him over to death, so that the flock might not be harmed, watching as he was for the inroad of such a beast.

But Marcellus judged it better to hold fast rather to patience, and that the discussion with the man should be conducted by himself with forbearance.

For he had already learned the whole substance of Manes' teaching;

for Turbo had recounted to them, both to him and to Marcellus, the whole empty babbling of the heresy;

namely, that Manes introduces two principles without beginning, always existing and never ceasing to be, opposed to one another; and to the one he gives the name Light and Good, and to the other Darkness and Evil, so that there is, in effect, God and the Devil.

But sometimes he also calls both of them gods, a good god and an evil god.

And he says that all things exist and are composed from these two principles.

And that the one principle produces all good things, while the other likewise produces the base things.

And that the substances of these two principles have been mixed together in the world, and that the one principle has made the body, while the soul belongs to the other;

and that this same soul is the one in human beings and in every animal and bird and reptile and beast;

not only so, but also in plants he claims that the moisture of life is a movement of soul, which he says exists also in human beings.

And other things too, as many as he asserts, fabricating myths and teaching:

He says that whoever eats meat, such a person eats a soul, and that he becomes liable to become such a thing himself — so that if he ate a pig, he would in turn become a pig, or a bull, or a bird, or some other of the edible creatures.

Wherefore such persons do not partake of things that have souls.

And if, he says, someone plants a fig tree, or an olive, or a vine, or a sycamore, or a persea, then when he dies his soul will in turn be bound in the branches of the trees which he planted, and will not be able to go beyond them.

And if, he says, someone marries a wife, then after his departure from here he will in turn be reincarnated and become a woman himself, so that he too might be married.

And if, he says, someone murdered a man, then after his departure from the body his soul will in turn be transformed into the body of a leper, or into a mouse, or a snake, or will become again some such creature, of the kind that he had also slain.

Again he said that the Wisdom from above, belonging to the good God, taking counsel concerning the soul that had been dispersed throughout all things (for he himself, and the Manichaeans who follow him, say that the soul is a part of God, torn away from him, and that it has been held captive by the archons of the opposing principle and root, and cast down into bodies — in this manner, he says, because it serves as food for the archons who seized it, and is apportioned among bodies so as to supply them with strength) — for this reason, he says, the aforesaid Wisdom set these luminaries in heaven, the sun and the moon and the stars, having devised a certain mechanism by means of the twelve elements of which the Greeks speak.

And he insists that these elements draw up the souls of dying men and of the other animals, since they are luminous.

And that they are carried onto the vessel;

For by 'ships' he means to say the sun and the moon.

And the small ship [i.e. the moon] is loaded for up to fifteen days, according to the waxing of the moon, and thus it crosses over and unloads, from the fifteenth day onward, into the great ship, that is, the sun.

And the sun, the great ship, ferries them across into the aeon of life and the region of the blessed.

And thus the souls that have been ferried across by means of the sun and the moon…

For he says that it is those souls which have come to be in the 'knowledge' proclaimed by his vulgar teaching that, once purified, are deemed worthy of this ferrying which he has fabricated as myth.

And again, a soul is no longer saved unless it should somehow partake of that same 'knowledge.'

And there is a great deal of theatrical exaggeration in this fabrication of his.

Now while matters stood thus and Archelaus had been apprised of them by Turbo, he was most ready for the contest of the dispute on account of the man's manifold knowledge concerning God and the information he had previously acquired, having learned precisely from Turbo everything concerning the man's sorcery — behold, Mani arrived together with the men he had with him.

At Cascar itself, Marcellus and Archelaus, having beforehand chosen together for their contest of the dispute certain judges — a man named Marsipus, and Claudius, and Aegialeus, and Cleobulus — one a philosopher in secular learning, another a physician-sophist, another a grammarian by nature, and the other a sophist.

And when many words had been spoken from both sides — Mani putting forward the tenets of his mythical teaching, and Archelaus, like a champion hoplite, by his own power beating down the missiles of his adversary — in the end Mani came off the worse, and the judges decided that the prize belonged to the truth (which was no marvel, since truth is self-established and cannot be overthrown, even should lawlessness, borne along with shamelessness, set itself against the ordinance of truth, seeing that falsehood has neither substance nor foundation, just as the shadow has of darkness, and the serpent's track of slipperiness, and the footless has of unsteadiness).

Coming to be in his presence, Mani again stirred up confusion, boasting.

He came upon the man — good in other respects, and admirable in his piety toward God, but poor in eloquence.

But even in this he was not able to mock the servant of Christ as he had supposed he would.

For God always prepares for those who hope in him, supplying the gifts that come from the Holy Spirit, just as he — being one who cannot lie — promised, saying, 'Do not be anxious about what you shall say.'

'For it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of my Father speaking in you.'

After this, Mani having wished once more to dispute with Tryphon the presbyter, and Tryphon having refuted him on many points, and having written to Archelaus about this matter, saying that a certain man had come there like a savage wolf and was attempting to destroy the fold—

'—but I beg you, send me word as to what I should do against this man, or with what arguments I should refute his evil teaching;'

'and if you yourself would deign to come—'

'—you would set Christ's fold and his flock at ease.' And Archelaus sent him two discourses, so as to deal with Mani readily at hand, but signified to him that he should await Archelaus's own arrival.

But Mani came forth into the middle of the village rather early in the morning, pretending, as he opened the encounter, to challenge Tryphon to come to a debate.

And as Tryphon presented himself and answered him point by point on what he asked, according to the understanding given him by God, and had confounded the deceiver — while Tryphon was quietly hesitating within himself over what to do next — Archelaus rose up like a strong master of the house watching over his own, and, advancing with boldness, sternly rebuked the man who was attempting to plunder the flock.

And as soon as Mani saw Archelaus, he said in a fawning tone, with hypocrisy, 'Let me converse with Tryphon;'

'for your rank surpasses mine, since you are a bishop.'

But he, having with a refuting argument exposed him as an even greater hypocrite, silenced him, and, having resolved the arguments that Mani had put forward, once more reduced him to shame, so that he could no longer open his mouth.

And the crowds, having again taken up their zeal, tried to lay hands on the wretch.

But he, fleeing from the crowds, arrived once more at the aforementioned fortress of Arabion.

From there, however, the king of the Persians, learning of Mani's refuge, sent men who seized him in the aforesaid fortress, dragged him off in disgrace into Persia, and, having ordered his skin to be flayed off with a reed, so rendered him his punishment.

They still have, to this day, in Persia, his skin made into a sack, filled with chaff.

And thus he ended his life.

For this reason the Manichaeans themselves make their beds upon reeds.

Now after he died in this way, having left behind his own disciples whom we have mentioned — Addas, Thomas, and Hermeias, who had been sent out by him before he received his due punishment in the manner described — Hermeias went to Egypt, where many met with him (for the heresy is not an ancient one), and those who had met the aforesaid Hermeias, a disciple of Mani, related to us the things concerning him.

Addas went to the eastern regions, and Thomas to Judea; through them the doctrine has been strengthened even to this day.

Mani used to say that he himself was the Paraclete Spirit, and at one time he claimed to be an apostle of Christ, at another the Paraclete Spirit; and there is a great deal of perverse inconsistency in this man's blindness.

From this point on, then, beloved, it becomes necessary for us to say something about the heresy and its vain folly.

For all that has gone before I have set forth in the manner of a narrative history.

Whence, then, this most pernicious Mani begins to teach, and write, and speak in his treatise concerning his faith.

For this man set forth various books, one of them equal in number to the twenty-two elements of the Syrian alphabet, composed by means of those letters.

For most of the Persians, besides the Persian letters, also make use of the Syrian script, just as among us many nations make use of the Greek letters, even though almost every nation has its own letters.

And others, forsooth, pride themselves on the most profound dialect of the Syrians, and on the dialect current at Palmyra, both it and its own letters.

And these letters number twenty-two.

For this reason this same book has also been divided into twenty-two sections of discourse.

To this one he gives the title 'The Mysteries of Manichaeus,' and to another, 'The Treasure.'

And having stitched together yet other books, he fancies himself the author of them — the one called 'the Little Treasure,' and another concerning astrology.

For they are not lacking in such meddlesome curiosity, but rather it lies readily at hand as a matter of boasting for them — astronomy, and phylacteries (I mean amulets worn on the body), and certain other incantations and sorceries.

At any rate, this same Mani begins to speak in his book as follows:

'There was God and matter, light and darkness, good and evil, utterly opposed to one another in every respect, so that the one has no communion whatsoever with the other.' And this, then, is the prologue of the charlatan.

From this point he begins his evil contrivance.

And the book lies extended at length, containing certain such worthless matters, the difficulty and self-contradiction of whose arguments one must grasp in summary even from the very beginning of its design.

For even though the rest is much nonsense and a fabulous plot, from the introduction alone the whole of his wickedness will be shown.

For the statement 'there was God and matter' set forth nothing short of the vain speculation of the Greeks.

And this vain conceit is easily caught out, easy to refute, and easily overthrown once its false pretense is exposed.

For that two [principles] should exist together, being both coeval and eternal, is, by reasonable calculation and intelligent understanding, impossible in the eyes of one who knows how to judge rationally.

And this will be known to everyone who possesses understanding.

For if the two are coeval, they are not even distinguished so much as by name.