[3] Zarathustra's ethical dualism is—to an extent—incorporated in Mani's doctrine, which views the world as being locked in an epic battle between opposing forces of good and evil.

[5][6] Manichaeism claims to present the complete version of teachings that had been corrupted and misinterpreted by the followers of its predecessors Adam, Zarathustra, Buddha and Jesus.

A long quotation, preserved by the eighth-century Nestorian Christian author Theodore Bar Konai,[7] shows that in the original Syriac Aramaic writings of Mani there was no influence of Iranian or Zoroastrian terms.

The adaptation of Manichaeism to the Zoroastrian religion appears to have begun in Mani's lifetime however, with his writing of the Middle Persian Shabuhragan, his book dedicated to the Sasanian emperor, Shapur I.

However, from the vantage point of its original Syriac descriptions (as quoted by Theodore Bar Khonai and outlined above), Manichaeism may be better described as a unique phenomenon of Aramaic Babylonia, occurring in proximity to two other new Aramaic religious phenomena, Talmudic Judaism and Mandaeism, which also appeared in Babylonia in roughly the third century.