History & overview · every faith gets one
The last Gnostics — baptized in living water, every week.
The only Gnostic religion to survive antiquity: the soul is light trapped in matter, John the Baptist is the great teacher, and baptism is not once but perpetual — every Sunday, in flowing river water, in white. An ancient community of Iraq and Iran, now scattered by war.
The founding
No single founder — Mandaeism accreted rather than began.
What it holds
Reality. The soul is light, exiled in a material world.
The divine. Hayyi Rabbi — the Great Life, the first light.
Death and after. The soul ascends through the toll-houses to the world of light.