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Zoroaster: Historical Prophet of Iran
Zoroaster (from the Latin Zoroastres, which is modeled after the Greek form Zorastres), also known as Zarathushtra (Avestan language) and Zartosht (Persian), was an Iranian philosopher, poet, and prophet whose ancient inspired hymns and associated works convey his original ideas and beliefs probably first uttered between 1400 and 1200 BC. (1) The religion Zoroastrianism is the “oldest of the revealed credal religions.” A credal religion is a religion that contains an authoritative formulation of its beliefs (the creed) employed in public worship or initiation rites as a brief affirmation of faith. The teachings contained in a creed are termed articles of faith or, sometimes, dogmas or doctrines. (2) “Zoroaster created a community which was united by clearly defined doctrines, shared moral endeavour, and common observances” (more below). (3)
Because of its age, Zoroastrianism “has probably had more influence on mankind, directly and indirectly, than any other single faith,” avers late British Zoroastrianism authority and philologist Dr. Mary Boyce (1920-2006). (4) Born in Darjeeling, India, and educated in England, Dr. Boyce spent 1963-1964 AD among orthodox Zoroastrians of the 24 villages of Yazd in central Iran, a town on the Trans-Asia trade route (Silk Road). Yazd is one of the few major centers of Zoroastrianism culture left in the world. Based on her yearlong experience in Yazd, Boyce wrote her book Zoroastrians to correct what she believed was misguided scholarship about this unique people and their faith. She authored or co-authored many other books on Zoroastrianism; a list of them is available elsewhere. (5-6) Zoroastrianism was the state religion of three great Iranian empires—Achaemenid (550-330 BC), Arsacid (247 BC-224 AD), and Sassanid (224-651 AD)—which reigned for a thousand years in Persia before Arabian-born Islam came to the Iranian plateau. “Iran’s power and prestige lent [Zoroastrianism] immense prestige, and some of its leading doctrines were adopted by Judaism, Christianity and Islam, as well as by a host of Gnostic faiths, while in the East it had some influence on the development of northern Buddhism,” declares Boyce. (4) The number of Zoroastrian communities in the world today is very small; they survive mostly in Iran and India (i.e., Parsis, Parsees). Nevertheless, Zoroastrianism remains “a shadowy but powerful presence in the Judaeo-Christian world,” says Boyce. (7) Some famous Zoroastrians are
Of all the great founders of religions, the historical Zoroaster is one of the least known. (9) Fortunately, some of his writings known as the “Gathas” survive to this day, because they are highly revered sacred texts of the Zoroastrian faith. The Gathas are seventeen hymns composed in the Avestan language. The Avestan language was the language of the Avestan people, as Boyce calls Zoroaster’s own tribe for want of a better name. (10) The Avestan language belongs to the old Iranian language group, as portrayed in the diagram below, where the Avestan group is in the lower right-hand corner of the diagram. The Iranian languages family (to which Avestan belongs) is one of three subunits of the Indo-Iranian family of languages, which itself is a subunit of the Proto-Indo-European family of languages.
The term “Avesta” refers to the compilation of extant Zoroastrian holy texts, which Zoroastrian priests collated over several hundred years, thousands of years ago. The Gathas are the oldest part of the Avesta. Many of the Zoroastrian holy texts have been lost, so that the Avesta is a remnant of them.
The Avestan language is similar to Vedic Sanskrit (the earliest form of Sanskrit). Even though Sanskrit is an Indic language and Avestan is an Iranian language (see diagram), they both share a common ancestor language (Indo-Iranian). By knowing Sanskrit, Avestan becomes decipherable. The earliest Sanskrit texts are Hindu texts of the Rigveda, whose composition philologists have assigned to about 1700 BC onward, according to Boyce. The Gathas say Zoroaster was the son of Pourushaspa, of the Spitaman family, whose members lived in a bipartite society comprised of priests and herdsmen/farmers. The members of this society (say the Gathas) lived a nomadic pastoral existence with small tribal kingdoms. (11) Where did this society dwell? It is likely that Zoroaster and his tribe originated from the Eurasian steppe, a vast belt of grasslands as described elsewhere (12), as did many Indo-Iranian tribes who mass migrated to the Iranian plateau, India, or Central Asia during the second and first millennia BC. (13) World religion scholar Solomon Nigosian pinpoints Zoroaster’s birthplace to what today is Azerbaijan in the Caucasus region of Eurasia, northwest of the area once occupied by the Medes. (9) Zoroaster’s tribe migrated to the Iranian plateau. The Gathas suggest that Zoroaster’s tribe was “poor or isolated, and…not rapidly influenced by the developments of the Bronze Age,” despite living during the Bronze Age.
Zoroaster referred to himself in the Gathas as a “zaotar,” that is, a fully qualified priest. Boyce notes that Zoroaster is the only founder of a credal religion who was both priest and prophet. She continues: In the Younger Avesta [as compared with the Older Avesta, recall the texts were collated over several hundred years], he is spoken of by the general word for priest, “athaurvan.” He also calls himself a “manthran,” that is, one able to compose “manthra (Sanskrit “mantra”), inspired utterances of power. Training for the priesthood began early among the Indo-Iranians, probably at about the age of seven, and was carried out orally, for they had no knowledge of writing. It must have consisted, basically, of learning both rituals and doctrines, as well as acquiring skill in extemporizing verses in invocation and praise of the gods, and learning by heart great manthras composed by earlier sages. The Iranians held that maturity was reached at fifteen, and it was presumably at that age that Zoroaster was made priest. (10) Zoroaster’s own Gathas say that after becoming a priest at age fifteen, he “must thereafter have sought all the higher knowledge which he could gain from various teachers.” “He further describes himself [in the Gathas] as a “vaedemna” or “one who knows,” an initiate possessed of divinely inspired wisdom. According to Zoroastrian tradition (preserved in the Pahlavi books) he spent years in a wandering quest for truth.” (14) During these wanderings, Zoroaster apparently witnessed “acts of violence, with war-bands, worshippers of the ‘Daevas,’ descending on peaceful communities to pillage, slaughter and carry off cattle.” (14) Zoroaster restricted the meaning of “daevas” to ancient gods of war and strife, whom he rejected because they caused painful chaos and disorder among otherwise peaceful and orderly communities of people who lived in balance with nature (e.g., water, animals, plants, rocks). Indeed, Zoroaster believed and preached that daevas were the servants of Angra Mainu, also known as Ahriman, who was the Hostile Spirit who was wicked by nature and choice, who attacked the physical world and is the ultimate source of all evil and suffering, and who presides over hell. (15) Ahriman was probably original to Zoroaster’s revelation (more below). (16) Zoroaster was “conscious himself of being powerless physically” and became “filled with a deep longing for justice, for the moral law of the Ahuras to be established for strong and weak alike, so that order and tranquility could prevail, and all be able to pursue the good life in peace,” writes Boyce. (19) Who or what are the Ahuras? Ahura in Avestan means simply “lord.” There are three Ahuras in Zoroastrianism: Ahura Mazda, Mithra and Apam Napat. Mithra was yazata (Avestan for a divinity or an entity worthy of worship) of the covenant and of loyalty, lord of ordeal by fire, lord of fire and the sun, war-god, and presider over judgment of the soul at death, according to Boyce. (17) Mithra accompanied the sun, “the greatest of all fires, in its daily course across the sky, gazing down as he did so to see who upheld the covenant, who broke it.” (18) Apam Napat, also called Varuna, was yazata (Avestan for a divinity or an entity worthy of worship) of the oath and truth, lord of the ordeal by water and lord of water. He was also guardian of asha, the cosmic principle of order, justice, righteousness and truth. For example, the asha inspires right conduct and regulates the seasons, says Boyce. Vacuna in ancient faith was probably chief Creator, although this identity later moved to Ahura Mazda. Ahura Mazda (Ahuramazda), also known as Ohrmazd, was lord of wisdom and, to Zoroaster, the greatest of the three Ahuras. When Zoroaster was about thirty years old, according to tradition, he experienced a revelation, remembered in the Gathas (Y 43) and a Pahlavi work (Zadspram XX-XXI). Boyce summarizes Zoroaster’s revelation: Zoroaster, being at a gathering met to celebrate a spring festival, went at dawn to a river to fetch water for the haoma-ceremony. He waded in to draw it from midstream; and when he returned to the bank—himself in a state of ritual purity, emerging from the pure element, water, in the freshness of a spring dawn—he had a vision. He saw on the bank a shining Being, who revealed himself as Vohu Manah “Good Purpose;” and this Being led Zoroaster into the presence of Ahura Mazda and five other radiant figures, before whom “he did not see his own shadow upon the earth, owing to their great light.” And it was the, from this great heptad, he received his revelation. (14) Boyce explains, “This was the first of a number of times that Zoroaster saw Ahura Mazda in vision, or felt conscious of his presence, or heard his words calling him to his service.” (15) Boyce continues: “For this, (he declares) “I was set apart as yours from the men to seek the right (asha)” (Y 28.4). It was as the master of asha (order, righteousness and justice) that he venerated Ahura Mazda. This was in accordance with tradition, since Mazda had been worshipped of old as the greatest of the three Ahuras, the guardians of asha; but Zoroaster went much further, and in a startling departure from accepted beliefs proclaimed Ahura Mazda to be the one uncreated God, existing eternally, and Creator of all else that is good, including all other beneficent divinities. (20) (Emphasis added) Perhaps, says Boyce, Zoroaster extrapolated from “the doctrine of the genesis of the world in seven stages, with seven creations all being represented at the yasna [primary liturgical collection of texts of the Avesta and the name of the principal Zoroastrian act of worship at which those verses are recited],” which “postulated primal unity in the physical sphere, with all life stemming from one original plan, animal and man.” If there was a primal unity in the physical sphere, there must be a primal unit in the divine sphere; hence, Zoroaster proposed that “Ahura Mazda, the all-wise,…the wholly just and good,” is the entity “from whom all other divine beings emanated.” (20) Zoroaster was extremely sensitive to the harshness of human life that he had evidently witnessed. He deeply believed that “wisdom, justice and goodness were utterly separate by nature from wickedness and cruelty. Recall that he had a vision of Ahura Mazda at the edge of the stream (see above). In that vision, he also beheld, “co-existing with Ahura Mazda, an Adversary, the ‘Hostile Spirit,’ Angra Mainyu, equally uncreated, but ignorant and wholly malign. These two great Beings Zoroaster beheld with prophetic eye at their original, far-off encountering.” (20) Zoroaster said, “Truly there are two primal Spirits, twins, renowned to be in conflict. In thought and word and act they are two, the good and the bad….And when these two Sprits first encountered, they created life and not-life, and that at the end the worst existence shall be for the followers of falsehood (drug), but the best dwelling for those who possess righteousness (asha). Of the two Spirits, the one who follows falsehood chose doing the worst things, the Holiest Spirit, who is clad in the hardest stone [i.e. the sky] chose righteousness, and (so shall they all) who will satisfy Ahura Mazda continually with just actions” (Y 30.3-5). (20) Ahriman, as noted earlier, is another name for the Hostile Spirit Angra Mainyu. Zoroaster believed that the two primal Beings, Ahura Mazda and Angra Mainyu, made “a deliberate choice (although each, it seems, according to his own proper nature) between good and evil, an act which prefigures the identical choice which every man must make for himself in this life. The exercise of choice changed the inherent antagonism between the two Spirits into an active one….Ahura Mazda knew in his wisdom that if he became Creator and fashioned this world, then the Hostile Spirit would attack it, because it was good, and it would become a battleground for their two forces, and in the end he, God, would win the great struggle there and be able to destroy evils, and so achieve a universe which would be wholly good forever.” (21) Zoroaster believed that death is the most general human affliction and at death, people—men as well as women and servants—could influence their chances of reaching Paradise based, not on power or wealth of offerings, but on the quality of the life they left behind—that is, its goodness and their “own ethical achievements,” says Boyce. (22) “The concept of hell, a place of torment presided over by Angra Mainyu, seems to be Zoroaster’s own, shaped by his deep sense of the need for justice.” (22) Boyce summarizes Zoroaster’s new teachings: Zoroaster was thus the first to teach the doctrines of an individual judgment. Heaven and Hell, the future resurrection of the body, the general Last Judgment, and life everlasting for the reunited soul and body. These doctrines were to become familiar articles of faith to much of mankind, through borrowings by Judaism, Christianity and Islam; yet it is in Zoroastrianism itself that they have their fullest logical coherence, since Zoroaster insisted both on the goodness of the material creation, and hence of the physical body, and on the unwavering impartiality of divine justice. According to him, salvation for the individual depended on the sum of his thoughts, words and deeds, and there could be no intervention, whether compassionate or capricious, by any divine Being to alter this. With such a doctrine, belief in the Day of Judgment had its full awful significance, with each man having to bear the responsibility for the fate of his own soul, as well as sharing in responsibility for the fate of the world. Zoroaster’s gospel was thus a noble and strenuous one, which called for both courage and resolution on the part of those willing to receive it. (22) This brief introduction to Zoroaster’s theology throws some light on the reason he angered and troubled his own people. “By offering the hope of heaven to everyone who would follow him and seek righteousness, he was breaking…with an aristocratic and priestly tradition, which consigned all lesser mortals to a subterranean life after death. Moreover, he not only extended the hope of salvation on high to the humble, but threatened the mighty with hell and ultimate extinction if they acted unjustly…His grand concepts of the one Creator, dualism and the great cosmic struggle, with the demand for continual moral endeavours, may well have been difficult to grasp, and once grasped, too challenging for the ordinary easy-going polytheist,” explained Boyce. (22) After his first revelation, Zoroaster wandered about as an itinerant teacher for the next ten or twelve years in search of a fruitful soil for his teaching. He did not meet with success for a long time. One day he had an inspiration to turn to the court of Vishtaspa in Bactria, writes Nigosian. (23) Bactria was the ancient, very fertile valley of the upper Oxus River (Amu Darya), near present day Termez, Uzbekistan, and Balkh, Afghanistan (see map). Termez is on the north shore of the Oxus River and Balkh (Bactra) is on the south shore. This is exactly the area Robert Byron aspired to reach as described in his famous book The Road to Oxiana (1937). (24) Bactria was originally settled by Indo-Iranians who originated in the European steppe region and mass migrated there and onward to India, Iran, and Central Asia during the second and first millennia BC.
Who was Vishtaspa? He was a king or princely ruler who was wrapped in the “toils of evil religious influence and fettered by the false belief that was rife in the land,” wrote Indo-Iranian Columbia University Professor A.V. Williams Jackson in 1919. (25) “The picture the Zoroastrian texts give is naturally a distorted one, colored by religious prejudice and animosity; but doubtless its darkness is not without reason. Everything is portrayed as bound by base superstition, or under the thrall of dread magic....The court of Vishtasp is dominated by scheming and unscrupulous priests…Especially powerful among these is one Zak…” (25) Zoroaster successfully converted King Vishtaspa, apparently in Balkh. After his conversion, the king became Zoroaster’s ardent patron, as did his wife Hutaosa: together they crusaded for Zoroaster in support of the creed and in behalf of the faith. (25) Indeed, eventually, Vishtaspa withdrew from active affairs in the latest part of his life, and gave himself up to pious pilgrimage or devotion, says Jackson. (26) Jackson believed that, “Viewed in its historic light the conversion of Vishtaspa is the main event of the [r]eligion…The struggling creed now has a royal patron and protector. Zoroaster, therefore, at once proceeds to admonish his new convert concerning the path of holiness. When Zoroaster “chanted the revelation in the abode of Vishtasp, it was manifest to the eye that it was danced to with joyfulness, both by the cattle and beasts of burden, and by the spirit of the fires which are in the abode. A new champion of the Faith, and protector of animal life as well, has been won, and joy reigns supreme. But the demons of Ahriman rush away to darkness.” (27) “With royal authority to back the religion and noble power to support it, the advance and spread of the faith must have been rapid,” concluded Jackson. (28) Zoroaster married three times, according to tradition, and lived in a new home and had three sons and three daughters. His three sons initiated and represented the three classes of society: the priests, the warriors, and the farmers, says Nigosian. (23) Zoroaster remained at Vishtaspa’s court for the remainder of his life, building the organization to support his new divine vision. The Iranian tradition of Zoroaster’s death says he perished at the age of seventy-seven years (29) in the 47th to 48th year of the religion at the hand of a Turanian named Bratrokresh during the Turanian [Turkish] invasion of Iran and the storming of Balkh. (30). Turan was located to the east and north of Balkh [Bactra], Bactria. Ferdowsi, author of Shahnameh (The Epic of Kings, composed around 1000 AD), describes the final scene as follows (paraphrased by Jackson): The army (of Turan) thereupon entered Balkh [Bactra], and the world became darkened with rapine and murder. They advanced toward the Temple of Fire and to the palace and glorious hall of gold. They burned the Zend-Avesta entire and they set fire to the edifice and palace alike. There (in the sanctuary) were eighty priests whose tongues ceased not to repeat the name of God; all these they slew in the very presence of the Fire and put an end to their life of devotion. By the blood of these was extinguished the Fire of Zardusht [Zoroaster]. Who slew this priest [Zoroaster] I do not know. (31)
Zoroaster was martyred, but his disciples organized and perpetuated the faith he founded. Zoroaster’s reputation was high in the classical world. For example, the fifth century BC Lydian (western Asia Minor) historian Xanthus (a contemporary of the Greek historian Herodotus) said that Zoroaster was “the greatest religious legislator of ancient times.” (32) Kriwaczek writes, “[h]is influence was thought to have shaped the view of philosophers from Pythagoras to Plato.” (32) When Zoroaster was rediscovered along with the classics during the European Renaissance, he received the high esteem of scholars writing about the history of civilization and the history of religion, says Kriwazek. In 1700, in fact, “Thomas Hyde, a professor at Oxford University (who coined the word cuneiform for the wedge-shaped writing of the ancient Middle East), collated every reference to Zoroaster that he could find in Greek, Latin, Hebrew and Arabic sources into his magisterial Historia Religionis Veterum Persarum eorumque Magorum (History of the Religion of the Ancient Persians and their Magi).” (32) Indeed, Zoroaster became the “acceptable, even noble, face of pre-Christian religion.” That said, he seemed to be dismissed, even though communities of Zoroastrians still exist today (e.g., the Parsees, Parsis, of Persia and India). The main reason for the diminution of Zoroaster was the devaluation of history from the perspective of ruling Muslim powers “who weren’t in the least interested in the scripture of an unbelieving, kafir, minority.” (33) The tide turned in the eighteenth century with the realization that the Sanskrit language was similar to the language in the Avesta, which could then be deciphered. By the mid-nineteenth century, many scholars had become interested in the contents of the Zoroastrian texts, including Prussian philosopher Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche (1844-1900) who famously brawled with Zoroastrian thought in his notoriously difficult book Thus Spoke Zarathustra (1883-1885). Zoroaster unleashed something in Nietzsche, but what Nietzsche put on paper in the name of Zarathustra has little to do with what Zoroaster exemplifies in the history of thought and religion, in this writer’s opinion. Nevertheless, having once heard the word “Zarathustra,” even as part of the title of Nietzsche’s famous book, few people will forget the name. Perhaps they will have the opportunity to follow up on who the real Zoroaster was and how he helped shape human civilization as we know it today. Notes:
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