Il “Bianco Monte” dei Magi. La montagna paradisiaca nel sincretismo iranico-mesopotamico

Abstract

A particular aspect of the cosmic mountain in the Iranian-Mesopotamian world is considered on the basis of a Manichean text (M.I.) mentioning a not well-defined locality called Parvān. Parvān is one and the same thing as the parwān ṭura hiuārā, ‘Parvān’s white mountain’ sheltering Yahia/John the Baptist of the Mandaean gnosis, on which stands the ‘unweaned (i.e. prematurely-died infants)-nourishing Tree’. In the Indo-Iranian world parwān corresponds to Avestic paurvatā- (Ysna X), where grows haoma, the lunar fluid ‘rich in milk’ capable of resuscitating the dead and making the living immortal. In its sacerdotal personification, haoma performs the liturgical sacrifice on the highest peak of mount Harā, the first and highest mountain of Iranian cosmography. It is the highest point on earth and the privileged place from where pure souls pass to heaven, that is, the earthly-lunar Paradise. Because of this aspect Parvān is related as well to the mountain on which the Enlightener (phōster) of the Nag Hammadi’s Apocalypse of Adam is abducted, and with the Mons Victorialis of Eastern Christian Traditions on the Magi (Chronicle of Zuqnīn). The same symbolism in an episode of the Graal cycle is also shortly analysed. It is compared with the description of the Manichean Paradise found in the Acta Archelai.