The Cologne Mani-Codex

A tiny parchment in Koine Greek that dates to the end of the 4th or beginning of the 5th Century CE. The codex details the life of the Prophet Mani, the founder of the religion Manichaeism, in a text titled “On the Origin of His Body.” It was found in the antique markets of Cairo in poor condition, and made its way to the city of Cologne, who produced a translated edition of the codex.¹ This English translation was based on the work from Cornelia Römer and Ludwig Koenen, by Judith and Samuel Lieu.

The Life of a Prophet

Likely compiled from earlier traditions and statements attributed to Mani, from his being raised in a baptist sect of the Alchasaitic tradition (also known as Elcesaite, an ancient Jewish-Christian sect with gnostic leanings, according to the Church Fathers Epiphanius and Eusebius), to encountering his Heavenly Twin-self, and learning revelations and enlightenments that led to his creation of a new, missionary faith on the foundations of older traditions. It was likely translated in Egypt from Aramaic, a lingua franca across much of West Asia, to Greek.² The context that Koenen and Romer provide between the discovery, translation, and analyzing of the minute codex highlight its importance to understanding the extinct religion, and, unprecedentedly, a biography that stems from actual believers, rather than polemical scholars belonging to Christianity, Islam or Buddhism.

Bibliography

• Koenen, Ludwig, and Römer, Cornelia. eds. The Cologne Mani Codex (P. Colon. inv. nr. 4780): “On the Origin of His Body.” Corpus Fontium Manichaeorum. Universität zu Köln, 1988.
• Henrichs, Albert (1979). “The Cologne Mani Codex Reconsidered”. Harvard Studies in Classical Philology.