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Primary topics

Zoroastrianism Ahura Mazda Zarathustra aša (asha) / arta

Angels and demons

Amesha Spentas · Yazatas Ahuras · Daevas Angra Mainyu

Scripture and worship

Avesta Gathas · Yasna Vendidad · Visperad Yashts · Khordeh Avesta Ab-Zohr The Ahuna Vairya Invocation Fire Temples

Accounts and legends

Dēnkard · Bundahišn Book of Arda Viraf Book of Jamasp Story of Sanjan

History and culture

Zurvanism Calendar · Festivals Marriage Eschatology

Adherents

Zoroastrians in Iran Parsis · Iranis • • • Persecution of Zoroastrians

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Zoroastrianism /ˌzɒroʊˈæstriənɪzəm/ (or Mazdaism) is a religion and philosophy based on the teachings of prophet Zoroaster (also known as Zarathustra, in Avestan) and was formerly among the world's largest religions.^[1] It was probably founded some time before the 6th century BCE in Greater Iran.

In Zoroastrianism, the Creator Ahura Mazda is all good, and no evil originates from him. Thus, in Zoroastrianism good and evil have distinct sources, with evil (druj) trying to destroy the creation of Mazda (asha), and good trying to sustain it. Mazda is not immanent in the world, and his creation is represented by the Amesha Spentas and the host of other Yazatas, through whom the works of God are evident to humanity, and through whom worship of Mazda is ultimately directed. The most important texts of the religion are those of the Avesta, of which a significant portion has been lost, and mostly only the liturgies of which have survived. The lost portions are known of only through references and brief quotations in the later works, primarily from the 9th to 11th centuries.

In some form, it served as the national or state religion of a significant portion of the Iranian people for many centuries. The religion first dwindled when the Achaemenid Empire was invaded by Alexander III of Macedon, after which it collapsed and disintegrated^[2] and it was further gradually marginalized by Islam from the 7th century onwards with the decline of the Sassanid Empire.^[3] The political power of the pre-Islamic Iranian dynasties lent Zoroastrianism immense prestige in ancient times, and some of its leading doctrines were adopted by other religious systems. It has no major theological divisions (the only significant schism is based on calendar differences), but it is not uniform. Modern-era influences have a significant impact on individual and local beliefs, practices, values and vocabulary, sometimes complementing tradition and enriching it, but sometimes also displacing tradition entirely.

Terminology[link]

The Oxford English Dictionary attests use of the term Zoroastrianism in 1874 in Archibald Sayce's Principles of Comparative Philology.^[4] The first surviving reference to Zoroaster in Western scholarship is attributed to Thomas Browne (1605–1682), who briefly refers to the prophet in his 1643 Religio Medici.^[5] The OED records 1743 (Warburton, Pope's Essay) as the earliest reference to Zoroaster.

The term Mazdaism /ˈmæzdə.ɪzəm/ is a typical 19th century construct, taking Mazda- from the name Ahura Mazda and adding the suffix -ism to suggest a belief system. The March 2001 draft edition of the OED also records an alternate form, Mazdeism, perhaps derived from the French Mazdéisme, which first appeared in 1871. The Zoroastrian name of the religion is Mazdayasna, which combines Mazda- with the Avestan language word yasna, meaning "worship, devotion".

In English, an adherent of the faith commonly refers to himself or herself as a Zoroastrian or, less commonly, a Zarathustrian. An older, but still widespread expression is Behdin, meaning "follower of Daena", for which "Good Religion" is one translation. In the Zoroastrian liturgy, the term Behdin is also used as a title for an individual who has been formally inducted into the religion in a Navjote ceremony.

Distinguishing characteristics[link]

Basic beliefs[link]

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Zoroastrians believe that there is one universal and transcendent God, Ahura Mazda. He is said to be the one uncreated Creator to whom all worship is ultimately directed.^[6] Ahura Mazda's creation—evident as asha, truth and order—is the antithesis of chaos, which is evident as druj, falsehood and disorder. The resulting conflict involves the entire universe, including humanity, which has an active role to play in the conflict.^[6]

The religion states that active participation in life through good thoughts, good words, and good deeds is necessary to ensure happiness and to keep chaos at bay. This active participation is a central element in Zoroaster's concept of free will, and Zoroastrianism rejects all forms of monasticism. Ahura Mazda will ultimately prevail over the evil Angra Mainyu or Ahriman, at which point the universe will undergo a cosmic renovation and time will end. In the final renovation, all of creation—even the souls of the dead that were initially banished to "darkness"—will be reunited in Ahura Mazda, returning to life in the undead form. At the end of time, a savior-figure (a Saoshyant) will bring about a final renovation of the world (frasho.kereti), in which the dead will be revived.^[6]

In Zoroastrian tradition, the malevolent is represented by Angra Mainyu (also referred to as "Ahriman"), the "Destructive Principle", while the benevolent is represented through Ahura Mazda's Spenta Mainyu, the instrument or "Bounteous Principle" of the act of creation. It is through Spenta Mainyu that transcendental Ahura Mazda is immanent in humankind, and through which the Creator interacts with the world. According to Zoroastrian cosmology, in articulating the Ahuna Vairya formula, Ahura Mazda made His ultimate triumph evident to Angra Mainyu. As expressions and aspects of Creation, Ahura Mazda emanated the Amesha Spentas ("Bounteous Immortals"), that are each the hypostasis and representative of one aspect of that Creation. These Amesha Spenta are in turn assisted by a league of lesser principles, the Yazatas, each "Worthy of Worship" and each again a hypostasis of a moral or physical aspect of creation.

Other characteristics[link]

In Zoroastrianism, water (apo, aban) and fire (atar, adar) are agents of ritual purity, and the associated purification ceremonies are considered the basis of ritual life. In Zoroastrian cosmogony, water and fire are respectively the second and last primordial elements to have been created, and scripture considers fire to have its origin in the waters. Both water and fire are considered life-sustaining, and both water and fire are represented within the precinct of a fire temple. Zoroastrians usually pray in the presence of some form of fire (which can be considered evident in any source of light), and the culminating rite of the principle act of worship constitutes a "strengthening of the waters". Fire is considered a medium through which spiritual insight and wisdom is gained, and water is considered the source of that wisdom.

While the Parsees in India have traditionally been opposed to proselytizing, probably for historical reasons, and even considered it a crime for which the culprit may face expulsion,^[7] Iranian Zoroastrians have never been opposed to conversion, and the practice has been endorsed by the Council of Mobeds of Tehran. While the Iranian authorities do not permit proselytizing within Iran, Iranian Zoroastrians in exile have actively encouraged missionary activities, with The Zarathushtrian Assembly in Los Angeles and the International Zoroastrian Centre in Paris as two prominent centres.

As in many other faiths, Zoroastrians are strongly encouraged to marry others of the same faith, but this is not a requirement of the religion itself. Rather, it is a creation of those in India. Some members of the Indian Zoroastrian community (the Parsis) contend that a child must have a Parsi father to be eligible for introduction into the faith, but this assertion is considered by most to be a violation of the Zoroastrian tenets of gender equality, and may be a remnant of an old Indian legal definition (since overruled) of Parsi. This issue is a matter of debate within the Parsi community, but with the increasingly global nature of modern society and the dwindling number of Zoroastrians, such opinions are less vociferous than they were previously.

In Zoroastrian tradition, life is a temporary state in which a mortal is expected to actively participate in the continuing battle between truth and falsehood. Prior to being born, the soul (urvan) of an individual is still united with its fravashi, of which there are very many, and which have existed since Mazda created the universe. During life, the fravashi acts as a guardian and protector. On the fourth day after death, the soul is reunited with its fravashi, in which the experiences of life in the material world are collected for the continuing battle in the spiritual world. For the most part, Zoroastrianism does not have a notion of reincarnation, at least not until the final renovation of the world. Despite this, followers of Ilm-e-Kshnoom in India believe in reincarnation and practice vegetarianism, two principles unknown to Orthodox Zoroastrianism.^[8]

In Zoroastrian scripture and tradition, a corpse is a host for decay, i.e., of druj. Consequently, scripture enjoins the "safe" disposal of the dead in a manner such that a corpse does not pollute the "good" creation. These injunctions are the doctrinal basis of the fast-fading traditional practice of "ritual exposure", most commonly identified with the so-called "Towers of Silence" for which there is no standard technical term in either scripture or tradition. The practice of ritual exposure is only practised by Zoroastrian communities of the Indian subcontinent, where it is not illegal, but where alternative disposal methods are desperately sought after diclofenac poisoning has led to the virtual extinction of scavenger birds. Other Zoroastrian communities either cremate their dead, or bury them in graves that are cased with lime mortar.

History[link]

Origins[link]

Zoroastrianism emerged out of a common prehistoric Indo-Iranian religious system dating back to the early 2nd millennium BCE.^[9] According to Zoroastrian tradition, Zoroaster was a reformer who exalted the deity of Wisdom, Ahura Mazda, to the status of Supreme Being and Creator, while demoting various other deities and rejecting certain rituals.

Classical antiquity[link]

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Farvahar. Persepolis, Iran.

Although older, Zoroastrianism only enters recorded history in the mid-5th century BCE. Herodotus' The Histories (completed c. 440 BCE) includes a description of Greater Iranian society with what may be recognizably Zoroastrian features, including exposure of the dead.

The Histories is a primary source of information on the early period of the Achaemenid era (648–330 BCE), in particular with respect to the role of the Magi. According to Herodotus i.101, the Magi were the sixth tribe of the Medians (until the unification of the Persian empire under Cyrus the Great, all Iranians were referred to as "Mede" or "Mada" by the peoples of the Ancient World), who appear to have been the priestly caste of the Mesopotamian-influenced branch of Zoroastrianism today known as Zurvanism, and who wielded considerable influence at the courts of the Median emperors.

Following the unification of the Median and Persian empires in 550 BCE, Cyrus the Great and, later, his son Cambyses II curtailed the powers of the Magi after they had attempted to sow dissent following their loss of influence. In 522 BCE, the Magi revolted and set up a rival claimant to the throne. The usurper, pretending to be Cyrus' younger son Smerdis, took power shortly thereafter. Owing to the despotic rule of Cambyses and his long absence in Egypt, "the whole people, Persians, Medes and all the other nations" acknowledged the usurper, especially as he granted a remission of taxes for three years (Herodotus iii. 68).

The Behistun Inscription, Iran.

According to the Behistun Inscription, pseudo-Smerdis ruled for seven months before being overthrown by Darius I in 521 BCE. The "Magi", though persecuted, continued to exist. A year following the death of the first pseudo-Smerdis (named Gaumata), a second pseudo-Smerdis (named Vahyazdāta) attempted a coup. The coup, though initially successful, failed.

Whether Cyrus II was a Zoroastrian is subject to debate. It did, however, influence him to the extent that it became the non-imposing religion of his empire, and its beliefs later allowed Cyrus to free the Jews and allow them to return to Judea when the emperor took Babylon in 539 BCE. Darius I was a devotee of Ahura Mazda, as attested to several times in the Behistun inscription. However, whether he was a follower of Zoroaster has not been conclusively established, since devotion to Ahura Mazda was (at the time) not necessarily an indication of an adherence to Zoroaster's teaching.

Darius I and later Achaemenid emperors, though acknowledging their devotion to Ahura Mazda in inscriptions, appear to have permitted religions to coexist. Nonetheless, it was during the Achaemenid period that Zoroastrianism gained momentum. A number of the Zoroastrian texts that today are part of the greater compendium of the Avesta have been attributed to that period. It was also during the later Achaemenid era that many of the divinities and divine concepts of proto-Indo-Iranian religion(s) were incorporated in Zoroastrianism, in particular those to whom the days of the month of the Zoroastrian calendar are dedicated. This calendar is still used today, a fact that is attributed to the Achaemenid period. Additionally, the divinities, or yazatas, are present-day Zoroastrian angels (Dhalla, 1938).

Almost nothing is known of the status of Zoroastrianism under the Seleucids and Parthians, who ruled over Persia following Alexander the Great's invasion in 330 BCE. According to later Zoroastrian legend (Denkard and the Book of Arda Viraf), many sacred texts were lost when Alexander's troops invaded Persepolis and subsequently destroyed the royal library there. Diodorus Siculus's Bibliotheca historica, which was completed c. 60 BCE, appears to substantiate this Zoroastrian legend (Diod. 17.72.2–17.72.6). According to one archaeological examination, the ruins of the palace of Xerxes bear traces of having been burned (Stolze, 1882). Whether a vast collection of (semi-)religious texts "written on parchment in gold ink", as suggested by the Denkard, actually existed remains a matter of speculation, but is unlikely. Given that many of the Denkards statements-as-fact have since been refuted among scholars, the tale of the library is widely accepted to be fictional (Kellens, 2002)

Late antiquity[link]

When the Sassanid dynasty came into power in 228 CE, they aggressively promoted the Zurvanite form of Zoroastrianism and, in some cases, persecuted Christians.^[10] When the Sassanids captured territory, they often built fire temples there to promote their religion. After Constantine, the Sassanids were suspicious of Christians, not least because of their perceived ties to the Christian Roman Empire. As such the Persian Church (the Church of the East) officially broke with Roman Christianity, and was tolerated and even sometimes favored by the Sassanids.

A form of Zoroastrianism was also prominent in the pre-Christian Caucasus region (especially modern-day Azerbaijan). During the periods of their suzerainty over the Caucasus, the Sassanids made attempts to promote the religion there as well.

Well before the 6th century CE, Zoroastrianism had spread to northern China via the Silk Road, gaining official status in a number of Chinese states.^{[citation needed]} Remains of Zoroastrian temples have been found in Kaifeng and Zhenjiang. By the 13th century, the religion had faded from prominence in China. However, Zoroastrianism (as well as later Manicheism) may still have influenced elements of Buddhism, especially in terms of light symbolism.^{[citation needed]}

Middle Ages[link]

A scene from the Hamzanama where Hamza ibn ‘Abd al-Muttalib Burns Zarthust’s Chest and Shatters the Urn with his Ashes

In the 7th century, and over the course of at least 16 years (several decades in the case of some provinces), the Sassanid Empire was overthrown by the Arabs. Although the administration of the state was rapidly Islamicized and subsumed under the Umayyad Caliphate, "there was little serious pressure" exerted on newly subjected people to adopt Islam.^[11] Islamic jurists considered only Muslims to be perfectly moral, and "unbelievers might as well be left to their inequities, so long as these did not vex their overlords."^[12]

There were also practical considerations: "because of their sheer numbers, the conquered Zoroastrians had to be treated as dhimmis (despite doubts [of the validity of this identification] that persisted down the centuries),"^[12] which made them eligible for protection. Thus, in the main, once the conquest was over and "local terms were agreed on", the Arab governors protected the local populations in exchange for tribute.^[12] The Arabs adopted the Sassanid tax-system, both the land-tax levied on land owners and the poll-tax levied on individuals.^[12] This is called jizya, a tax levied on non-Muslims living in Muslim Caliphates (i.e., the dhimmis). In time, this poll-tax came to be used as a means to humble the non-Muslims, and a number of laws and restrictions evolved to emphasize their inferior status. Under the early orthodox caliphs, as long as the non-Muslims paid their taxes and adhered to the dhimmi laws, administrators were enjoined to leave non-Muslims "in their religion and their land." (Caliph Abu Bakr, qtd. in Boyce 1979, p. 146).

Thus, though subject to a new leadership and harassed, once the horrors of conquest were over, the Zoroastrians were able to continue in their former ways. There was, however, a slow but steady social and economic pressure to convert.^[13][14] The nobility and city-dwellers were the first to convert, with Islam more slowly being accepted among the peasantry and landed gentry.^[15] "Power and worldly-advantage" now lay with followers of Islam, and although the "official policy was one of aloof contempt, there were individual Muslims eager to proselytize and ready to use all sorts of means to do so."^[16]

In time, a tradition evolved by which Islam was made to appear as a partly Iranian religion. One example of this was a legend that Husayn, son the fourth caliph Ali and grandson of Islam's prophet Muhammad, had married a captive Sassanid princess named Shahrbanu. This "wholly fictitious figure"^[17] was said to have borne Husayn a son, the historical fourth Shi'a imam, who claimed that the caliphate rightly belonged to him and his descendants, and that the Umayyads had wrongfully wrested it from him. The alleged descent from the Sassanid house counterbalanced the Arab nationalism of the Umayyads, and the Iranian national association with a Zoroastrian past was disarmed. Thus, according to scholar Mary Boyce, "it was no longer the Zoroastrians alone who stood for patriotism and loyalty to the past."^[17] The "damning indictment" that becoming Muslim was equivalent to becoming Un-Iranian only remained an idiom in Zoroastrian texts.^[17]

With Iranian (especially Persian) support, the Abbasids overthrew the Ummayads in 750, and in the subsequent caliphate government—that nominally lasted until 1258—Muslim Iranians received marked favor in the new government, both in Iran and at the capital in Baghdad. This mitigated the antagonism between Arabs and Iranians, but sharpened the distinction between Muslims and non-Muslims. The Abbasids zealously persecuted heretics, and although this was directed mainly at Muslim sectarians, it also created a harsher climate for non-Muslims.^[18] Although the Abbasids were deadly foes of Zoroastrianism, the brand of Islam they propagated throughout Iran became in turn ever more "Zoroastrianized", making it easier for Iranians to embrace Islam.

The 9th century was the last in which Zoroastrians had the means to engage in creative work on a great scale, and the 9th century has come to define the great number of Zoroastrian texts that were composed or re-written during the 8th to 10th centuries (excluding copying and lesser amendments, which continue for some time thereafter). All of these works are in the Middle Persian dialect of that period (free of Arabic words), and written in the difficult Pahlavi script (hence the adoption of the term "Pahlavi" as the name of the variant of the language, and of the genre, of those Zoroastrian books). If read aloud, these books would still have been intelligible to the laity. Many of these texts are responses to the tribulations of the time, and all of them include exhortations to stand fast in their religious beliefs. Some, such as the "Denkard", are doctrinal defenses of the religion, while others are explanations of theological aspects (such as the Bundahishn's) or practical aspects (e.g., explanation of rituals) of it. About sixty such works are known to have existed, of which some are known only from references to them in other works.^{[citation needed]}

Two decrees in particular encouraged the transition to a preponderantly Islamic society.^{[citation needed]} The first edict, adapted from a Arsacid and Sassanid one (but in those to the advantage of Zoroastrians), was that only a Muslim could own Muslim slaves or indentured servants. Thus, a bonded individual owned by a Zoroastrian could automatically become a freeman by converting to Islam. The other edict was that if one male member of a Zoroastrian family converted to Islam, he instantly inherited all its property.

Under Abbasid rule, Muslim Iranians (who by then were in the majority) increasingly found ways to taunt Zoroastrians, and distressing them became a popular sport. For example, in the 9th century, a deeply venerated cypress tree in Khorasan (which Parthian-era legend supposed had been planted by Zoroaster himself) was felled for the construction of a palace in Baghdad, 2,000 miles (3,200 km) away. In the 10th century, on the day that a Tower of Silence had been completed at much trouble and expense, a Muslim official contrived to get up onto it, and to call the adhan (the Muslim call to prayer) from its walls. This was made a pretext to annex the building.^[19] Another popular means to distress Zoroastrians was to maltreat dogs, as these animals are sacred in Zoroastrianism. Such baiting, which was to continue down the centuries, was indulged in by all; not only by high officials, but by the general uneducated population as well.

Despite these economic and social incentives to convert, Zoroastrianism remained strong in some regions, particularly in those furthest away from the Caliphate capital at Baghdad. In Bukhara (in present-day Uzbekistan), resistance to Islam required the 9th century Arab commander Qutaiba to convert his province four times. The first three times the citizens reverted to their old religion. Finally, the governor made their religion "difficult for them in every way", turned the local fire temple into a mosque, and encouraged the local population to attend Friday prayers by paying each attendee two dirhams.^[16] The cities where Arab governors resided were particularly vulnerable to such pressures, and in these cases the Zoroastrians were left with no choice but to either conform or migrate to regions that had a more amicable administration.^[16]

Among these migrations were those to cities in (or on the margins of) the great salt deserts, in particular to Yazd and Kerman, which remain centers of Iranian Zoroastrianism to this day. Yazd became the seat of the Iranian high priests during Mongol Il-Khanate rule, when the "best hope for survival [for a non-Muslim] was to be inconspicuous."^[20] Crucial to the present-day survival of Zoroastrianism was a migration from the northeastern Iranian town of "Sanjan in south-western Khorasan",^[21] to Gujarat, in western India. The descendants of that group are today known as the Parsis—"as the Gujaratis, from long tradition, called anyone from Iran"^[21]—who today represent the larger of the two groups of Zoroastrians.

The Zoroastrian Achaemenid Empire at its greatest extent was the largest ancient empire in recorded history at 8.0 million km² (480 BCE).^[22]

Also in Khorasan in the northeastern Iran, a 10th century Iranian nobleman brought together four Zoroastrian priests to transcribe a Sassanid-era Middle Persian work titled Book of the Lord (Khwaday Namag) from Pahlavi script into Arabic script. This transcription, which remained in Middle Persian prose (an Arabic version, by al-Muqaffa, also exists), was completed in 957 and subsequently became the basis for Firdausi's Book of Kings. It became enormously popular among both Zoroastrians and Muslims, and also served to propagate the Sassanid justification for overthrowing the Arsacids (i.e., that the Sassanids had restored the faith to its "orthodox" form after the Hellenistic Arsacids had allowed Zoroastrianism to become corrupt).

The struggle between Zoroastrianism and Islam declined in the 10th and 11th centuries, as, by then, most of the country was Islamic. Local Iranian dynasties, "all vigorously Muslim,"^[21] had emerged as largely independent vassals of the Caliphs. In the 16th century, in one of the early letters between Iranian Zoroastrians and their co-religionists in India, the priests of Yazd lamented that "no period [in human history], not even that of Alexander, had been more grievous or troublesome for the faithful than 'this millennium of the demon of Wrath'."^[23]

Relation to other religions and cultures[link]

The Achaemenid Empire in the 5th century BCE consisted of the largest empire in history by percentage of world population.^[24]

It is believed by most scholars^[25] that key concepts of Zoroastrian eschatology and demonology have had influence on the Abrahamic religions.^[26][27] On the other hand, Zoroastrianism itself inherited ideas from other belief systems and, like other "practiced" religions, accommodates some degree of syncretism.^[28]

Many traits of Zoroastrianism can be traced back to the culture and beliefs of the prehistorical Indo-Iranian period, that is, to the time before the migrations that led to the Indians and Iranians becoming distinct peoples. Zoroastrianism consequently shares elements with the historical Vedic religion that also has its origins in that era. An example is the relation of the Zoroastrian word Ahura (Ahura Mazda) and the Vedic word Asura (meaning demon). They are therefore thought^{[by whom?]} to have descended from a common Proto-Indo-Iranian religion. However, Zoroastrianism was also strongly affected by the later culture of the Iranian Heroic Age (1500 BCE onwards), an influence to which the Indic religions were not subject. Moreover, the other culture groups that the respective peoples came to interact with were different, for instance in 6th–4th century BCE Western Iran with Fertile Crescent culture, with each side absorbing ideas from the other. Such inter-cultural influences notwithstanding, Zoroastrian "scripture" is essentially a product of (Indo-) Iranian culture, and representing the oldest and largest corpus pre-Islamic Iranian ideology—is considered^{[by whom?]} a reflection of that culture. Then, together with the Vedas, which represent the oldest texts of the Indian branch of Indo-Iranian culture, it is possible to reconstruct some facets of prototypical Indo-Iranian beliefs. Since these two groups of sources also represent the oldest non-fragmentary evidence of Indo-European languages, the analysis of them also motivated attempts to characterize an even earlier Proto-Indo-European religion, and in turn influenced various unifying hypotheses like those of Carl Gustav Jung or James George Frazer^{[citation needed]}. Although these unifying notions deeply influenced the modernists of the late 19th and early 20th century, they have not fared well under the scrutiny of more recent interdisciplinary peer review. The study of pre-Islamic Iran has itself undergone a radical change in direction since the 1950s, and the field is today disinclined to speculation.

Zoroastrianism is often compared with the Manichaeism, which is nominally an Iranian religion but has its origins in the Middle-Eastern Gnosticism. Superficially, such a comparison may be apt, as both are uncompromisingly dualistic, and Manichaeism nominally adopted many of the Yazatas for its own pantheon. Gherardo Gnoli, in The Encyclopaedia of Religion, says that "we can assert that Manichaeism has its roots in the Iranian religious tradition and that its relationship to Mazdaism, or Zoroastrianism, is more or less like that of Christianity to Judaism".^[29] As religious types, they are, however, quite different:^[30] Manichaeism equated evil with matter and good with spirit, and was therefore particularly suitable as a doctrinal basis for every form of asceticism and many forms of mysticism. Zoroastrianism, on the other hand, rejects every form of asceticism, has no dualism of matter and spirit (only of good and evil), and sees the spiritual world as not very different from the natural one, and the word "paradise" (via Latin and Greek from Avestan pairi.daeza, literally "stone-bounded enclosure") applies equally to both. Manichaeism's basic doctrine was that the world and all corporeal bodies were constructed from the substance of Satan, an idea that is fundamentally at odds with the Zoroastrian notion of a world that was created by God and that is all good, and any corruption of it is an effect of the bad. From what may be inferred from many Manichean texts and a few Zoroastrian sources, the adherents of the two religions (or at least their respective priesthoods) despised each other intensely.

Many aspects of Zoroastrianism are present in the culture and mythologies of the peoples of the Greater Iran, not least because Zoroastrianism was a dominant influence on the people of the cultural continent for a thousand years. Even after the rise of Islam and the loss of direct influence, Zoroastrianism remained part of the cultural heritage of the Iranian language-speaking world, in part as festivals and customs, but also because Ferdowsi incorporated a number of the figures and stories from the Avesta in his epic Shāhnāme, which in turn is pivotal to Iranian identity.

Zoroastrianism is a tradition that has nourished and sustained the lives of its adherents for countless generations. It combines cosmogonic dualism and escathological monotheism in a manner unique to itself among the religions of the world. Zoroastrianism proclaims a movement through time from dualism to monotheism.^[31]

Religious text[link]

Avestan[link]

The Avesta is the religious book of Zoroastrians that contains a collection of sacred texts. The history of the Avesta is found in many Pahlavi texts. The twenty-one nasks were created by Ahura Mazda and brought by Zoroaster to Vishtaspa. Here, two copies were created, one which was put in the house of archives, and the other put in the Imperial treasury. During Alexander's conquest of Persia, the Avesta was burned, and the scientific sections that the Greeks could use were dispersed among themselves. Under the reign of King Valax of the Arsacis Dynasty, an attempt was made to restore the Avesta. During the Sassanid Empire, Ardeshir ordered Tansar, his high priest, to finish the work that King Valax had started. Shapur I sent priests to locate the scientific text portions of the Avesta that were in the possession of the Greeks. Under Shapur II, Arderbad Mahrespandand revised the canon to ensure its orthodox character, while under Khosrow I, the Avesta was translated into Pahlavi.

The compilation of these ancient texts was successfully established underneath the Mazdean priesthood and the Sassanian emperors. Only a fraction of the texts survive today. The later manuscripts all date from this millennium, the latest being from 1288, 590 years after the fall of the Sassanian Empire. The texts that remain today are the Gathas, Yasna, Visperad and the Vendidad. Along with these texts is the communal household prayer book called the Khordeh Avesta, which contains the Yashts and the Siroza. The rest of the materials from the Avesta are called "Avestan fragments".^[32]

Middle Persian/Pahlavi[link]

Middle Persian and Pahlavi works created in the 9th and 10th century contain many religious Zoroastrian books, as most of the writers and copyists were part of the Zoroastrian clergy. The most significant and important books of this era include the Denkard, Bundahishn, Menog-i Khrad, Selections of Zadspram, Jamasp Namag, Epistles of Manucher, Rivayats, Dadestan-i-Denig, and Arda Viraf Namag. All Middle Persian texts written on Zoroastrianism during this time period are considered secondary works on the religion, and not scripture. Nonetheless, these texts have a strong influence on the religion.

The Prophet Zoroaster[link]

Zoroastrianism was founded by the Prophet Zoroaster (or Zarathustra) in ancient Iran. However, it is debated to exactly when he lived, as estimates range from 1700 BCE^[33] to 500 BCE.^[34] The precise date of the founding of Zoroastrianism is uncertain. An approximate date of 1500–1200 BCE has been established through archaeological evidence and linguistic comparisons with the Hindu text, the Rig Veda. However there is no way of knowing exactly when Zoroaster lived, as he lived in what, to his people, were prehistoric times.^[35]

Zoroaster was born in either Northeast Iran or Southwest Afghanistan. He was born into a Bronze Age culture with a polytheistic religion, which included animal sacrifice^[36] and the ritual use of intoxicants. This religion was quite similar to the early forms of Hinduism in India. The name Zoroaster is a Greek rendering of the name Zarathustra. He is known as Zarathusti in Persian and Zaratosht in Gujarati. Zoroaster's birth and early life are little documented. What is known is recorded in the Gathas—the core of the Avesta, which contains hymns thought to be composed by Zoroaster himself. Born into the Spitama clan, he worked as a priest. He had a wife, three sons, and three daughters. Zoroaster rejected the religion of the Bronze Age Iranians, with their many gods and oppressive class structure, in which the Karvis and Karapans (princes and priests) controlled the ordinary people. He also opposed animal sacrifices and the use of the hallucinogenic Haoma plant (possibly a species of ephedra) in rituals, but held the rooster as a "symbol of light"^[37] and associated the cock with "good against evil"^[38] because of his heraldic actions.

The vision of Zoroaster[link]

According to Zoroastrian belief, when Zoroaster was 30 years old, he went into the Daiti river to draw water for a Haoma ceremony; when he emerged, he received a vision of Vohu Manah. After this, Vohu Manah took him to the other six Amesha Spentas, where he received the completion of his vision.^[39] This vision radically transformed his view of the world, and he tried to teach this view to others. Zoroaster believed in one creator God, teaching that only one God was worthy of worship. Furthermore, some of the deities of the old religion, the Daevas (Devas in Sanskrit), appeared to delight in war and strife. Zoroaster said that these were evil spirits and were workers of Angra Mainyu, God's adversary.

Zoroaster's ideas did not take off quickly, and, at first, he only had one convert: his cousin Maidhyoimanha.^[40] The local religious authorities opposed his ideas. They felt their own faiths, power, and particularly their rituals, were threatened because Zoroaster taught against over-ritualising religious ceremonies. Many ordinary people did not like Zoroaster's downgrading of the Daevas to evil spirits. After 12 years, Zoroaster left his home to find somewhere more open to new ideas. He found such a place in the country of King Vishtaspa (in Bactria). The King and his queen, Hutosa, heard Zoroaster debating with the religious leaders of his land, and decided to accept Zoroaster's ideas and make them the official religion of their kingdom. Zoroaster died in his late 70s. Very little is known of the time between Zoroaster and the Achaemenian period, except that, during this period, Zoroastrianism spread to Western Iran. By the time of the founding of the Achaemenid Empire, Zoroastrianism was already a well-established religion.

Principal beliefs[link]

Faravahar (or Ferohar), one of the primary symbols of Zoroastrianism, believed to be the depiction of a Fravashi (guardian spirit)

In Zoroastrianism, Ahura Mazda is the beginning and the end, the creator of everything that can and cannot be seen, the Eternal, the Pure and the only Truth. In the Gathas, the most sacred texts of Zoroastrianism thought to have been composed by Zoroaster himself, the prophet acknowledged devotion to no other divinity besides Ahura Mazda.

Daena (din in modern Persian) is the eternal Law, whose order was revealed to humanity through the Mathra-Spenta ("Holy Words"). Daena has been used to mean religion, faith, law, and even as a translation for the Hindu and Buddhist term Dharma. The latter is often interpreted as "duty" but can also mean social order, right conduct, or virtue. The metaphor of the "path" of Daena is represented in Zoroastrianism by the muslin undershirt Sudra, the "Good/Holy Path", and the 72-thread Kushti girdle, the "Pathfinder".

Daena should not be confused with the fundamental principle asha (Vedic rta), the equitable law of the universe, which governed the life of the ancient Indo-Iranians. For these, asha was the course of everything observable — the motion of the planets and astral bodies; the progression of the seasons; and the pattern of daily nomadic herdsman life, governed by regular metronomic events such as sunrise and sunset. All physical creation (geti) was thus determined to run according to a master plan — inherent to Ahura Mazda — and violations of the order (druj) were violations against creation, and thus violations against Ahura Mazda. This concept of asha versus the druj should not be confused with the good-versus-evil battle evident in western religions, for although both forms of opposition express moral conflict, the asha versus druj concept is more systemic and less personal, representing, for instance, chaos (that opposes order); or "uncreation", evident as natural decay (that opposes creation); or more simply "the lie" (that opposes truth and righteousness). Moreover, in his role as the one uncreated creator of all, Ahura Mazda is not the creator of druj, which is "nothing", anti-creation, and thus (likewise) uncreated. Thus, in Zoroaster's revelation, Ahura Mazda was perceived to be the creator of only the good (Yasna 31.4), the "supreme benevolent providence" (Yasna 43.11), that will ultimately triumph (Yasna 48.1).

A Parsi Wedding, 1905

In this schema of asha versus druj, mortal beings (both humans and animals) play a critical role, for they too are created. Here, in their lives, they are active participants in the conflict, and it is their duty to defend order, which would decay without counteraction. Throughout the Gathas, Zoroaster emphasizes deeds and actions, and accordingly asceticism is frowned upon in Zoroastrianism. In later Zoroastrianism, this was explained as fleeing from the experiences of life, which was the very purpose that the urvan (most commonly translated as the "soul") was sent into the mortal world to collect. The avoidance of any aspect of life, which includes the avoidance of the pleasures of life, is a shirking of the responsibility and duty to oneself, one's urvan, and one's family and social obligations.

Central to Zoroastrianism is the emphasis on moral choice, to choose the responsibility and duty for which one is in the mortal world, or to give up this duty and so facilitate the work of druj. Similarly, predestination is rejected in Zoroastrian teaching. Humans bear responsibility for all situations they are in, and in the way they act toward one another. Reward, punishment, happiness, and grief all depend on how individuals live their lives.^[41]

In Zoroastrianism, good transpires for those who do righteous deeds. Those who do evil have themselves to blame for their ruin. Zoroastrian morality is then to be summed up in the simple phrase, "good thoughts, good words, good deeds" (Humata, Hukhta, Hvarshta in Avestan), for it is through these that asha is maintained and druj is kept in check.

Through accumulation, several other beliefs were introduced to the religion that, in some instances, supersede those expressed in the Gathas. In the late 19th century, the moral and immoral forces came to be represented by Spenta Mainyu and its antithesis Angra Mainyu, the "good spirit" and "evil spirit" emanations of Ahura Mazda, respectively. Although the names are old, this opposition is a modern Western-influenced development popularized by Martin Haug in the 1880s, and was, in effect, a realignment of the precepts of Zurvanism (Zurvanite Zoroastrianism), which had invented a third deity, Zurvan, to explain a mention of twinship (Yasna 30.3) between the moral and immoral. Although Zurvanism had died out by the 10th century, the critical question of the "twin brothers" mentioned in Yasna 30.3 remained, and Haug's explanation provided a convenient defence against Christian missionaries, who disparaged the Parsis for their "dualism". Haug's concept was subsequently disseminated as a Parsi interpretation, thus corroborating Haug's theory, and the idea became so popular that it is now almost universally accepted as doctrine.^{[citation needed]}

Achaemenid era (648–330 BCE) Zoroastrianism developed the abstract concepts of heaven and hell, as well as personal and final judgment, all of which are only alluded to in the Gathas. Yasna 19 (which has only survived in a Sassanid era ([–650 CE] Zend commentary on the Ahuna Vairya invocation), prescribes a Path to Judgment known as the Chinvat Peretum or Chinvat bridge (cf: As-Sirāt in Islam), which all souls had to cross, and judgment (over thoughts, words, and deeds performed during a lifetime) was passed as they were doing so. However, the Zoroastrian personal judgment is not final. At the end of time, when evil is finally defeated, all souls will be ultimately reunited with their Fravashi. Thus, Zoroastrianism can be said to be a universalist religion with respect to salvation.

In addition, and strongly influenced by Babylonian and Akkadian practices, the Achaemenids popularized shrines and temples, hitherto alien forms of worship. In the wake of Achaemenid expansion, shrines were constructed throughout the empire and particularly influenced the role of Mithra, Aredvi Sura Anahita, Verethregna and Tishtrya, all of which, in addition to their original (proto-)Indo-Iranian functions, now also received Perso-Babylonian functions.

Creation of the universe[link]

According to the Zoroastrian story of creation, Ahura Mazda existed in light in goodness above, while Angra Mainyu existed in darkness and ignorance below. They have existed independently of each other for all time, and manifest contrary substances. Ahura Mazda first created seven abstract heavenly beings called Amesha Spentas, who support him and represent beneficent aspects, along with numerous yazads, lesser beings worthy of worship. He then created the universe itself in order to ensnare evil. Ahura Mazda created the floating, egg-shaped universe in two parts: first the spiritual (menog) and 3,000 years later, the physical (getig). Ahura Mazda then created Gayomard, the archetypical perfect man, and the first bull.^[41]

While Ahura Mazda created the universe and mankind, Angra Mainyu, whose instinct is to destroy, miscreated demons, evil yazads, and noxious creatures (khrafstar) such as snakes, ants, and flies. Angra Mainyu created an opposite, evil being for each good being, except for humans, which he found he could not match. Angra Mainyu invaded the universe through the base of the sky, inflicting Gayomard and the bull with suffering and death. However, the evil forces were trapped in the universe and could not retreat. The dying primordial man and bull emitted seeds. From the bull's seed grew all beneficial plants and animals of the world, and from the man's seed grew a plant whose leaves became the first human couple. Man thus struggles in a two-fold universe trapped with evil. The evils of this physical world are not products of an inherent weakness, but are the fault of Angra Mainyu's assault on creation. This assault turned the perfectly flat, peaceful, and ever day-lit world into a mountainous, violent place that is half night.^[41]

Renovation and judgment[link]

Zoroastrianism also includes beliefs about the renovation of the world and individual judgment (cf. general and particular judgment), including the resurrection of the dead.

Individual judgment at death is by the Bridge of Judgment, which each human must cross, facing a spiritual judgment. Humans' actions under their free will determine the outcome. One is either greeted at the bridge by a beautiful, sweet-smelling maiden or by an ugly, foul-smelling old woman. The maiden leads the dead safely across the bridge to the Amesha Spenta Good Mind, who carries the dead to paradise. The old woman leads the dead down a bridge that narrows until the departed falls off into the abyss of hell.^[41]

Zoroastrian hell is reformative; punishments fit the crimes, and souls do not rest in eternal damnation. Hell contains foul smells and evil food, and souls are packed tightly together although they believe they are in total isolation.^[41]

In Zoroastrian eschatology, a 3,000-year struggle between good and evil will be fought, punctuated by evil's final assault. During the final assault, the sun and moon will darken and mankind will lose its reverence for religion, family, and elders. The world will fall into winter, and Angra Mainyu's most fearsome miscreant, Azi Dahaka, will break free and terrorize the world.^[41]

The final savior of the world, Saoshyant, will be born to a virgin impregnated by the seed of Zoroaster while bathing in a lake. Saoshyant will raise the dead – including those in both heaven and hell – for final judgment, returning the wicked to hell to be purged of bodily sin. Next, all will wade through a river of molten metal in which the righteous will not burn. Heavenly forces will ultimately triumph over evil, rendering it forever impotent. Saoshyant and Ahura Mazda will offer a bull as a final sacrifice for all time, and all men will become immortal. Mountains will again flatten and valleys will rise; heaven will descend to the moon, and the earth will rise to meet them both.^[41]

Man requires two judgments because there are as many aspects to his being: spiritual (menog) and physical (getig).^[41]

Head covering[link]

The Zarathushtri also practice traditional head covering ritual similar to that of Judaism (probably predating it). It is vital to the practice, and according to Dr. Hoshang Bhadha,

A Zarathustri is enjoined to cover his head at all times. It is one of the basic disciplines for a Zarathustri. If you have ever look at the pictures of Zarathustris from the past, you will recognize them simply because they were wearing cap or turban covering their head. If you read the description of Parsees from the past... it is emphatically described that whether a child, female or male they all had their head(s) covered. It is unfortunate that our own community people laugh on us for wearing cap, which is the foundation of all our religion practices. Needless to say, today a Zarathustri wearing cap will get strange glances; he/she will evoke giggles and some people even consider them as one belonging to the Stone Age. However, such reactions are seldom seen when a Zarathustri will observe a Muslim or Jew demonstrating their practice of covering head during and out of their prayer area. It is a common site to see a Zarathustri coming out from the Agiary with one hand over his head, not as a respect but to prepare himself/ herself to remove the cap/scarf before he/she reaches the main gate. Some people feel embarrass to wear in public whereas some remove it to protect their hairstyle. My dear Zarathustris, wearing cap is not imposed upon us but it is a remedy to protect oneself from destructive thought process[es]...

^[42]

Adherents[link]

The Zoroastrian Atash Behram of Yazd, Iran.

India is considered to be home to the largest Zoroastrian population in the world. When the Islamic armies, under the first Caliphs, invaded Persia, those locals who were unwilling to convert to Islam sought refuge, first in the mountains of Northern Iran, then the regions of Yazd and its surrounding villages. Later, in the ninth century CE, a group sought refuge in the western coastal region of India, and also scattered to other regions of the world. In recent years, the United States has become a significant destination of Zoroastrian populations, holding the second largest population of Zoroastrians after India.

Small Zoroastrian communities may be found all over the world, with a continuing concentration in Western India, Central Iran, and Southern Pakistan. Zoroastrians of the diaspora are primarily located in Great Britain and the former British colonies—in particular Canada and Australia. Zoroastrian communities comprised two main groups of people: those of South Asian Zoroastrian background known as Parsis (or Parsees), and those of Central Asian background.

Iran and Central Asia[link]

Communities exist in Tehran, as well as in Yazd, Kerman and Kermanshah, where many still speak an Iranian language distinct from the usual Persian. They call their language Dari (not to be confused with the Dari of Afghanistan). Their language is also called Gabri or Bahdinan (also the name of a modern Kurdish dialect), literally "of the Good Religion". Sometimes their language is named for the cities in which it is spoken, such as Yazdi or Kermani. Iranian Zoroastrians were historically called Gabrs, originally without a pejorative connotation but in the present-day derogatorily applied to all non-Muslims.

There is some interest among Iranians, as well as people in various Central Asian countries such as Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, in their ancient Zoroastrian heritage; some people in these countries take notice of their Zoroastrian past^[who?]. At the instigation of the government of Tajikistan, UNESCO declared 2003 a year to celebrate the "3000th anniversary of Zoroastrian culture", with special events throughout the world.

In South Asia[link]

This unreferenced section requires citations to ensure verifiability.

Parsi Navjote ceremony (rites of admission into the Zoroastrian faith)

Following the fall of the Sassanid Empire in 651 CE, many Zoroastrians migrated. Among them were several groups who ventured to Gujarat on the western shores of the Indian subcontinent, where they finally settled. The descendants of those refugees are today known as the Parsis. The year of arrival on the subcontinent cannot be precisely established, and Parsi legend and tradition assigns various dates to the event.

In the Indian subcontinent, these Zoroastrians enjoyed tolerance and even admiration from other religious communities.^{[citation needed]} From the 19th century onward, the Parsis gained a reputation for their education and widespread influence in all aspects of society, partly due to the divisive strategy of British colonialism, which favored certain minorities. Parsis are generally more affluent than other Indians and are stereotypically viewed as among the most Anglicised and "Westernised" of the various minority groups.^{[citation needed]} They have also played an instrumental role in the economic development of the region over many decades; several of the best-known business conglomerates of India are run by Parsi-Zoroastrians, including Tata, Godrej, and Wadia families.

Demographics[link]

In 2004, the number of Zoroastrians worldwide was estimated at between 145,000 and 210,000.^[43] India's 2001 Census found 69,601 Parsi Zoroastrians. In Pakistan, they number 5,000, mostly living in Karachi; they have been reinforced in recent years with a number of Zoroastrian refugees from Iran. North America is thought to be home to 18,000–25,000 Zoroastrians of both South Asian and Iranian background. A further 3,500 live in Australia (mainly in Sydney). Iran's figures of Zoroastrians have ranged widely; the last census (1974) before the revolution of 1979 revealed 21,400 Zoroastrians.

Some 10,000 adherents remain in the Central Asian regions that were once considered the traditional stronghold of Zoroastrianism, i.e., Bactria (see also Balkh), which is in Northern Afghanistan; Sogdiana; Margiana; and other areas close to Zoroaster's homeland.

In the Indian census of 2001, the Parsis numbered 69,601, representing about 0.006% of the total population of India, with a concentration in and around the city of Mumbai. Due to a low birth rate and high rate of emigration, demographic trends project that by 2020 the Parsis will number only about 23,000 or 0.002% of the total population of India. The Parsis would then cease to be called a community and will be labeled a "tribe". By 2008, the birth-to-death ratio was 1:5; 200 births per year to 1,000 deaths.^[44]

In Iran, emigration, out-marriage and low birth rates are likewise leading to a decline in the Zoroastrian population, which is currently estimated at under 20,000.^[45]

References[link]

This article includes a list of references, but its sources remain unclear because it has insufficient inline citations. Please help to improve this article by introducing more precise citations. (August 2009)

Works cited

• Khan, Roni K (1996), "The Tenets of Zoroastrianism", http://tenets.parsizoroastrianism.com/ 
• Black, Matthew; Rowley, H. H., eds. (1982), Peake's Commentary on the Bible, New York: Nelson, ISBN 0-415-05147-9 
• Boyce, Mary (1984), Textual sources for the study of Zoroastrianism, Manchester: Manchester UP, ISBN 0-226-06930-3 
• Boyce, Mary (1987), Zoroastrianism: A Shadowy but Powerful Presence in the Judaeo-Christian World, London: William's Trust 
• Boyce, Mary (1979), Zoroastrians: Their Religious Beliefs and Practices, London: Routledge, ISBN 0-415-23903-6  (note to catalogue searchers: the spine of this edition misprints the title "Zoroastrians" as "Zoroastians", and this may lead to catalogue errors)
• Boyce, Mary (1975), The History of Zoroastrianism, 1, Leiden: Brill, ISBN 90-04-10474-7, (repr. 1996) 
• Boyce, Mary (1982), The History of Zoroastrianism, 2, Leiden: Brill, ISBN 90-04-06506-7, (repr. 1997) 
• Boyce, Mary (2007), Zoroastrians: Their Religious Beliefs and Practices, London: Routledge, ISBN 978-0-415-23903-5 * Boyce, Mary (1983), "Ahura Mazdā", Encyclopaedia Iranica, 1, New York: Routledge & Kegan Paul  pages 684–687
• Bulliet, Richard W. (1979), Conversion to Islam in the Medieval Period: An Essay in Quantitative History, Cambridge: Harvard UP, ISBN 0-674-17035-0 
• Carroll, Warren H. (1985), Founding Of Christendom: History Of Christendom, 1, Urbana: Illinois UP, ISBN 0-931888-21-2, (repr. 2004) 
• Clark, Peter (1998), Zoroastrianism. An Introduction to an Ancient Faith, Brighton: Sussex Academic Press, ISBN 1-898723-78-8 
• Dhalla, Maneckji Nusservanji (1938), History of Zoroastrianism, New York: OUP 
• Duchesne-Guillemin, Jacques (1988), "Zoroastrianism", Encyclopedia Americana, 29, Danbury: Grolier  pages 813–815
• Duchesne-Guillemin, Jacques (2006), "Zoroastrianism: Relation to other religions", Encyclopædia Britannica (Online ed.), http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9207, retrieved 2006-05-31 
• Eliade, Mircea; Couliano, Ioan P. (1991), The Eliade Guide to World Religions, New York: Harper Collins 
• Foltz, Richard (2004), Spirituality in the Land of the Noble: How Iran Shaped the World's Religions, Oxford: Oneworld publications, ISBN 1-85168-336-4 
• Kellens, Jean, "Avesta", Encyclopaedia Iranica, 3, New York: Routledge and Kegan Paul  pages 35–44.
• King, Charles William (1887), Gnostics and their Remains Ancient and Mediaeval, London: Bell & Daldy, ISBN 0-7661-0381-1 (repr. 1998) 
• Melton, J. Gordon (1996), Encyclopedia of American Religions, Detroit: Gale Research 
• Malandra, William W. (1983), An Introduction to Ancient Iranian Religion. Readings from the Avesta and Achaemenid Inscriptions, Minneapolis: U. Minnesota Press, ISBN 0-8166-1114-9 
• Malandra, William W. (2005), "Zoroastrianism: Historical Review", Encyclopaedia Iranica, New York: iranica.com, http://www.iranica.com/newsite/articles/ot_grp9/ot_zorhist_20051007.html 
• Moulton, James Hope (1917), The Treasure of the Magi: A Study of Modern Zoroastrianism, London: OUP, 1-564-59612-5 (repr. 1997) 
• Russell, James R. (1987), Zoroastrianism in Armenia (Harvard Iranian Series), Oxford: Harvard University Press, ISBN 0-674-96850-6 
• Simpson, John A.; Weiner, Edmund S., eds. (1989), "Zoroastrianism", Oxford English Dictionary (2nd ed.), London: Oxford UP, ISBN 0-19-861186-2 
• Stolze, Franz (1882), Die Achaemenidischen und Sasanidischen Denkmäler und Inschriften von Persepolis, Istakhr, Pasargadae, Shâpûr, Berlin: A. Asher 
• Zaehner, Robert Charles (1961), The Dawn and Twilight of Zoroastrianism, London: Phoenix Press, ISBN 1-84212-165-0 

• Verlag, Chronik (2008), The Chronicle of World History, United States: Konecky and Konecky 
• Robinson, B.A. (2010-03-01), Zoroastrianism: Holy text, beliefs and practices, http://www.iranica.com/newsite/articles/ot_grp9/ot_zorhist_20051007.html, retrieved 2010-03-01 ^{[dead link]}
• Saga of the Aryans, Historical novel on ancient Iranian migrations by Porus Homi Havewala, Published Mumbai, India (2005, 2010).

External links[link]

	Zoroastrianism portal
	Ancient Near East portal
	Iran portal

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Zoroastrianism

• Zoroastrianism at the Open Directory Project
  (includes a list of Zoroastrian organizations)

This article relies on references to primary sources or sources affiliated with the subject, rather than references from independent authors and third-party publications. Please add citations from reliable sources. (November 2009)

The Flames was a musical group from Durban in South Africa. The band was originally formed in 1963 by guitarist Steve Fataar, bassist Brother Fataar (real name Edries Fataar), drummer George Faber and guitarist Eugene Champion. However this line-up would only be together to record a couple of songs. Ricky Fataar replaced George Faber as the band's drummer around 1964 and Edries Fredericks replaced Eugene Champion as the guitarist. Baby Duval briefly replaced Edries Fredericks in 1967 although it is unclear whether he was involved in any of the recordings that were released. Blondie Chaplin then replaced Baby Duval in 1967. This was to be the line-up from 1967 until their demise as a group in 1970.

Steve Fataar has confirmed that Baby Duval is featured as a performer on the Flames second album "That's Enough", which was released in early 1967.

Discography[link]

• Ummm! Ummm! Oh Yeah!!! (1965)
• That's Enough (1967)
• Burning Soul! (1967)
• Soul Meeting!! (1968)
• Soulfire!! (1968)
• Ball of Flames (1970)
• The Flame (The Flames album)|The Flame (1970)
• Burning Soul!/Soulfire (CD 2010)

External links[link]

• The-Flames official website

This South Africa-related article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. v t e

This article on a rock band is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. v t e

Freddie Mercury
Mercury performing in New Haven, Connecticut, in 1978 with Queen
Background information
Birth name	Farrokh Bulsara
Born	(1946-09-05)5 September 1946 Stone Town, Zanzibar
Origin	London, England, UK[1]
Died	24 November 1991(1991-11-24) (aged 45) Kensington, London, England, United Kingdom
Genres	Rock, hard rock, glam rock
Occupations	Musician, singer-songwriter, record producer
Instruments	Multi-instrumentalist Vocals, piano, keyboards, guitar
Years active	1969–1991
Labels	Columbia, Polydor, EMI, Parlophone, Hollywood Records
Associated acts	Queen, Wreckage/Ibex, Montserrat Caballé Freddie Mercury's Signature

Freddie Mercury (born Farrokh Bulsara (Gujarati: ફારોખ બલ્સારા‌), 5 September 1946 – 24 November 1991)^[2][3] was a British musician, singer and songwriter, best known as the lead vocalist and lyricist of the rock band Queen. As a performer, he was known for his flamboyant stage persona and powerful vocals over a four-octave range.^[4][5][6] As a songwriter, Mercury composed many hits for Queen, including "Bohemian Rhapsody", "Killer Queen", "Somebody to Love", "Don't Stop Me Now", "Crazy Little Thing Called Love" and "We Are the Champions". In addition to his work with Queen, he led a solo career, and also occasionally served as a producer and guest musician (piano or vocals) for other artists. He died of bronchopneumonia brought on by AIDS on 24 November 1991, only one day after publicly acknowledging he had the disease.

Mercury was a Parsi born in Zanzibar and grew up there and in India until his mid-teens. He has been referred to as "Britain's first Asian rock star".^[7] In 2002, Mercury was placed at number 58 in the BBC's poll of the 100 Greatest Britons, in 2006, Time Asia named him one of the most influential Asian heroes of the past 60 years,^[8] and he continues to be voted one of the greatest singers in the history of popular music. In 2005, a poll organised by Blender and MTV2 saw Mercury voted the greatest male singer of all time.^[9] In 2008, Rolling Stone editors ranked him number 18 on their list of the 100 greatest singers of all time.^[6] In 2009, a Classic Rock poll saw him voted the greatest rock singer of all time.^[10] Allmusic has characterised Mercury as "one of rock's greatest all-time entertainers", who possessed "one of the greatest voices in all of music".^[11]

Early life[link]

Mercury was born in the British protectorate of Zanzibar, East Africa (now part of Tanzania). His parents, Bomi and Jer Bulsara,^[a] were Parsis from the Gujarat region of the then province of Bombay Presidency in British India.^[12][b] The family surname is derived from the town of Bulsar (also known as Valsad) in southern Gujarat. As Parsis, Mercury and his family practised the Zoroastrian religion.^[13] The Bulsara family had moved to Zanzibar so that his father could continue his job as a cashier at the British Colonial Office. He had a younger sister, Kashmira.^[14]

The house in Zanzibar where Mercury lived in his early years

Mercury spent the bulk of his childhood in India and began taking piano lessons at the age of seven.^[15] In 1954, at the age of eight, Mercury was sent to study at St. Peter's School, a British-style boarding school for boys in Panchgani near Bombay (now Mumbai), India.^[16] One of his formative musical influences at the time was Bollywood singer Lata Mangeshkar.^[17] Aged 12, he formed a school band, The Hectics, and covered rock and roll artists such as Cliff Richard and Little Richard.^[18] A friend from the time recalls that he had "an uncanny ability to listen to the radio and replay what he heard on piano".^[19] It was also at St. Peter's where he began to call himself "Freddie". Mercury remained in India, living with his grandmother and aunt until he completed his education at St. Mary's School, Bombay.^[20]

At the age of 17, Mercury and his family fled from Zanzibar for safety reasons due to the 1964 Zanzibar Revolution,^[7] in which thousands of Arabs and Indians were killed.^[21] The family moved into a small house in Feltham, Middlesex, England. Mercury enrolled at Isleworth Polytechnic (now West Thames College) in West London where he studied art. He ultimately earned a Diploma in Art and Graphic Design at Ealing Art College, later using these skills to design the Queen crest. Mercury remained a British citizen for the rest of his life.

Following graduation, Mercury joined a series of bands and sold second-hand clothes in the Kensington Market in London. He also held a job at Heathrow Airport. Friends from the time remember him as a quiet and shy young man who showed a great deal of interest in music.^[22] In 1969 he joined the band Ibex, later renamed Wreckage. When this band failed to take off, he joined a second band called Sour Milk Sea. However, by early 1970 this group broke up as well.^[23]

In April 1970, Mercury joined guitarist Brian May and drummer Roger Taylor who had previously been in a band called Smile. Despite reservations from the other members, Mercury chose the name "Queen" for the new band. He later said about the band's name, "I was certainly aware of the gay connotations, but that was just one facet of it".^[1] At about the same time, he changed his surname, Bulsara, to Mercury.^[24]

Career[link]

Singer[link]

Freddie Mercury in 1978

Freddie Mercury's vocal range

Although Mercury's speaking voice naturally fell in the baritone range, he delivered most songs in the tenor range.^[25] His vocal range extended from an F (F2) to an F (F6).^[26] He could belt up to a high F (F5).^[26] Biographer David Bret described his voice as "escalating within a few bars from a deep, throaty rock-growl to tender, vibrant tenor, then on to a high-pitched, perfect coloratura, pure and crystalline in the upper reaches".^[27] Spanish soprano Montserrat Caballé, with whom Mercury recorded an album, expressed her opinion that "the difference between Freddie and almost all the other rock stars was that he was selling the voice".^[28] She adds, "His technique was astonishing. No problem of tempo, he sung with an incisive sense of rhythm, his vocal placement was very good and he was able to glide effortlessly from a register to another. He also had a great musicality. His phrasing was subtle, delicate and sweet or energetic and slamming. He was able to find the right colouring or expressive nuance for each word."^[26] As Queen's career progressed, he would increasingly alter the highest notes of their songs when live, often harmonising with seconds, thirds or fifths instead. Mercury was said to have "the rawest vocal fold nodules" and claimed never to have had any formal vocal training.^[29]

Songwriter[link]

Mercury wrote 10 of the 17 songs on Queen's Greatest Hits album: "Bohemian Rhapsody", "Seven Seas of Rhye", "Killer Queen", "Somebody to Love", "Good Old-Fashioned Lover Boy", "We Are the Champions", "Bicycle Race", "Don't Stop Me Now", "Crazy Little Thing Called Love" and "Play the Game".^[30]

The most notable aspect of his songwriting involved the wide range of genres that he used, which included, among other styles, rockabilly, progressive rock, heavy metal, gospel and disco. As he explained in a 1986 interview, "I hate doing the same thing again and again and again. I like to see what's happening now in music, film and theatre and incorporate all of those things."^[31] Compared to many popular songwriters, Mercury also tended to write musically complex material. For example, "Bohemian Rhapsody" is acyclic in structure and comprises dozens of chords.^[32][33] He also wrote six songs from Queen II which deal with multiple key changes and complex material. "Crazy Little Thing Called Love", on the other hand, contains only a few chords. Despite the fact that Mercury often wrote very intricate harmonies, he also claimed that he could barely read music.^[34] He wrote most of his songs on the piano and used a wide variety of different key signatures.^[32]

Live performer[link]

Mercury, performing live in 1979, with his bottomless microphone stand

Mercury performing live in 1984

Mercury was noted for his live performances, which were often delivered to stadium audiences around the world. He displayed a highly theatrical style that often evoked a great deal of participation from the crowd. A writer for The Spectator described him as "a performer out to tease, shock and ultimately charm his audience with various extravagant versions of himself".^[35] David Bowie, who performed at the Freddie Mercury Tribute Concert and recorded the song "Under Pressure" with Queen, praised Mercury's performance style, saying: "Of all the more theatrical rock performers, Freddie took it further than the rest... he took it over the edge. And of course, I always admired a man who wears tights. I only saw him in concert once and as they say, he was definitely a man who could hold an audience in the palm of his hand."^[36] Queen guitarist Brian May wrote that Mercury could make "the last person at the back of the furthest stand in a stadium feel that he was connected."^[37]

One of Mercury's most notable performances with Queen took place at Live Aid in 1985, during which the entire stadium audience of 72,000 people clapped, sang and swayed in unison. Queen's performance at the event has since been voted by a group of music executives as the greatest live performance in the history of rock music. The results were aired on a television program called "The World's Greatest Gigs".^[38][39] In reviewing Live Aid in 2005, one critic wrote, "Those who compile lists of Great Rock Frontmen and award the top spots to Mick Jagger, Robert Plant, etc all are guilty of a terrible oversight. Freddie, as evidenced by his Dionysian Live Aid performance, was easily the most godlike of them all."^[40]

Over the course of his career, Mercury performed an estimated 700 concerts in countries around the world with Queen. A notable aspect of Queen concerts was the large scale involved.^[31] He once explained, "We're the Cecil B. DeMille of rock and roll, always wanting to do things bigger and better."^[31] The band was the first ever to play in South American stadiums, breaking worldwide records for concert attendance in the Morumbi Stadium in São Paulo in 1981.^[41] In 1986, Queen also played behind the Iron Curtain when they performed to a crowd of 80,000 in Budapest, in what was one of the biggest rock concerts ever held in Eastern Europe.^[42] Mercury's final live performance with Queen took place on 9 August 1986 at Knebworth Park in England and drew an attendance estimated as high as 300,000.^[43]

Instrumentalist[link]

Freddie Mercury playing guitar during a live concert with Queen in Frankfurt, Germany, 1984.

As a young boy in India, Mercury received formal piano training up to the age of nine. Later on, while living in London, he learned guitar. Much of the music he liked was guitar-oriented: his favourite artists at the time were The Who, The Beatles, Jimi Hendrix, David Bowie, and Led Zeppelin. He was often self-deprecating about his own skills on both instruments and from the early 1980s onward began extensively using guest keyboardists for both Queen and his solo career. Most notably, he enlisted Fred Mandel (a Canadian musician who also worked for Pink Floyd, Elton John and Supertramp) for his first solo project, and from 1985 onward collaborated with Mike Moran (in the studio) and Spike Edney (in concert), leaving most of the keyboard work exclusively to them.

Mercury played the piano in many of Queen's most popular songs, including "Killer Queen", "Bohemian Rhapsody", "Good Old Fashioned Lover Boy", "We Are the Champions", "Somebody To Love" and "Don't Stop Me Now". He used concert grand pianos and, occasionally, other keyboard instruments such as the harpsichord. From 1980 onward, he also made frequent use of synthesisers in the studio. Queen guitarist Brian May claims that Mercury was unimpressed with his own abilities at the piano and used the instrument less over time because he wanted to walk around onstage and entertain the audience.^[44] Although he wrote many lines for the guitar, Mercury possessed only rudimentary skills on the instrument. Songs like "Ogre Battle" and "Crazy Little Thing Called Love" were composed on the guitar; the latter featured Mercury playing acoustic guitar both on stage and in the studio.^[45]

Solo career[link]

In addition to his work with Queen, Mercury put out two solo albums and several singles. Although his solo work was not as commercially successful as most Queen albums, the two off-Queen albums and several of the singles debuted in the top 10 of the UK Album Charts. His first solo effort involved his contribution to the Richard "Wolfie" Wolf mix of Love Kills on the 1984 album (the song also used as the end title theme for National Lampoon's "Loaded Weapon") and new soundtrack to the 1926 Fritz Lang film Metropolis. The song, produced by Giorgio Moroder, debuted at the number 10 position in the UK charts.^[46]

Mercury's two full albums outside the band were Mr. Bad Guy (1985) and Barcelona (1988). The former is a pop-oriented album that emphasises disco and dance music. "Barcelona" was recorded and performed with the opera singer Montserrat Caballé, whom he had long admired. Mr. Bad Guy debuted in the top ten of the UK Album Charts.^[46] In 1993, a remix of "Living on My Own", a single from the album, reached the No.1 position on the UK Singles Charts.^[47] The song also garnered Mercury a posthumous Ivor Novello Award. Allmusic critic Eduardo Rivadavia describes Mr. Bad Guy as "outstanding from start to finish" and expressed his view that Mercury "did a commendable job of stretching into uncharted territory".^[48] In particular, the album is heavily synthesiser-driven in a way that is not characteristic of previous Queen albums.

Barcelona, recorded with Spanish soprano Montserrat Caballé, combines elements of popular music and opera. Many critics were uncertain what to make of the album; one referred to it as "the most bizarre CD of the year".^[49] The album was a commercial success,^[50] and the album's title track debuted at the No.8 position in the UK charts and was a hit in Spain.^[51] The title track received massive air play as the official hymn of the 1992 Summer Olympics (held in Barcelona one year after Mercury's death). Caballé sang it live at the opening of the Olympics with Mercury's part played on a screen, and again prior to the start of the 1999 UEFA Champions League Final in Barcelona.^[52]

In addition to the two solo albums, Mercury released several singles, including his own version of the hit The Great Pretender by The Platters, which debuted at number five in the UK in 1987.^[46] In September 2006, a compilation album featuring Mercury's solo work was released in the UK in honour of what would have been his 60th birthday. The album debuted in the top 10 of the UK Album Charts.^[53]

In 1981–1983, Mercury recorded several tracks with Michael Jackson, including a demo of "State of Shock", "Victory" and "There Must Be More to Life Than This".^[54] None of these collaborations were officially released, although bootleg recordings exist. Jackson went on to record the single "State of Shock" with Mick Jagger for The Jacksons's album Victory.^[55] Mercury included the solo version of "There Must Be More To Life Than This" on his Mr. Bad Guy album.^[56] In November 2011, Brian May announced that a series of duets that Mercury recorded with Jackson are to be released in 2012.^[57][58]

Personal life[link]

Queen in New Haven, Connecticut, US in November 1978.

Relationships[link]

In the early 1970s Mercury had a long-term relationship with Mary Austin, whom he had met through guitarist Brian May. He lived with Austin for several years in West Kensington. By the mid-1970s, however, the singer had begun an affair with a male American record executive at Elektra Records, which ultimately resulted in the end of his relationship with Austin.^[59] Mercury and Austin nevertheless remained close friends through the years, with Mercury often referring to her as his only true friend. In a 1985 interview, Mercury said of Austin, "All my lovers asked me why they couldn't replace Mary [Austin], but it's simply impossible. The only friend I've got is Mary and I don't want anybody else. To me, she was my common-law wife. To me, it was a marriage. We believe in each other, that's enough for me."^[60] He also wrote several songs about Austin, the most notable of which is "Love of My Life". In his will, Mercury left his London home to Austin, rather than his then partner Jim Hutton, saying, "You would have been my wife and it would have been yours anyway".^[61] Mercury was also the godfather of Mary's oldest son, Richard.^[44]

During the early to mid 80s, he was romantically involved with Barbara Valentin, an Austrian actress,^[62] who is featured in the video for "It's a Hard Life".^[63] By 1985, he began another long-term relationship with a hairdresser named Jim Hutton. Hutton, who himself was tested HIV-positive in 1990,^[64] lived with Mercury for the last six years of his life, nursed him during his illness, and was present at his bedside when he died. Hutton claimed that Mercury died wearing a wedding band that Hutton had given him.^[64] Hutton died from cancer on 1 January 2010.^[65]

Sexual orientation[link]

Mercury was an acknowledged bisexual.^[18][66][67] While some critics claimed he hid his sexual orientation from the public,^[7][28][68] others claimed he was "openly gay".^[8][69] In December 1974, when asked directly, "So how about being bent?" by the New Musical Express, Mercury replied, "You're a crafty cow. Let's put it this way; there were times when I was young and green. It's a thing schoolboys go through. I've had my share of schoolboy pranks. I'm not going to elaborate further." Homosexuality was legalised in the United Kingdom in 1967, only seven years earlier. In the 1980s, he would often distance himself from his partner, Jim Hutton, during public events.^[64]

In 1992, John Marshall of Gay Times expressed the following opinion: "[Mercury] was a 'scene-queen', not afraid to publicly express his gayness but unwilling to analyse or justify his 'lifestyle' ... It was as if Freddie Mercury was saying to the world, 'I am what I am. So what?' And that in itself for some was a statement."^[70] A writer for a gay online newspaper felt that audiences may have been overly naïve about the matter: "While in many respects he was overtly queer his whole career ("I am as gay as a daffodil, my dear" being one of his most famous quotes), his sexual orientation seemed to pass over the heads of scrutinising audiences and pundits (both gay and straight) for decades".^[71]

Personality[link]

Although he cultivated a flamboyant stage personality, Mercury was a very shy and retiring man in person, particularly around people he did not know well.^[19][28][72] He also granted very few interviews. Mercury once said of himself: "When I'm performing I'm an extrovert, yet inside I'm a completely different man."^[73] While on stage, Mercury basked in the love from the audience, which was famously noted by Kurt Cobain, in his suicide note, when he wrote of how he both admired and envied Mercury for being able to do so.^[74]

Criticism and controversy[link]

HIV[link]

Mercury did not disclose his HIV status to the public for several years, and it has been suggested that he could have made a contribution to AIDS awareness by speaking earlier about his situation and his fight against the disease.^[75][76]

Other controversies[link]

Queen were widely criticised when they broke a United Nations cultural boycott in 1984 by performing a series of shows at Sun City, an entertainment complex in Bophuthatswana, a homeland of (then) apartheid South Africa. As a result of these shows, Queen was placed on a United Nations list of artists who broke the boycott and was widely criticised in magazines such as the NME.^[40]

A further controversy ensued in August 2006, when an organisation calling itself the Islamic Mobilization and Propagation petitioned the Zanzibar government's culture ministry, demanding that a large-scale celebration of what would have been Mercury's sixtieth birthday be cancelled. The organisation issued several complaints about the planned celebrations, including that Mercury was not a true Zanzibari and that he was gay, which is not in accordance with their interpretation of sharia. The organisation claimed that "associating Mercury with Zanzibar degrades our island as a place of Islam".^[69] The planned celebration was cancelled.

Illness and death[link]

According to his partner Jim Hutton, Mercury was diagnosed with AIDS shortly after Easter of 1987.^[77] Around that time, Mercury claimed in an interview to have tested negative for HIV.^[28] Despite the denials, the British press pursued the rampant rumours over the next few years, fuelled by Mercury's increasingly gaunt appearance, Queen's absence from touring, and reports from former lovers to various tabloid journals – by 1990 the rumours about Mercury's health were rife.^[78] At the 1990 Brit Awards held at the Dominion Theatre, London on 18 February, Mercury made his final public appearance on stage when he joined the rest of Queen to collect the Brit Award for Outstanding Contribution to Music.^[79][80] Towards the end of his life, he was routinely stalked by photographers, while the daily tabloid newspaper The Sun featured a series of articles claiming that he was seriously ill; notably in an article from November 1990 which featured an image of a haggard looking Mercury on the front page accompanied by the headline "It's official – Freddie is seriously ill".^[81]