Haran Gawaita
The Haran Gawaita (Mandaic ࡄࡀࡓࡀࡍ ࡂࡀࡅࡀࡉࡕࡀ "Inner Haran" or "Inner Hauran") is a Mandaean text which purports to tell the history of the Mandaeans and their arrival in Media as "Nasoraeans" from Jerusalem.[1]
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Text, dating and authorship
The text is in Mandaic language and script, dated to around the 4th–6th centuries and of unknown authorship. An English translation was published in 1953 by Lady E. S. Drower.[2]
Content
According to the Haran Gawaita, John the Baptist was baptized, initiated, and educated by the patron of the Nasirutha ("secret knowledge"), Anush (אנושׁ) or Anush-ʼuthra, the hierophant of the sect.[3] This research was conducted by the Oxford scholar and specialist on the Nasoraeans, E. S. Drower. Mandaeans considered themselves Judeans and are aware of the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple in 70 CE but they did not leave because of this. They left before 70 CE due to persecution by a faction of more normative or orthodox Jews. With the help of the Parthian king Ardban II (previously known as Ardban III), who ruled from 11-38CE, the Mandaeans settled in Media, and later moved to southern Babylonia [4][5]
See also
References
- "And sixty thousand Nasoraeans abandoned the Sign of the Seven and entered the Median Hills, a place where we were free from domination by all other races." Karen L. King, What is Gnosticism?, 2005, Page 140
- Les textes de Nag Hammadi: - Page 111 Jacques E. Ménard, Université des sciences humaines de Strasbourg. Centre de recherches d'histoire des religions - 1975 "This part of the theory is based on a sort of « History of the Mandaean Movement », called Diwan of the Great Revelation, called Harran Gawaita (the Inner Harran) published in 1953 by Lady ES Drower s». It begins, after a preamble and a .."
- Drower, p. 37
- Buckley, Jorunn Jacobsen. The Mandaeans: Ancient Texts and Modern People. Oxford University Press, 2002.p4
- Buckley, Jorunn Jacobsen(2010). Turning the Tables on Jesus: The Mandaean View. In Horsley, Richard (March 2010). Christian Origins. ISBN 9781451416640.(pp94-11). Minneapolis: Fortress Press
Further reading
- The Haran Gawaita and the Baptism of Hibil-Ziwa: the Mandaic text, E. S. Drower
- The Haran Gawaita and the Baptism of Hibil-Ziwa. The Mandaic Text Reproduced Together with Translation, Notes, and Commentary translated and edited by E. S. Drower (Mandaic text omitted)
- Diwan Maṣbuta Hibil Ziwa, 1953