The Death of Mani in Retrospect

Q4 Social Sciences Millennium DIPr Pub Date : 2021-10-08 DOI:10.1515/mill-2021-0003
M. O’Farrell
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Abstract

Abstract The execution of the prophet Mani (c. 216-273) by the Sasanian king Bahram I (r. 271-274) received sharply different treatments in the historiography of three of the confessional groups of the Sasanian empire. Variously a persecuted prophet, a blasphemous lunatic or a sinister heresiarch the representations of this moment sought to establish its meaning in the context of communal narratives predicated on the claims of sacred history. Despite this, it is notable that Manichean, Christian and Perso-Arabic accounts clearly share features. This indicates not only that Mani’s death became a site of competition between the constituent groups of the Sasanian empire, but that the internal historiographies of these groups were in some sense entwined, or at least sensitive to the historical claims made by their opponents. This is particularly relevant in the case of the Perso-Arabic narrative. This version, which almost certainly descends from a priestly Zoroastrian source, presents a picture of a confident priesthood stiffening the spine of a wavering king. It is contended that the source of this story was composed as a counterstrike in a historical debate in which Christian and Manichean authors had successfully propagated an image of Bahram’s court as religiously tepid and his priests as slanderers or non-entities. That such an intervention was required signals a disjuncture between early and late forms of Sasanian ideology. Moreover, it presents more evidence in support of theories of a late and deliberate construction of Zoroastrian “orthodoxy”.
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回顾摩尼之死
萨珊国王巴拉姆一世(约271-274)对先知玛尼(约216-273)的处决在萨珊帝国的三个忏悔团体的史学中得到了截然不同的处理。一个受迫害的先知,一个亵渎神明的疯子或一个邪恶的异端,这一刻的表现试图在基于神圣历史主张的公共叙事的背景下建立其意义。尽管如此,值得注意的是摩尼教、基督教和波斯人-阿拉伯人的说法明显有共同的特点。这不仅表明马尼之死成为萨珊帝国各组成集团之间竞争的场所,而且表明这些集团的内部史学在某种意义上是相互交织的,或者至少对对手的历史主张很敏感。这在人-阿拉伯叙述的情况下尤其相关。这个版本,几乎可以肯定是从祭司琐罗亚斯德教的来源,呈现了一个自信的祭司僵硬的一个动摇的国王的脊柱的图片。有人认为,这个故事的来源是作为对一场历史辩论的反击,在这场辩论中,基督教和摩尼教的作者成功地宣传了巴赫拉姆宫廷是宗教不温不火的形象,他的牧师是诽谤者或虚无的形象。这种干预是必要的,这标志着早期和晚期萨珊意识形态之间的脱节。此外,它提出了更多的证据,支持理论的后期和蓄意建设的琐罗亚斯德教的“正统”。
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来源期刊
Millennium DIPr
Millennium DIPr Social Sciences-Law
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审稿时长
1 weeks
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