Mani, On Becoming A Prophet

According to traditional historical interpretations from ancient sources, the Prophet Mani received his first 'revelation' when he was but a child of 12 or 13. This indicates that he certainly had a deep soul and an inquisitive mind, much as we know from Christian writers that Jesus also was a gifted boy who could debate with the elders of the temple.

The Lebanese writer Amin Maalouf describes in his brilliant novel 'The Gardens of Light' Mani's first encounter with inspiration from the place of divinity. From this work I was inspired to share with you the story of Mani's encounter with the divine, a touching story we all can relate to. The story of Mani takes place in the region of the fertile crescent, during a time when religion and faith was being influenced by the search for mystical experience rather than stagnant dogma and adherence to rules and rites. This era saw the rise of such notable personalities that began with the likes of Jesus of Nazareth and John the Baptist, along with the Gnostics and the hermits of the deserts and the mountains such as the Essenes. Many faiths developed at this time, and many paths were being created. Some would go on to be great world religions, others would die or be put to the sword by empires intent on unification under one set of dogmatic rules that would unite for political, rather than spiritual reasons. Mani was born in what is now known as Iraq at this tumultuous time.

Visiting the home of Chloe, a young girl who was attracted to him, in the way of young, innocent love and attraction. Mani however became intrigued by some old frescoes in the outdoor patio of her home. The girl's father was an old Greek who's ancestors came with the armies of Alexander the Great many centuries before. Mani's friend, a Phoenician lad named Malchos had a crush on the young Chloe, so while visiting Malchos engaged in conversation with her father, trying to impress the man to like him. This Greek who would recount tales passed on to him from his father and grandfather of Alexander's battles and exploits, a topic for storytelling that was quite popular in the Middle East at the time. Mani however was more interested in the frescoes outside in the patio. Uninterested in the common stories and exploits of the late great Iskandar, as Alexander was known in Mesopotamia, the land between the rivers, he simply excused himself and walked outside to inspect the ancient frescoes on the walls.
The frescoes were old and darkened from years of age and exposure to air and the elements. Mani had a talent for art. He went out and found some materials with which he fashioned brushes, and asked the maid of the house of the Greek for pigment so as to paint the frescoes and make them new. Seeking permission to do this, the old Greek smiled and told Mani to go ahead and do with the frescoes as he liked. There was one fresco Mani was drawn to a figure of a solitary man with rays of Sun seemingly emanating from his crown. As Mani was brought up in the church if the Brethren, the Mandanean followers of John the Baptist, he thought this figure to be that of the Prophet himself, the announcer and anointer of Jesus of Nazareth. Mani had been a member of that community since he was a child, as his father sent him to be one of them, much against Mani's wishes. Over the years, though he loved John the Baptist and the path to divine enlightenment, he had grown discontent with the strict dogmatic rules of the Brethren and he left their church, seeking to find his path and calling in life. At this time he was thinking about painting. Performing some work on these frescoes, redoing them and making them new and beautiful again would be a good way to practice, maybe get the word out that there was a new artist on the rise. Mani was ecstatic to update a painting of a great Prophet whom had touched his life early on in age.

He worked diligently all that afternoon as his friends sat and listened to the stories the old greek had to tell. Mani heard the mumbling of the old man's voice, and his friend's ecstatic "oohs" and "ahhs" as the storyteller unraveled his tales of battles and heroism. But Mani was unmoved by the story, totally uninterested, preferring to be engrossed in his work which he viewed as an act of devotion. He cleaned the frescoes, prepared the lines on the figure to be painted, then added the colored pigment. Then, in the late afternoon, he sat back and glanced at his work, with which he was more than content with. It was good work, very good,and he began to feel confident and somewhat proud that what he took to be his calling in life was unfolding in front of his eyes. He certainly knew, in his heart, that he was a gifted artist. As if by the hand of fate or a stroke of divine intervention, his host and his friends entered the room, having had enough of Alexander stories for one day. They stood there in awe and amazement at the talent that had just unfolded in front of them: Malchos his Phoenecian friend, pretty Chloe, bearing a plate of watermelon, and her father, his voice now hoarse from reciting for more than four hours now. They looked at the beautiful work Mani had done and smiled with approval. Mani asked the father of the house "do you like my work, lord?" He replied that the work was excellent. "Thank you for renewing these old frescoes, Mani. I never new how beautiful they really were. You have given life to something I though long dead, as I never thought they could look like this". Mani asked if he also admired John the Baptist. "John the Baptist?" There is no likeness of John the Baptist here boy, this is a portrait of the god Mithras, which you have brought to life with your wonderful talent."

Mani was in shock and could not move or utter a sound. Mithras was, for Mani, an idol, a god of the heathens and polytheists, the lord of a cult. How could he have done this? Why would the God of goodness who blessed John and spoke with Jesus allow him to be fooled by this god of idolatry and paganism? "This cannot be, he cried...it just cannot be!" With tears running down his face, Mani threw his brushes to the ground and ran out of the house. His friends ran after him but he ran so fast they lost him. Mani ran and ran, and didn't turn around once to look back. He had performed an evil duty, beautifying the face of an idol whom he considered as evil, wrong, pagan. How could he have been so stupid and trusting, he thought to himself as he ran through the town and outside of it's suburbs. He went to a spot he always went to, a secret place where he always found solitude and peace, a place known only to he and he alone. He had been there many times before, as a child when he used to ask forbidden questions of the Brethren and they would beat him. He would run and hide here, his secret place, his garden in the shade as it were. There on the banks of the Tigris river, a quiet spot under the lowering branches of a date palm tree laden heavy with golden sweet fruit, bowing as it were to the water which nourished and purified it. Here Mani was shaded and protected from the rays of the hot Sun. A cool breeze blew across the face of the water, the life giving Tigris which gave birth to mankind's earliest civilizations, where humanity began to contemplate existence, being and the possibility of divinity.

Mani lay facedown by the bank of the river, protected by the seemingly loving, lowering branches of the date palm trees. The wind rustled the leaves, as if playing music on a thousand lutes which quivered and danced just above the periphery of the waters of the sacred Tigris. He was panting, almost out of breath, and tears streamed down his face, upon which he gazed in the reflection in the water. He looked at his reflection and began to berate himself; "cursed, you are, Mani. Fool. How could you allow yourself to be fooled like that? You let your pride get the best of you as you thought yourself a great artist. Little did you know that you were being played and fooled all along. The artist! Take the future in your hands! Be what you want to be, the commander of your own ship, so you thought. And what do you make beautiful? An idol, the false god of a pagan cult! Cursed you are, and cursed you should be, damned forever! Damn you, damn you, damn you...idiot!" Mani continued to stare at his reflection, his face contorted in anger and disgust. "I Hope you burn in the fire of hell for your insolent act!" he yelled out. There was nobody there, nobody around, but if there were they would have heard him holler across the river on the other side, such was his anger and passionate hatred for himself.

He continued to stare at his reflection in the water and the tears rolling down his face as he cried profusely. He was surely in a state of grief, as if he lost a mother or a lover. He was mourning his self and his inability to go out on his own and be a good judge of situations. Perhaps the Brethren were right after all. On his own they said, without guidance and instruction, Mani would lose his way and falter spiritually. Maybe he shouldn't have left the security of the Brethren after all, he thought to himself as he stared at the reflection of his face in the water.

Then, something mysterious happened. His face, reflected in the water, seemingly looked at him, directly into his eyes. The tears stopped. His face became, as he noticed in the reflection, less contorted as a feeling of calm began to replace the pain he felt in his heart so deeply. Then the face in the water looked at Mani, and spoke; "Mani, calm yourself. You did nothing wrong". Mani touched his own lips and realized that as the reflected face spoke, his own lips did not move. "Mani, fear not. Be not sad. You made something beautiful. Your intention was to bring about beauty. It matters not what you painted or what you tried to make beautiful. You brought about beauty, that is all that is important. All things are material, all things hold light. The material will fade away, as your won material body will one day fade away. But your soul of light shall live on, forever, in gardens of light. Your work today was like the work we do in this world. We work to understand the soul, and make our lives beautiful, as you made that fresco beautiful. It was fading away, you gave it life, and it will one day fade away again, forever. But your work, your intention to bring about beauty, this is how darkness is canceled, with the light of love".

Mani stared at the water as if in a trance, though he was fully conscious. His tears had dried, and he no longer felt doubt and pain. He knew now that he did nothing wrong, for all things will pass. But his intention to imbue the fresco with a soul, as every human being needs to be imbued with the knowledge of the soul so as to attain enlightenment and escape the realm of darkness we have been cast into. We are here, this is the reality of our situation. We worry about things that really mean so little in the scheme of it all. In this encounter with his self, Mani broke the chains of dogma he was tied to when he was a devotee to a religious group he felt had erred somehow. He was not proud nor was he incapable of learning on his own. God is light and all things good, and God will lead you to the garden of light, step by step. We all need to run from what we fear most, our own egotistical, commanding self, and seek the shade of the date palms on the Tigris river of our being. There, we can be enlightened, illuminated by the crystalline light-truth which lies within each of us.

Mani would go on and find that he was not destined to be an artist, though he would paint and draw from time to time. He would also use his talent for medicine and healing to help those in need, for every body is matter and matter eventually fails from time to time. The act of caring and curing is a lighting of the soul, the blaze of health which, even if only for a short while, describes the eternal gardens where there is no more sickness or sadness. From this, Mani would go on to announce to the world his message of light and salvation, the freeing of the soul from the prison in which we find ourselves. On that late afternoon on the banks of the sacred river Tigris, under the branches of the date palms, Mani broke free from one of the cells of his imprisonment. One day he too would be free from the prison of this world, to go on to the gardens of light beyond from whence we came, our permanent and true abode with the Lord of light, power and beauty.

Our body, though a necessity in this life, in this state of existence, is our prison. Our soul is our hope and our true self. Seek the shade under the branches of the date palm, and let your inner self speak to you and point the way to salvation, a light illumines your conscience and your surroundings. This is how each of us can truly become free.