Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-rdxmf Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-25T05:59:12.847Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Identification of a small fragment of Mani's Living Gospel (Turfan Collection, Berlin, M5439)1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 November 2017

Mohammad Shokri-Foumeshi
Mohammad Shokri-Foumeshi*
Affiliation:
University of Religions and Denominations, Qom, Iran
*
[email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Heretofore three fragments of Maniʼs Living Gospel – the most important work of Mani – have been recognized in Middle Persian and in Manichaean script: M17, M172/I/ and M644. This article, with a codicological and textological approach, shows that M17 and the new fragment M5439 are two separate pieces of a single manuscript page. The verso-side of M5439 has a new text. Now, after the identification and reading of this damaged fragment, we are able to correct the previous reconstructions and comment on a few Middle Persian words. The text contains a part of the exordium and of the chapter Aleph of the Living Gospel.

Keywords

Mani's GospelM5439TurfanMiddle PersianManuscript fragmentManichaeism
Type
Articles
Information
Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies , Volume 80 , Issue 3 , October 2017 , pp. 473 - 483
Copyright
Copyright © SOAS, University of London 2017 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

1

I would like to thank Professors Desmond Durkin-Meisterernst and Nicholas Sims-Williams for their kind suggestions and constructive advice. Thanks also to the group “Digitales Turfan-Archiv I” from the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities (BBAW), group Turfan Studies, and Berlin State Library – Prussian Cultural Heritage, Oriental Department, who provided me with the environment necessary for studying and publishing the fragment M5439.

References

Andreas, F.C. and Henning, W.B.. 1934. Mitteliranische Manichaica aus Chinesisch-Turkestan, iii. Berlin: SPAW.Google Scholar
Boyce, M. 1960. A Catalogue of the Iranian Manuscripts in Manichean Script in the German Turfan Collection. Berlin.Google Scholar
Boyce, M. 1964. “The use of relative particles in Western Middle Iranian”, Indo-Iranica, Mélanges presentés à Georg Morgenstierne. Wiesbaden, 28–47.Google Scholar
Boyce, M. 1975. A Reader in Manichaean Middle Persian and Parthian. (Acta Iranica 9a.) Tehran and Liège.Google Scholar
Dehkhoda, A.-A. 1985–. Loγat-nāme-i Dehkhodā. Tehran.Google Scholar
Durkin-Meisterernst, D. 2004. Dictionary of Manichaean Middle Persian and Parthian. (Corpus Fontium Manichaeorum, Dictionary of Manichaean Texts III,1.) Turnhout.Google Scholar
Gardner, I. and Lieu, S.N.C.. 2004. Manichaean Texts from the Roman Empire. Cambridge.Google Scholar
Gershevitch, I. 1964a. “Iranian chronological adverbs”, in Redard, G. (ed.), Indo-Iranica, Mélanges presentés à Georg Morgenstierne. Wiesbaden, 77–88.Google Scholar
Gershevitch, I. 1964b. “Dialect variation in Early Persian”, Transactions of the Philological Society, 1964 [1965], 1–29.Google Scholar
Humbach, H. and Skjærvø, P.O.. 1983. The Sassanian Inscription of Paikuli. Wiesbaden.Google Scholar
Klimkeit, H.-J. 1989. Hymnen und Gebete der Religion des Lichts. Iranische und türkische liturgische Texte der Manichäer Zentralasiens. Opladen.Google Scholar
Klimkeit, H.-J. 1993. Gnosis on the Silk Road. Gnostic Texts from Central Asia. San Francisco.Google Scholar
Koenen, L. and Römer, C. (eds). 1988. Der Kölner Mani-Kodex (Über das Werden seines Leibes), Kritische Edition aufgrund der von A. Henrichs und L. Koenen besorgten Erstedition. Opladen.Google Scholar
MacKenzie, D.N. 1994. «‘I, Mani …’», in Preissler, H., Seiwert, H., with Mürmel, H. (eds), Gnosisforschung und Religionsgeschichte. Festschrift für Kurt Rudolph zum 65. Geburtstag. Marburg, 183–98.Google Scholar
Müller, F.W.K. 1904. Handschriften-Reste in Estrangelo-Schrift aus Turfan, Chinesisch-Turkestan, i. (Sitzungsberichte der Preussischen Akademie der Wissenschaften (SPAW), IX.) 348–52; ii. aus dem Anhang zu den Abhandlungen der Königlichen Preussischen Akademie der Wissenschaften (APAW), 1–117.Google Scholar
Salemann, C. 1908. Manichäische Studien I. (Mémoires de l'Academie Impériale des Sciences de St.-Pétersbourg, VIIIe série.), vol. VIII, no. 10. Saint Petersburg.Google Scholar
Shokri-Foumeshi, M. 2014. “Mani's Living Gospel and the Ewangelyōnīg hymns: edition, reconstruction and commentary with a codicological and textological approach based on Manichaean Turfan fragments in the Berlin Collection”, PhD dissertation, Free University Berlin, Institute for Iranian Studies.Google Scholar
Sundermann, W. 1996. Iranian Manichaean Turfan Texts in Early Publications (1904–1934). (Corpus Inscriptionum Iranicarum, Supplementary Series, vol. III.) London.Google Scholar
Weber, D. 2000. Iranian Manichaean Turfan Texts in Publications since 1934. (Corpus Inscriptionum Iranicarum, Supplementary Series, vol. IV.) London.Google Scholar