Once they have mastered phonics they will be able to spell most of the new words that they hear. By using a systematic synthetic phonics approach almost all children will become independent and confident readers quickly.

Your child will move away from mechanically identifying and blending the letter sounds (known as decoding) and begin to read fluently even when they are confronted with words they have never seen or heard before.

Studies Support The Importance Of Synthetic Phonics Teaching

A National Reading Panel was established in the USA to assess the effectiveness of the different approaches that are used to teach children to read. The panel looked at the different approaches for two years and a key area of interest was the role of using phonics to teach reading to children.

ItBUILDING CULTURAL CAPACITY CORE DESCRIPTION: The goal of the Building Cultural Capacity Core is to adapt assessment and intervention methodologies for utility with different ethnic assessment and intervention methodologies for utility with different ethnic groups, to develop strategies for building community ties with ethnic subgroups, and to enhance access to culturally salient preventive interventions by under-represented groups, through two multi- component projects: The Northwest Indian Prevention Intervention Research Center (NIPIRC) and the Adaptation of Assessments and Theory for Hispanic Families (AATHF) project. The vision of the NIPIRC is to prepare tribes in the Northwest region for the development of their own regional prevention and intervention research center. The encompassing goal of the AATHF pilot study is to develop strategies for the establishment of community links with Hispanic families


old breaker, in retrospect, correlated with heavy rain (not uncommon in Oregon).

Update:
I found the water entry point. There is an outdoor outlet on the same side of the house as the one that failed inside. Apparently this indoor box was feeding the outside one. I had looked at the outdoor box already, but it seemed dry. However, as soon as I loosened the bottom screw holding the receptacle in, water came pouring out. The end of the cable inside had been immersed in water, but apparently had no nicks in the wire sheath. Once this water wicked to the inside it cleverly located a nick in the hot wire from eleven years ago when the house was built. In celebration of locating the long lost nick in theThe Grizzlies have given Lionel Hollins permission to speak to other teams after initial talks between Memphis and the coach stalled over what one source described as "major philosophical differences."

Hollins' contract with the Grizzlies expires at the end of the month. Both he and the team have said they hoped he would return to build on the most successful season in franchise history. But initial conversations on a new contract haven't been productive, leading the Grizzlies to give him permission to speak with other teams on Sunday.

The Brooklyn Nets and Los Angeles Clippers each have interest in Hollins, but no team has formally requested permission to speak to Hollins yet, a source familiar with the situation said Sunday.

Hollins told ESPN last month that Grizzlies management came to him


said. "Now I'm trying to go to bat for him, try and keep him here."

ESPN.com's Marc Stein reported in early April that Grizzlies management wants to retain Hollins, even after the coach's initially angry reaction to the late-January trade of Rudy Gay to Toronto. Yet it remains to be seen how much Memphis is willing to spend to keep him.

Doubts about Hollins' willingness to work for new Grizzlies owner Robert Pera and CEO Jason Levien have likewise been in circulation since the coach's multiple critiques of the Gay deal in its immediate aftermath. Sources told ESPN.com that Hollins' relationship with star forward Zach Randolph has been strained at times throughout the season as well.

Stein reported last month that assistant coach Dave Joerger would receive strong consideration to takeover the rear wheels of the tractor.
The tractor portion of the transport truck includes a disk, oftentimes referred to as a fifth wheel, located atop the horizontal bed of the tractor. A pin located under the front of the semi-trailer locks into the disk for attaching the semi-trailer to the tractor while the platform provides support for the front end of the trailer. The semi-trailer is quickly detached from the tractor by disconnecting the connection with the pin. This allows the tractor to connect with and haul a second semi-trailer while the first semi-trailer is being unloaded.
The standard tractor-trailer assembly is quite large, rendering movement of the tractor-trailer assembly down a narrow roadway all but impossible.
A need exists for a cargo carrier attachment and cargo carrying container for


Teen Robbed At Cash Machine - By Classmate's MUM!

When 17-year-old Blair McCarron was mugged at a cash machine she was understandably shocked.

But that was nothing compared to her shock when she recognised the person who tried to rob her: her classmate's MUM!

Blair McCarron, of Deltona, Florida, returning to her car after stopping by a Bank of America ATM when she was grabbed from behind and had her face smashed into the steering wheel.

But as the attack continued, the teen recognised the suspected mugger was classmate's mother, Tammy Perras, 45, and shouted her name.

The mother then stopped the assault - and Blair gave Perras $5 to get rid of her.

On the 911 call released by police, the victim described the assault, saying: "She grabbed me by the back ofmy head and hits my head on the steering wheel, and she tries to, like, jump in the car with me."

Blair told police that as Perras struck her, she threatened to kill the girl and steal all her belongings.

At that moment, however, the teen turned around. "I kicked her off me, and I realised it my friend's mom," she said.

The mother then allegedly tried to convince Blair not to press charges against her, insisting that the entire incident was a 'joke'.

She then told her that her daughter was unemployed and she needed money to buy diapers for her grandchild.

But Blair said: "I'm a mom and I'm working two jobs, seven days a week to support my kid and you're not going to come try to take something that


a hydrogen atom, a halogen atom
(fluorine, chlorine atoms, etc.), a nitro group, a hydroxyl group, a lower alkoxy group, a phosphoric acid ester (a substitute formed on phosphoric acid esterification with a hydroxyl group: xe2x80x94OPO3H2, hereinafter the same), a phosphoric acid amide (a substitute formed on phosphoric acid amidation with an amino group: xe2x80x94NHPO3H2, hereinafter the same), an amino lower alkoxy group, a lower alkyl amino lower alkoxy group, a di-lower alkyl amino lower alkoxy group, a mercapto group, a lower alkyl thio group, an amino group, a lower alkyl amino group, a di-lower alkyl amino group, a lower alkyl group, an amino lower alkyl group, a trifluoro methyl group, a lower alkanoyl group, a lower alkanoyl amino group and an amino acid acylamino group, X denotes aadministration of the platinum compound, such as Cisplatin or the other platinum coordination compound.
The antitumor agent of the present invention may comprise a pharmaceutical preparation comprising at least the stilbene derivative and the platinum coordination compound as described above, such that the two active ingredients may be contained as a mixture in the pharmaceutical preparation. However, the two active ingredients in the present invention may also be contained separately in distinct pharmaceutical preparations used in combination. It is noted that such a pharmaceutical preparation containing other agents (third and fourth medical ingredients and so on) such as other antitumor agents, may naturally be encompassed by the present invention, insofar as the effective ingredients used in the present invention are contained in the pharmaceutical preparation. Moreover, it is possible


ScienceDaily (Aug. 27, 2009) — Candomblé, a religion practiced primarily in South America and inspired by older African beliefs, makes much use of animal sacrifice. Researchers writing in the Journal of Ethnobiology and Ethnomedicine carried out interviews with priests, priestesses and adherents of the religion, documenting the role sacrifice plays in their beliefs.

Nivaldo Léo Neto, from the Universidade Estadual da Paraba, Brazil, worked with a team of researchers to carry out the structured and semi-structured interviews. He said, "A total of 29 animal species were used during sacrificial rituals, according to the priests and priestesses. Animals are sacrificed and offered to their deities, known as orishas, for the prosperity of all life".

The practice of sacrifice is present in several cultures, and is fundamental to many religions including Judaism,The transition of the European Proteomics Association into the future.
The following report provides an overview of the discussions and outcome of the EuPA General Council meeting that took place in Estoril 20-21 October 2010. During the annual meeting future policy and action plans in a variety of areas are decided. Several important points were decided upon during this meeting including the expansion of the EuPA Executive Committee by introducing a new EuPA committee - EuPA Developments - that will initially spearhead activities in standardisation, imaging ms and biobanking. The EuPA General Council also invited Russia as its 17th member. More details about these and additional activities are presented in the article.


Scientist Award from the Minister of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, Japan, in 2005. His research interests are in the areas of information and communication theory, statistical mechanics of information processing, machine learning, and neural networks. He is a member of the IEEE, the Japanese Neural Network Society, the Acoustical Society of Japan, the Physical Society of Japan, and the Architectural Institute of Japan.

[^1]: This paper was presented in part at [@mori2010cpq; @mori2010non]. The work of R. Mori was supported by the Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research for JSPS Fellows (22$\cdot$5936). The work of T. Tanaka was supported by the Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C), JSPS, Japan (22560375).

[^2]: R. Mori is with the Department of Mathematical and Computing Science, Graduate School of Information Science and Engineering, Tokyo Institute ofnight, and players were asked to take off their bandannas. The Transylvania Gaming Society, a student organization, agreed Monday to cancel the game early and think of new ways to identify players the next time, said Bob Brown, associate dean of student affairs.

He said a security camera captured the interaction, but the video was grainy, and it was hard to make out details of the vehicle or the men inside.

The game began Friday and was scheduled to end Tuesday. Brown said 20 or fewer Transylvania students had participated.

"The students who do play it are really passionate about it," he said.

Humans vs. Zombies began in 2005 on the campus of Goucher College in Maryland. The idea spread through social media, and the game is now played by more than


700 registered groups, said Max Temkin, a co-founder of the game, which has a national organization.

College students play it to relieve stress, learn teamwork and act out fantasies of surviving during a zombie apocalypse — a concept made popular by horror movies and, more recently, The Walking Dead comics, created by Kentuckian Robert Kirkman, and the hit AMC TV show that it spawned.

Players on the zombie team typically seek out and tag "human" players, who defend themselves with foam weapons, such as NERF blasters and pool noodles, or by throwing marshmallows or rolled-up socks.

Zombies who are hit may not chase or tag humans for a short time. Humans who are tagged become members of the zombie team.

According to the rules on the game's official Web site, Humansvszombies.org, aTrichotropis bicarinata

Trichotropis bicarinata is a species of small sea snail, a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Capulidae, the cap snails.

Distribution

Description

The maximum recorded shell length is 37 mm.

Habitat
Minimum recorded depth is 10 m. Maximum recorded depth is 475 m.

References

External links

Category:Capulidae
Category:Gastropods described in 1825


Sam Houston Statue Herman Park Houston, TX designed by Enrico Cerracchio in 1924 and dedicated in August 1925. Located at the Northwest entrance to Herman Park and across the street from the Houston Museum of Natural Science. Copyright 2014 Douglas … Continue reading →

Willow St Pump Station Sunset 811 North San Jacinto 77002 Shot just below the main building of Houston’s first sewer system, Near the confluence of White Oak Bayou and Buffalo Bayou. It is also the location of the Allen Brothers’ … Continue reading →

Rosemont Bridge Sunset over Buffalo Bayou Downtown Houston, TX Skyline Rosemont Bridge is a hike and bike crossing over Buffalo Bayou east of Montrose at the bottom of the Memorial by Windsor. The bayou is high after a flooding night … Continuereading →

Rosemont Bridge Night over Buffalo Bayou Downtown Houston, TX Skyline Rosemont Bridge is a hike and bike crossing over Buffalo Bayou east of Montrose at the bottom of the Memorial by Windsor. The bayou is high after a flooding night … Continue reading →

Gigapan Houston Skyline Dusk Jensen St. Bridge over Buffalo Bayou 77003 2-23-14 Copyright, 2013 Douglas Robertson for Citizen Doug Productions See it on the gigapan site See more gigapans by Citizen Doug

BBVA Compass Stadium Downtown Houston Night. A soccer-specific stadium, home to the Houston Dynamo, a Major League Soccer club, the Houston Dash of the National Women’s Soccer League, and to Texas Southern Tigers football. The stadium is located on a … Continue reading →

Gigapan of the Downtown Houston Skyline Sunset to Night from


the Seattle-Tacoma International Airport to add advanced biometric and smartcard capabilities to the airport's existing ID system for secure access control. Meanwhile, Iridian Technologies recently announced the deployment of iris recognition cameras in the school district of Plumstead, New Jersey, to help improve school safety by controlling admission to buildings. And, Saflink Corporation, a biometric security solutions integrator and developer, with the help of SecuGen fingerprint sensors, contracted with Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Rhode Island last year to offer up fingerprint access for employees to safeguard patient medical records and other critical corporate data.

Other leading vendors all have their news of customer wins in the U.S., Europe, Asia Pacific and other regions to share. Indeed, proponents of biometric technologies would argue that the list of recentFire at technology company in Sunnyvale investigated

Investigators are looking into the cause of a fire that damaged a technology company in the South Bay.

Flames tore through the Kortek Technology Integration building on Sobrante Way and Central Expressway in Sunnyvale.

Firefighters had to cut their way into offices and break down doors to gain entry. It took over an hour to put the fire out.

Several offices were damaged. The thick black smoke could be seen for miles.

"It was a considerable fire," said Battalion Chief Jeffrey Plecque. "One of the things that made this more significant was that the fire did vent through the roof of the building, and that lets the flame and the smoke to exit out the top of the building."

Fire crews say the business was closed at


2020 Raiders Draft Prospect

Name: Jalen Reagor

Position: Wide Receiver

School: Texas Christian University

Height: 5’11”

Weight: 195 pounds

Stats

Speed

Wide receivers, by nature, should possess the ability to run. With that said, Reagor is more than fast. His burst, and ability to get to third gear in a hurry becomes readily present. Reagor, at times, during his career in Fort Worth, actually needed to slow down and wait for the ball. Then, he adjusts and immediately streak down field.

Hands

As mentioned, Reagor had to dealt with inconsistent quarterbacks. The velocity and accuracy affects talent. That being said, Reagor needs to clean up a little of this aspect. By stabbing the ball and cleanly plucking it, that extra time will allow for extra yardage. At the next level, he will see an increase in velocity andunder six feet, Reagor win jump balls versus taller corners, with ease.

Intangibles

The son of former All-American and Super Bowl champ Montae Reagor, the younger grew up around the pro game with NFL players. Additionally, former NFL quarterback Jon Kitna coached Reagor at Waxahachie (TX) High School. The moment as a professional should not be too big or overwhelming for him.

Raiders Fit

Granted, Reagor may not possess the physical profile of what Jon Gruden would consider a Raiders receiver. Yet, knowing Gruden and Mayock’s attention to gut feeling, they will consider drafting Reagor in Day Two. In Reagor, the Raiders could see as close as they could draft in Tyreek Hill, without the baggage. Now, Reagor may not match Hill’s elite speed, he matches the competitive streak and could rate


Australians born of Australian parents will soon be a minority.

The census shows Australia reached a "tipping point" in 2016 where only slightly more than half its residents had two Australian-born parents.

The long-term low of 50.7 per cent is a step down from 54 per cent in 2011 and 57 per cent in 2006.

More than a quarter of Australia's population in 2016 was born overseas (26.3 per cent, up from 24.6 per cent) and for the first time since colonisation, most of the overseas-born came from Asia rather than Europe.News

UNICEF/Clarke for UNOCHA | A student stands in the ruins of one of his former classrooms, which was destroyed in June 2015, at the Aal Okab school in Saada, Yemen. Students now attend lessons in UNICEF tents nearby.

An escalation in fighting, increasing obstacles to aid delivery and lack of food and fuel, is compounding Yemen’s dire humanitarian crisis, the United Nations top relief official warned on Thursday, calling on all parties to the conflict to end the violence.

Across Yemen, more than 22 million people are dependent on humanitarian assistance or protection, of whom around 8.4 million are severely food insecure and at risk of starvation.

“If conditions do not improve, a further 10 million people will fall into this category by the end of the year,” cautioned Mark Lowcock,


the UN Emergency Relief Coordinator, in a statement.

The threat of a resurgence in deadly cholera, together with watery diarrhoea also looms, which infected over 600,000 people during the last outbreak, he added.

Of particular concern is the situation of Yemen’s children – one in four are out of school, not only deprived of education but also at risk of recruitment by armed groups and exploitation.

Amidst worsening suffering in the war-torn country, humanitarian agencies are also facing increasing restrictions on their work, said Mr. Lowcock.

“Humanitarian staff are being detained and intimidated and visas are being delayed and denied. Programmes and missions are being interfered with in ways which contradict humanitarian principles,” he added, calling on the Government to act on the assurances it made in the past and lift restrictions.

Mr.Lowcock, who is also the UN Humanitarian Affairs chief, said that imports of aid and commercial food has declined recently.

“Confidence among commercial shipping companies has eroded due to delays, including as a result of inspections undertaken by the Saudi-led Coalition after these vessels have been cleared by UNVIM,” he said.

The UN Verification and Inspection Mechanism for Yemen – UNVIM for short – was established to facilitate commercial shipping in and out of Yemeni ports, in order to manage clearance requests and coordinate inspection of cargo at the ports of Hudaydah, Saleef and Ras Isa.

Mr. Lowcock said that humanitarian agencies stand ready to increase their delivery of assistance to the people of Yemen, and called on all warring parties to cooperate more, to ease civilian suffering.

“Finally, I urge all


LONDON: The UK is now facing a national shortage of paracetamol, commonly used to fight Covid-19, due to India curbing exports of the drug during the global pandemic. Pharmacists across the UK are being forced to ration paracetamol-containing products to one packet per customer, with many shops completely out of stock of the world's most popular painkiller.On March 3, India restricted the export of 26 pharmaceutical ingredients and the medicines made from them, which included paracetamol, some antibiotics and certain vitamins.Department for International Trade officials in the UK are currently in discussions with their Indian counterparts about easing those restrictions for key British suppliers.India is one of the world’s largest producers and exporters of drugs, with the UK heavily reliant on its supply. India’s pharmaceutical companies source aboutUS secretary of state met Russian president and foreign minister to discuss Iran, Ukraine, Venezuela and Syria.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has said he would like to “fully restore” relations with the United States and believes that his US counterpart Donald Trump wants to do the same.

Putin on Tuesday told US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo he came to that conclusion after a phone call with Trump a few days ago.

The Russian president, speaking ahead of a meeting with Pompeo, also said that his country had not interfered in US elections.

Earlier, Pompeo met Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov in the Russian Black Sea resort of Sochi in hopes of finding common grounds in strategic issues over Iran, Syria, Ukraine and Venezuela.

At a joint news conference following the meeting, Pompeo


In recent years, hybrid vehicles and electric vehicles have receives attention as vehicles developed in view of environments. The hybrid vehicle uses, as drive power sources, a DC power supply, an inverter and an electric motor driven by the inverter in addition to a conventional engine. More specifically, the engine is driven to provide the drive power source, and further the inverter converts a DC voltage provided from the DC power supply into an AC voltage for driving the motor by the converted AC motor to provide the drive power source.
The electric vehicle uses, as drive power sources, a DC power supply and an inverter as well as an electric motor driven by the inverter.
For appropriately driving the vehicle and improving energy efficiency, the hybrid vehicle or thewho contributed to my passion for history and politics. v ABSTRACT OF THE DISSERTATION Iranian Philosophy of Religion and the History of Political Thought by Ahmad R. Motameni Doctor of Philosophy, Graduate Program in Political Science University of California, Riverside, August 2014 Dr. John Christian Laursen, Chairperson The subject of this dissertation is the relationship between Iranian philosophy of religion and the history of political thought. Major turning points in this history can be attributed to the ideas of the ancient Iranian poet, Zoroaster. He preached against raiding nomads who would steal animals for sacrificial purposes. His moral and ethical philosophy is known as Zoroastrianism. As the first monotheist philosophy, Zoroastrianism inspired a unique form of religious toleration. The ancient Zoroastrians opposed the political rivalries attributed to belligerent


city-state gods. This played a vital role in the rise of the Persian Empire. During the height of the Empire, Zoroastrianism was the largest religion in the world. The belief in a single Creator also changed the idea of history itself. By rejecting the existence of conflicting spirits, some human beings no longer perceived themselves as the irrelevant victims of a cosmological struggle. Although Zoroastrianism endured a sharp and dramatic decline after the Muslim conquest of Iran, its legacy lives on. This vi legacy has been unjustly ignored by historians of political ideas. It played a major role in the development of numerous cultural philosophies, and it had more influence on the history of human religion than any other faith. In this study, I will argue that Zoroastrianismis relevant to virtually every philosophy of history. I will also demonstrate how the study of Zoroastrianism by European travelers and philosophers from the sixteenth to the nineteenth centuries influenced the history of German nationalism and helped set into motion the unfortunate events that culminated in the Aryan Supremacy movement. The rise of the Nazi party disgraced the Aryan identity and stigmatized many Oriental traditions, but the remnants of ancient Iranian culture are still admired by the Iranians of today. In the concluding section of this study, I will argue that Zoroastrianism still plays an important role in Iranian political affairs. While Zoroastrians are a recognized minority in Iran, all Iranians, including Muslims and Jews, celebrate Zoroastrian traditions and holidays. Since the establishment of the Islamic Republic of


deserves more attention. The early spread of Zoroastrianism was based on the hymns of an Iranian poet named "Zartusht," otherwise known as Zoroaster. He lived around 1400 BCE. The spiritual connection to the natural world was a key theme for Zoroaster. According to the hymns, published much later in a book called the Avesta, he preached against local nomads who stole animals for ritual sacrifices. Zoroaster's ethical crusade against the local nomads and corrupt priests culminated in a unique form of religious tolerance. Years later, the story of Zoroaster inspired a movement to abolish conflicting spirits and local deities. It played an important role in the rise of the Achaemenian Empire, also known as the Persian Empire (550-330 BCE). At the height of the Persian Empire in thefifth century BCE, Zoroastrianism was the largest religion in the world (Boyce 1984, ix).1 Zoroastrianism originally developed in a pastoral setting three and a half millennia ago and the accounts of Zoroaster describe a major social transformation. The 1 Some estimates of the population of the Persian Achaemenian Empire range from 10 million to 80 million. Most scholars agree to possible figures around 50 million people (Forbes and Prevas 2009, 14). At the low end, Barry Strauss claimed that it was about 20 million people or a fifth of the world population (Strauss 2004, 37). During this period, Zoroastrianism spread as far east as China. 2 setting for his story is a chaotic period of history when wild nomads incessantly raided pastoral areas for the sake of animal


"philosophy" evolved from the critique of the so-called "sophists," who taught advanced rhetoric lessons for a fee. Philosophy means love for wisdom, and use of the term emphasized that the search for wisdom is separate from the desire for material gain. Consequently, a philosopher will try to evaluate religious claims, such as the 2 A common assumption in the scientific study of religion is that theories of religion are useful only insofar as they are true. According to the "myth-ritualist theory," religion is primitive science: through myth and ritual, which operate together and constitute its core, religion magically manipulates the world. Modern skepticism toward the two, especially toward rituals, has perhaps resulted in an underestimation of their significance, especially in modern religion (Segal 1980, 173). 3 Philosophy ofReligion was a relatively novel topic at the beginning of the nineteenth century. Insofar as philosophy dealt with God, it was customarily in the form of a rational theology, as a special branch of metaphysics (Hodgson 2006, 1). In other words, philosophy of religion is an inquiry into human reason itself in order to see whether it possesses the ability of knowing God, and, consequently, contains the possibility of a philosophy of religion (Soldan 1886, 303). 3 existence of transcendent gods. So while Zoroastrianism is typically described as a religion, it can also be interpreted as an anti-ritualistic philosophy of religion. Zoroaster's ideas reflect a stricter form of monotheism in comparison to the religious practices and cultural philosophies of ancient Egypt, Babylon, and India. However, unlike the Abrahamic


religions that would come later, Zoroastrianism did not conflict with other religions. Zoroaster seemed to be a lot more interested in protecting animals than inspiring religious conversions (Yasna 29.1; Guthrie (Tr.) 1914). His ideas evolved from the traditional religious practices of his society, which meant that an attack against polytheistic perspectives would be an attack against the roots of monotheism. In other words, Zoroaster recognized that monotheistic thought was the consequence of a journey that began with polytheism. While the Zoroastrian philosophy was based on a critique of religious rituals and practices, it never justified attacks against anyone's faith and core beliefs. It was defined by action rather than meditation since Zoroaster held that moral reasoning culminates in proper conduct (Boyce 1978, 239). In turn, Zoroastrianism played arole in the general policy of toleration and freedom of religious worship, which is associated with the legacy of Cyrus the Great (6th Century BCE).4 According to Plato (4th Century BCE) and many other historians, the 4 There are some accounts which characterize Cyrus as a bloodthirsty imperialist. Like any other king, his subjects risked death if they challenged his rule. However, in a time when it was common to enslave the prisoners of conquered territories, Cyrus freed the Jews from captivity in Babylon and allowed them to return to Jerusalem. 4 rise of the Persian Empire was partly attributed to the ethical conduct of its early rulers.5 Later, the gradual disintegration of Persian civilization led to the spread of its culture in the form of strict monotheist


thought. In addition to the accounts of European merchants and explorers who visited Iran after the fifteenth century, there are numerous sources which suggest that prior to the conquest of Iran by Alexander the Great (330 BCE), Zoroastrian philosophy began spreading into Jewish and Greek culture and influenced the story of Jesus and the history of Christianity.6 In turn, the dramatic decline of Zoroastrianism following the Muslim conquest of Iran did not end its influence. It continued to shape history and political relations since it was adapted by many people, including the conquerors. The belief in a single Creator altered the idea of history itself. By rejecting the existence of conflicting spirits, the followers of Zoroaster no longer perceived themselves as the irrelevant victims of a cosmological struggle.They accepted an active role in the universe using their reflections on the past as a guide for change. Meanwhile, they unleashed their love for wisdom and reflected on every subject, including the proper form of government and the overall purpose of human history. 5The Persian Empire reached its height of territorial control under Darius the Great in the fifth century BCE. He made Zoroastrianism the official state religion and carried on Cyrus's legacy of religious toleration by funding the construction of non-Zoroastrian temples. 6 In 1697, French Orientalist Barthélemy d'Herbelot published Bibliotheca orientalis and noted that the "ancient Persians have it that Zoroaster was more ancient than Moses, and there are Magi who even maintain that he is none other than Abraham and call him Ibrahim Zardusht"


(d'Herbelot 1697, 931). 5 In this study, I will review the relevant literature on Zoroastrianism and the history of philosophy before I explain the connection between Zoroastrianism and philosophy of history. Philosophy of history consists of speculation about a common theme or purpose in history through reflection on the story of human existence in its entirety. Although it is a separate subject, it inevitably overlaps with the history of philosophy. The main feature of Zoroastrian philosophy is that it emphasizes the power of the Universal Spirit (Mind).7 This is the first main reason why Zoroastrianism is relevant to the study of philosophies of history. Many notable post-Enlightenment philosophers either used the Universal Spirit as a key component in their outline of history or called for its rejection. Thetheory of the Universal Spirit recognizes that the world's creatures are united by a creative purpose. It is personified by the universal culture of God worship, which is rooted in Zoroaster's devotion to Ahura Mazda (The Creator of Truth). Zoroastrianism is also relevant to the philosophy of history due to its role in shaping distinct phases of history. Zoroaster proclaimed a new era in human history by declaring the existence of a single Creator. Since the Enlightenment, most philosophies of history have described a progressive process characterized by distinct phases.8 The author of one of them, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, claimed that there were four 7 The philosophical and linguistic connection between Mind and Spirit is rooted in the Zoroastrian term for humanity's ability to think, which is


"Mainyu." 8 The list of influential Enlightenment and post-Enlightenment authors associated with a progressive philosophy of history includes Johann Gottfried Herder, Immanuel Kant, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, and Karl Marx. 6 phases of history defined by the rise and decline of spiritual life. In his Lectures on the Philosophy of History, he asserted that the first phase of history began in the "Oriental World" and was highlighted by Zoroaster's discovery of the Universal Spirit. Zoroastrianism is also connected to the dialectical tradition of juxtaposition and interaction. The hymns of Zoroaster illustrate how monotheist thought is rooted in an epic battle between conflicting spirits. The prose and content is characterized by the ancient view of progressive motion based on a process of thesis, antithesis, and synthesis. As it says,"In the beginning, both Mentalities became conscious of each other, and while the deceitful one chose to perpetrate evil, the most Holy Spirit chose the truth, just like the followers of Ahura Mazda" (Yasna 30.3-5; Guthrie (Tr.) 1914).9 This pattern is especially pertinent to the classic debate between idealist and materialist philosophers, which was reignited by Karl Marx's and Friedrich Engels's materialist philosophy of history. Although the materialist philosophy was a critique of Hegelian idealism, Marx used a dialectical method of argumentation, which he attributed to Hegel's works. For Marx and Engels, history was driven by the human struggle against the antithesis of spirit, otherwise known as matter. 9 Kenneth Sylvan Guthrie published The Hymns of Zoroaster: usually called the Gathas, for the first time made entirely accessible


that the study of Zoroastrianism by European travelers and philosophers between the sixteenth and nineteenth centuries contributed to the rise of German nationalism and set into motion the ideas that culminated in an Aryan supremacist movement. During this period, European intellectual history was largely dominated by the legacy of the East-West schism of Christianity and the desire to reconcile religion and philosophy as well as faith and reason. Hegel's writings illustrate this point. Meanwhile, some Germans were searching for an identity that would separate them from the rest of Europe. Like Hegel, they found a synthesis and solution in Zoroastrianism. Although the rise of the Nazi party disgraced the Aryan identity and stigmatized the ancient Indo-Aryan symbols, the remnants of these ancient cultures are still admired among Iraniansand Indians today. Zoroastrianism still influences Iranian and Indian political affairs. Since the establishment of the Islamic Republic of Iran, Zoroastrian traditions and holidays have been used to defy state policies. These traditions and holidays represent the pre-Islamic religious and political identity of the Iranian people which is often expressed during protests against the current regime. Methodology In this study, I will trace the chain of ideas from ancient Zoroastrianism, also known as, to the European travelers and explorers who influenced the Romantic Era German philosophers such as Johan Gottfried Herder, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, and Karl Marx. As I mentioned, between the sixteenth and nineteenth centuries, many 8 European explorers and merchants made visits to Asia and learned more about Zoroastrianism. The Romantic Era philosophers referred to


dissertation is a review of the available sources on Zoroastrianism. It is mostly a review of the few written records that we have, since the Zoroastrian tradition mainly survived through oral accounts. The second chapter is a review of the reports from European travelers and explorers who visited Iran and India between the sixteenth and nineteenth centuries and learned about Zoroastrianism. This chapter mainly involves the interpretation of texts and references in travel writing. It provides an opportunity to learn about the European perspective on Eastern religions, and how the study of those religions affected the religious history of Europe. The first and 9 second chapters are both literature reviews but the point of separating the chapters was to distinguish the sources which can tell us about thehistory of the Zoroastrian religion itself from the sources which can tell us about the European perspective on the Zoroastrian religion, to the extent this is possible. In the third chapter I will attempt to defend the argument that Zoroastrianism is very influential by searching for references to it in studies on the history of religion and philosophy of history. I will also try to interpret the Hegelian view of Zoroastrianism based on Hegel's references to Iranian philosophy of religion. Hegel used Zoroastrian ideas to support a four-stage process of history as driven by spiritual life. The Hegelian view of history is often described as an idealist view of history. The third chapter defends the argument that Zoroastrianism is relevant to the philosophy of history. This chapter is


largely concerned with the history of political thought and the evolution of ideas. It is concerned with the period in which the Zoroastrian legacy was revived in Europe and studied as an influential movement across various periods of history. The fourth chapter is very different from the other chapters in terms of methodology. It investigates how and why Nazi political propagandists appropriated Iranian history and connected it to their ideology. Unlike Hegel, the Nazis were less concerned with the philosophy of religion and twisted the Zoroastrian legacy to fit their racist beliefs. Regardless, without this chapter, the story about the revival of Zoroastrian ideas by European scholars, especially the German philosophers who attempted to relate 10 their culture to the East, seems incomplete. I will investigate this connectionby surveying the references to Zoroastrianism and Aryan religion in the speeches and works of high ranking Nazi officials. The fifth and final chapter examines the role Zoroastrian traditions and rituals play as a subversive religion and form of protest in the Islamic Republic of Iran. I will briefly review the historical connection between Zoroastrianism and the Shia movement to further explain the influence of Zoroastrianism.10 Then I will examine government publications as well as quotes from high ranking officials in the Islamic Republic of Iran which refer to Zoroastrianism and pre-Islamic traditions. In this chapter I seek to show that Zoroastrianism still plays an important role in Iranian politics. While Zoroastrians are only a recognized religious minority in Iran, almost all Iranians, including Muslims and Jews, celebrate


and movements. I will also try to demonstrate why it deserves more attention from scholars who are interested in the history of ideas. After the Muslim conquest of Iran, very little written material was produced inside Iran on the history of the Zoroastrians (Firby 1988, 15). Though this does not deny the importance of such internal material, scholars are forced to rely heavily upon external sources, in particular, upon the accounts of European travelers (Firby 1988, 15). Therefore, the accounts of European travelers and explorers are very important, especially for scholars of Zoroastrianism. These accounts led to the appropriation of many Zoroastrian ideas and philosophies while most historians overlooked its influence throughout the world. Unlike studies which are motivated by a biased Eurocentric view, I hope this studywill be understood as a more cosmopolitan approach to the history and methodology of political thought (Godrej 2011, 3-9). Although the term Orient simply means "the East" and is rooted in the term for the "rising" sun, Edward Said pointed out that the term developed into the Western view of the East, which ultimately defined it as a distinct region from the West (Said 1978, 32). Once it developed into a distinct region from the West, there were fewer restrictions on scholars and explorers who described it as an extremely romanticized and exotic adventure land filled with mysterious cultures. Furthermore, the region known as the East evolved into a theatrical foil, or a tool that 12 could help the West define itself. While the East became a land


of mystery, sensuality, and irrationality in many modern novels and Hollywood films, the West was portrayed as the rational, self-controlled, and civilized opposite. The depiction of the East as a land of mystery and irrationality served to justify the colonial policies of many European imperialists. According to Mary Boyce, a British scholar of Iranian languages who studied Zoroastrianism in Iran, "Christianity and acquaintances with Greek mythology had combined to create in Europe a conviction that polytheism belonged to the childlike past of the human race, having been superseded for all advanced peoples by monotheism" (Boyce 1975, ix). This conviction essentially hindered Zoroastrian studies for Western scholars during its early stages since they found it difficult to reconcile its metaphoric teachings and complex history with the Zoroastrian legacy thatphilosophy of religion. The European travelers who wrote about it largely affected the type of questions scholars asked in Europe in regard to religion, knowledge, and progress. The accounts of the travelers and explorers who learned about the history of the ancient "Near East" would not have been possible without their commercial and material interests. In this study, I will also use arguments from the field of comparative linguistics in order to support some of the cultural ties between the ancient Iranians and modern German philosophers. The development of the field of comparative linguistics was largely influenced by the translation of the Zoroastrian Avesta by the French scholar Abraham Hyachinthe Anquetil du Perron in 1771. The only way modern historians were 14 able to date the language of


the Avesta and begin their attempts to interpret it was by comparing it to Vedic texts. The language used in the Avesta is the only available source for the first form of a distinctly Iranian language. Like the Vedic texts, it falls under the more general linguistic classification of sources for an ancient Indo-European language. In addition, the collection of Vedic and Avestai sources include content which seems to pre-date the divergence between the people who settled on the Iranian plateau and the people who settled in the Indus Valley region. Thus, the comparison of these sources provides insight into the early development of modern languages. The linguistic arguments behind the existence of a proto-Aryan religion are rooted in the acquisition of the ancient Zoroastrian hymns. In turn,the Aryan ideology of the Nazi movement was the culmination of a "perfect storm" of rhetoric in the wake of timeless religious debates and recent advances in comparative linguistics. In the chapter on the influences of Zoroastrianism on German-Aryan Nationalism, I trace the rise of an Ariosophist Zoroastrian cult (established around 1900) and its influences in 1920s Vienna. Ariosophy is best defined as an Aryan supremacist pagan revival movement. In Mein Kampf, Adolf Hitler stated that his experiences in Vienna laid the foundation of his outlook as he studied racist pamphlets (Hitler 1937, 21). It is quite difficult to find direct links between the Nazi Party leaders and the religious millenarian movements since it was politically advantageous for the Nazis to deny such ties. However, there are direct


references to Zoroastrianism and Aryan Christianity in the 15 works of Hitler and Alfred Rosenberg (Hitler 1922, 1 and Rosenberg 1930, 7). This study closely examines the history of political relations between Iran and Germany as well as the personalities and lives of some of the central characters associated with the occult societies in order to propose that the European scholars and explorers from the sixteenth to nineteenth century who attempted to alleviate the tensions behind the EastWest schism set into motion the events that would culminate in an Aryan Nazi movement. Purpose The purpose of this study is to convince historians of political ideas that Zoroastrianism is very influential and deserves more attention. Although it the least well known of the world religions, it exerted more influenceworldwide political thought (Black 2001, 1). While this can be problematic in itself, 16 the problems are compounded when the story is mostly highlighted by ancient Greek and modern European contributions to the chain of intellectual thought. In 2001, Black suggested that while the history of Islamic political thought has been studied by a few, there is a lot more scope for research (Black 2001, 1). He mainly suggested that scholars must investigate Islamic contributions to the history of political thought in order to get a full picture. Similarly, my study suggests that scholars should consider how Zoroastrian ideas affected the history of political thought before and after the spread of both Platonism and Islam. In his 2009 study, A World History of Political Thought, Black included less


than three pages on Iran which was far fewer than any other cultural community listed in his table of contents. The history of several other cultures consisted of twenty to thirty pages. In the few pages on Iran, Black noted the importance of religion in the success of the Persian Empire. According to Black, "the idea of the investiture of the king by the supreme god seems to mark 'the transition from a charismatic notion of power, bound up by tribal society and expressed in the Avesta,' to a new view of monarchical sovereignty as 'in practice unlimited, extending to a successor substantially independent of the priesthood'" (Black 2009, 47). "Iran's adoption of a sacred monarchy was thus part of its political development into a more unified andmuch larger state" (Black 2009, 48). The Iranian regime was more explicitly multicultural than any of its predecessors. Meanwhile, the Iranian king was perceived as a promoter of agriculture with a dynamic relationship with nature. "The Iranian kings sponsored irrigation-works;; this 'politics of 17 water made the farming communities depend on him'" (Black 2009, 48). From Zoroastrian religious ideals came the view that the Persian king is characterized by his 'love of truth' while his enemies and rebels belong to 'the lie'" (Wiesehöfer 2001, 33 and Black 2009, 47). The policies of toleration attributed to the Persian kings inaugurated a new phase in religious monarchy which was the means by which the Persians linked together India, Mesopotamia, Greece, and countless other tribes, with Aramaic as the common tongue


(Black 2009, 48). My dissertation also examines the dualist character of Iranian philosophy of religion and explains how it may relate to the triadic formula of progressive history described by Karl Marx. According to Marx, he learned this formula from Hegel's works since the latter used a triadic method to organize his essays and lectures. In my third chapter, I will offer an argument that close attention to Zoroastrian thought will aid in illuminating aspects of Hegel's work which have often puzzled scholars. A brief comparison of Zoroaster's ancient hymns and Hegel's lecture notes suggests that Hegel's use of contradictory rhetoric was loosely based on his study of Zoroastrianism. Finally, if anybody wonders how and why the Nazis connected themselves to Iranian and Indian culture, this study willprovide a thorough explanation. While the Nazis disgraced the ancient Aryan symbols throughout the entire world, these symbols still remain popular in Iran and India. Although these countries reject the Nazi ideology, Iran still maintains close cultural ties to (post-Nazi) Germany which has been one of its largest trading partners since the early years of the twentieth century. I hope to convince 18 historians that while Zoroastrianism remains influential in Iran to some extent, closer attention to Zoroastrian studies will also shed light on a neglected influence on Nazism, while also locating some of the ideas that shaped our notions of the Aryan culture. The concluding section examines the role Zoroastrianism plays as a subversive religion in the Islamic Republic of Iran and how it might usefully inform


efforts to refashion Iranian politics and identity in the contemporary context. Since the ancient Aryan culture and symbols represent the pre-Islamic identity of the Iranian people, the celebration of Zoroastrian holidays and traditions is a means to defy the Islamic policies of the contemporary Iranian state. Any hope for reform and change within the Islamic Republic must re-define Iranian identity. Otherwise such change could be associated with imperialism and foreign influences, both east (Russia and China) and west (the United States). Nevertheless, many critics of the Islamic Republic are calling for secular reform. They hope a change of the state's laws and institutions will overcome Iran's long history of religious fanaticism. 19 Chapter One Materials for Zoroastrian Studies The influence of Zoroastrianism on the history of philosophy andwhich went into its construction. This chapter also demonstrates how Zoroastrianism spread throughout many different cultures and played a role in the development of Abrahamic religions. Primary Sources The collection of sacred Zoroastrian teachings is known as the Avesta. It includes a set of hymns attributed to Zoroaster, as well as various other oral traditions which 20 preceded and followed his life.11 Based on the pastoral setting and its linguistic connection to Vedic texts, the hymns of Zoroaster may be dated as far back as 1400 BCE (Boyce 1975, 44). The Avesta is the only source for the oldest recorded Iranian language, which is known as Avestai. Nevertheless, it was not recorded in written form until the fifth century CE. The Iranians who lived during the time of


Zoroaster rarely committed their ideas to writing. For many centuries afterwards, they regarded writing as an alien art that was only fit for secular purposes (Boyce 1984, 1). Boyce believed the Avesta was first written in the Avestai alphabet in the fifth century CE, and the oldest extant manuscript has been dated to 1323 CE (Boyce 1984, 1). The Avestai alphabet was developed during the Sassanian Era (224-637 CE) so that there would be written representations of the correct way to recite ancient hymns. The Avestai alphabet was written in an Iranian script known as Pahlavi, which originally evolved from the Aramaic script that was used by the Achaemenians (Persians).12 11 The main source for the Gathas used in this study is The Hymns of Zoroaster: usually calledthe Gathas, for the first time made entirely accessible by transliterated text, translation, dictionary and grammar, introductory tables, analysis, higher and Biblical criticism, complete concordance, and subject index (1914) by Kenneth Sylvan Guthrie. The other sources for the Gathas and the Avesta used in this study include The Zend Avesta: Part One (1879) and Part Two (1883) by James Darmesteter, The Zend Avesta: Part Three (1887) by Lawrence Heyworth Mills, Die Gatha's Des Awesta (2010) by Christian Bartholomae, and The Hymns of Zoroaster (1952) by Jacques Duchesne-Guillemin. Guthrie's translation combines the efforts of the translations by both Mills and Bartholomae. 12 It always ought to be kept in mind in discussing the origin of letters of the Avestai alphabet that Pahlavi and Avestai writing was executed by the


is referred to as the Yashts (Yasts). The Yashts are 21 hymns composed of Younger Avestai. The poetic quality and antiquity of certain verses in the Yashts parallel the Rig Veda and may include content that goes back to 2000 BCE. However, unlike the Gathic sections, they were not exactly memorized. The "less sacred" works were handed down in a more fluid oral transmission, which was partly memorized and partly composed by various generations (Boyce 1984, 2). Thus, the Yashts were ancient verses which included content that survived in the Younger Avestai dialect. The earliest of which are available include content which pre-dates the "prophet" Zarathustra's reform, based on oral accounts that describe the worship and propitiation of the deities of the Indo-Iranian and Iranian pantheons (Stewart 2007,137). "Much of the material contained in them goes back to a more distant time than that of Zoroaster's reform, and scholars have been divided in their opinion as to whether or not the contents of the Yashts reflect a departure from his reform, which would mean that after his death people returned to the former religious system, or whether they can be reconciled with his teachings" (Moulton 1913, 22 197ff, Lincoln 1981, 50, Zaehner 2002, 166, and Stewart 2007, 137).13 The Yashts invoke the pre-Zoroastrian divinities that were converted into metaphoric principles and symbols such as immortality, wholeness, and truth. In contrast, the Yasna is a documentation of older hymns that survived through a stricter oral tradition which preserved both content and style. It includes the "Gathas,"


against the sacrifice of cattle. Boyce noted that although Zoroaster, like most ancient Iranians, was willing to eat meat, he opposed cruel animal sacrifices which were instigated by corrupt priests and raiding nomads (Boyce 1975, 215-216). Zoroaster prayed for "the cattle (perfecting) that pasturage which should fatten It for our food" (Yasna 48.5; Guthrie (Tr.) 1914). In Avestai, the word for food is pitu "meat," whereas in later Iranian languages of the settled period this was replaced by nān or its equivalent, that is, "bread." The Vedic Indians too were flesh-eaters. Even today, despite the general Hindu dislike of taking life, the Brahmans, in their highest ritual, the yajña, both offer and partake of the blood sacrifice (Boyce 1975, 215-216). 14 The list of historians and comparative linguistswho regarded Zoroaster's ideas as the first form of monotheism includes Mary Boyce (Boyce 1975, 44), Martin Haug (Haug 1865, 1, 3, and 15), and Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (Hegel 1991b, 173-174). 23 The Gathas The Gathas refer to the 17 hymns of Zoroaster which begin with the 28th hymn or chapter of the Yasna (Haug 1865, 1). These hymns were composed in 238 verses which consist of about six thousand words. "They comprise seventeen sections of poetical matter, equal in extent to about twenty-five to thirty hymns of the Rig Veda, composed in ancient Aryan meters, ascribing supreme (beneficent) power to the Deity Ahura Mazda, who is yet opposed coordinately by an evil Deity called Aka Mainyu or Angra Mainyu" (Mills 1887, xviii). Based on the pastoral


setting he describes, as well as the linguistic connection to Vedic texts, the hymns of Zoroaster may be dated to the period around 1400 BCE (Boyce 1975, 44). These hymns, along with various other undated fragments of Avestai texts, survived through oral transmission and were rewritten centuries later by the Parsis (Boyce 1984, 3). In a brief outline of the first chapter of the Gathas by Scottish philosopher and writer Kenneth Sylvan Guthrie, "Zoroaster prays for the Holy Spirit, so as to satisfy both the good mind and the Soul of the Bovine Creation" (Guthrie 1914, v). According to his complete translation of the first verse of the Gathas, "With outstretched hands;; and by reverent prayer for support, O Mazda, (mindful) I will entreat as the first (blessing)30.11; Guthrie (Tr.) 1914). For a complete summary and analysis of the Gathas and the Avesta, please see the Appendix to this dissertation. The main lesson we can learn from the Gathas is that Zoroaster lived in a chaotic period of history in which wild nomads incessantly raided pastoralists for the sake of animal sacrifices. Meanwhile, the priests were essentially tricking nomads into stealing 16 In certain sections, Guthrie included varying translations of keywords from both Christian Bartholomae and Lawrence H. Mills along with labels in parenthesis for their particular translation. 27 food for them. Duchesne-Guillemin recognized that "the nomad is a thief of cattle, which he sacrifices and eats" (Duchesne-Guillemin 1952, 5). Although Zoroaster was a priest who underwent formal training, he rebelled against the socioeconomic order


of his society and launched a major political upheaval. This upheaval coincided with the transition from semi-nomadic pastoral society to an agricultural society. In an effort to facilitate this process, Zoroaster preached against raiding nomads, and ridiculed priests who "mumbled" their prayers with little thought to their meaning (Boyce 1975, 12). Based on his belief in a single Creator, Zoroaster urged people to abandon nomadic lifestyles and share natural resources such as water and land. He taught the fertilization of the meadows which makes permanent settlements possible (Duchesne-Guillemin 1952, 5). Although Zoroaster's message was composed in a priestly language, it was meant to be heard by everyone. "Zoroaster's religion was drawn down from the nebulous region of speculation into the clear, sane light of historical actuality which makesit shine all the brighter by contrast with the greater obscurity" (Guthrie 1914, 141). Guthrie noted that "it only adds to his glory that he was willing and able successfully to implant his monotheism, his personal devotion, his passion for righteousness and his humanitarianism among those blood-stained nomads" (Guthrie 1914, 141). Zoroaster was a meditative thinker and a visionary, but he was also a priest, and as we have seen in the Gathas, "he continued to pursue this calling while preaching his new message" (Boyce 1975, 214). As stated in the Gathas, "Zoroaster seeks to be heard beyond the 28 Magians" (Yasna 33.7; Guthrie (Tr.) 1914). He certainly succeeded in this matter. His campaign against raiding nomads and dishonest priests culminated in the first expression of monotheistic thought,


and had more influence on world religions than any other single faith. Yasna "Yasna" means worship and sacrifice (Mills 1887, 195). It is now hardly necessary to say that the Yasna is the chief liturgy of the Zarathustrians, in which confession, invocation, prayer, exhortation, and praise are all combined as in other liturgies (Mills 1887, 195). The Yasna, like many other religious compositions, is made up of more or less mutually adapted fragments of different ages, as well as modes of composition (Mills 1887, 195). As mentioned, the Gathas are sung in the middle of the Yasna starting with the twenty-eighth Hymn. In the first Hymn of the Yasna, the sacrifice commences. "I announce, and I (will) complete (my Yasna) to Ahura Mazda, the Creator, the radiant and1883, 149). "O Mithra, lord of the wide pastures, thou master of the house, of the borough, of the town, of the country, thou Zarathustrotema (chief of the sacerdotal order, the so-called Maubedanmaused). Mithra is twentyfold between two friends or two relations; Mithra is thirtyfold between two men of the same group; Mithra is fortyfold between two partners; Mithra is fiftyfold between wife and husband; Mithra is sixtyfold between two pupils (of the same master); Mithra is seventyfold between the pupil and his master; Mithra is eightyfold between the son-in-law and his father-in-law; Mithra is ninetyfold between two brothers; Mithra is a hundredfold between the father and the son; Mithra is a thousandfold between two nations; Mithra is ten thousandfold when connected with the Mithraicism (Mithraism) (Darmesteter 1883,


may be the source of the trials and initiation rituals of later Roman Mithraicism (Mithraism) (Darmesteter 1883, 119).22 Zoroaster asked Ahura Mazda to tell him how the faithful man shall drink the libations cleanly prepared in order to please Mithra, and Ahura Mazda replied, "Let them wash their bodies three days and three nights; let them undergo thirty strokes for the sacrifice and prayer unto Mithra, the lord of wide pastures. Let them wash their bodies two days and two nights; let them undergo twenty strokes for the sacrifice and prayer unto Mithra, the lord of the wide pastures. Let no man drink of these libations who does not know the staota yesnya (the last chapters of the Yasna): Visperatavo (the first words of the) 22 Early referencesto Christ as the sun, the prevalence of his sunlike halo in Christian art, and the Church's decision to fix the commemoration of the Nativity on December 25 (a day traditionally celebrated by sunworshippers as the annual "birth" of the sun following the winter solstice) all seem to point to some possible "solar" origin of Christianity. More specifically, particularly given the evangelical association of the Nativity with the Persian Magi, they may indicate some possible early contact between Christianity and Mithraism, a Persian religion that flourished throughout the Roman Empire during the second and third centuries, and which actually revolved around the cult of the sun. The correspondence between the Mithraist "day of the sun" and the day claimed by the Church to have been the day of


Zoroastrian scholars compiled mixed sets of prose texts in late Younger Avestai. This collection is known as the Vi Daevo Data (Videvtat), later corrupted to the Vendidad (Boyce 1975, 274). These texts were concerned with the laws of purity, and its name means "the antithesis of evil spirit" (Boyce 1984, 2). This is the only congregational text that is not recited entirely from memory. The ancient Avesta as presented by Zoroaster to Vishtaspa, king of Bactria, was supposed to have been composed of twenty-one books, the greater part of which was burnt by Alexander the Great (Darmesteter 1879, xxxii). After the death of Alexander the priests from the Zoroastrian religion met together, and by collecting the various fragments that had escaped the ravages of the war and otherthat they knew by heart, they formed the present collection, which is a very small part of the original book, as out of the twenty-one books there was only one that was preserved in its entirety, the Vendidad (Darmesteter 1879, xxxii). 34 The Vendidad functions as a code or manual for Zoroastrian priests. As mentioned, it is one of twenty one volumes, but the only one that was preserved in its entirety. It is linguistically distinct from Avestai and Younger Avestai portions of the Avesta which suggests that it was originally composed shortly before the development of the Median and Persian Empires. The Vendidad has often been described as the book of the laws of the Parsis; it may be more exactly called the code of purification, a


description, however, which is itself only so far correct that the laws of purification are the object of the largest part of the book (Darmesteter 1879, xxxiii). According to Mary Boyce, the Videvdat, "the code abjuring daevas, is a collection of miscellaneous pieces of varying antiquity, put together at some relatively late date to form a night office celebrated to smite the powers of darkness" (Boyce 1975, 274). The core sections of the Videvdat concern "the purity laws, to which were added various heterogeneous works such as the first fargard" (Boyce 1975, 274). The first fargard (chapter) begins with a dialogue between Ahura Mazda and Zoroaster. As it says in the first line of the Vendidad, "Ahura Mazda spake unto Spitama Zarathustra, saying: I have made every landdear to its dwellers, even though it had no charms whatever in it, had I not made every land dear to its dwellers, even though it had no charms whatever in it, then the whole living world would have invaded Airyana Vaego" (Fargard 1.1-2;; Darmesteter (Tr.) 1879, 4). "The first of the good lands and countries which I, Ahura Mazda created, was the Airyana Vaego, by the good river Daitya" (Fargard 1.3;; Darmesteter (Tr.) 1879, 4-5). Airyana Vaego (Iran Vaej) refers to 35 the area inhabited by the Aryans. "Thereupon came Angra Mainyu, who is all death, and he counter-created by his witchcraft the serpent in the river and winter, a work of the Daevas" (Fargard 1.3;; Darmesteter (Tr.) 1879, 5). "There are ten winter months there, two


summer months, and those are cold for the waters, cold for the earth, cold for the trees. [So] winter falls there with the worst of plagues" (Fargard 1.4;; Darmesteter (Tr.) 1879, 5).23 Airyana Vaego is the first of sixteen other "good lands" which were described in the first chapter of the Vendidad. "Various suggestions have been made as to why this list was originally drawn up, the most reasonable (in the light of its preservation as a religious work) seeming to be that these were lands which early accepted Zoroastrianism (though later, evidently, than the wholly unknown regions named in the Farvardin Yasht)" (Boyce 1975, 275). 24 "The second of the good lands which I, Ahura Mazda, created, was the plains in Sughdha (Soghd)" (Fargard 1.5;; Darmesteter (Tr.)it must be admitted that the lines devoted to Airyanem Vaejah, which introduce the text, are plainly late in composition" (Boyce 1975, 4 and 275). 36 The third of the good lands Ahura Mazda created refers to Margu, also known as Merv and Margiana, which is an area that overlaps with modern day Afghanistan and Turkmenistan. "The third of the good lands and countries which I, Ahura Mazda, created, was the strong, holy Mouru, [and] thereupon came Angra Mainyu, who is all death, and he counter created-by his witchcraft sinful lusts" (Fargard 1.6;; Darmesteter (Tr.) 1879, 6). The fourth of the good lands refers to Bakhdhi, also known as Bakhtri, Bactria, and Balkh, which is a region in Northern Afghanistan. "Thereupon came Angra Mainyu, who is all death


and he counter-created by his witchcraft, the Bravara" (Fargard 1.7; Darmesteter (Tr.) 1879, 6).25 For a complete summary and analysis of the Vendidad, please see the Appendix. Bactria and Margiana are the sites of the Bactria-Margiana Archeological Complex, which is a modern label for a Bronze Age civilization which dates back to 2200 BCE, and faded away some 500 years later (Lawler 2003, 979). "Four thousand years ago along the banks of the ancient Oxus River, which now separates Afghanistan from Uzbekistan, there were people who lived in vast compounds protected by high walls, produced their own bronzes, ceramics, and stone seals, and traded their wares as far as the Persian Gulf and Palestine" (Lawler 2003, 979).26 "When the Persians arrived 25 Bravara refers to the "corn carryingant" (Fargard 14.5;; Darmesteter (Tr.) 1879, 167). 26 Although these people would have been key players in Bronze Age Central Asia, their civilization remains an enigma due to twentieth century politics. For decades Soviet archeologists labored in this region but revealed little to their Western colleagues, and the 1979 Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and the Iranian revolution closed off those countries for study. Now a growing number of scientists are focusing their attention on what is dubbed the Bactrian-Margiana Archeological Complex (BMAC) to understand its extent and its influence on the neighboring Mesopotamian and Indus civilizations. Material from BMAC 37 in these regions, however, in the mid sixth century BCE, the dominant power seems to have been Bactria; and a legend persisted, down into Sassanian times and beyond,


which associated both Zoroaster and his patron Vishtaspa with the Bactrian capital of Balkh" (Boyce 1975, 275-276). "Presumably this, like the legend which set the kavis in Seistan (Sistan) and made the Hamun Lake holy, was a product of that mixture of piety and patriotism which led various Zoroastrian peoples to associate the prophet with their own homelands" (Boyce 1975, 276). In addition to the Vendidad, there are various composite works and prayers such as the Nyayesh, the Gah, and the Little Avesta that were grouped together with all other major Zoroastrian works which established the "Great" Avesta. The Great Avesta included the sources mentioned above, some of which were previously unwritten. It also included stories about the life of Zoroaster, apocalyptic works, and sources for law, cosmogony,and scholastic science (Boyce 1984, 3). The Great Avesta was completed during the Sassanian period around the fifth and sixth century CE (Boyce 1984, 3). The Sassanian authorities placed copies of the Great Avesta in the libraries of the chief fire temples but they were all destroyed during the Arab, Turkic, and Mongol invasions. However, the scope of its content is known from a detailed summary given in had long been found in archeological sites across the region, but researchers did not know where it originated. The collapse of the Soviet Union and now the cautious re-opening of Iran give Western scientists a chance to explore this neglected culture, which left traces across the Middle East and likely reached far beyond the confines of the Asian steppes (Lawler


2003, 979). 38 the Denkard (Boyce 1984, 4). The Denkard (Acts of Religion) is a massive compilation of very diverse materials concerning the history of Zoroastrianism made in the ninth and tenth centuries (Boyce 1984, 4).27 It was written in the Pahlavi script, which was the written form of Middle Farsi that was based on the Phoenician and Aramaic alphabet.28 The first three books of the Denkard were edited by Adurbad of Emedan, who also wrote the remaining six books which are dated to 1020 CE (Sanjana 1874, 26). Various undated fragments of the Denkard survived through oral transmission and were rewritten centuries later by the Parsis. The only manuscript that is nearly complete is now in Bombay, dated to 1659 (Gignoux 1994, 284). The Denkard includes portionsof a liturgical text, as well as two very cryptic and difficult works on priestly rituals (Boyce 1984, 3). Parsi Sources After the Islamic conquest of Iran, a few members of the Zoroastrian community moved into the mountains where they still survive today in Kerman and Yazd (Mavalwala 1963, 173). In the ninth century, a large group of Zoroastrians left Iran to seek religious freedom in Western India. They are known as the "Parsis" since they were associated with ancient Persia. 27 Dastur Peshotanji Behramji Sanjana, Darab Peshota Sanjana, and Ratanshah Kohiyar published an edition of the Dinkard in Bombay (1874) based on the fragments of the original compilation by Adurbad of Emedan dated to 1020 CE. 28 Iranians refer to their language as "Farsi," which is known


in English as "Persian." 39 While most Parsis attempted to maintain their distinct identity through restrictions on marriage and religious conversion, the majority of them began speaking Gujarati and the scholar priests among them translated Zoroastrian texts from the Pahlavi script into Sanskrit and Old Gujarati (Dhaval 1871, 1-122 and Boyce 1984, 5). "In the late fifteenth century the Parsis, under the leadership of Changa Asa, also called Changa Shah, sought guidance from leading Irani priests on matters of ritual and observance. In 1478 a layman, Nariman Hoshang, traveled by trading vessel from Broach to the Persian Gulf, and thence overland to Yazd. The correspondence thus initiated continued at intervals down to 1778" (Boyce 1984, 117). "In 1599 a Parsi priest [Bahman Kaikobad Hamjiar Sanjana] completed a poemin Persian [known as] the 'Qissa-i Sanjan' [Story of Sanjan]. Celebrating the history of the oldest Parsi sacred fire, it was based mainly on early oral traditions of the Parsis. From this time on Parsi records of various kinds (inscriptions, legal documents, genealogies, etc.) increased steadily" (Boyce 1984, 8).29 It seemed as though the Parsis would never escape Islamic persecution and conquest no matter how many times they moved. According to the "Qissa-i Sanjan," before they left Iran, the Parsis continued to face persecution after moving to the shores of the Strait of Hormuz, and eventually "sailed away and sought refuge on the West Coast of India" (Hodivala 1920, 100, Mavalwala 1963, 173, and Boyce 1984, 120).30 29 An English translation of the "Qissa-i Sanjan" was published in


Studies in Parsi History (1920) by Shahpurshah Homasji Hodivala. 30 "The Parsi founding fathers, who appear to have landed at Sanjan in 936 CE, apparently named this, their first settlement in India, after their home town in Kohistan, in Khorasan. Hormuz is a port on the Persian Gulf, Div an island off the Indian coast" (Boyce 1984, 120). 40 "Islam eventually reached Gujarat, and a Muslim army approached Sanjan, probably around 1465 CE, to 'wrest it from the Rajah (ruler).' The Rajah summoned the Parsis to his aid. They fought heroically and suffered heavy losses, but in vain. The Rajah was slain and the Sanjan seized and sacked" (Boyce 1984, 120). A large share of the Parsi community continued the journey to salvation by heading toward the cityof Mumbai, also known as Bombay. "When in 1640, Bombay began to develop as a great port, the Zarathustrians, or Parsis, as they are most commonly called, began to move into the city where they today constitute a highly respected and prosperous community" (Mavalwala 1963, 173). The Parsis "were invited to settle in Bombay as ship builders, traders and merchants, and mediators between the East India Company and the hinterland; they became an enterprising and prosperous community" (Ganesh 2008, 318). "With the arrival of the Europeans, the Parsi traders now had the opportunity to extend their activities by using the larger ships of the Europeans. In the first half of the eighteenth century, Parsis opened new native trade routes to Burma, Calcutta, Persia, the Arabian peninsula, and China"


India (Mavalwala 1963, 173). The accumulation of wealth by the Parsi community along with their reputation for success inspired Robert E. Kennedy to write an article on "The Protestant Work Ethic and the Parsis" (1962), in which he investigated "whether the Parsis took a proportionately greater part than others in the economic activities of their time and place" (Kennedy 1962, 17). Based on the general values of the Zoroastrian tradition, Kennedy argued that the "'commercial bent of the Parsi mind' is similar to the capitalistic bent of the Puritan mind in Max Weber's study" (Kennedy 1962, 18).31 The Parsis reconstructed the Denkard which helped preserve the Pahlavi textual sources of the Zoroastrian tradition. "During the nineteenth century, lay Parsis published descriptions of traditional beliefs and practices of co-religionists"(Boyce 1984, 8), which includes Parsi manuscripts which date back to 1695 CE, as well as the available Parsi publications from before and after the establishment of the Cama Oriental Institute (Modi 1928, ix and 1). The Cama Oriental Institute was established in 1909 in honor of influential Parsi scholar, Kharshedji Rustomji Cama (Modi 1928, ix). 31 In the Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (1930), Max Weber (1864-1920) argued "that the greater relative participation of Protestants in the ownership of capital, in management, and the upper ranks of labor in great modern industrial and commercial enterprises, may in part be explained" by a "spirit of capitalism" and a culture which values diligent labor (Weber 2005, 3-4 and 31-35). 42 As the socioeconomic status of Iranian Zoroastrians


continued to decline, members of the Parsi community emerged as important institutional authorities concerning religious matters. After the establishment of the Parsi community in India, there were additional waves of migration by Iranian Zoroastrians to India, usually in response to discriminatory policies by religious monarchs, such as the early rulers of the Qajar dynasty (1785-1925). Although the Iranian Zoroastrians who migrated to Mumbai in the nineteenth century form a small and distinct group in Mumbai, the Parsis officially recognize them as part of the Parsi Zoroastrian community (Ganesh 2008, 319). "The Parsis have a thriving diaspora" (Ganesh 2008, 318). "In the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, they had become heavily involved in India's overseas trade in different parts of the British Empire and migrated to Yemen (especially Aden),East Africa, and Hong Kong. A powerful group of Parsis also settled down in Karachi. Later, after independence, like other South Asian communities, they migrated to Britain, Canada, Hong Kong, the United States of America, Australia, and New Zealand" (Hinnells 2005, 138, Lai 2006, 100, and Ganesh 2008, 318-319). In an effort to explore cases concerning the tension between local and transnational communities, Kamala Ganesh published a study on the relationship between Bombay Parsis and the Zoroastrian diaspora (Ganesh 2008, 315). According to Ganesh, "in recent decades, Zoroastrians based in the West, particularly North America, of both Parsi and Iranian origin, have coalesced around certain issues to form a third group, increasingly influential. This diaspora has unleashed a new kind of dynamics, altering the traditional 'big brother' role


43 that Parsis had played in their long history of interaction with Iranian Zoroastrians" (Ganesh 2008, 319). Despite their common religion and culture, there are instances in which Parsis have diverged from Iranian Zoroastrians in regard to social activities. According to Ganesh, "the differences are more obvious in the diaspora, especially among those living in the United States of America and Canada" (Ganesh 2008, 323). For instance, "Parsis accept the authority of the priests in religious matters and see the priest as a man of spiritual power a Hindu influence. Living in the Muslim environment, the Iranians see all authority as lying in the words of the Prophet as revealed in the sacred scriptures; they often speak negatively about the role of the priesthood" (Hinnells 1994, 66 andGanesh 2008, 319-320). "This seems to have left its imprint on the overall Zoroastrian diasporic religious practice, which tends to have more textual, rational, theological, and transcendental elements than Indian Zoroastrianism" (Lai 2006, 101). Meanwhile, "some Iranians claim to follow the faith in its pure form, whereas Indian Parsis are seen as more westernized due to British influence. In addition, they feel the Parsis in India have become too ritualistic due to Hindu influence" (Ganesh 2008, 323). "The Iranian Zoroastrian diaspora is, on the whole, pro conversion especially for Shia Muslims from Iran who may want to go back to their ancestral religion (Writer 1994, 123), and this has somewhat influenced the Parsi diaspora, backed by renowned diasporic scholars such as Kaikhosrov Irani" (Ganesh 2008, 323). "Owing to


diaspora in the West, a similar division exists between the 'fundamentalists' and the 'traditionalists'" (Ganesh 2008, 317).32 Post-Pahlavi Script After the tenth century, the Iranian Zoroastrians abandoned composition in Pahlavi script and began using Arabic script. Although they still used Farsi, they steadily adopted more Arabic synonyms and loanwords. During this period, the Zoroastrians of Iran were highly persecuted and gradually reduced to a poor and intellectually isolated minority. In turn, their energies were focused on the survival of their community and the preservation of their core teachings (Boyce 1984, 5). Phillip G. Kreyenbroek suggested 32 "The Parsi case is important in another sense too in the context of India's religious pluralism as well as the many examples of coercive power of religious and caste communities and thelack of intra community dissension. The long standing struggle of Asghar Ali Engineer for internal democracy among Dawoodi Bohras is a striking example of one individual questioning the hold of another individual an autocratic leader over an entire community" (Ganesh 2008, 317). 45 that Zoroastrianism stopped evolving a few centuries after the Islamic conquest of Iran due to the struggle for survival of the Zoroastrian community (Kreyenbroek 2001, viii). In 2001, Kreyenbroek and Shehnez N. Munshi published Living Zoroastrianism based on interviews with urban Parsis in Bombay, India (Kreyenbroek 2001, vii). As mentioned, from the fifteenth to the eighteenth centuries, Iranian and Parsi priests sporadically sent letters to each other concerning matters of ritual and observance (Boyce 1984, 5). The Iranian answers to Parsi questions were preserved, and


they shed valuable light on the religious life of the community (Boyce 1984, 5). They are known as the "Persian Rivayats" (Dhabar Ed. 1999) which are hundreds of pages (Boyce 1984, 5). During this period a variety of European merchants and travelers recorded their encounters with Zoroastrians in Iran and India. A few notable accounts that will be examined in the following chapter include the works of Raphael Du Mans, Jean-Baptiste Tavernier, Jean Chardin, and Abraham Hyacinthe Anquetil du Perron (Du Mans 1660, Tavernier 1679, Chardin 1711, and Anquetil du Perron 1771). Political Records There are historical records as well as linguistic evidence which suggest that the Western Iranian tribes such as the Medes and the Persians adopted Zoroastrianism from the Eastern Iranian people (Boyce 1984, 7).33 Thefaith passed on from the Medes to the 33 The structure of the Eastern and Western Iranian languages supports the view that Zoroastrianism originated in Eastern Iran. The Iranian languages are classified under the Indo-Iranian branch of IndoEuropean languages (Rask 1834, 3, Testen 2011, 289-290, and Bertoncini et al. 2012, 391). The Eastern 46 Persian Achaemenians, who ruled over the greatest empire in the ancient world. Their dynasty lasted from 550 to 330 BCE and their inscriptions make numerous references to Zoroastrianism. According to Darius's inscription at Bisutun (Gershevitch 1985, Image 34), Cyrus the Great succeeded as a spiritually enlightened leader through his worship of Ahura Mazda (Column I Section 1-5). Darius also declared himself the ninth ruler of the noble line of Achaemenian Kings, before stating that


"By the Grace of Ahura Mazda am I King; Ahura Mazda has granted me this Kingdom" (Column I Section 5). Ahura Mazda is the Holy Spirit of God for Zoroastrians. The inscription at Bisutun was mainly political propaganda intended to solidify Darius's Achaemenian ancestry, but it demonstrates the importance of God worship in Persian society. Religious toleration was a remarkable feature of Persian rule and Cyrus was a liberal-minded promoter of this intelligent and humane policy (Gershevitch 1985, 412). In an age when it was common for powerful sovereigns to enslave the people of conquered territory, Cyrus freed the Jews from captivity in Babylon and assured their protection (Masroori 1999, 13). After the conquest of Babylon, Cyrus did not destroy temples and statues associated with local deities. Hereversed the conquered king Nabonidus's hierarchical treatment of religion (Cyrus admitted that the accounts of and Western branches of Old Iranian languages are both rooted in the Avestai language but the Eastern branch maintained a closer connection to the protolanguage (Gershevitch 1985, 640). 47 Nabonidus's lack of toleration were greatly exaggerated, but the latter had centralized all the statues of the deities in Babylon to the indignation of both the priests and the people) (Arberry 1953, 6). In turn, unlike the rulers he conquered, Cyrus permitted all cultures to maintain symbols of their gods and worship them throughout his empire. His role in the development of the Jewish tradition was exceptional. He is enshrined as a great liberator in the Hebrew Bible and Jewish history (Laursen 1999, 1).


According to Hebrew scholar Ephraim E. Urbach, the Jews were mostly polytheist during the Babylonian exile and believed their God was superior to the gods of various other city-states (Urbach 1975, 20). Their God was in essence the God of Israel, which was never recognized and referred to as the creator of the world until the Jews were influenced by Iranian culture. Once Cyrus freed the Jews from captivity, some of them settled in Iran, while others interacted with Iranians throughout the Empire. According to Urbach, the Zoroastrians they encountered in Iran inspired their strict monotheist thought (Urbach 1975, 20). Urbach proposed that the Jews moved closer to monotheism because they interacted with Iranians and learned more about dualism.34 In other words, the Zoroastrian faith inspired the Jewsto elevate the God of Israel to something similar to the Universal Spirit, which eventually developed into the Abrahamic God. 34 Dualism refers to the perception that society and nature consist of antithetical forces, or two parts which are in opposition to each other. 48 In regard to the creation of the world, there are striking similarities between some sections of the Gathas (Yasna 44.3 and 44.4) and the Hebrew Bible, particularly the Book of Isaiah (Isaiah 40.26 and 44.24). These sections discuss the creation of the world and the motion of the stars. "Oh Ahura Mazda, this I ask of thee: Who established the sun lit days and the shining stars? Who apart from thee established the law by which the moon waxes and wanes? These things


sources and the second Book of Isaiah, "Thus, we have two closely connected themes, both concentrated in the same eight chapters of a fifteen-chapter work, one of them – political propaganda- absolutely new to the Hebrew tradition and certainly derived from the Persians, the other-the cosmology-never before so important in the Hebrew tradition, but found in Persian material and there expressed in a form strikingly similar to the one it has here" (Smith 1996, 82). In II Isaiah and the Persians, Smith wrote that "the similarity of elements in II Isaiah to elements in Cyrus's proclamation concerning his conquest of Babylon was first pointed out by [Rudolf] Kittel in 1898" (Kittel 1898, 149 and Smith 1963, 415). Kittel suggested that the content was not directly related and thethe very evolution of the most primitive but fundamental and therefore eternal notions of right and wrong, is first of all discernible in earnest activity in the original Gathas, Zoroaster's own contribution to the enlightenment of mankind" (Dawson 1931, vii). "The rules and religious precepts of Zoroastrianism are found in Christian and Jewish creed and practice, [and] they came into existence centuries ahead of Judaism and Christianity, and in fact were relics of the race from which sprang the religions of Greece, of Rome, of Germany, of Scandinavia, and in short, of European countries, and of America, Australia, and other places which Europe has colonized" (Dawson 1931, viiiix). Dawson provided a list of parallel or near-parallel sayings that were Zoroastrian and Judeo-Christian, which constituted almost four pages (Dawson


after death and in future rewards and 51 punishments, have been traced to the religion with which the Jews had come in contact during the Babylonian captivity" (Dawson 1931, x). Boyce suggested that Zoroastrian influence on Judaism can mainly be attributed to Persian propagandists who used a variety of methods to inspire both Second Isaiah and Babylonian priests to have confidence in Cyrus (Boyce 1982, 47). "It would seem, therefore, that Cyrus's agent stressed in his subversive talks with the Jewish prophet [Isaiah] the majesty and might of his Lord, Ahuramazda, and his power to work wonders through his chosen instrument, Cyrus; and that Second Isaiah, rooted in the traditions of his own people, accepted the message of hope and the new concept of God, but saw theUnder the leadership of King Darius, the Persian Empire reached its height of territorial control (Gershevitch 1985, 217). Darius married Cyrus's granddaughter which further solidified his ties to the noble line of Achaemenian rulers (Gershevitch 1985, 226). As 52 Herodotus mentioned in the Histories, "the Persian nation contains a number of tribes [and] the Pasargadae are the most distinguished; they contain the clan of the Achaemenians from which spring the Perseid kings, [and] the other tribes are the Panthialaei, Derusiaei, Germanii, all of which are attached to the soil, the remainder -the Dai, Mardi, Dropici, Sagarti, being nomadic" (Herodotus 1901, 57). Although Darius established Zoroastrianism as the official faith of the Iranian people he followed Cyrus's model of religious toleration and funded the construction of non-Zoroastrian temples (Ezra


5.1-6.15). During this period, various Greek writers also made references to the Achaemenian dynasty and the "Persian religion." Plato mentioned Zoroaster in various works such as Alcibiades (Plato 2001, 121), and Aristotle assumed that he made references to his teachings in The Laws (Boyce 1984, 15).35 According to the Natural History of Pliny, in the fourth century BCE, Aristotle proclaimed Plato the re-embodiment of Zoroaster who he believed lived 6,000 years earlier (The Elder Pliny 2010, 422, Jackson 1896, 1, and Boyce 1984, 15).36 35 According to Werner Jaeger, there are parallels between Plato's four virtues in Alcibiades I and the ethics of Zarathustra. Also, the bad world-soul that opposes the good one in the Laws is a tribute to Zoroaster, to whom Plato was attracted because ofLaertius (CE 2d, 3d century), de Vit. Philos. Proem. 2, similarly quotes Hermodorus (BCE 250), the follower of Plato, as authority for placing Zoroaster's date at 5000 years before the fall of Troy, and, as he adds on the authority of Xanthus of Lydia (Diogenes Laertius 1901, 5). A.V. Williams Jackson suggested that these extraordinary figures are presumably due to the 53 The Achaemenian dynasty ended with the invasion of Alexander the Great even though he portrayed himself as a Persian King. According to Boyce, "it remains remarkable that, although Alexander was a pupil of Aristotle, who greatly respected Zoroaster and the ancient order of the Magi (Boyce 1982, 260 and 280-281), no mention is made in the surviving annals of any encounter between him and a Magus,


nor is any benefaction or generosity attested on his part towards the Iranian priesthood or their places of worship" (Boyce 1991, 12). After Alexander's death in 323 BCE, Iran was ruled by his generals until the establishment of the Parthian Empire. The Parthians ruled from 248 BCE to 224 CE. Their scanty records show that they maintained the Zoroastrian faith (Boyce 1984, 7). There are also Greek and Roman records which make references to Zoroastrian observances beginning with the Persian period up to the Parthian period (Herodotus 1901, 54-63, Xenophon 1891, 146, and Cicero 1971, 245). In addition, the Zoroastrian faith was a major theme in a Parthian court romance called Vis & Ramin which has been re-written several times (Gorgani 2009, 425). Fakhredin Greeks' having misunderstood thestatements of the Iranians, who place Zoroaster's millennium amid a great world-period of 12,000 years which they divided into cycles of 3,000 years (Jackson 1896, 3). Eudoxus, a noted mathematician and astronomer, had studied in Babylonia and had brought back to his friend Plato knowledge of Zoroastrian dualism, arousing his deep interest in the Iranian faith. Eudoxus wished it to be taught that the most famous and most beneficial of the philosophical sects was that of the Magi (Jaeger 1948, 131). There is no reason to doubt that Eudoxus felt a huge sense of loss at Plato's death, and linking him in this way with Zoroaster has been interpreted as bringing them together "as two essentially similar historical phenomena" (Jaeger 1948, 131-133 and Boyce 2005, 11). It was


Aristotle who, led by his doctrine of a periodical return of all human knowledge, first specifically connected Zoroaster with the return of dualism, and thereby put Plato in a setting that corresponded to his profound reverence for him. The doctrine that truth returns at certain intervals assumes that men are incapable of permanently retaining it once it has been discovered, even if it has been known for a long period of time (Jaeger 1948, 136). 54 Gorgani wrote the story as we have it in the eleventh century. According to Abdolhossein Zarrinkoob, it was originally written during the Parthian dynasty, around the first century CE (Zarrinkoob 2000, 22). The Parthian Empire declined due to internal strife and steady conflict with the Roman Empire. It led to the riseof the Sassanian Empire in the third century CE which was characterized by its political exploitation of the Zoroastrian faith. The Sassanians immediately initiated a revival of Iranian culture when they took over. Like Darius, the Sassanians declared Zoroastrianism the official state religion (Yarshater 1983, 134) and referred to their King as the Shahanshah (King of Kings). They strongly promoted the use of the "Pahlavi" script and language otherwise known as Middle Farsi (Yarshater 1983, 644). During their rule, Iranian society became extremely hierarchical. The commoners were used as the sole tax base for an elite class of priests, warriors, and administrative secretaries (Yarshater 1983, 644). Their economy was also weakened by their wars with the Byzantine Empire. These problems left Iran extremely vulnerable to an attack, which


culminated in the Islamic conquest. Although Iranian forces repelled the initial attacks from the mid-Western border, the Arabs eventually penetrated Iran from the Northwestern border after a pivotal victory against the Byzantines. Sassanian rule was highlighted by a major socialist and cultural movement led by Mazdak. Mazdak was the son of Bamdad and gained prominence during the sixth century under Sassanian King Kavadh. Mazdak was known to support vegetarianism and early forms of communitarian thought. During periods of drought when there were 55 threats of famine, Mazdak encouraged the people to loot storage buildings belonging to the aristocracy (Dorraj 1990, 69). Mazdak believed he was a Zoroastrian puritan and strongly criticized religious ritualism and materialism (Yarshater 1983, 150). In some ways, his ideas are comparable to the ancientcynicism associated with Diogenes of Sinope. Like Diogenes, he embraced the human condition and supported altruism (Diogenes Laertius 1972, 39). Mazdak had numerous followers including King Kavadh himself. Opponents of his ideology alleged that Kavadh offered Mazdak a chance to sleep with his wife in order to prove his communitarian loyalty (Yarshater 1983, 150). Supposedly, Mazdak refused the offer after his close friends and the Crown Prince suggested that it was not a good idea. Manochehr Dorraj claims that "any serious attempt at a historical overview of Irano-Islamic populism must refer back to the social thought of Mazdak" (Dorraj 1990, 66). During the fifth century, Iranian priests began to compile an immense chronicle in Farsi translated as the "Book of Kings" or "Epic of Kings." It linked the


Sassanian dynasty to Vishtaspa, who is known as the first King who Zoroaster converted to the faith (Boyce 1984, 7). The early Sassanian Kings and their high priests also left inscriptions which made references to Zoroastrianism. The Book of Kings survived through Arabic translations and the great epic version of it written by Hakim Abol-Qasem Ferdowsi Tusi, who was born in Khorasan, Iran. His epic account of Iranian history is known as the Shahnameh. 56 The Shahnameh was presented to the Kings of the Samanyan Dynasty around the year 1000, and is widely considered the national epic of Iran (Frye 1975, 155). Ferdowsi wrote it with minimum use of Arabic words in an effort to revive the Iranian language. He also waited for the establishment of a legitimateIranian dynasty before presenting it to them. According to, Behrooz Mahmoodi-Bakhtiari, "the [Samanyans] were the first authorities that adopted a scientific and systematic approach to saving the Persian language from a gradual death" (Mahmoodi-Bakhtiari 2003, 251). In turn, the endurance of Farsi as an active language is mainly attributed to the works of Ferdowsi, especially the Shahnameh. Ferdowsi's book documents Iranian history from the creation of the world to the time of the Arab conquest of Iran. It briefly mentions the rule of the Samanyans within a timeline of Iranian dynasties. Most of the heroic characters are Indo-Iranian, and it was largely inspired by previous oral, literary, and mythical histories. Certain Indo-Iranian characters within the Shahnameh were previously mentioned in the Avesta and the Rig Veda (Yasna 32.1;


Guthrie (Tr.) 1914 and Mandala 1.71.7; Oldenberg (Tr.) 1897, 80). Notable Scholars Nora Elisabeth Mary Boyce (1920-2006), a British scholar and professor of Iranian languages, is perhaps the most influential modern historian of Zoroastrianism. She was born in Darjeeling, India. During the 1960s, she studied Zoroastrianism while living in the Iranian villages of Yazd. She became a professor at the School of Oriental and African Studies of the University of London. She wrote as Mary Boyce and is 57 frequently cited by most historians of Iran and Zoroastrianism (Gershevitch 1985, 416, Firby 1988, 7, Clark 1998, xiii, Fried 2004, 223, and Pourshariati 2008, 10). In her book on the Decline of the Sasanian Empire, Parvaneh Pourshariati referred to her as the "late matriarch of Zoroastrian studies" (Pourshariati 2008,10). Nora Kathleen Firby dedicated her book on European travelers and their perceptions of Zoroastrians in the 17th and 18th centuries to Professors J.R. Hinnells and Mary Boyce (Firby 2004, 5). As Peter Clark wrote in the preface for his book on Zoroastrianism, "I acknowledge the enormous influence of Professor Mary Boyce in my studies; the frequent references to her own work throughout this book testify to the debt I, and indeed all students of this remarkable religion, owe her" (Clark 1998, xiii). In the foreword to Clark's book, W.J. Johnson mentioned that "while a seemingly endless series of introductions to the 'major religions' have tripped off the presses, students of Zoroastrianism had, until recently, only Mary Boyce's groundbreaking 1979 'Zoroastrians: Their Religious Beliefs and Practices' for convenient