Description

ZOROASTRIANISM

We must begin with some background information. If you would like the explanation for the above graphic click on the image.
About 5000 years ago, i.e. around 3000 B.C.E. a group of people called the Proto Indo-Iranians lived on the South Russian Steppes, to the east of the river Volga [Boyce]. The Proto Indo-Iranians believed in a primitive concept of order (called rta in Sanskrit). They knew that order existed in the universe because night followed day, the moon waxed and waned and each year the seasons followed one another. They believed that this law was guarded by divinities or gods called Asuras, among which Varuna and Mithra were most popular. The Proto Indo-Iranians worshiped instinctively and often through fear. For example, when they saw lightning and heard thunder they thought that the gods were angry at them. For every natural phenomenon such as earthquakes, volcanoes, snow storms, hurricanes they would make sacrifices of animals and food to their deities in order to appease them. About a thousand years later i.e. 2000 B.C.E., the Proto Indo-Iranians split into two groups. One group migrated westwards and came to be known as the Iranians while the other group went east and was known as the Vedic Indians or Vedic Aryans. Because of this common root the early religious scriptures of the Indian and the Iranian have some similarities but after the split each of them developed separately. The Iranians were mostly nomads, they did not have a fixed place to live, for they herded cattle and would keep moving around in search of fresh pasture and water. Since they lived in the open they worshiped nature and they had a god or goddess for each of the elements of nature, i.e. they believed that one god looked after the sky (Asman), another took care of the Earth (Zam), the third looked after the Moon (Mah) and a goddess called Anahita looked after the waters. They called this whole pantheon of gods and goddesses as Ahuras. The word Ahura comes from the root Ah meaning "to be", so Ahura can be derived as the Being. The Iranians believed their Ahuras to be very powerful and their priests called Karapans had many rituals and made sacrifices of animals and plant food to fire and water. Their Ahuras were similar to Asuras of the Proto Indo-Iranians and of the Rig Vedas. Several hundred years later the Iranians learned the use of bronze and developed horse drawn chariots. Some Iranians abandoned the task of herding cattle, became warriors and would go from place to place raiding cattle. These lawless people worshiped the gods of war and were called Daevas. Their priests were called Kavis who were very shrewd and practiced black magic. It was during this time somewhere around 1500 B.C.E. that Zarathushtra/Zoroaster was born. As a young boy he was interested in nature and wanted to know as to how the world was created. His search for creation and the creator lead him to God with who he communed after several years of meditation. When he was 30 years old, he introduced a religion known today as Zoroastrianism. Zarathushtra was known to the ancient Greeks as Zoroaster and hence his followers are called Zoroastrians. Some followers who live in India prefer to be called Zarathustis.
Zoroastrianism, named after the Persian prophet known also as Zaratust, Zathraustes, Zarathustra, etc., was for centuries embraced by those ancient Caucasians known as Aryans or Iranians; and it became for them an instrument of national policy in their bitter conflicts against surrounding nomadic tribes and Semitic nations, represented primarily by the "Turanians," Babylonians, Assyrians, Phoenicians, and Arabians. With the emergence of the first Persian Empire under Cyrus and its further expansion under Darius the Great Hystaspes, 521-486, B.C.E. the worship of Ahuramazda dominated twenty-three nations. These Iranians did more than drive the Semitic races into permanent eclipse: themselves descended from the older Sumerians, they were the