Äzrua is the supreme god of the Uyghur Manichaean church, the Father of Greatness who reigns over the Paradise of Light. His name, taken through Sogdian from the Iranian Zurwān, marks the syncretism by which the Manichaeans clothed their highest principle in an Iranian dress. Transcendent and serene, Äzrua does not fight the darkness himself; when the powers of the abyss press upon the light he sets the cosmic rescue in motion by evocation, calling forth the Mother of Life and, through her, the First Man Xormuzta who goes down to war. He stands at the apex of the Manichaean hierarchy attested in the Turfan hymns and confessional texts of the West Uyghur kingdom.