Pahlavi Texts, Part II (SBE18), E.W. West, tr. [1882], at sacred-texts.com
1. As to the seventy-first question and reply, that which you ask is thus: What are the heinous sins of committing unnatural intercourse, is it proper to order or perform the sacred ceremony for him who shall commit unnatural intercourse, and is it then proper to practise sitting together and eating together with him who shall commit it, and shall commit it with a longing for it, or not?
2. The reply is this, that of the evil Mazda-worshippers 2--who were the seven evil-doers of sin of a heinous kind 3, whose practice of Aharman's will was as much as an approximation to that of
[paragraph continues] Aharman himself--two are those whom you have mentioned, who are defiled with mutual sin. 3. For, of those seven evil-doers, one was Az-î Dahâk 1, by whom witchcraft was first glorified; he exercised the sovereignty of misgovernment, and desired a life of the unintellectual (ahangân khayâ) for the world. 4. One was Azî Sruvar 2, by whom infesting the highway in terrible modes, frightful watchfulness (vîmag-bîdârîh) 3 of the road, and devouring of horse and man were perpetrated. 5. One was Vadak 4 the mother of Dahâk, by whom adultery was first committed, and by it all lineage is disturbed, control is put an end to, and without the authority of the husband an intermingling of son with son 5 occurs. 6. One was the Vîptak 6 ('pathic')
in the intercourse of males, the infecundity of which is the desire of men; and by him the intercourse of males and the way of destroying the seed were first shown unto males. 7. One was the Vîpînîdak 1 ('pæderast'), the male by whom the use of females was first brought among the errors (khazdag) of the male, and was despised (dûkhtŏ) by him; he who is a cherisher of seed is delivering it to females, and that which is destroying the seed is the flowing of stenches into the prescribed vessels 2 for it, the delivering it to males by a demoniacal process, and carrying on a practice which effaces (âhangêdŏ) and conceals the race 3 of the living. 8. One was Tûr-î Brâdar-vakhsh 4, the Karap and heterodox wizard, by whom the best of men was put to death. 9. And one was he by whom the religions of apostates 5 were preferred--through the deceitfulness of the perverted text and interpretation 6 which they themselves utter--to the law which the righteous
has praised, that existence which would have procured a complete remedy, and would have become the eternity of the records which bestow salvation, through the good righteousness which is owing to the pure religion, the best of knowledge.
10. And they who are defiled by a propensity to stench are thereby welcoming the demons and fiends 1, and are far from good thought 2 through vexing it; and a distance from them is to be maintained of necessity in sitting and eating with them, except so far as it may be opportune for the giving of incitement by words for withdrawing (padâlisnŏ) from their sinfulness, while converting them from that propensity. 11. Should one die, to order a ceremonial for him is indecorous, and to perform it would be unauthorised; but if he were to do so penitently one would then be authorised to perform his ceremonial after the three nights 3, for it is the remedy for atonement of sin. 12. And so long as he is living he is in the contingencies (vakhtagânŏ) owing to the sickness through which he is in that way an infamous one (akhamîdâr), and there are no preventives (bôndagânŏ) and medicinal powder for it; these are teachings also for the duty and good works of a ceremonial for the soul 4.
216:2 M14 has 'of a like evil practice, in inclination for sins, were the very heinous in the religion of the Mazda-worshippers.'
216:3 Reading girâî van vinâs, and assuming that van is a miswriting of gûn.
217:1 See Chap.. XXXVII, 97.
217:2 A personification of Av. azi srvara, a serpent or dragon thus described in the Hôm Yt. (Yas. IX, 34-39):--'(Keresâspa) who slew the serpent Srvara which devoured horses and men, which was poisonous and yellow, over which yellow poison flowed a hand's-breadth (spear's-length?) high. On which Keresâspa cooked a beverage in a caldron at the mid-day hour, and the serpent scorched, hissed, sprang forth, away from the caldron, and upset the boiling water; Keresâspa Naremanau fled aside frightened' (see Haug's Essays, pp. 178, 179). The same account is given in Zamyâd Yt. 40.
217:3 M14 has bîmînîdârîh, 'terrifying.'
217:4 See Chap. LXXVIII, a. There is possibly some connection between this name and the Av. epithet, Vadhaghana, which is thus mentioned by the evil spirit, speaking to Zaratûst, in Vend. XIX, 23:--'Curse the good Mazda-worshipping religion! and thou shalt obtain fortune such as the Vadhaghana sovereign obtained;' and Mkh. LVII, 25 calls him 'the Vadagân sovereign Dahâk.' The Pahlavi writers seem to have taken this epithet as a matronymic, owing to its form, but whether the mother's name be really traditional, or merely manufactured from the epithet, is doubtful.
217:5 Reading levatman barman barman, instead of levatman bûm barman. M14 omits bûm.
217:6 Av. viptô (p. p. of vip, 'to sow, to fecundate'), used in the p. 218 sense of 'a pathic' in Vend. VIII, 102. This name, as well as the next one, is used here more as representing a class than an individual.
218:1 The p. p. of the causal form of vîptanŏ, 'to fecundate,' used as an equivalent of the Av. vaêpayô of Vend. VIII, 102.
218:2 Assuming that pavan pavan mûdragânŏ stands for pavan farmûd ragânŏ; but there is some doubt as to the correct reading of several words in this section.
218:3 Or 'seed.'
218:4 The eldest of five brothers who were wizards of the Karap race or caste, and deadly enemies of Zaratûst (see Byt. II, 3). He is said to have slain Zaratûst in the end.
218:5 Aharmôkô, Av. ashemaogha, means literally 'disturbing the right,' and is a term applied to an ungodly man specially under the influence of the evil spirit, as an apostate is naturally supposed to be.
218:6 The Avesta and Zand.
219:1 Who are supposed to seize upon them and pervade them; hence the necessity of shunning such men, to avoid contamination from the demons who possess them.
219:2 That is, from what is personified in the archangel Vohûman.
219:3 During which the soul is supposed to remain on earth, hovering about the body, after death (see Chaps. XX, 2, XXIV, 2, XXV, 2).
219:4 That is, they are warnings to him to repent.