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The
Book of Giants
Manichean
Texts
GIANTS, THE BOOK OF, a book mentioned
as a canonical work of Mani in the Coptic Kephalaia (chap. 148),
in the Homilies (p. 25.3-4), and Psalms (p. 46.29), as well
as in the Chinese compendium of Mani's teachings, third article (Copt.
p±o@me
nngigas, p±o@me nnsalaæire; Chin. ju
huan ). In Mir. Man. III, text b, l. 134-35, the work is called
kawa@n
(k÷w÷n, kw÷n) "giants." If the recipient
was Ma@r Ammo@, it may have been a Parthian translation. But it could also
have been addressed to a priest called Frih-Ma@r-Ammo@ and written in Middle
Persian. It is mentioned by the Arabic title Sefr al-jaba@bera in
Ebn al-Nad^m's al-Fehrest (ed. Tajaddod, p. 399, tr. Dodge, p. 798;
cf. also GÚazµanfar in Henning, 1943, p. 72). In Kephalaia
(ed. Polotsky and Böhlig, p. 5, l. 25), the Book of Giants
is missing in a list of Mani's works. Instead, there appears a "writing
on the subject of the Parthians," which was assumed to be the Book of
Giants. This is hardly compatible with the fact that the Book of
Giants had so far been attested by quotations in Middle Persian, Sogdian,
and Old Tukish, but not in Parthian.
Written records.
Most of the extant fragments of the Book of Giants were presented
by Walter B. Henning in 1934 (pp. 29-32), and especially in 1943 (fragments
A to G; fragment F probably came from another cosmogonical text, see Sundermann,
1973, p. 12; fragments H to V contain extracts, quotations, and allusions).
Although none of fragments presented by Henning can be fully identified
by referring to the title, the subject of the texts concerns the events
of primeval gigantomachy. Supplements were provided by Werner Sundermann
in 1973 (Text 22, pp. 77-78, page heading [gwyæ]n m÷[zyndr÷n
r÷y], and perhaps text 20, pp. 76-77), 1984 ([gwyæn
¿yg] m÷zyndr÷n r÷y "[Discourse] on Demons,"
page heading), and the corrected Russian version, 1989. An unpublished
piece containing the subject of the
Book of Giants is fragment 7447
of the Otani collection. The assumption by Marc Antoine Kugener and Franz
Cumont that the quotations in the 123rd homily of Severus of ntioch also
came from Mani's "Book of Giants" was contested on solid grounds by John
C. Reeves (pp. 165-74).
The Book of Giants has so far been attested
in the following languages: Middle Persian (Henning, 1943, Texts A [partially],
D; Sundermann, 1973, text 22; idem, 1984=1989, text L), Parthian version
(perhaps Sundermann, 1973, text 20), Sogdian version (Henning, 1943, texts
C, E, G; Henning's double-sheet half in Sundermann, 1994, pp. 45-48; Otani
7447), Old Turkic (Henning, 1943, text B, with reference to the Le Coq
and Bang editions). Thus the Book of Giants has so far only been
transmitted in the East Manichean tradition by the collection of texts
in Berlin, St. Petersburg, and Kyoto. Nor is anything left of the original
Aramaic text. But through the use of material from the Book of Giants
in Coptic Manichean writings, the work had also become known among the
Manicheans of western countries (Henning, 1943, Texts M, P, Q, R, S).
Content. The Book of Giants tells
the story of those demons who were chained up by the Living Spirit, assisted
by his seven sons, in the seven lower firmaments of the sky, and of whom
two hundred had been able to free themselves and return to earth. Here
the human race had already spread, and it was the period of the apostle
Enoch. The demons, traditionally called "guardians" (Aram. ¿^r,
Gk. egre@´goros, Sogd. pa@æe), subjugated humanity
and established a tyrannical rule of terror, and, with the daughters of
mankind, they begot a race of giants (Aram. *gabba@re@, Gr. gi´gantes,
Copt. nngigas, Mid. Pers. kawa@n, Sogd. kawiæt ).
The extant fragments mention one of the leaders
of the demons, ˆahm^za@d (Mid. Pers. æhmyz÷d, Sogd.
æxmyz÷t),
his sons, the giants Sa@m (Mid. Pers.
s÷m, Sogd. Sa@hm,
s÷hm)
and Nar^ma@n (Mid. Pers. nrym÷n, Sogd. Pa@tsa@hm,
p÷ts÷xm),
another leader,
Wiro@gda@d (Mid. Pers. wrwgd÷d, Old
Turk. Wrukdad), his son Ma@haway (Mid. Pers. and Sogd. m÷hwy)
and other names; they describe the fight among the demons, the killing
of 400,000 just men, the struggle of Sa@m against the sea monster
Leviathan
(lwy÷tyn), and the terrible nightmares announcing the punishment
of the demons. To seek their interpretation, the winged
Ma@haway
is sent to the apostle Enoch (Mid. Pers. hwnwx, Old Turk. Xonug),
who was carried to heaven. Finally, the four avenging angels, identified
as Raphael, Michael, Gabriel, and Israel (Hebr. Uriel; Mid. Pers. rwp÷yl,
myx÷yl,
gbr÷yl,
sr÷yl)
put an end to the evil doings of the demons and incarcerated them and their
sons, i. e., the giants.
Sources. The main sources, already named
by Isaac de Beausobre, are: the apocryphal works ascribed to the prophet
Enoch (and a Graphe@´ to@n Giga‚nton). Jozef T. Milik managed
to identify fragments of a work from the Enoch literature among the Qumra@n
texts. This work does not appear in later Christian versions, but shows
such affinities with the Manichean pieces that he provisionally referred
to it as a Book of Giants (Milik, ed., pp. 57-78). Another question
is whether this Jewish Book of Giants was later replaced in the
Christian Enoch tradition by a Book of Parables (Greenfield and Stone,
1977, pp. 51-65 and 1979, pp. 89-92). It certainly served Mani as the main
source of his Book of Giants, as shown by textual comparisons and
the similarity or correspondence of many names: Aram. ˆem^háazah
= Man. ˆahm^za@d, Aram. Ohyah = Man. Sa@m, explained
in a Sogd. text as [÷wx]y÷ (Henning, 1943,
p. 70), Aram. Hahyah = Man. Nar^ma@n, explained in the same
place as ÷xy÷, Aram. Baraq÷e@l = Man.
Wirogda@d,
Aram. Ma@haway (mhwy) = Man. Ma@haway, Aram. H®oba@biæ
(háwbbæ) = Man. (Mid. Pers.) hwb÷byæ.
The Qumra@n fragments of the Enoch book also resemble the Manichean Book
of Giants because they consider figures of the Mesopotamian Gilgamesh
epic as giants (Milik, ed., pp. 29, 313; see also Reeves' interpretation
of ÷tnbyæ in the Mid. Persian text as Utnapiætim;
see Reeves, 1993, pp. 114-15).
Reeves, who follows Milik's theory, so far as
the dependence of the Manichean on the Aramaic Book of Henoch from
Qumra@n is postulated, has edited, with detailed commentaries, a summary
of eleven Qumra@n fragments that presumably belong to the Book of Henoch
(Reeves, pp. 51-164). The question still remains to find out what connection
exists between the Book of Giants and Graphe@´ to@n Giga‚nto@n
or Liber de Orgia nomine gigante (Henning, 1943, p. 52).
Despite the names of Sa@m and Nar^ma@n (but not
Rostam!) known from the Iranian epic tradition, the story of the giants
is not of Iranian origin. Due to GÚazµanfar's reference to
these figures, Cumont had once assumed the Book of Giants to be
of Iranian origin. But the Turfan texts and Dead Sea Scrolls contradicted
this theory. The Iranian names in the Book of Giants in the East
Manichean tradition are translations, not original. Today an Iranian influence
can at most be assumed, as Geo Widengren does, by ascribing an Iranian,
Zurvanite background to the Enoch texts (Widengren, 1966, pp. 151-77).
But this can hardly be ascertained regarding the myth of the giants (Widengren,
1961, pp. 80-82).
History and effects of the text. Although
the Book of Giants belongs to Mani's canonical writings, details
of it were inevitably changed and adapted to Iranian, Turkish, or Buddhist
concepts and ideas in Iran and Central Asia (Henning, 1943, pp. 55-56).
Enoch, for instance, here became a Buddha in the Manichean sense (Klimkeit,
1980; Peters, 1989). A remarkable exegetic intervention is found in Henning's
Sogdian text G (ll. 10-11; Henning, 1943, pp. 68-69), which says that the
avenging angels appointed "guardians" (p÷æ[yyt¯])
to watch the "demons," although the demons themselves, who had come down
from heaven, were the "guardians" of heaven according to the Enoch tradition.
The commentator, who recognized the significance of the concept but did
not understand why it was used for the captured demons, gave it a "plausible"
interpretation.
Mani attributed great importance to the Jewish
Enoch writings, which were also the source of his astronomical and calendrical
ideas (Henning, 1934, p. 34; Tubach, 1987). Reeves (1992, pp. 185-206)
even derives Mani's entire macrocosmic and microcosmic myth from the Book
of Giants. I feel that this theory does not do justice to the radically
dualistic character of Manichean cosmogony and does not account for the
much greater phenomenological similarity between the cosmogony of evolved
Zoroastrianism and such Gnostic writings as the Paraphrase of
ˆem.
Manichean mural paintings with motifs of trees,
as discovered in the Turfan oasis, were assumed to refer to the tree with
three trunks from Mani's Book of Giants (Klimkeit, 1980a, pp. 252-57;
idem, 1980b, p. 373). This theory of course depends on the interpretation
of tree motifs and also on the assumption that the quotations from Severus
of Antioch go back to the Book of Giants (see above).
Meaning of the Book of Giants. Mani's attention
may have been drawn to the Enoch literature because of his "interest in
myths and legends of the distant past" (Henning, 1934, p. 32). But like
any Manichean parable, his Book of Giants must also have had a didactic
purpose. Gedaliahu Stroumsa rightly points out that the work contained
an "essentially religious message" (p. 165). I believe that any attempt
at interpreting the Book of Giants must be based on the thirty-eighth
Kephalaeon, "On the light nous and the apostles and saints" (Polotsky and
Böhlig, eds., I, pp. 89-102). Here the Book of Giants is presented
as a parable for the constant challenge of the New on behalf of the Old
Man who is tied up to his body. The Petersburg fragment L of the Book
of Giants seems to confirm this interpretation (OLZ 83, 1988,
col. 200), and it may be no coincidence that the Turkish fragment of the
book belongs to the same manuscript as the Turkish fragment of the Sermons
of the Light-Nous, which, among other things, deals with the struggle between
the New and the Old Man (Le Coq, III, p. 15; Sundermann, 1983, p. 241).
To the modern observer, Mani's Book of Giants
demonstrates, unlike any other Manichean text, the universal religious
aspect and the dissemination of this doctrine from Judaeo-Christianity
to Buddhism and from the Dead Sea to the cave temples of Dunhuang (Klimkeit,
1980; idem, 1980; Peters, on how the biblical prophet Henoch became Buddha).
Bibliography: F. C. Andreas and W. B. Henning, Mitteliranische
Manichaica aus Chinesisch-Turkestan III, SPAW, Phil.-hist. Kl., Berlin,
1934, pp. 848-912. W. Bang, "Manichäische Erzähler," in Le
Muse‚on 44, pp. 1-36. Isaac de Beausobre, Histoire de Maniche‚e
et du Manicheisme, 2 vols., Amsterdam, 1734-39. F. Cumont, Recherches
sur le maniche‚isme I, Brussels, 1908. G. Flügel, Mani, seine
Lehre und seine Schriften, Leipzig, 1862. J. C. Greenfield and M. E.
Stone, "The Enochic Pentateuch and the Date of the Similitudes," Harvard
Theological Review 70, 1977, pp. 51-65. J. C. Greenfield and M. E.
Stone, "The Books of Enoch and the Traditions of Enoch," Numen 26/1,
1979, pp. 89-103. G. Haloun and W. B. Henning, "The Compendium of the Doctrines
and Styles of the Teaching of Mani, the Buddha of Light," Asia Major,
N.S. 3, 1952, pp. 184-212. W. Henning, " Ein manichäisches Henochbuch,"
SPAW,
Phil. hist. Kl., Berlin, 1934, pp. 27-35; repr. in idem, Selected Papers
I Acta Iranica 14, Leiden, 1977. Idem, "The Book of the Giants,"
BSO(A)S
11, 1943, pp. 52-74; repr. in idem, Selected Papers II, Acta Iranica
15, Leiden, 1977, pp. 115-37. H. J. Klimkeit, "Der dreistämmige Baum:
Bemerkungen zur manichäischen Kunst und Symbolik," in Festgabe
W. Perpeet, Bonn, 1980a, pp. 245-62. Idem, "Der Buddha Henoch: Qumran
und Turfan," Zeitschrift für Religions- und Geistesgeschichte
32, 1980b, pp. 367-77. A. v. Le Coq, "Türkische Manichaica aus Chotscho.
III," APAW, 1922. J. T. Milik, ed., The Books of Enoch: Aramaic
Fragments of Qumrân Cave 4, Oxford, 1976. U. Peters, Wie der
biblische Prophet Henoch zum Buddha wurde: Die jüdische Henochtradition
als frühes Beispiel interkultureller und interreligiöser Vermittlung
zwischen Ost und West, Bonn, 1989. H. J. Polotsky and A. Böhlig,
eds., Kephalaia, 1. Hälfte, Manichäische Handschriften der
Staatlichen Museen Berlin I, Stuttgart, 1940. J. C. Reeves, Jewish
Lore in Manichaean Cosmogony: Studies in the Book of Giants Traditions,
Cincinnati, 1992. Idem, "Utnapishtim in the Book of Giants?," Journal
of Biblical Literature 112, 1993, pp. 110-15. Idem, Heralds of That
Good Realm: Syro-Mesopotamian Gnosis and Jewish Traditions, Leiden,
New York, and Cologne, 1996, pp. 183-98. P. O. Skjœrvø, "Iranian
Epic and the Manichean Book of Giants: Irano-Manichaica III," in
AAASH
48, 1995, pp. 187-223. G. A. Straumsa, Another Seed: Studies in Gnostic
Mythology, Leiden, 1984. W. Sundermann, Mittelpersische und parthische
kosmogonische und Parabeltexte der Manichäer, Berliner Turfantexte
4, Berlin, 1973. Idem, "Der Chinesische Traite‚ maniche‚en und der
parthische Sermon vom Lichtnous," AoF 10, 1983, pp. 231-42.Idem,
"Ein weiteres Fragment aus Manis Gigantenbuch," in Hommages J. Duchesne-Guillemin,
Acta Iranica 23, Leiden, 1984, pp. 491-505. Idem, "Eæ±e odin
fragment iz knigi gigantov Mani,"
VDI 3, 1989, pp.
67-79. Idem, "Mani's Book of Giants and the Jewish Books of Enoch:
A Case of Termonological Difference and What it Implies," in Sh. Shaked
and A. Netzer, eds., Irano-Judaica: Studies Relating to the Jewish Contacts
with Persian Culture throughout the Ages III, Jerusalem, 1994, pp.
40-48. J. Tubach, "Spuren des astronomischen Henochbuches bei den Manichäern
Mittelasiens," in P. O. Scholz and R. Stempel, eds., Nubia et Oriens
Christianus: Festschrift C. D. G. Müller, Cologne, 1987 (1988),
pp. 73-94. G. Widengren, Mani und der Manichäismus, Stuttgart,
1961; tr. Ch. Kessler as Mani and Manichaeism, New York, Chicago,
and San Francisco, 1965. Idem, "Iran and Israel in Parthian Times with
Special Regard to the Ethiopic Book of Enoch," Temenos 2, Helsinki,
1966, pp. 138-77. J. Wilkens,
Neue Fragmente aus Manis Gigantenbuch,
forthcoming.
(WERNER SUNDERMANN) NÈ.
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