Zarathushtra or Zoroaster was probably
born in Bactria, near Lake Urmi in Iran, around 1400-1600 B.C. The original
scriptures of Zoroastrianism were destroyed by the Arabs. The seventeen
remaining Gathas form the core of the creed preached by Zarathushtra. There are
several translations of the name 'Zarathushtra.' One translation from Wikipedia
is "golden shining star.' The name derives possibly from 'zara'/'zarat'
meaning gold and 'ustra' from 'ush' (shining) and 'str' (star), i.e. 'golden
shining star.' Mary Boyce translates the name as ‘one who can manage camels:
(‘ustra’=camel) and ‘zara’ means ‘to drag.’ Zarathushtra is ‘one who
cherishes/nurtures camels.’[1]
There are verses in the Zend Avesta which support this view:
‘This I ask thee, tell me truly Ahura – whether I shall
indeed, O Right, earn the reward, even ten mares with a stallion and a camel
which was promised me, O Mazda, as well as through these, the future gift of
Welfare and Immortality.’[2]
Zarathushtra was a priest, prophet and lawgiver. The facts about his life are
thin. There is a myth surrounding his birth. Legend has it that Zarathushtra
laughed instead of crying when he was born. The baby was suffused with a divine
aura. When hostile locals in the area heard of this unusual baby, they felt
threatened. The baby was abducted and left out in a path frequented by wild
animals. Miraculously, he was unharmed and the distraught parents were able to
take him back home. At the age of twenty, Zarathushtra left his home and went
to Aria. In the oral tradition, he left home when he was ten. This is
consistent with the practice of sending future priests like Zarathushtra for
study as early as age seven.
Zarathushtra refers to himself as the 'zaotar,' i.e. an invoker, a man
dedicated to priesthood or 'vaedamna, ' (one who knows) in the Gathas[3].
One glorious day, the recluse Zarathushtra went to the Daiti River to fetch
water for a hoama ceremony and was drenched in light: He had a vision of 'Vohu
Mano,' (good mind/divine love). Vohu Mano took him to Ahura Mazda: The light
(Ahura) of wisdom (Mazda). Zarathushtra describes Ahura Mazda:
“When I conceived of Thee, O Mazda, as
the First and the Last, as the Most Adorable One,
As the Father of Good Thought, as the creator of Truth and Right,
As the Lord Judge of our 'actions in' life, then I made a place for thee in my
very eyes."[4]
Zarathustra's vision of Ahura Mazda is the central fact of his life. When
Zarathustra came down from the mountains after his vision, he faced a great
deal of opposition from the priests and the aristocracy even in his mother's
village. Zarathustra is forced to flee the country:
‘To what land shall I go to flee? From
nobles and from my peers they sever me, nor are the people pleased with
me...not the Liar rulers of the land.
I know wherefore O Mazda, I have been unable (to achieve) anything.
Only a few herds are mine (and thus it is so) and because I have got but a few
people.
I cry unto Thee, see Thou to it, O Ahura, granting me support.’[5]
Zarathushtra's life changes when he meets King Vistaspa. Like all prophets, he
is credited with supernatural powers and a cluster of myths have grown around
him, though these are later additions. Zarathushtra specifically denied a
belief in the supernatural. There is a fable that the king was terribly
distressed because his favorite horse was critically ill and had actually drawn
its legs under its belly. Zarathushtra freed the first leg and said to the
king: "You must convert to Zoroastrianism." The king agreed. The
second and third legs were freed when the queen and crown prince agreed to
convert, the fourth when the king promised to protect Zarathushtra from
persecution. King Vistaspa promised to propagate Zarathustra's religion if he
married his daughter or in some accounts, the daughter of his vazir
Frashoshtra. And so Zarathushtra was married. Of his children, at least two
were daughters. In other accounts, Queen Hutaosa was the first to convert.
Thereafter the king accepted Zarathushtra.
Mary Boyce tells an interesting story about Zarathustra's meeting with the
king. According to the thirteenth century Persian poem,' Zaratust
Name', King Vistaspa accepted Zoroastrianism but asked for four
boons:
1. I will behold in spirit the place which I will occupy after my death.
2. My body shall be invulnerable.
3. I shall have clairvoyance, the wisdom to look into the future.
4. My soul will leave my body only on the Day of Judgment.
Zarathustra told the king that such great boons cannot be given to one person.
He consecrated four things: wine, milk, incense and a pomegranate. He offered
the wine to the king. As the king drank the wine, he had a vision of God. His
soul was alight with the desire to worship God. The other boons were gifted to
the king’s two sons and his minister.[6]
Zoroastrianism spread and became a major religion in Persia. Zarathustra had
offered his life to Ahura Mazda during the early days of his ministry [7] At
the age of seventy seven, Zarathushtra was murdered by the invading Turanian
tribes while he was praying at the altar in the fire temple. He may have been
hacked to death and burnt alive.
Pic: www.hinduwebsite.com
[1] Boyce, Mary (1996),A
History of Zoroastrianism, The Early Period, Volume II, (Hansdbuch der
Orientalistk series, Leiden, Brill)p. 182
[2] Yasna:44.18,
51.14, Taraporevala,I.J.S.,(1951) The Divine Songs of Zarathushtra, trans. Bortholomae,(Bombay : Taraporevala
& Sons),www.avesta.org
[4] Tagore,
Rabindra Nath, forward, D.J.Irani, The Divine Songs of Zarathushtra,(Kessinger),
reprinted (Newton: Centre for Iranian Studies, 2004), Yasna:31.8
[6] Boyce,
Mary (1984),”On the Antiquity of Zoroastrian Apocalyptic, ‘Bulletin of the
School of Oriental and African Studies, London:SOAS,p.60
Zoroastrianism
is the first modern religion in west in the sense that it is grounded in a
clearly articulated moral code. It influenced Judaism, Christianity and Islam.
The tenets, dictates or commandments which are normally a part of a religious creed become fetters if not understood correctly. There is very little scope
for independent judgment or moral choice. The cardinal virtue is obedience.
Zoroastrianism is a combination of creed and free will. In terms of religious
principles, animal sacrifice, nature worship, drugs and intoxicants are
censured. Purity and goodness are exalted. Fire is worshiped because it cannot
be polluted. As decent human beings we must not pollute the earth, air or water
either in life or in death. Zoroastrianism is remarkable for its humanism. It
preaches equality of gender, race, class and nationality. Slavery and
inhumanity are immoral. At a time when the rule of the jungle prevailed and
might was right, Zarathustra said that the leader should be chosen by the
people. Zoroastrianism does not advocate asceticism. Zoroaster himself was married.
Interestingly, much like the Protestant ethic, there is an emphasis on hard
work and personal effort. Laziness of any kind or living off the labor of
others is frowned upon. Each person must do his best to protect himself and
anyone else he sees suffering from oppression of any kind. Zarathustra‘s ethic
emphasizes compassion, generosity, sympathy and purity of body, mind and soul.
Above all, it is humane. It accepts failure as a small glitch in the path to
success.
Rabindra Nath Tagore wrote a beautiful forward to D.J. Irani’s translation of The
Divine Songs of Zarathushtra.
He touches the very soul of the
verses. This is a faith based on direct experience and inner realization and
hence utterly simple and profound. It is not insight based on a study of books
or knowledge of ritual. It is the ‘ineffable illumination of truth.’ Tagore
talks of the transition from traditional rituals, steeped in the blood and gore
of animal sacrifice to a religion rooted in moral values, spirituality and
truth. It is a religion which replaces a creed nurtured by the fear of powerful
deities for justice and an inner goodness:
‘The
outer expression of truth reaches its white light of simplicity through its inner
realization. True simplicity is the physiognomy of perfection.’
Zarathushtra reaches a stage where his mind becomes so pure that it is
transparent. He rejects the idea of an exclusive God of a chosen people or
tribe. In Tagore’s view, his religion is universal:
“He
(Zarathushtra) was not like a man who by some chance of friction had lighted a
lamp, and knowing that it could not be shared by all, secured it with a miser’s
care for his own domestic use. But he was a watcher in the night, who stood on
the lonely peak facing the East and broke out singing the poems of life to the
sleeping world when the sun came out on the brim of the horizon.”
Zarathushtra sees God as the ‘desire of all desires,’ the highest good. He asks
questions which ring through every religion in these sublime verses:
‘...Who
determined the path of sun and stars...Who is it by whom the moon waxes and
wanes again...Who upholds the earth beneath and the firmament from falling? Who
the waters and plants? Who yoked swiftness to winds and clouds? Who is, O
Mazda, creator of Good Thought...What artist made light and darkness? What
artist sleep and waking? Who made morning, noon and night that call the
understanding of man to his duty?’
There is a strong intellectual component which emphasizes personal choice. The
concept of original sin is absent. Each soul starts with a ‘tabula rasa.’ At
the core of the creed are three principles: good thoughts (‘humata’), good
words (‘hukata’) and good deeds (‘hvarshta’). Human beings are given free will
and a 'Daena' or conscience so that they may choose the good (‘vayo’) over the
bad (‘akem’) or truth rather than deceit:
‘ Hear
with your ears the best things, look upon them with clear seeing thought, for
decision between the two beliefs, each man for himself before the great
consummation’
The twin positive and negative mentalities make the world what it is. Since man
is free to choose, he is responsible for his fate. Ali Jafrey has done a
perceptive analysis of the concepts of good and evil in the Gathas.
He lights on the inner meaning of the verses. Good and bad have consequences.
The ‘ashavan’, the follower of good reaches wholeness and immortality, the
allegorical house of light and song. This is a blissful state of mind which a
righteous person achieves through living an ethical life, i.e. the ‘spenta way
of being.’ The follower of ‘druj,’ harmful thoughts, lie, or wrong becomes
‘dregvant.’ He develops a bad mind and is left behind. The process of choosing
the good and rejecting wickedness is ‘the refiner’s fire.’. There is no
physical heaven, hell, resurrection or reincarnation. Zarathustra does not
mention a primordial evil spirit. He describes abstract qualities;
‘Asha’ (truth) and ‘druj’ (lie, wickedness). ‘Druj’ was
replaced by 'Angre Mainyu' or Ahriman, a personified evil spirit opposing Ahura
Mazda in later centuries. It is interesting that the word used for evil
throughout the Gathas is ‘lie’. What this does in effect is create a man-centric ethic. There is a foretaste of the existential emphasis on the autonomy
of the human being and a focus on self knowledge:
‘When
Thou, O Mazda, in the beginning didst create the Individual and the
Individuality through Thy Spirit, and powers of understanding – when Thou didst
make life clothed with the body, when (Thou madest) actions and teachings,
whereby one may exercise one’s convictions at one’s free will.’
After death, the soul travels across the Cinvat Bridge. Ahura Mazda judges his
actions. Thereafter the good attain immortality in Ahura Mazda’s allegorical
abode of song and light (‘garo damane’).The wicked have to endure the
allegorical abode of woe and misery (‘druj damane’):
‘Thus
the Self of the Liar destroys for himself self the assurance of the straight
Way; whose soul shall tremble at the Revelation and Bridge of the Separator
having turned aside with deeds and tongue from the Path of Right.
In the end Ahriman is destroyed and only good (life/gaem) remains because
wickedness (non life/ ‘ajyatim’) has no real existence. The wicked are
spiritually dead. Ultimately every soul becomes one with God and makes the
transition from the material (existential) to the spiritual world.
Pic: www.sumangalicana.in
