Elkesaites The Elkesaites were a Judeo-Christian baptismal sect that originated in the Transjordan and were active between 100 and 400 CE. The members of this sect, like the Mandaeans, performed frequent baptisms for purification and had a Gnostic disposition. The Church Father
Epiphanius (writing in the fourth century CE) seems to make a distinction between two main groups within the Essenes: "Of those that came before his [Elxai (Elkesai), an Ossaean prophet] time and during it, the Ossaeans and the
Nasaraeans." Epiphanius describes the Ossaeans as following:
Essenes The
Essenes were a
mystic Jewish sect during the
Second Temple period that flourished from the second century BCE to the first century CE. Early Mandaean religious concepts and terminologies recur in the
Dead Sea Scrolls, and
Yardena (Jordan) has been the name of every baptismal water in Mandaeism.
Mara d-Rabuta (
Mandaic: "Lord of Greatness", one of the names for
Hayyi Rabbi) is found in the
Genesis Apocryphon II, 4. An early Mandaean self-appellation is
bhiria zidqa, meaning 'elect of righteousness' or 'the chosen righteous', a term found in the
Book of Enoch and
Genesis Apocryphon II, 4. As Nasoraeans, Mandaeans believe that they constitute the true congregation of
bnia nhura, meaning 'Sons of Light', a term used by the Essenes. Mandaean scripture affirms that the Mandaeans descend directly from
John the Baptist's original Nasoraean Mandaean disciples in Jerusalem and there are numerous similarities between John's movement and the Essenes. Similar to the Essenes, it is forbidden for a Mandaean to reveal the names of the angels to a gentile.
Bana'im Bana'im were a minor Jewish sect and an offshoot of the
Essenes during the second century in Israel. The Bana'im put heavy emphasis on the cleanliness of clothing since they believed that garments cannot even have a small mudstain before dipping in purifying water. There exists considerable debate around their activities in Israel and the meaning of the name, some believe that they would put heavy emphasis on the study of the creation of the world, while some believe that the Bana'im were an Essene order employed with the ax and shovel. Other scholars instead have suggested that the name of the Bana'im is derived from the Greek word for "bath". In this case the sect would be similar to the
Hemerobaptists or
Tovelei Shaḥarit.
Hemerobaptists Hemerobaptists (Heb.
Tovelei Shaḥarit; 'Morning Bathers') were an ancient religious sect that practiced daily baptism. They were likely a division of the Essenes.
Maghāriya Maghāriya were a minor Jewish sect that appeared in the first century BCE, their special practice was the keeping of all their literature in caves in the surrounding hills of Israel. They made their own commentaries on the Bible and the law. The Maghāriya believed that God is too sublime to mingle with matter, thus they did not believe that God directly created the world, but that an angel, which represents God created the earth which is similar to the Mandaean demiurgic
Ptahil. Some scholars have identified the Maghāriya with the Essenes or the
Therapeutae.
Kabbalah Nathaniel Deutsch writes:
R.J. Zwi Werblowsky suggests Mandaeism has more commonality with Kabbalah than with
Merkabah mysticism such as cosmogony and sexual imagery.
The Thousand and Twelve Questions,
Scroll of Exalted Kingship, and
Alma Rišaia Rba link the alphabet with the creation of the world, a concept found in
Sefer Yetzirah and the
Bahir.
Manichaeans According to the
Fihrist of
ibn al-Nadim, the Mesopotamian prophet
Mani, the founder of
Manichaeism, was brought up within the
Elkesaite (
Elcesaite or
Elchasaite) sect, this being confirmed more recently by the
Cologne Mani Codex. None of the
Manichaean scriptures has survived in its entirety, and it seems that the remaining fragments have not been compared to the
Ginza Rabba. Mani later left the Elkasaites to found his own religion. In a comparative analysis, the Swedish Egyptologist
Torgny Säve-Söderbergh indicated that Mani's
Psalms of Thomas was closely related to Mandaean texts. According to
E. S. Drower, "some of the most ancient Manichaean psalms, the Coptic Psalms of Thomas, were paraphrases and even word-for-word translations of Mandaic originals; prosody and phrase offering proof that the Manichaean was the borrower and not vice-versa."
Samaritan Baptist sects According to Magris, Samaritan Baptist sects were an offshoot of
John the Baptist. One offshoot was in turn headed by
Dositheus,
Simon Magus, and
Menander. It was in this milieu that the idea emerged that the world was created by ignorant angels. Their baptismal ritual removed the consequences of sin, and led to a regeneration by which natural death, which was caused by these angels, was overcome. The Samaritan leaders were viewed as "the embodiment of God's power, spirit, or wisdom, and as the redeemer and revealer of 'true knowledge. The
Simonians were centered on Simon Magus, the magician baptised by Philip and rebuked by Peter in Acts 8, who became in early Christianity the archetypal false teacher. The ascription by Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, and others of a connection between schools in their time and the individual in Acts 8 may be as legendary as the stories attached to him in various apocryphal books. Justin Martyr identifies Menander of Antioch as Simon Magus' pupil. According to Hippolytus, Simonianism is an earlier form of
Valentinianism.
Sethians Kurt Rudolph has observed many parallels between Mandaean texts and
Sethian Gnostic texts from the
Nag Hammadi library.
Birger A. Pearson also compares the "
Five Seals" of Sethianism, which he believes is a reference to quintuple ritual immersion in water, to Mandaean
masbuta. According to
Buckley (2010), "Sethian Gnostic literature ... is related, perhaps as a younger sibling, to Mandaean baptism ideology."
Valentinians A Mandaean baptismal formula was adopted by Valentinian Gnostics in Rome and Alexandria in the second century CE.
Yezidis A Yezidologist, Artur Rodziewicz, in his analysis of Yezidi cosmogony, demonstrated its affinities with Mandaean accounts of the creation of the world, particularly in the version known from the
Mandaean Book of John. These parallels include conceptions relating to the central Yezidi deity referred to as the Peacock Angel (
Tawûsî Melek). ==Demographics==