The Functions of Manuscripts for the Turfan Manichaean Community (9th-11th Centuries)

Abstract

This dissertation is a religious-social study of the Manichaean community of the Turfan region during the 9th-11th centuries and its relationship with the Turfan Manichaean manuscripts. Manichaeism, as an official religion of the Qocho Uyghur Kingdom (based in the Turfan region), was replanted to Turfan from the Mongolian Steppe by Uyghurs. It has been known that the Turfan Manichaean community was sustained by Sogdian missionaries and merchants, and Uyghur nobles. Accordingly, the Uyghur Manichaean manuscripts were more often used by the auditors (lay believers), while the Middle Persian, Parthian, and Sogdian Manichaean ones were mainly intended for the elects (priests). Along with the use of the Turfan Manichaean manuscripts, Manichaeism was introduced and practiced in the realm of the Qocho Uyghur Kingdom. The communications between the Turfan Manichaeans and other Central Asian Manichaean communities can be also attested by the Turfan Manichaean materials. But, the previous scholarship has paid too much attention either to the textual contents and linguistic aspects of the Turfan Manichaean manuscripts or to the analysis of historical events in the eastern Manichaean contexts. However, the actual operation of the Turfan Manichaean community and the Turfan Manichaean use of the manuscripts have not yet been sufficiently researched. Therefore, this dissertation investigates how the Mesopotamian dualist religion (Manichaeism) under the Qocho Uyghur administration successfully took root in the Turfan region, and how the Turfan Manichaean community itself was built up with the manifold use of manuscripts. The manuscripts had various functions and significances for the Turfan Manichaean community. This dissertation answers three questions: First, how the texts and pictures on the Manichaean manuscripts functioned in the Turfan Manichaean missionary and religious practices; secondly, how the Manichaean manuscripts that were used by elects functioned to construct the Turfan Manichaean community; thirdly, what roles the Turfan Manichaean manuscripts and texts played regarding the secular sphere and what they meant to the lay Manichaeans. In brief, this dissertation attempts to reconstruct a relatively more complete image of the Turfan Manichaean community by seeing it from the inside, based on the surviving Manichaean textual and pictorial materials from the Turfan region.