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Mandaeism or Mandaeanism ( '; (アラビア語:مندائية) ''/'') is a gnostic religion with a strongly dualistic worldview. Its adherents, the Mandaeans, revere Adam, Abel, Seth, Enos, Noah, Shem, Aram and especially John the Baptist, but reject Abraham, Moses and Jesus. The Aramaic ''manda'' means "knowledge," as does Greek ''gnosis''.〔The Light and the Dark: Dualism in ancient Iran, India, and China Petrus Franciscus Maria Fontaine - 1990 "Although it shows Jewish and Christian influences, Mandaeism was hostile to Judaism and Christianity. Mandaeans spoke an East-Aramaic language in which 'manda' means 'knowledge'; this already is sufficient proof of the connection of Mandaeism with the Gnosis...〕 According to most scholars, Mandaeans migrated from the Southern Levant to Mesopotamia in the first centuries CE, and are of pre-Arab and pre-Islamic origin. They are Semites and speak a dialect of Eastern Aramaic known as Mandaic. They may well be related to the Nabateans who were pagan, Aramaic-speaking indigenous pre-Arab and pre-Islamic inhabitants of southern Iraq. Mandaeans appear to have settled in northern Mesopotamia, but the religion has been practised primarily around the lower Karun, Euphrates and Tigris and the rivers that surround the Shatt-al-Arab waterway, part of southern Iraq and Khuzestan Province in Iran. There are thought to be between 60,000 and 70,000 Mandaeans worldwide.〔(Iraqi minority group needs U.S. attention ), Kai Thaler, ''Yale Daily News'', March 9, 2007.〕 Until the 2003 Iraq war, almost all of them lived in Iraq.〔("Save the Gnostics" ) by Nathaniel Deutsch, October 6, 2007, ''New York Times.''〕 Many Mandaean Iraqis have since fled their country (as have many other Iraqis) because of the turmoil created by the 2003 invasion of Iraq and subsequent occupation by U.S. armed forces, and the related rise in sectarian violence by Muslim extremists.〔(Iraq's Mandaeans 'face extinction' ), Angus Crawford, BBC, March 4, 2007.〕 By 2007, the population of Mandaeans in Iraq had fallen to approximately 5,000.〔 Most Mandaean Iraqis have sought refuge in Iran, with fellow Mandaeans there. Others have moved to northern Iraq. There has been a much smaller influx into Syria and Jordan, with smaller populations in Sweden, Australia, the United States and other Western countries. The Mandaeans have remained separate and intensely private—reports of them and of their religion have come primarily from outsiders, particularly from the Orientalist Julius Heinrich Petermann, Nicolas Siouffi (a Yazidi) and Lady Drower. An Anglican vicar, Rev. Peter Owen-Jones, included a short segment on a Mandaean group in Sydney, Australia, in his BBC series, ''Around the World in 80 Faiths.'' ==Origin of name== The term Mandaeism comes from Classical Mandaic ''Mandaiia'' and appears in Neo-Mandaic as ''Mandeyānā.'' On the basis of cognates in other Aramaic dialects, Semiticists such as Mark Lidzbarski and Rudolf Macuch have translated the term ''manda'', from which ''Mandaiia'' derives, as "knowledge" (cf. Aramaic מַנְדַּע ''(unicode:mandaʻ)'' in Dan. 2:21, 4:31, 33, 5:12; cf. (ヘブライ語:מַדַּע) ''(unicode:maddaʻ)'', with characteristic assimilation of /n/ to the following consonant, medial -nd- hence becoming -dd-〔Angel Sáenz-Badillos, ''A History of the Hebrew Language.'' Cambridge University Press, 1993 (ISBN 978-0521556347), p. 36 ''et passim.'' (See also Biblical Hebrew phonology#Classification: "Hebrew also shares with the Canaanite languages ... assimilation of non-final /n/ to the following consonant.")〕). This etymology suggests that the Mandaeans may well be the only sect surviving from late Antiquity to identify themselves explicitly as Gnostics. Other scholars derive the term ''mandaiia'' from ''Mandā d-Heyyi'' (Mandaic ''(unicode:manda ḏ-hiia'') "Knowledge of Life," reference to the chief divinity ''hiia rbia'' "the Great Life") or from the word ''(bi)mandi'',〔〔 which is the cultic hut in which many Mandaean ceremonies are performed (such as the baptism, which is the central sacrament of Mandaean religious life). This last term is possibly to be derived from Pahlavi ''m’nd'' ''mānd'' ("house"). Within the Middle East, but outside of their community, the Mandaeans are more commonly known as the ' (singular: ). The term ' is derived from the Aramaic root related to baptism, the neo-Mandaic is ''.'' In Islam, the term "Sabians" ((アラビア語:الصابئون) ') is used as a blanket term for adherents to a number of religions, including that of the Mandaeans, in reference to the Sabians of the Qur'an. Occasionally, Mandaeans are called Christians of Saint John, based upon preliminary reports made by members of the Discalced Carmelite mission in Basra during the 16th century. A ' ((アラビア語:مندى)) is a place of worship for followers of Mandaeism. A ' must be built beside a river in order to perform ''maṣbattah'' (baptism) because water is an essential element in the Mandaeic faith. Modern 's sometimes have a bath inside a building instead. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Mandaeism」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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