‘You Are Twinned with the Spirit’

Re-reading a Christian Non-Canonical Text in Light of Jewish, Eastern-Christian, Manichaean Practices and Scriptures

This project deals with a less known Christian non-canonical  writing, mainly known as Revelation of the Magi (Landau 2008). The text, which has been preserved in the only manuscript of a Syriac world chronicle known as Chronicle of Zuqnīn (after 775 CE), is an independent excerpt about the  Magi, to be dated around the 3rd-4th century CE. After depicting the Magi as keepers of a secret knowledge transmitted from Adam to Seth, Revelation of the Magi insists on the Magi’s peculiar religious devotion (mainly based on silent prayers and rituals) and on their visionary experiences, above all, the vision of the star upon a pillar of light (4:2-8) and other types of perceptions (27-28). The last part is devoted to Thomas’ blessing of the oil. The Magi are then baptized and start preaching. The project aims to identify the sources of this text, to analyze the ritual experiences, which the excerpt records, and to study the textual connections and literary combinations between Revelation of the Magi and  literatures associated both to the name of Adam and Seth.