Justice will once take the place which the Magians are keeping now, for it is they who lord it over the world.

A Manichaean Prayer and Confession Book. Edited and translated by Nicholas Sims-Williams, with introduction by John Sheldon and codicology by Zsuzsanna Gulácsi. Corpus Fontium Manichaeorum, Series Iranica, vol. 1. Turnhout: Brepols, 2022. Pp. xxvi + 195. €100.

This is my first published paper, written over a decade ago. I can't remember exactly what I argued in it, but I can assure you that the follow up paper "Epistemology and Eudaimonism in Augustine's Contra Academicos" is better.

Manicheism is founded in two world originating ontological principles: Good or Light, presented by the sun and Evil or Darkness, personinified in the matter. From this ontological dualism proceeds the idea which man is not responsible to the evil he practices according to, but this-one (evil) is to be blamed to his bad nature, in other words evil is inherent to his corporal nature. Hence, strictly speaking, there is no real evil in manicheism, but only natural evil. However, paradoxally, manicheism (...) refers to a duty Moral, which through the man good part (the soul) must struggle in order to be liberated from matter´s bonds (the boddy), through an ascetical rigorous life, materialized in three commandments observance, the to called three seals: mouth, hands and breast seals. (shrink)

The essays in Practicing Gnosis demonstrate that the Gnostics were not necessarily trendy intellectuals seeking epistomological certainities. Instead, this book explores how Gnostics were seeking religious experiences that relied on practices including ritual, magic, liturgy, and theurgy. This book celebrates the career of Birger A. Pearson.

Emerson once referred to Swedenborg as “one of the missouriums and mastodons of literature.” These terms could with far more truth and less banality be applied to St. Augustine. His thought is overwhelming, as is the amount of literature he has generated. A wealth of studies has been published in the past half-century, some of exceptional value such as those of Peter Brown, John O’Meara, Jean Pepin, and Eugene Portalie.