Zarathustra and the faith of Ahura Mazda
The prophet Zarathustra (Zoroaster) preaches a faith of one wise god, Ahura Mazda, and of the struggle between truth and the lie, which becomes the religion of ancient Iran.
- Zoroastrians: Their Religious Beliefs and Practices — Mary Boyce, Routledge (1979)
- A History of Iran: Empire of the Mind — Michael Axworthy, Basic Books (2008)
- Sasanian Persia: The Rise and Fall of an Empire — Touraj Daryaee, I.B. Tauris (2009)
Long before Islam, the Iranian peoples worshipped a family of gods related to those of ancient India. Into this world came a priest and poet the Greeks called Zoroaster and Iranians call Zarathustra (in Persian, Zartosht). His seventeen hymns, the Gathas, preserved by oral recitation for many centuries, proclaim one supreme, wise god, Ahura Mazda, and a world in which every person, man or woman, must choose between truth and falsehood.
- Zoroastrians: Their Religious Beliefs and Practices — Mary Boyce, Routledge (1979)
Out of his teaching grew one of the world’s oldest living religions, with fire as the symbol of purity, a moral code summed up in humata, hukhta, hvarshta, “good thoughts, good words, good deeds”, and ideas of judgement, heaven and a final renewal of the world that many scholars believe influenced Judaism, Christianity and Islam.
- Zoroastrians: Their Religious Beliefs and Practices — Mary Boyce, Routledge (1979)
- A History of Iran: Empire of the Mind — Michael Axworthy, Basic Books (2008)
- Zoroastrians: Their Religious Beliefs and Practices — Mary Boyce, Routledge (1979)
- Sasanian Persia: The Rise and Fall of an Empire — Touraj Daryaee, I.B. Tauris (2009)
After the Arab conquest most Iranians slowly became Muslim. Some Zoroastrians held on in Yazd and Kerman; others sailed to western India, where their descendants, the Parsis, became a famous community in Mumbai. Today Zoroastrians are a small, officially recognised minority in Iran with a reserved seat in parliament, while Nowruz, Yalda and the fire festival of Chaharshanbe Suri are celebrated by almost everyone.
- Zoroastrians: Their Religious Beliefs and Practices — Mary Boyce, Routledge (1979)
- Iran — Encyclopaedia Britannica
Zarathustra was a prophet who received a revelation from Ahura Mazda, the Wise Lord. His hymns, the Gathas, teach that every person must choose between asha (truth, order) and druj (the lie), and that good will finally triumph. Later Zoroastrian tradition placed him "258 years before Alexander".
- Zoroastrians: Their Religious Beliefs and Practices — Mary Boyce, Routledge (1979)
The archaic language of the Gathas, close to that of the Indian Rig Veda, leads many scholars to place Zarathustra somewhere between about 1500 and 1000 BCE, in the steppes of eastern Iran or Central Asia; others still argue for a later date. Almost nothing about his life can be confirmed.
- Zoroastrians: Their Religious Beliefs and Practices — Mary Boyce, Routledge (1979)
- A History of Iran: Empire of the Mind — Michael Axworthy, Basic Books (2008)
Why it matters today
Only a small minority of Iranians are Zoroastrian today, but the old faith runs underneath everyday Iranian life: Nowruz, the fire-jumping of Chaharshanbe Suri and the long night of Yalda all have pre-Islamic roots. For many secular and diaspora Iranians the winged Faravahar symbol and the motto "good thoughts, good words, good deeds" are badges of an identity older than the Islamic Republic.