The Diffusion of Manichaeism in the Roman Empire Peter Brown, The Journal of Roman Studies, Vol. 59, No. 1/2. (1969), pp. 92-103. Stable URL hitp:/Mlinks.jstor-org/sicisici=007S-4398%281969%2959%3A 1%2F2%3C92%3ATDOMIT%3E2.0,CO%3B2-W The Journal of Roman Studies is currently published by Society for the Promotion of Roman Studies. Your use of the ISTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use, available at hup:/www,jstororglabout/terms.hml. ISTOR’s Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unless you have obtained prior permission, you may not download an entire issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and you may use content in the JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use. Please contact the publisher regarding any further use of this work. Publisher contact information may be obtained at hutp:/www,jstor.org/journals/sprs. html ch copy of any part of'a JSTOR transmission must contain the same copyright notice that appears on the sereen or printed page of such transmission, ISTOR is an independent not-for-profit organization dedicated to creating and preserving a digital archive of scholarly journals. For more information regarding JSTOR, please contact support @ jstor.org. hupulwww jstor.org/ Thu May 25 16:16:57 2006‘THE DIFFUSION OF MANICHAEISM IN THE ROMAN EMPIRE By PETER BROWN A study of the fate of Manichaeism in the Roman Empire derives its interest from three ‘main problems. First, Manichacism was invariably associated with Persia: to study the growth of Manichaeism in the eastern provinces of the Roman Empire, and to trace the attitude of the Roman governing-class to its expansion, is to touch on an important sector of the cultural relations between the Sassanian Empire and the Roman world. Secondly, the repression of Manichaeism in the Christian Empire was the spear-head of religious in- tolerance : the only Christian heretics to be executed in the Early Church were Manichees or those, such as Priscillian, on whom the accusation of Manichaeism could be made to stick, Thirdly, Manichacism was a missionary religion : its rapid expansion in the third and fourth centuries makes it the last religion from the eastern provinces to attempt to make headway in Roman society, just as its appearance in the Tang Empire of China, alongside Buddhism and Nestorian Christianity, place it among the leading ‘ barbarian’ religions that spread into an Empire which had suddenly opened to the Western World. Conversely, the withering away of Manichaeism in the Roman Empire is a symptom of the growth of a nev, mote exclusive, more localized society, that foreshadows the embattled Christendom of the Middle Ages. ‘The Reseript of Diocletian, of a.v. 297, to Julianus, Proconsul of Africa, is our first evidence of the offical reaction to the spread of Manichaeism : “Eos [5c. Manichacos] audivimus nuperrime veluti nova et inopinata prodigia in hhune mundum de Persica adversaria nobis gente progressa vel orta esse... . et verendum est, ne forte ... conentur per execrandas consuetudines et scaevas leges Persarum innocentioris naturae homines, Romanam gentem modestam atque tranquillam, et universum orbem nostrum veluti venenis anguis malivoli inficere.’* ‘The Emperor has been taken a little too seriously. Many scholars have simply assumed that, because Manichacism entered the Roman Empire from across the political frontier, it was a Persian religion.* More precisely, others have argued that Manichaeism could find a place in the religious beliefs of the Iranian governing class of the Sassanian smpire,® and that both its expansion within the Sassanian Empire and its missionary activity in the eastern provinces of the Roman Empire served the statecraft of the King of Kings.* ‘The unquestioning identification of Manichacism with Persia has acted, also, as a labour saving device for students of religious intolerance in the Later Empire : ‘it has lulled us into believing that we know precisely why this group, at least, was so hated. ‘Manichacism was not a ‘ Persian’ religion in the strict sense. It is unfortunate that the first and only study of the diffusion of Manichacism in the Roman Empire, by de Stoop, in 1909, should have been the work of a pupil of Cumont, and written at a time when the “Tranian’’ interpretation of Manichaeism was at its height, recently fed, as it had been, by * Mosuicaram ot Romanarion Legumm Collatio x, 3, bg, ved EB Seckel-B. Kuebler, Jurisprudentiag ‘ahicittinianae relgutae 2 1929, Dh, 381 B, whone {ext I follow "see below p, 98 on the imagery of the angus maleolis. "Now in A. Adam, Teste sum ecliomas (Kleine Tease fs Noresangen Tbungen, 175), 1954, no. $6, pp. 82-3, "Recently accepted by By Nolterra, # La costin signe ai Digcleino.e Msssiminiano "contro Maniche’, Persia il mondo. greco-romano (Ac fxdemin dei Lincet, anno 363, quero 76), 1966, pp a7-59 at pp. 40-44 5G Wdengrtn, "Mesopotamian, Eloments in Manichastom (Oppaila Universitets Arsskrif) 1946, P.179 2" By propagating asyncretise religion, Mani was able to offer the Sassanian King of Kings a pieces nae a aes tNonay by WeSeaton,'L'Bgyptcmanichfenn Chronique d Beypte xv, 1939, pps 302-372" Le rol Nearete les Arse ot Te manicicime flanger R. Dusiaud, 1930, pp, 227-244; and. Deletion et a Tetrarchie(Bibliothéaue de Teco rangaised Athenes et Rome, 162), 1940, pp. 149-159 j and accepted, for Instance, yA Chascagnol, La prifecture urbane rut le" Basctimpid, 1960, p. 156." Ce sort partiulier Stexplique sans doute par les origins ianicmnes de fa doctrine et par la crainte de trahisons cau moment des Itteres entre la Rome et la Perse”. (My fais),‘THE DIFFUSION OF MANICHAEISM IN THE ROMAN EMPIRE 93 the discovery of Manichaean manuscripts in their most ‘ Iranian’ form, in Central Asia. For Cumont, Manichaeism was the direct successor of Mithraism in the Roman world.* ‘The general reassessment of the nature of Manichacism,? followed by the discovery of the Coptic Manichaean documents in the Fayyiim in Egypt ® has made it increasingly difficult to represent Manichaeism as a development of Iranian religion.* ‘The Manichees centered the Roman Empire, not as a final version of the Mages Hellenisés, but at the behest ‘of a man who claimed to be an * Apostle of Jesus Christ": they intended to supersede Christianity, not to spread the scaevas leges Persarum."® Diocletian had made the mistake, pardonable in a Roman if not in a modern historian of Near Eastern culture, of treating Persian-controlled Mesopotamia tout court as * Persia. Mani belongs where he said he belonged, to the “ land of Babylon’. He came from southern Mesopotamia, the Sassanian province of Asorestan, "Acopic.** Of his seven great books, one only was written in Middle Persian : the rest, in an Aramaic closely related to Syriae.!? He looks back to the Gnostic Christianity of Osrhoene : his dialogue is with ‘Marcion and Bardaisan of Edessa ; "? Zoroaster is a distant figure to him. ‘To study Mani and Manichaeism, is to study cultural frontiers that have nothing to do with the political frontiers of the two Empires. ‘The history of Manichaeism is to a large extent a history of the Syriac-speaking belt, that stretched along the Fertile Crescent without interruption, from Antioch to Ctesiphon. * The frontier territory between Rome and Parthia was neither a cultural barrier nor a mere gateway and point of passage between East and West. It was a vital creative centre in its own right, and it was this fact above all which enabled it to serve as an effective intermediary between the two great civilisations that flourished on its borders.’ "1 What Ward-Perkins has said of the art of the Parthian period, remains true of the religious historyof the whole Late Antiquity. Mesopotamia was the‘ religiése Wetterecke der Spitantike’. What we must first discover is why, from this Wetterecke, the wind of Manichaeism appears to have blown so strongly to the West. "This problem has been brought yet further from solution by ill-founded speculations on the relations between Mani, the Manichees and the Persian Kings, Shapur I, Ohrmizd I, Bahram I and Narsch I. ‘These speculations ascribe to Shapur I the intention of using the ‘message of Mani as a religious cement for his diverse Empire,"® and to Narsch, the plan of, rallying the Manichees in the Roman world as a Persian fifth-column, and, hence, of provoking the justified indignation of the Emperor Diocletian.1® Such an interpretation of the rise of Manichacism raises the general problem of the relations of the Sassanians to their non-Iranian subjects in general and to non-Zoroastrian religions in particular—a problem that has recently been handled by J. Neusner, for the case of the Jews in Babylonia, with exemplary caution and largely negative results.!7 8G, de Stop, Hai sur la difusion du maniciome dns Penpire onain (Cniverate de Gand. Recueil de traveue publide par fa feculté de phi letres, 38) 1909. For the development of teudies, and i relation to the nds in Egypt and Cental Ane the beet acount is by J. Rien lato~ ‘iucton um Grades. manichéennee", homers Thole Lace ty, 9S, hs te A034, 1959, pP.- 363-400. See Fe Camont, the Mysteries of Mithra (sans MeComach Bove lion Yop 207 The fect af Manichaean spre out the empire taro the fourth century, at the moment wl Miniesiam was exisng, an war called to sume fhe laters succestion| 5 Most notably E- Waldschmidt —W. Lente, Die Suellen Jesu inl Manichtismue (Ahondbongen der Ahad. Wisenchafien, Berlin 1033, 19) 2 Hk ‘Stkaeder, Urform snd Rovbldang de manichiches ‘Systems (Vortrge der Warburg Bibiahek vv, 1924 Tong), roan, and F.C. Burk, The Relig of the Moméhees tons PC'Schmide—J. J Polotsky, Ein Mani-Fund in Aaypien : “Oriinalichrifien des Ment tnd seiner ‘Seiden. (steungshrichte der presasachen hadonie der Wisemhaten, Pilot He. Rave, 4933, 0 * Gheliche "Wael in de ta acd archlgie ‘capte xv, 1960, pp. 41-61, ep. p- 47-—Zoroaster and ‘Buddha ‘are distant hgutes, compared to Jesus. ‘The bese statement of the natuse of Mlanichseismn relates Manito Gaostiiam, not to Zoroaster: HL C. Puech, Le Manihaiome : son fondateur, sa doctrine (Musée Guimet, Bibliodiaque de diftusion U1) 1049, es PP, 9-7. 's'Soe especially, J. Ries,‘ Jésus-Cheist dans la religion de Mant”, Augustiiana Xv, 1964, PP. “SEER AsorestanAsoip, see E. Monigmann— 2 Marca Recherche‘, Yer Ry Gear Dit ris, 1983, 42 ane $9, Me 8 “Pfenning Mitelianich © Hondbuck der rien talisttg abt, IV Bd. Granth sb) 73: fa acinee den ‘Syrnchon aaheverwandten otranaachen MUS ght cophasized by Burke op. cit (0.7) sn, nie ae (09) Pa J.B. Ward-Perking, "'tontore politiche fronitre." cultural", Posia il mondo. greco- ‘romano cit. (a. 2), 39-400 © from the’ English sum- ay a Be 995 PW Soeren op. it 3) Se Saeorar ok gf SENSES Toe Pie goes Bao Bt dacndad Be te Bo ri pp a8 a