pronounced taste for the multicultural by 240, when he appeared before the newly crowned Shapur I, he had already successfully fused Jewish, Christian and Zoroastrian teachings into a spectacular new whole, while also claiming, just for good measure, to be the heir of the Buddha. Although Shapur himself, while intrigued by Mani’s teachings, had failed to be converted by them, the self-proclaimed prophet’s disciples spread to the limits of West and East and fashioned out of their master’s teachings an authentically global faith. From Carthage to China, there had come to exist cells of
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