It seems certain that he put Mani to death, and probable that he enticed him to leave the shelter of his castle by artifice, thus showing himself not only harsh but treacherous towards the unfortunate heresiarch.

If it be true that he caused him to be flayed alive, we can scarcely exonerate him from the charge of actual cruelty, unless indeed we regard the punishment as an ordinary mode of execution in Persia.
Perhaps, however, in this case, as in other similar ones, there is no sufficient evidence that the process of flaying took place until the culprit was dead, the real object of the excoriation being, not the infliction of pain, but the preservation of a memorial which could be used as a warning and a terror to others.

The skin of Mani, stuffed with straw, was no doubt suspended for some time after his execution over one of the gates of the great city of Shahpur; and it is possible that this fact may have been the sole ground of the belief (which, it is to be remembered, was not universal) that he actually suffered death by flaying.
The death of the leader was followed by the persecution of his disciples.

Mani had organized a hierarchy, consisting of twelve apostles, seventy-two bishops, and a numerous priesthood; and his sect was widely established at the time of his execution.

Varahran handed over these unfortunates, or at any rate such of them as he was able to seize, to the tender mercies of the Magians, who put to death great numbers of Manichseans.