Against the Manichaeans

Contra Manichaeos · Didymus the Blind · 4th century (c. 350s-360s) · treatise

Greek · domain: alexandrian · researched 2026-11-13

no English translation located. No published English translation of this text was located in the catalogues and series checked. Where only a non-English rendering or a translation of a daughter version exists, it is recorded below and does not close the gap. Treat this as a gap candidate, not as proof that no translation exists; the evidence names every source checked.

Why this is in the register

HOLLIS Primo 'Didymus "Contra Manichaeos"' returns exactly one record, an English doctoral thesis 'The origin of evil: Didymus the Blind's Contra Manichaeos and its debt to Origen's theology and exegesis' (1997), which is a study, not a translation: https://hollis.harvard.edu/discovery/search?query=any,contains,Didymus%20%22Contra%20Manichaeos%22&tab=Everything&search_scope=MyInst_and_CI&vid=01HVD_INST:HVD2&offset=0 The variant 'Didymus blind "Against the Manichaeans"' returns 0 records: https://hollis.harvard.edu/discovery/search?query=any,contains,Didymus%20blind%20%22Against%20the%20Manichaeans%22&tab=Everything&search_scope=MyInst_and_CI&vid=01HVD_INST:HVD2&offset=0 No Fathers of the Church, Ancient Christian Writers or Popular Patristics volume was located.

A polemical treatise in 27 chapters arguing that evil has no independent substance; known mainly through the Tura material and Migne. The 1997 thesis is the only English-language book-length treatment found and it does not print a translation.

Existing translations recorded

None recorded in English. Non-English versions, where they exist, are named in the evidence above.

Electronic text

No open electronic text was verified for this work. The Greek/Coptic/Geʿez may exist only in a print or subscription edition (Migne, CSCO, TLG, CMCL).

Scanned witnesses

Scan search: open scan — 1 candidate(s). PG 39 cols 1085-1108 is the Migne printing of the Greek Contra Manichaeos. The same text is also in the 165-tome container 'patrologia-volumes' file 039, but that derivative (5,586,154 B) measures Greek script ratio 0.0 - Latin-model OCR, unusable for Greek. No separate early-print edition of the Greek was found: advancedsearch title:Didymus (40 items) surfaces only modern studies and unrelated 'Thomas Didymus' titles, and the only pre-modern item is the Migne volume itself.

Scan / witness	Format	Pages	Rights	OCR	Evidence
Patrologiae Cursus Completus, Series Graeca, vol. 39 (Didymus Alexandrinus) internet-archive · patrologiae_cursus_completus_gr_vol_039	pdf	941	public-domain	poor	GET https://archive.org/metadata/patrologiae_cursus_completus_gr_vol_039 -> 200 (941 images, licenseurl PD Mark, 1858). Text derivative https://archive.org/download/patrologiae_cursus_completus_gr_vol_039/patrologiae_cu…

Harvard Hollis

Hollis query: Didymus the Blind Against the Manichaeans — 1 record(s); match basis author_title_unquoted.

Record	Citation
The light and the darkness : studies in Manichaeism and its world · 2001 · eng	"The light and the darkness : studies in Manichaeism and its world." Leiden ; Boston : Brill, 2001. https://hollis.harvard.edu/permalink/f/1s5nto6/990087015360203941

Sources checked

Cite: Tergwame, “Against the Manichaeans” (greek gap dossier), 2026. https://naxiai.com/christian/gaps/greek-didymus-contra-manichaeos