KHUASTUANIFT.
Sect. I. “[The Son of?] the God Khormuzta even the Fivefold God descended from the heavens with the purity of all the gods, to war against the Demon; he (the Fivefold God) battled against the Shimnus[[1154]] of evil deeds, and against the five species of the Kingdom of the Demons. God and the Devil, Light and Darkness then intermingled. The youth of the Divine Khormuzta even the Fivefold God, and our souls, joined battle with Sin and the Demon-world and became ensnared and entangled with it. All the princes of the Demons came with the insatiable and shameless Demon of Envy and a hundred and forty myriads of demons banded together in evil intent, ignorance, and folly. He himself, the Born and Created (i.e. the Fivefold God or son of Khormuzta) forgot the eternal heaven of the Gods and became separated from the Gods of Light. Hence, O my God! if the Shimnu (Great Devil) of evil intent has led astray our thoughts and inclined us to devilish deeds.—If, becoming thereby foolish and without understanding, we have sinned and erred against the foundation and root of all bright spirits, even against the pure and bright Azrua the Lord[[1155]].—If thereby Light and Darkness, God and the Devil have intermingled ...
here follows a lacuna of several pages which Prof. von Le Coq suggests was filled with “an explanation of the allegorical story of the combat” and its practical application.
“... If we have said ... is its foundation and root.—If we have said if anyone animates a body it is God; or that if anyone kills, it is God.—If we have said Good and Evil have alike been created by God. If we have said it is He [God] who has created the eternal Gods. If we have said the Divine Khormuzta and the Shimnu (Great Devil) are brethren[[1156]]. O my God, if in our sin we have spoken such awful blasphemies, having unwittingly become false to God. If we have thus committed this unpardonable sin. O my God, I N.N.[[1157]] now repent. To cleanse myself from sin, I pray: Manâstâr hîrzâ! (My sin remit!)”
Sect. II. “When because of the God of the Sun and Moon and of the Gods enthroned in the two resplendent Palaces, the foundation and root of the light of all the Burkhans[[1158]] of Earth and Water go to the heaven prepared for their assembly (foundation and root), the first gate they reach is the God of the Sun and Moon. In order to deliver the Fivefold God and to sever the Light from the Darkness he rolls along the lower part of the heavens in fulness and lights up the four corners of the earth. O my God, if in our sin we have unwittingly sinned against the God of the Sun and Moon, the Gods enthroned in the two resplendent Palaces. If, although calling him the True, Mighty, and Powerful God, we have not believed in him. If we have uttered many spoken blasphemies. If we have said the God of the Sun and Moon dies, and his rise and setting comes [?] not by [his own?] strength, and that should he [trust to his?] own strength, he will not rise [?]. If we have said, our own bodies were created before the Sun and Moon. To cleanse ourselves from this unwitting sin also, we pray: Manâstâr hîrzâ (Our sin remit).”
Sect. III. “Since, in defence of the Fivefold God, even the youth of the Divine Khormuzta, his five members, that is to say, First, the God of the Ether; Secondly, the God of the Wind; Thirdly, the God of the Light; Fourthly, the God of the Water; Fifthly, the God of the Fire, having battled against Sin and the Demon-world were ensnared and entangled[[1159]], and have intermingled with the Darkness. Since they were unable to go to the heaven of God and are now upon the earth. Since the ten heavens above, the eight earths beneath, exist on account of the Fivefold God. Since of everything that is upon the earth the Fivefold God is the Majesty, the Radiance [?], the Likeness, the Body, the Soul, the Strength, the Light, the Foundation and the Root. O my God, if in our sin we have unwittingly offended against or caused grief to the Fivefold God by an evil and wicked mind. If we have allowed our fourteen members to gain domination over us. If by taking animated beings with our ten snake-headed fingers and our thirty-two teeth, we have fed upon them and have thus angered and grieved the Gods [?][[1160]]. If we have in any way sinned against the dry and wet earth, against the five kinds of animals, and against the five kinds of herbs and trees. O my God, to cleanse ourselves from sin, so pray we now: Manâstâr hîrzâ! (Our sin remit!)”
Sect. IV. “If we have unwittingly sinned against the divine Burkhans of the hosts (of the Messenger God[[1161]]) and against the merit-attaining pure Elect. If although we have called them the true and divine Burkhans and the well-doing and pure Elect, we have not believed on them. If although we have uttered the word of God, we have through folly acted against it and not performed it [?]. If instead of spreading the decrees and commandments, we have impeded them. O my God, we now repent and to cleanse ourselves from sin, we pray: Manâstâr hîrzâ! (Our sin remit!)”
Sect. V. “If we have wandered into sin against the five kinds of animated beings, that is to say, First, against two-footed man; Secondly, against the four-footed animals; Thirdly, against the flying animals; Fourthly, against the animals in the water; Fifthly, against the animals upon earth which creep on their bellies. O my God, if in our sin against these five kinds of animated and moving beings from the great to the small, we have beaten and wounded, abused, and injured, and pained, or even put them to death. If thus we have become the tormentors of so many animated and moving beings. O my God, to cleanse ourselves from sin, so pray we now: Manâstâr hîrzâ! (Our sin remit!)”
It will be seen that in these first five sections or clauses of the Confession, we have a confirmation in all essential points of the version of the faith taught by Manes as it has been preserved for us by the Mahommedan authors quoted above. It is even possible that it was from this source that the author of the Fihrist and Al-Bîrûnî derived some of their information concerning the Manichaeans, and although it is impossible as yet to fix any date for the Confession except within very wide limits, it may be said that it is probably earlier than either of the Mahommedan writers. It is certainly earlier than 1035 A.D., the date at which the grotto at Tun-huang in which one of the copies was bricked up[[1162]]. But it seems plain that it must have long before been used in the Manichaean worship from the fact that copies differing little, if at all, from each other have been found in two different scripts. As two of these are in the Turkish language, it seems likely that they were translated for proselytizing purposes into this from the earlier Syriac version shortly after the conquest of the Tou-kiue or Turks by the Ouigours, which some authors put as far back as the VIIth century A.D.[[1163]] The tenets of the Manichaeans must have been well settled for this to be possible, and we have here, therefore, an account at first hand of Manichaean teaching at a date much earlier than the Mahommedan authors quoted above, and first reduced to writing between the earliest promulgation of Manes’ own teaching and the Mahommedan conquest of Persia. It is, therefore, contemporary, or nearly so, with the period of activity of the Zoroastrianism revived by the Sassanides, and it is interesting to find how much nearer in appearance to the cosmology and theology of the Avesta are those of the Khuastuanift than is the Christianized form of Manichaeism introduced into Europe and Africa and combated by St Augustine. Khormuzta, the First Man, is certainly Ahura Mazda, Oromazes, or Ormuzd, while the Fivefold God here spoken of as the “youth” is clearly to be identified with his five sons or the armour left below on his defeat[[1164]]. Hence it is probable that the Manichaeans in Upper Asia did not wish to appear as the worshippers of any other deities than those of the Persian nation[[1165]], although where Christianity was the religion of the State, they were willing to call these deities by other names[[1166]]. Yet the dualism which is the real characteristic of the faith of Manes here as elsewhere admits of no compromise, and the sin against which the Section II is directed is plainly that Zervanist heresy which would make Zervan akerene or Boundless Time the author of all things, and Ormuzd and Ahriman alike his sons. The part played by the Sun and Moon in the redemption of the Light is here the same as that assigned to them in both the Christian and the Mahommedan accounts of Manes’ own teaching, but nothing is here said of the wheel which appears in the former[[1167]]. The Divine “Burkhans” mentioned in Section III are, as we shall see later, the Divine Messengers sent from time to time into the present world to assist in the redemption of the Light. The sinfulness of feeding upon, injuring, or even angering the lower animals is here much more strongly insisted upon than in the other documents and demands repentance even in the case of the Hearers, and this points directly to a closer connection with Buddhism than hitherto has been thought possible. It is plainly opposed to the later Zoroastrian teaching, which makes the killing of certain animals belonging to the creation of Ahriman a religious duty; and may therefore have only been adopted by the Manichaeans when they found themselves in contact with a large community of professed Buddhists.
The next five sections of the Khuastuanift run thus: