Off the top of my head... Perhaps if you looked at the specific
texts that the Cathars accepted (since they did not accept the Old
Testament, or I believe, great chunks of the New Testament in its
Catholic form) you could get a lead on this question. Or,
alternately, if you considered Bogomil theology; the two are not
interchangeable but I think that the influence of the Eastern heresy
upon the development of Catharism in the West is pretty well accepted
these days (isn't it?).
As a last point, since I cannot resist putting my two cents in on the
question of Cathar belief -- we should be very very cautious in
portraying Cathar dogma in a unified manner. We all know about the
regional differences/disputes, but there is ample evidence that
believers were pretty unclear on any number of fairly substantive
theological points (much as Catholic believers were at the time). In
short, what one perfect proclaimed as "correct" in one region may
well have not been believed by the Cathar believers there or may have
been believed in a creative way).
Cheers,
Nicole
Dr. N. M. Schulman
Assistant Professor, Department of History
Ohio Wesleyan University
Delaware, OH 43015-2398 U.S.A.
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