Good Thoughts, Good Words, Good Deeds

Zoroastrian temple near Persepolis

By Heidi Noroozy

The first time my husband and I visited the central Iranian city of Esfahan, our explorations of the city took us to the outskirts, where a Zoroastrian fire temple perches high atop a hill. The structure today is in ruins, not much more than crumbling walls the same color as the yellowish rocky cliff at their base. While there are much better preserved fire temples elsewhere in Iran, this one got me interested in Iran’s Zoroastrian past. Over the years, on subsequent trips, I’ve noticed more influences, from fire and water symbolism to architecture. From epic Persian poetry (such as Ferdowsi’s Shahnameh) to holidays that date back to Zoroastrian times. If you’ve been following my contributions to this blog, you’ve probably also observed some of the ways in which Zoroastrianism continues to influence Persian culture.

The religion is over three thousand years old and follows the teachings of Zoroaster (also known as Zarathustra or Zartoshti, as he’s called in Farsi). Although the exact date of his birth is unknown, Zoroaster probably lived sometime between 1500 and 1000 BC. He recorded his teachings in a series of poems—the Hymns of Zoroaster—which form the most sacred part of the Zoroastrian scripture (the Avesta).

Zoroastrianism was one of the first faiths to believe in a single deity rather than a pantheon of gods and also the concepts of heaven and hell. This duality is expressed in the ongoing battle between Ahura Mazda (the Wise Lord) and Ahriman (the Destructive Spirit), an internal struggle within each human aimed at banishing evil through “good thoughts, good words, good deeds.”

Haft seen

Zoroastrians see fire and water as purifying elements, and these symbols are still common in everyday Iranian life, even if much of the original meaning has been lost. Among these symbols are the mirror and candlesticks that Iranians place in their haft seen arrangements during the Persian New Year. The mirror reflects the candle’s flame like firelight across the surface of a reflecting pool.

The use of rosewater in ceremonies and sprinkled around the house during the spring cleaning ritual called khooneh tekooneh (shaking the house) was also handed down from Zoroastrian times. Iranians still use rosewater to clean Islamic shrines and wash the graves of deceased loved ones.

A number of Iranian holidays are rooted in Zoroastrian traditions. The most important of these celebrations is Eid-e Norooz, or Persian New Year, which takes place on the spring equinox and is kicked off by a Zoroastrian fire festival (Chahar Shanbeh Souri). Another is Shabeh Yalda, the winter solstice, with rituals that reflect the struggle between light and dark, Ahura Mazda and Ahriman. And Tiregan is a Zoroastrian-based midsummer festival that celebrates the rain.

Zoroastrian society of ancient Persia has also left its stamp on Iran’s present-day Islamic Republic. The ancient Zoroastrians had a hierarchical class system, including a high-ranking, hereditary priesthood whose members were known as the magi. The Bible refers to the magi as the three wise men who brought gifts to Jesus at his birth. This priestly class can be seen today in Iran’s clerics (the mullahs and ayatollahs). While these religious ranks are not hereditary anymore, no other Islamic society has anything quite like them.

Farohar image on a plate

Zoroastrianism’s influence extends beyond Persian culture to the Abrahamic religions of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. The faith of the ancient Persians introduced concepts such as the Kingdom of God (which Zoroaster called “the chosen government”), five daily prayers (Islam), and resurrection. The early Zoroastrians believed that the soul dwells in the material world for three days after death before rising to the spirit realm, which is reflected in Jesus’s resurrection after his crucifixion.

One of the best known Zoroastrian symbols is the farohar or faravahar, a figure with the wings and tail of a bird and the body of a man. It represents a fravashi (guardian angel) and first appeared on royal inscriptions. I have one in the form of a gold pendant with the farohar encircled by a decorative ring. Modern Zoroastrians interpret the farohar as representing one’s purpose in life—to think good thoughts, speak good words, and do good deeds. Not a bad purpose for any of us to have.

Battle of the Gods

The head of an asura outside a
monastery entrance in Angkor,
Cambodia. (Photo by yarowind)

According to Indian lore, devas and asuras were divine entities, basically gods, but the kind that fought wars and spent precious time and energy keeping each other at bay. The devas were the good guys, and the asuras the baddies. 

But if you go back, way back, to the earliest Indo-Iranian texts, there was a time when the asuras were on par with the devas. The devas supposedly ruled the natural world, the asuras the moral and social one. Somewhere along the way, as the texts evolved and new ones sprung up, the asuras became the villains. According to Hindu myths, they were wicked and materialistic. In Buddhism, asuras were said to lack self control and let their passions (wrath, pride, aggression) get the best of them.

These aren’t easy myths to reconcile, for the asuras are still considered deities in the Hindu pantheon, highly revering certain ones, including Agni (god of fire) and Rudra (god of wind). While King Indra ruled the devas, Varuna, the god of water, presided over the asuras, and the two were powerful rivals. (Think of Indra as the Hindu counterpart to Zeus in Greek mythology.) Both Indra and Varuna were thought to rule the sky and earth, but they represented opposing interests.

Researchers over the past few hundred years, and as recently as a decade ago, have made some startling discoveries about these legends. The ancient epic Hindu poem, Rig Veda, refers to Indra carrying his people across many rivers and lands to reach what is now Punjab in Pakistan and India, eastern Afghanistan, and the Upper Indus Valley. In recent years, archaeologists discovered that the forefathers of Indo-Aryans hail from a place in Central Asia, specifically in Turkmenistan. Russian and Turkmen archaeologists have dug up impressive artifacts from a civilization the original Aryans, including the devas and asuras, hailed from. Among the important finds: horse-drawn chariots with spoked wheels, fire altars, sunken bowls with traces of an ancient drink known as soma that’s mentioned in the Vedas, as well as remnants of horse sacrifices.

Archaeologists believe the Indo-Iranians first arrived at this spot in Turkmenistan around 4,000 years ago, drawn there because of the existence of an oasis. They left some time later, as major climactic shifts began to take place and the fertile delta they relied on dried up. Presumably that's what the Vedas refer to, about some among them moving east (towards modern-day Pakistan and India) and others moving west (Afghanistan and Iran). Many different communities evolved out of these migrations, each one putting down roots in the rich, fertile valleys and lands between Central and South Asia.

It’s impossible to say which of the civilizations from the various groups that migrated away are still buried and waiting for us to discover. But we do know these original Indo-Iranians (Aryans), wherever they went, took the concepts of the fire god and the stories of the asuras and devas with them. 

 Ahura Mazda is often depicted in ancient art as
performing the crowning ceremonies of kings, to show
both the divine blessing of the ascension and god’s
protection of the king. In this relief at Taq-e-Bostan,
Ahura Mazda crowns Khosrow II (at center), with
the goddess Anahita at left. Anahita’s name derives from
the old Indo-Iranian word for the goddess Harahvati (Persian)
and Saraswati (Sanskrit). (Photo by Philippe Chavin)

Only thing is, the legend of the devas and the asuras evolved much differently among the Persians than the Hindus. 

In the Gathas, the earliest Zoroastrian hymns, ahuras were followers of asha (truth) and daevas of druj (falsehood). Ahura being the Persian form of the Sanskrit word asura, Varuna became Ahura Mazda. Curiously, while Ahura means "truth," Mazda means “other.” Both cultures still consider fire and water as the main ritual agents of purity.

According to the Persian texts, the two factions had vast differences of outlook and perspective right from the get-go, the chasm between them perhaps widening to such an extent that the two groups eventually went their separate ways. There’s no mention of any specific wars or battles as in the Vedic version, but eventually, the daevas came to be understood as malign creatures (not even deities).

The Indian and Persian legends share many similar concepts though--manu as man, Saraswati or Harahvati as both a river and a goddess, soma or haoma as a sacred plant, yajna or yasna as worship and sacrifice, and so on. Both scriptures, the Hindu Vedas and the Zoroastrian Avesta, retell a few of the same myths and legends, though from differing points of view. In the Vedic version, Varuna and Indra agree to cooperate at the dawn of each new year to reestablish order. In the Persian legend, daevas were originally not considered hostile (they are in later versions) but rather only following a false path and possibly the wrong gods.

There are many more such fascinating intersections. According to author Michael Wood in his landmark documentary, The Story of India, and book by the same name: “The big picture…is that the ancestors of Aryans were part of a huge language group who spread out from the area between the Caspian and Aral seas 4,000 years ago, and whose language lies at the root of modern European languages, including English, Welsh, Gaelic, Latin and Greek, but also Persian and the main modern north Indian language.” (Check out Michael Wood’s work for many more such amazing discoveries.)

Wood makes a point about these remarkable legends that the following photo also illustrates.

In the Bangkok airport, a sculpture shows the asuras using Naga Vasuki,
the king of the serpents, to churn an ocean of milk along with the
devas (not shown) to extract ambrosia. According to Hindu mythology, and later Chinese and
Japanese mythology as well, Vasuki was one of eight great Naga kings.
(Photo by Sailko)

For generations, we may have considered these legends as merely old stories but as time goes on, we find that they are grounded in quite a bit of historical fact. And how powerful these two entirely separate belief systems are that they continue to thrive today, both rooted from ancient traditions that have influenced so many others. Doesn't it boggle the mind to see how interconnected we all are?

Keeping the Faith

An old photo of the
Parsee Tower of Silence in Bombay

Heidi’s column from Monday discussed the beautiful fire and water symbols of Zoroastrianism, Iran’s dominant religion until about the seventh century. That’s when Islam came to Iran and many Zoroastrians, fleeing persecution, migrated to India, where they blended their unique culture within the mainstream one.

Parsees (also spelled Parsis), as they are known on the subcontinent, are well educated, urban (most live in Mumbai), and relatively affluent. They’re a tiny group—estimates put their overall number at about 70,000—but even if you haven’t heard the name of this community, you’ve heard of some of its most prominent members: award-winning author Rohinton Mistry; the late Freddie Mercury, the lead singer of Queen (his real name was Farrokh Bulsara); and conductor Zubin Mehta. Then there’s the billionaire Tata family, who own, among their numerous global ventures, Jaguar and Land Rover (through Tata Motors), Tetley tea (Tata Global Beverages), and the world’s tenth largest steel company (Tata Steel).

As a group, Parsees have maintained a relatively pure lineage (at one time, they were listed in the Guiness Book of World Records for having the most birth defects, because of their once-high incidence of intermarriage), but they are also uniquely Indian. They’ve adopted the Indian language of Gujarati, the women wear saris, and the religion has even borrowed a few Hindu customs, such as men wearing the holy thread around the shoulder and waist, the use of coconuts and rice during religious ceremonies, and the application of red powder to their foreheads (tilaks) during baptism and marriage.

They also meld some ancient Persian customs with Hindu ones. For example, one method for removing the evil eye in a number of Muslim countries, including Iran, is the burning of the espand seed (also known as esfand). In India, Parsees have modified this practice in a ritual called achu michu. The person performing the ritual says a traditional Zoroastrian prayer, known as the tandorosti, to wish the recipient a long and healthy life. Then they circle a tray, carrying a coconut, betel leaves, betel nuts, sugar, and yogurt (items commonly used in Hindu rituals), around the receiver’s head seven times. Sometimes a boiled egg is one of these items (definitely not a Hindu custom). Then water from a little flower vase known as a kutli is poured into the tray, and the tray is then circled again around the recipient’s head seven times. It’s interesting how similar this practice is to the Hindu custom of performing aarti to bless someone. In fact, in achu pichu, as in aarti, a tilak is placed on the recipient’s forehead and a sweet placed in his or her mouth, then the recipient touches the feet of the person giving the blessing. Still, it’s believed the practice evolved from the tradition of burning of esfand/espand seeds.

There’s at least one age-old Parsee custom that always seemed ultra exotic to me, even for India. It’s the method by which Parsees dispose of their dead. Zoroastrianism forbids burial, cremation, or disposal at sea because it would contaminate the sacred elements of earth, fire, and water. So instead, mourners in Mumbai carry the deceased up the steep Malabar Hill, an upscale part of town, to place the body atop the Parsee Bawdi, or the Tower of Silence. The idea is that vultures, other scavengers, and the scorching sun eventually decompose the remains, allowing the soul to join the spiritual world. India is one of the few places that hasn’t banned this ancient tradition, which makes it one of the few places, perhaps the only place, where Zoroastrians can continue it.

That may not be the only reason the community continues on in India. It’s believed that India and Iran share the same Aryan roots from Central Asia, which was once the stronghold of Zoroastrianism, before the two split off and the Indic people migrated south. One tantalizing remnant of this link is that the name for the Zoroastrian god, Ahura Mazda, sounds much like asura, the Sanksrit word for demon. Had there been a war separating the Indo-Iranian cultures?

Either way, worldwide, Zoroastrians only number about 200,000 today. Estimates in Iran range wildly, from 20,000 to 90,000, depending on the source (many have emigrated since the 1979 revolution), with another 20,000 in the States and Canada, plus the 70,000 in India. It’s no wonder theirs is a small community. Zoroastrians have a low birth rate, they don’t proselytize, and their numbers keep dwindling as they marry outside their culture.

But in an interesting twist, the religion is staying alive in other ways. In recent years, a Mazdean-Christian Universalism philosophy emerged, which says that the ideas of a benevolent god and the existence of evil in the world were originally Zoroastrian ones that Judaism adopted and which eventually made their way into Christianity. Swedish music producer Alexander Bard is a well-known convert. There’s even a Mazdean-Christian Alliance in Brooklyn, New York. While it’s not exactly a revolution, this beautiful, ancient faith carries on.