The Bogomil Bible
About a lost gospel
7/15/20251 min read
The Bogomil Bible
Active roughly between the 10th and 15th centuries, the Bogomils were dualists or Gnostics. They held some intriguing beliefs, considering the body to be their temple and rejecting traditional churches and their hierarchy. They also had significant political tendencies, showing resistance to state and church authorities, which actually helped their movement spread across the Byzantine Empire and into various parts of Europe.
Now, here's where it gets complicated: much of what we know about the Bogomils comes from sources that were decidedly hostile. Take Cosmas the Priest's "Treatise Against the Bogomils", for instance. This work accused them of things like hating the local rulers and advising serfs not to work for their masters. Supporters of some theories argue that these allegations about Bogomil doctrines are largely false precisely because the sources are so hostile.
Adding to the mystery, their actual Bible has never been found. While there are a few religious writings attributed to them, a significant amount of information comes from oral stories. These were notably gathered by a teacher in Northern Romania more than a hundred years ago. In fact, these very stories are being used today in an attempt to recreate this lost bible. We will focus on these stories next.
Enkolpion: The Legacy
A novel by LJ Palas
Mitch is a gifted young physicist in Chicago, recruited to work on a classified project under the guidance of Igor, an enigmatic Russian mathematician. When Igor dies suddenly in what is labeled a suicide, Mitch senses the truth is far more complicated. His company responds with massive layoffs—yet Mitch is inexplicably spared and even promoted, a reward that feels more like a warning.
Still reeling from a devastating car accident that nearly killed him and claimed the life of his girlfriend, Lily, Mitch tries to piece his life back together. Memories of her haunt him: their travels, their shared passions, and especially the strange gifts she left behind—a rare edition of Malory’s Arthurian tales and an ancient Cyrillic manuscript filled with cryptic codes and mysterious chapters.
As Mitch unravels the manuscript, he finds uncanny parallels between its stories and his own unraveling reality: apocryphal accounts of Archangel Michael’s battle against the forces of darkness, secret grail traditions, and a cycle of conflicts fought across centuries. His dreams are filled with visions of Arthur’s knights, while in the waking world he faces suspicion from the police, who connect him to a crime he did not commit. A powerful lawyer shields him, but Detective Rogers quietly warns Mitch that Igor may have been murdered—and that Lily’s “accident” may not have been an accident at all.
Determined to uncover the truth, Mitch hires his own detective and discovers a chilling conspiracy: impostors framing him for murder, shadowy figures linked to his company, and ties between the manuscript’s tales and a hidden war still being fought. Sword against sword. Light against darkness. Science entangled with myth.
When Mitch saves a man who holds vital knowledge about this battle, the world of legend collides with his own in ways he never imagined. Ancient weapons, sacred relics, and secret societies converge, all orbiting around a single, terrifying truth: a cosmic struggle is being waged in the shadows of modern life, and Mitch may be destined to stand at its center.
Blending the pulse of a contemporary thriller with the mystique of Arthurian legend and apocryphal lore, this novel delivers a journey that is at once intellectual, spiritual, and action-packed. It asks: how much of myth is history, how much of history is prophecy—and when the lines blur, who will rise to fight?
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