Zoroastrianism is the ancient, pre-Islamic religion of Persia (modern-day Iran).

It survives there in isolated areas but more prosperously in India, where the

descendants of Zoroastrian Persian immigrants are known as Parsis, or

Parsees. In India the religion is called Parsiism.

Founded by the Iranian prophet and reformer Zoroaster in the 6th century

BCE, Zoroastrianism contains both monotheistic and dualistic features. Its

concepts of one God, judgment, heaven and hell likely influenced the major

Western religons of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.

Texts

The Zoroastrian sacred text is the Avesta ("Book of the Law"), a fragmentary

collection of sacred writings. Compiled over many centuries, the Avesta was

not completed until Persia's Sassanid dynasty (226-641 AD).

It consists of: liturgical works with hymns ascribed to Zarathustra (the Gathas);

invocations and rituals to be used at festivals; hymns of praise; and spells

against demons and prescriptions for purification.

Beliefs

The Zoroastrian concept of God incorporates both monotheism and dualism.

In his visions, Zarathustra was taken up to heaven, where Ahura Mazda

revealed that he had an opponent, Aura Mainyu, the spirit and promoter of

evil. Ahura Mazda charged Zarathustra with the task of inviting all human

beings to choose between him (good) and Aura Mainyu (evil).

Though Zoroastrianism was never as aggressively monotheistic as Judaism

or Islam, it does represent an original attempt at unifying under the worship of

one supreme god a polytheistic religion comparable to those of the ancient

Greeks, Latins, Indians, and other early peoples. Its other salient feature,

namely dualism, was never understood in an absolute, rigorous fashion. Good

and Evil fight an unequal battle in which the former is assured of triumph.

God's omnipotence is thus only temporarily limited.

Zoroaster taught that man must enlist in this cosmic struggle because of his

capacity of free choice. Thus Zoroastrianism is a highly ethical religion in

which the choice of good over evil has almost cosmic importance. Zarathustra

taught that humans are free to choose between right and wrong, truth and lie,

and light and dark, and that their choices would affect their eternity destiny.

The Zoroastrian afterlife is determined by the balance of the good and evil

deeds, words, and thoughts of the whole life. For those whose good deeds

outweight the bad, heaven awaits. Those who did more evil than good go to

hell (which has several levels corresponding to degrees of wickedness). There

is an intermediate stage for those whose deeds weight out equally.

This general principle is not absolute, however, but allows for human

weakness. All faults do not have to be registered or weighed forever on the

scales. There are two means of effacing them: confession and the transfer of

supererogatory merits (similar to the Roman Catholic "Treasury of Merits").

The latter is the basis for Zoroastrian prayers and ceremonies for the

departed.

Zoroaster invoked saviors who, like the dawns of new days, would come to

the world. He hoped himself to be one of them. After his death, the belief in

coming saviors developed. He also incorporated belief in angels and demons.

Zoroaster's ideas of ethical monotheism, heaven, hell, angelology, the

resurrection of the body, and the messiah figure were influential on Judaism,

Christianity, and Islam, though to what extent is not known for certain.

Practices

Today's Zoroastrians (Parsis) practice an important coming of age ritual, in

which all young Parsis must be initiated when they reach the age of seven (in

India) or 10 (in Persia). They receive the shirt (sadre) and the girdle (kusti),

which they are to wear their whole life.

There are three types of purification, in order of increasing importance:

- padyab, or ablution

- nahn, or bath

- bareshnum, a complicated ritual performed at special places with the

participation of a dog (whose left ear is touched by the candidate and whose

gaze puts the evil spirits to flight) and lasting several days

The Zoroastrian system of penance entails reciting the patet, the firm resolve

not to sin again, and the confession of sins to a dastur or to an ordinary priest

if a dastur is not obtainable.

The chief ceremony, the Yasna, essentially a sacrifice of haoma (the sacred

liquor), is celebrated before the sacred fire with recitation of large parts of the

Avesta. There also are offerings of bread and milk and, formerly, of meat or

animal fat.

The sacred fire must be kept burning continually and has to be fed at least five

times a day. Prayers also are recited five times a day. The founding of a new

fire involves a very elaborate ceremony. There are also rites for purification

and for regeneration of a fire.

Zoroastrian burial rites center on exposure of the dead. After death, a dog is

brought before the corpse (preferably a "four-eyed" dog, i.e., with a spot

above each eye, believed to increase the efficacy of its gaze). The rite is

repeated five times a day. After the first one, fire is brought into the room

where it is kept burning until three days after the removal of the corpse to the

Tower of Silence. The removal must be done during the daytime.

The interior of the Tower of Silence is built in three concentric circles, one

each for men, women, and children. The corpses are exposed there naked.

The vultures do not take long—an hour or two at the most—to strip the flesh

off the bones, and these, dried by the sun, are later swept into the central well.

Formerly the bones were kept in an ossuary, the astodan, to preserve them

from rain and animals. The morning of the fourth day is marked by the most

solemn observance in the death ritual, for it is then that the departed soul

reaches the next world and appears before the deities who are to pass

judgment over it.

Festivals, in which worship is an essential part, are characteristic aspects of

Zoroastrianism, a faith that enjoins on man the pleasant duty of being happy.

The principal festivals in the Parsi year are the six seasonal festivals,

Gahanbars, and the days in memory of the dead at year's end. Also, each day

of the month and each of the 12 months of the year is dedicated to a deity.

The day named after the month is the great feast day of that particular deity.

The New Year festival, Noruz, is the most joyous and beautiful of Zoroastrian

feasts, a spring festival in honour of Rapithwin, the personification of noonday

and summer. The festival to Mithra, or Mehragan, was traditionally an autumn

one, as honoured as the spring feast of Noruz.