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ZOROASTER : The Prophet of Zoroastrian Faith

A tiny religious comminity of Zoroastrians follow the faith propagated by their prophet Zoroaster who lived and taught in ancient Persia where comes today as modern Iran. This area, the middle east is characterised by rivalries and struggles for domination among the various groups of people occupying the area. From Egyptians to Hammurabi and Assyrians, from Persians to Alexander the Great, had dynasty for some period and so on, the area became a culturally rich territory.

         According to the Zoroastrian sources, Zoroaster lived in the seventh to sixth centuries BCE. His birthplace was Azerbaijcan. His family’s geneology is traced back through forty- five generations to Gayomert who was the first human being according to their belief. His mother gave virgin birth to Zoroaster at the age fifteen. He had many supernatural events that the writer mentions about it : “The traditional account of Zoroaster’s infancy and later life abound with miracles.”[1] There are several stories about him that some animals saved him from some dangerous situations. Furthermore, tradition maintains that Zoroaster was trained to be a priest. He left his parents against their wishes at the age of twenty. After being taught the principles of ‘true’ and ‘good’ of religion tenets by Ahura Mazda (Wise Lord), he spent his following ten years by trying to teach his beliefs. However he couldn’t managed anyone to believe his teachings but his cousin. With the disappointment of converting only one person, he cried to Ahura Mazda as it is  written in Yasna which is a scripture in Avesta. Actually his passionate concern for Ahura Mazda was so dominant that he could forget about the failures and continue to his tryings to teach people his faith. There is a verse in the Yasna about that, after crying to Ahura Mazda about the disappointments, exlusion from his family he said : “Yes, praising, I shall worship all the time my Lord.”(50.4) An event that effected the spread of  Zoroastrianism in a positive way, is about a king who accepted the teachings of him. This acceptance has broken the power of the people who were against the Zoroaster and created a more appropriate environment for the teachings.

         Zoroaster had a family, he married three times and got three sons and three daughters. His three sons initiated and represented the three classes of society: the priests, the warriors and the farmers. Finally, his death came to him at the age of seventy-seven while he was praying in a fire temple.

         If we happen to consider Zoroaster with non-Zoroastrianism sources, we can say that his birth date is in conflict, there is not a certain information. However, placing him at about seventh to sixth centuries BCE should be accepted as appropriate. According to some Islamic authors like el-Birûni, Zoroaster’s birthplace is western Iran or Azerbaijcan.

AVESTA: The Scripture of Zoroastrian Faith

If we want to study the Zoroastrian faith simply as a complation of facts,figures and hystorical data, we should venture some much work. It is like examining fossils, because it has dark ages as the mankind has generally. There were many incursions and invades to the Zoroastrian world. For instance, the Alexander the Great and Muslim Arabs had conquered the land in different era’s. However, after they had entered they made a big damage to Zoroastrian literature as destroying many scriptures and forcing Zoroasterians to abondon their faiths. It was really hard to recover all the things damaged and destroyed. So, Avesta has been created with some scriptures which was renewed by Zoroastrian Priests. So the selection of the original part of the Avesta will be actually a small part of it.

Avesta’s content is hymns, formulas, narratives and laws which have been written in quite long period. It can be seperated into two main principles. First part contains the Yasna, the Visparad and the Videvdat, the second part includes the Khordeh Avesta and the Yashts.

An example from Avesta can show that how much meaningful is the scriptures :

A thousand people can’t convince one by words to the extent that one person can convince a thousand by action." (Dk6.e15) This verse of Avesta, points out the important fact when trying to convince one with not our words but our actions. For instance saying self-sacrifice is good would not be enough to convince someone but we need to show it with our actions, so a very fundamental thing, which is generally forgotten, referred in the Avesta.

Yasna means ‘sacrifice’, is consisted of 6 Gathas which are considered as words of Zoroaster. Yasna as a whole is about the nature of Ahura Mazda and his divine powers, the creation of the universe, a last judgement, future rewards and punishment.

Visparad means ‘to all the lords’, in this part there are some additional subjects which are about heads of spiritual and terrestrial worlds, all the lords in the water, the sky and the entire animal kingdom.

Videvdat, means ‘anti demonic law’, consist of religious, civil, criminal and purification laws.

Khordeh Avesta is intended for the use of priests and by persons in private devotion.

Yasht, means ‘worship’, consist of prayers addressed to angels and various gods and goddess of different ranks.

Student’s Comments

         Every prophet has endeavoured to expand their religion and they have all received opposite reaction to their teachings. These strict opposite reactions were sustained by generally the other religion’s priests. We know that like Zoroaster, the other prophets such as Moses, Jesus and Muhammed had very difficulty as they were expressing their teachings and feeligs about the religions they’ve been taught. The holy Wars, Zoroaster performed, had a special aim that lies beneath of the war fact. The wars were reasons for people to get superior and manage the others. However, behind all these reasons, Zoroaster had a thought of teaching his religion all the time. He used the wars and the state power for only teaching the Zoroastrianism. Also, this valid fact was used by other prophets, too. For instance, after Muhammed emigrated to Medina from Mekka, he found some power supporting him against Mekka’s hostily environment. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Boyce,M. Zoroastrianism: Its Antiquity and Consant Vigour. Mazda Publishers 1992

         U.S.A.California.

Knappert,J. The Encyclopedia of Middle Eastern Mythology and Religion.

Boyce,M. Zoroastrians, Their Religious Beliefs and Practices. Thetford Press 1979. Norfolk,

Great Britain.

Hartman,S. Parsism: The Religion of Zoroaster. By E.J.Brill,Leiden. 1980 The Netherlands.s

Boyce,M. A History of  Zoroastrianism (Volume one). By E.J.Brill,Leiden. 1989 The

         Netherlands.

Boyce,M. Zoroastrian Faith, Tradition and Modern Research. McGill-Queen’s University

         Press 1993. Canada.

[1] Boyce,M. Zoroastrian Faith, Tradition & Modern Research. (1993)