[Vision2020] Karates are dull

[Andreas Schou]

So, you happen to have hit on one of my major interests. I've read _Gnosis: 
Its Structure and History_ , by Kurt Rudolf, which focuses quite a bit on 
the Mandaeans (which are probably the last historical Gnostic sect)

They're weird and, at best, quasi-Jewish. There's a lot of pseudo-Egyptian 
signs and sigls, and a very "Book of the Dead-ish" focus on how the soul 
moves through various "watch-houses" on its way to God. Plus, during the 
time when they were labelled as another Gnostic sect, they picked up a lot 
of Gnostic practice and terminology. ITheir "Book of John", the Sidra 
d-Yahia, isn't the Christian book of John either. Like the Yezidi, I suspect 
they were a local religion that predated Christianity, but glommed onto 
historical figures in a competition to become the fourth "Religion of the 
Book" mentioned in the Koran and exempt themeselves from persecution.

Like Jews, though, and unlike virtually everyone else in the world, they do 
do something quite similar to the tephillim -- little phylacteries full of 
religious maxims worn on the upper arm. They also traditionally see 
themselves as having gotten their traditional head-coverings, the burzinqa, 
fromt he Jews, and identify them with the other half of the tephillim.

As for the Karaites ... yeah, I agree. Just like Mennonites and Calvinists, 
I find Karaites deadly boring. If Torah has any "plain meaning" accessable 
without interpretation, it's entirely opaque to me. .

-- ACS

P.S. If my religious tradition included a collection of texts that argued 
about whether an ass with the head of a man could be circumcized and join 
the Covenant, I certainly wouldn't reject it!
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