GINZA. Among their many books, the Gnostic Mandaeans of Iraq and Iran rank the voluminous Ginza ("treasure"), their "holy book," as the most important. It is studied by priests, and its presence is required at the performance of the major Mandaean rituals. In the seventh century of the common era, during the Islamic conquest, the Mandaeans assembled the Ginza in order to gain status as a "people of the book," allowed to resist conversion to Islam. The work, separated into Right Ginza and Left Ginza, contains a number of myths concerning the creation of the world and of human beings, descriptions of the human lot on earth, moral teachings, polemics against other faiths, and hymns. In Mandaeism generally, "right" and "left" are connected to the otherworldly and the earthly realms, respectively. However, in the case of the two parts of Ginza, the designations seem to contradict this pattern...