Was the Religious Manichaean Narrative a Mythical Narrative? Some Remarks from the Perspective of Andrzej Wierciński’s Definition of Myth
Was the Religious Manichaean Narrative a Mythical Narrative? Some Remarks from the Perspective of Andrzej Wierciński’s Definition of Myth

Summary/Abstract: Many specialists in Manichaeism wrote after World War II about the religious Manichaean narrative as a myth or a mythology. In this paper I examine whether the Manichaean narrative actually meets the criteria of definition of myth. This question is also worth asking because some scholars emphasize the monosemic character of the mentioned narrative. The definition of myth which I use is that of Andrzej Wierciński (1930–2003), a Polish anthropologist of religion. Among my reasons for choosing this is because it includes as many as nine features of myth and also refers to scientific narrative, which by its nature has one level of meaning. I refer this definition, above all, to Manichaean evidence in the Coptic language, but when the need arises I also invoke other sources, both polemical and apologetic.

• Details
• Contents