The text is in the Mandaic language and script. It is of unknown authorship.
The recipients of the text are stated to be those disciples who must persevere in their faith during the Arab age, meaning that it must post-date the early Muslim conquests at the least. Furthermore, the text makes repeated reference to Baghdad, a city built in 762, and as such is likely to also post-date the 8th century.[3]
According to the Haran Gawaita, John the Baptist was baptized, initiated, and educated by the patron of the Nasirutha (secret knowledge), Enosh (Anush or Anush-ʼuthra), the hierophant of the sect.[4]: 6–7 This research was conducted by the Oxford scholar and specialist on the Nasoraeans, Lady Ethel S. Drower. According to Jorunn J. Buckley, the Mandaeans see themselves to be former Judeans based in Jerusalem that loved Adonai until the birth of Jesus.[5]: 49 [2]: 96 These Nasoraean disciples of John the Baptist[4]: IX are aware of the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple in 70 CE, but they did not leave because of this. They fled before 70 CE due to persecution by a faction of more normative or Orthodox Jews. With the help of the Parthian king Artabanus II (Ardban II; previously known as Ardban III), who ruled from 11-38 CE, the Mandaeans settled in the Median Hills (Mandaic: Ṭura ḏ-Madai[6]: xiii ), and later moved to southern Babylonia.[5]: 4 [2][7]
An English translation of the Haran Gawaita and the Diwan Masbuta d Hibil Ziwa was published in 1953 by Lady E. S. Drower, which was based on manuscripts 9 and 36 of the Drower Collection (abbreviated DC 9 and DC 36, respectively).[8]
A typesetted Mandaic version of DC 9 was published by Majid Fandi Al-Mubaraki in 2002.[9]
A German translation, which makes use of Drower's manuscripts as well as two additional privately held manuscripts, was published in 2020 by Bogdan Burtea.[10]
^"And sixty thousand Nasoraeans abandoned the Sign of the Seven and entered the Median Hills, a place where we were free from domination by all other races." Karen L. King, What is Gnosticism?, 2005, Page 140
^ abcBuckley, Jorunn Jacobsen (2010). Turning the Tables on Jesus: The Mandaean View. In Horsley, Richard (March 2010). Christian Origins. Fortress Press. ISBN9781451416640.(pp94-111). Minneapolis: Fortress Press
^ abBladel, Kevin Thomas van (2017). From Sasanian Mandaeans to Ṣābians of the marshes. Leiden studies in Islam and society. Leiden; Boston: Brill. pp. 7–8. ISBN978-90-04-33943-9.
^ abDrower, Ethel Stefana (1953). The Haran Gawaita and the Baptism of Hibil-Ziwa. Vatican City: Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana.
^ abBuckley, Jorunn Jacobsen (2002). The Mandaeans: ancient texts and modern people. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN0-19-515385-5. OCLC65198443.
^Drower, E. S. (1960). The secret Adam: a study of Nasoraean gnosis. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
^Gündüz, Şinasi (1994). "The Knowledge of Life: The Origins and Early History of the Mandaeans and Their Relation to the Sabians of the Qur'ān and to the Harranians". Journal of Semitic Studies Supplement. 3. Oxford University Press. ISBN0-19-922193-6. ISSN0022-4480.
^Les textes de Nag Hammadi: - Page 111 Jacques E. Ménard, Université des sciences humaines de Strasbourg. Centre de recherches d'histoire des religions - 1975 "This part of the theory is based on a sort of « History of the Mandaean Movement », called Diwan of the Great Revelation, called Harran Gawaita (the Inner Harran) published in 1953 by Lady ES Drower s». It begins, after a preamble and a .."
