Pahlavi Texts, Part V: Marvels of Zoroastrianism (SBE47), E.W. West, tr. [1897], at sacred-texts.com

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INTRODUCTION.

1. IN the summary account of the Spend Nask, given in the eighth book of the Dînkard, chapter XIV, it is stated in § 4 (see S.B.E., vol. xxxvii, p. 32) that many marvels, owing to Zaratûst, are published therein, 'just as there are some which, collected and selected, are noticed by the Dînkard manuscript.' This statement evidently refers to the seventh book of the Dînkard, which contains the legendary history of Zaratûst and his religion, related as a series of marvels extending from the creation to the resurrection of mankind. A much briefer account of some of the same details occurs at the beginning of the fifth book of the Dînkard, and appears to have been abridged from a compilation which was either derived partially from a foreign source, or prepared for the use of foreign proselytes. A third compilation of similar legends is found among the Selections of Zâd-sparam. And a careful translation of these three Pahlavi Texts constitutes the Marvels of Zoroastrianism contained in this volume.

2. As the extent of Dk. VII is about 16,000 Pahlavi words (without allowing for one folio lost), it probably contains about four-fifths of the details included in the Spend Nask, the Pahlavi version, of which has been estimated, in S.B.E., vol. xxxvii, p. 469, to extend to 20,500 words. It says very little about Zaratûst's conferences with the sacred beings (mentioned in Dk. VIII, xiv, 5, 6), and gives no description of the other world and the way thither (as reported ibid. 8). But it probably contains many verbatim extracts from other parts of the Pahlavi version of the Spend Nask, which appear, however, to have been previously collected in the Exposition of the Good Religion, an older MS. than the Dînkard, which is quoted as an authority in Dk. VII, i, 2.

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3. This seventh book commences with a detailed statement of the descent of the glorious ruling dynasty from the primeval man Gâyômard, through his descendants, the Pêsdâdian and Kayânian rulers, to Kaî-Vistâsp. Among the individuals, rarely mentioned elsewhere, are the sacred being Hadish (the protector of homesteads in the Visperad), Vâêgered the brother of king Hôshâng, Pâtakhsrôbô king of the Arabs, and Aôshnar the chancellor of Kai-Ûs. Zaratûst and the three millennial apostles are also mentioned, but the contents of this first chapter are probably derived from the Kitradâd Nask (see Dk. VII, xiii, 20) and from Yt. XIX, 25-93.

4. Chapter II begins the legendary history of Zaratûst with the descent of his glory, from the presence of Aûharmazd to the house in which Zaratûst's mother was about to be born; and, alarmed at her radiance, the Kavîgs and Karaps, or ruling priests of the district, oblige her father to send her away to another valley, where Pôrûshâspô resided, to whom she was afterwards married; and several legends are related, in which both the archangels and archdemons are active agents, which lead on to the birth of Zaratûst, thirty years before the end of the ninth millennium of the universe, and his complete genealogy is given.

5. Chapter III begins with his laughing at birth, and describes the ill-will of the Karaps, or priests of those times, and their many attempts to destroy him during his childhood, till he openly defied them at the age of seven. At the end of the ninth millennium, when he was thirty years old, as he was bringing Hôm-water out of the fourth effluent of the Dâîtî river, he met the archangel Vohûmanô who had come to invite him to a conference with Aûharmazd, about which no details are given.

6. Chapter IV, however, proceeds to mention that, in two years, he returned from his first conference, by order of Aûharmazd, to preach his religion to the Kîgs and Karaps in the presence of their ruler, Aûrvâîtâ-dang the Tûr. They seem to have listened attentively till he advocated Khvêtûkdas, when they demanded his death, and

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were supported by the Tûr's brother; but the Tûr's son, who presided, remonstrated with them, and Aûrvâîtâ-dang himself protected him, but refused to be converted. Zaratûst was afterwards sent to demand slaves and horses from Vêdvoîst, a rich Karap, who refused them arrogantly; he also went to Parshad-gau in Sagastân and cured his bull with Hôm-water, whereupon Parshad-gau joined him in worship, but not in public. Zaratûst repulsed the demons as in Vd. XIX, 1-4; he is then tempted by a Karap in the form of Spendarmad, whom he also repulses. And he is finally sent to the court of Vistâsp, where he is relentlessly opposed by the Kîgs and Karaps who obtained his imprisonment, during which he is saved from starvation by a miracle; then some of the sacred beings arrive to assist him, and Vistâsp is at last converted, twelve years after the coming of the religion when Zaratûst went to his first conference with Aûharmazd.

7. Chapter V refers to the marvels of the last thirty-five years of Zaratûst's life, after Vistâsp's conversion, but says nothing about his own death, except that he departed to the best existence at the age of seventy-seven. It mentions the establishment of ordeals of thirty-three kinds, the victory of Vistâsp over Argâsp the Khyôn, the useful works and advice of Zaratûst, the compilation of the Avesta, and the birth of Pêshyôtan, the immortal ruler of Kangdez.

8. Chapter VI continues this account of marvels till the death of Vistâsp, which occurred forty-three years later. The legends related are about the presentation of a heavenly chariot to Vistâsp by the soul of an old hero Sritô who had been killed about 350 years before; and regarding the coming of two high-priests from the southern regions of the earth, ten years after the departure of Zaratûst, to enquire about the religion.

9. Chapter VII relates the marvels occurring after the death of Vistâsp until the end of the sovereignty of Irân; mentioning king Vohûmanô, who was a grandson of Vistâsp, the high-priest Sênôv who lived throughout the second century of the religion, the devastator Alexander the Great, the four successive high-priests who restore orthodoxy

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in the fifth and sixth centuries of the religion, the apostate Rashn-rêsh of about the same period, king Artakhshatar the founder of the Sâsânian dynasty, his chancellor Tanvasar, Atûrpâd-î Mâraspendân and his son surnamed Avarethrabau, with an anonymous arch-apostate of their time, and then king Khûsrô Anôshêrvân. Finally, it condemns the proceedings of the devastators in later times, whose names are not mentioned.

10. Chapter VIII deals with the ninth and tenth centuries of the religion, which bring the millennium of Zaratûst to a close. After a bitter lamentation over the anarchy in religion and government—in which parts of §§ 34 and 36 are taken from the Varstmânsar commentary on Yas. XXXII in Dk. IX, xxxii, 17, 20—it refers to the arrival of Kitrô-mêhônŏ, 'him of the racial home,' a title of Pêshyôtanŏ, son of Vistâsp, and immortal ruler of Kangdez, who arrives with 150 disciples to restore the religion and destroy the wicked, including the Turkish demons, the Arabs, and the ecclesiastical Shêdâspô 1 (Theodosius?). In the thirtieth year before the end of this tenth millennium Aûshêdar, the Developer of Righteousness, is born, and confers with the archangels at the end of the millennium, when the sun stands still for ten days and nights.

11. Chapter IX describes the eleventh millennium, that of Aûshêdar, who produces much prosperity and progress which continue until the fifth century. Then the wizard Mahrkûs appears for seven years, and produces awful winters in four of them, in which most of mankind and animals perish, till he is himself destroyed by the Dâhmân Âfrîn. Afterwards, Yim's enclosure is opened to replenish the earth with animals and men who then begin to subsist more upon the milk of cattle, which is plentiful; and Ashavahistô interferes to diminish the slaughter of cattle. At the end of the fifth century two-thirds of the Irânians have become righteous, and in the thirtieth year before the end of this eleventh millennium Aûshêdar-mâh, the Developer

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of Worship, is born, and confers with the archangels at the end of the millennium, when the sun stands still for twenty days and nights.

12. Chapter X describes the twelfth millennium, that of Aûshêdar-mâh, during which mankind continue to improve, are better supplied, and have fewer wants, while deaths occur only through old age and the executioner. During the last fifty-three years, they leave off eating meat and subsist upon vegetables and milk, for which latter they substitute water for the last three years. But the old tyrant Dahâk breaks loose, and Kerêsâspô has to be roused to smite him. In the thirtieth year before the end of this twelfth millennium Sôshâns, the Triumphant Benefiter, is born; Kaî-Khûsrô and his companions afterwards arrive to assist him, and the sun stands still for thirty days and nights.

13. Chapter XI describes how Sôshâns and his assistants destroy all the evil remaining in the world, during the course of fifty-seven years, while mankind subsist for seventeen years on vegetables, thirty years on water, and ten years on spiritual food. And, at the end of these fifty-seven years, Aharman and the fiend are annihilated, and the renovation for the future existence occurs.

14. Several of the details described in Dk. VII are briefly mentioned in Dk. V, i-iv, where they are introduced by a statement of the siege of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar (Bûkht-Narsîh) assisted by Kaî-Lôharâsp, father of Vistâsp. Excepting this account of the siege, in which the Jews are evidently called 'a congregation or tribe' (ram), and some remarks about the same 'tribe' at the end of Chapter IV, all the other details which are mentioned have reference only to Irânians; but they are said to be the sayings of Âtûr-farnbag as to the MS. which that tribe call really their Gyêmarâ (Chaps. I, 2, 3; IV, 8), as the name can be most plausibly read. Most of the strictly Irânian details have manifestly been derived from the same sources as were consulted by the writer of Dk. VII, that is, from the Pahlavi versions of the Spend. and Kitradâd Nasks. It would probably be hazardous to suppose that the Jewish compilers of the Gemara could have had access to these

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sources, and it might be preferable to assume that Âtûr-farnbag was himself compiling a record of Zoroastrian traditions for the use of some converts from Judaism, to take the place of the Gemara of their former faith.

15. The Zaratûst-nâmak of Zâd-sparam is contained in the latter half (Zs. XII-XXIII) of the first series of his Selections, the former half of which, being a paraphrase of the first half of the Bundahis, has been translated in S.B.E., vol. v, pp. 155-186. In Chapter XII Zâd-sparam relates two of the earliest legends referring to Mazda-worship, which he had found in old MSS. The first of these describes the appearance of the archangel Spendarmad, wearing a golden sacred girdle, at the court of king Mânûskîhar, 428 1 years before the coming of the religion to Zaratûst when he went to his conference with the sacred beings. The other is the legend of the warrior Sritô, the seventh brother, who was sent by Kai-Ûs to kill the frontier-settling ox which threatened him, 300 years before the coming of the religion, with future execration by Zaratûst.

16. Chapter XIII refers to the descent of Zaratûst's glory upon his mother at her birth, and the combination of his spiritual and worldly natures; also detailing his genealogy. Chapter XIV describes the attempts of the demons to destroy him before and at his birth, when Vohûmanô entered his reasoning powers and made him laugh with delight and utter one form of the Ahunavair formula. Chapter XV is about the five Karap brothers, with their first cousins the Aûsikhshes, all descended from the demon of Wrath and a sister of king Mânûskîhar; also about the four brothers of Zaratûst who seem to be unmentioned elsewhere.

17. Chapter XVI details the attempts of one of the Karaps to destroy Zaratûst during his infancy, and the means by which he is preserved; it also explains who Râgh and Nôdar were. In Chapter XVII one of the Karaps foretells the future success of Zaratûst. In Chapter XVIII

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his father bears him accused of folly, and takes him to a Karap to be cured. In Chapter XIX the chief Karap comes to the house of Zaratûst's father, and is invited to consecrate the food set before him; but Zaratûst objects and a quarrel ensues, which so much disturbs the Karap that he leaves the house, and drops dead from his horse on the road home. In Chapter XX instances are given of Zaratûst's righteous desires, his compassionate assistance of people fording a river, his liberal disposition, his abandoning worldly desires, his pity for dogs, his wish for a good-looking wife, and his acceptance of progress even from the wicked, during his youth.

18. Chapter XXI relates that, at thirty years of age, on his way to the festival of spring, he saw in a vision all mankind following Mêdyômâh, his first cousin, into his presence. He then went on to the bank of the Dâîtîh, and crossed its four channels, when he met Vohûmanô who led him to the assembly of the archangels, where he received instruction from Aûharmazd and saw the omniscient wisdom; the archangels also subjected him to various ordeals.

19. Chapter XXII refers to his conferences with the seven archangels, each at a different place, and extending over ten years. In Chapter XXIII, Mêdyômâh is converted at the end of these ten years. The next two years are spent on the conversion of Vistâsp, in which Zaratûst is assisted by some of the sacred beings, and the narrative ends by giving the dates of several other conversions, births, and deaths. But after its 300th year the religion is disturbed and the monarchy contested; referring. no doubt, to the effects of Alexander's conquest of Persia.

20. These three narratives appear to be the only connected statements of the Zoroastrian legend that remain extant in Pahlavi, and all three seem to be chiefly derived from the Sâsânian Pahlavi version of the Spend Nask, with some probable additions from the similar version of the Kitradâd Nask, as may be gathered from the-summary accounts of the contents of these Nasks given in Dk. VIII, xiii, 20-xiv, 15, and translated in S.B.E., vol. xxxvii, pp. 31-34. There are, however, allusions to other legends

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regarding Zaratûst to be found scattered about in Pahlavi literature, to which we shall return after mentioning the manuscript authorities for the texts translated in this volume.

21. The chief existing authority for the Pahlavi text of the Dînkard, Books III-IX, and the only independent one for Book VII, is the MS. B in Bombay, which has been fully described in S.B.E., vol. xxxvii, pp. xxxiii-xxxvii; it will therefore be sufficient here to give a short statement of the information which was there detailed at full length. This MS., written in 1659, was an unbound quarto volume of 392 folios when it was brought from Irân to Surat in 1783; after which time 70 folios became detached from various parts of the MS., but nearly all these had been discovered more than twenty years ago.

22. The writer of the MS. not only recorded the date of his own work, but also copied two previous colophons of his predecessors, with dates corresponding to A.D. 1516 and 1020, and it appears that there had been an intermediate copy about 1355. The MS. of 1020 had been copied at Bakdâd, possibly from the original MS. of the last editor of the Dînkard, which must have been completed about A.D. 900.

23. For the text of Dk. V we have a second authority, independent of B, in the MS. K43 at Kopenhagen (see S.B.E., vol. xxxvii, pp. xxxvii-viii), written shortly after 1594 and also descended from the MS. of 1020.

24. The Selections of Zâd-sparam are found in some of the old MSS., which also contain the Dâdistân-i Dînîk (see S.B.E., vol. xviii, pp. xv-xvii). of the two MSS. used for the text of Zâd-sparam's Zaratûst-nâmak, K35 was brought from Irân to Kopenhagen in 1843. It has lost many folios, both at the beginning and end; but, before it was so mutilated, a copy (BK) of it was made, which is now in Bombay and contains a copy of its colophon, the date of which corresponds to A.D. 1592. For the text of Zs. xxii, 4-xxiv, 19, which has been lost from K35, the translator is indebted to this old copy. The other MS. authority T, belonging to Ervad Tehmuras in Bombay

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[paragraph continues] (a copy of which has been used), is dated two generations earlier.

25. Regarding the period of Zâd-sparam's career we are well informed by the date of the third Epistle of Mânûskîhar, corresponding to A.D. 881, at which time Zâd-sparam was probably in the prime of life; but his Selections were certainly compiled as late as A.D. 900, or about the same time as the completion of the Dînkard. So that the Pahlavi texts, from which these three narratives of the Zoroastrian legends have been translated, were no doubt all written about A.D. 900, and the information they contain was nearly all derived from the Pahlavi versions of two of the Nasks.

26. We have reason to believe that the Pahlavi versions of Avesta texts were completed in the fourth century and revised in the sixth, after the downfall of the heretic Mazdak. This may not only be clearly inferred from the traditional account of the compilation and restorations of the Avesta and Zand, preserved in Dk. IV, 21-36, and translated in S.B.E., vol. xxxvii, pp. 412-418; but is also in accordance with the actual condition of the Pahlavi versions of the liturgical Avesta texts. With the exception of a few interpolated passages, the whole of these Pahlavi versions might have been written, or revised, in the time of king Shahpûhar II (A.D. 309-379). And the exceptional passages mention no persons or events of a later date than the reign of king Khûsrô I (A.D. 531-578); being merely references to such persons as Mazdak, the heretic, and certain commentators who lived about that time.

27. If we examine the Zoroastrian legends, translated in this volume, we shall also find it difficult to discover a passage that clearly alludes to any historical personage of later date than Khûsrô I, who is named in Dk. V, iii, 3; VII, vii, 26, although the compiler of the Dînkard had the traditions of 250 years of Arab rule to draw upon for facts, if he had been disposed to continue the statements of the Pahlavi Spend Nask down to his own time. No doubt, these traditions may have intensified his denunciations of

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the devastators in Dk. VII, vii, 29-38; viii, 4-9, but, like most Pahlavi writers, he is careful not to mention Muhammadanism. Dk. VII, vii, 33, 34 seem to refer to some particular individual of this later time; but the references to Kaîsar and Khâkân, the Turkish demons with dishevelled hair, the Arab, and Shedâspô (Theodosius?) of Arûm, may all have been taken from a Pahlavi version revised in the time of Khûsrô I.

28. That the original Pahlavi version was translated from an Avesta text, though many Pahlavi commentaries were intermingled, appears certain. Apart from the numerous quotations from revelation (dênô), which may be safely assumed to have had an Avesta original, there are many passages interspersed with glosses, such as the Pahlavi translators habitually used, as well as numerous sentences beginning with a verb, an Avesta peculiarity which generally disappears in an English translation. Regarding the age of this Avesta text it would be hazardous to speculate without further information than we yet possess.

29. The principal details connected with the Zoroastrian legends which have been noticed in other Pahlavi and Pâzand texts, with references to the passages where they occur, are as follows:—

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30. Beyond the frequent occurrence of the names of the chief actors in the traditions, there are not many references to the Zoroastrian legends in the extant Avesta. This is owing to the fact that three-fourths of the Avesta texts, including the Nasks specially devoted to these legends, have been lost. The chief references to them that still survive in the Avesta are as follows:—

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31. So far as these references in the Avesta extend, they agree with the Pahlavi versions of the legends, and occasionally state some further particulars. We may, therefore, safely conclude that these Pahlavi versions present a fairly complete view of the Zoroastrian legends current in Sâsânian times. But we have another means of testing this conclusion more fully in the Persian Zartust-nâmah, translated by Eastwick in the Appendix to The Parsi Religion, as contained in the Zand-Avasta, by John Wilson, D. D. (Bombay: 1843).

32. This Zartust-nâmah contains 1570 Persian couplets, composed by Zartust Bahrâm Pazdû, apparently at the ancient city of Raî, and finished on August 12, 1278. But Eastwick's English translation was made from a good MS. of this poem, written by Dastûr Barzû Qiyâmu-d-dîn (= Kâmdîn) in 1636, belonging to the Wilson Collection and now in the library of Lord Crawford at Wigan. Zartust Bahrâm relates how a priest of Raî, named Kaî-Kâûs son of Kaî-Khusrô, showed him an old Pahlavi MS.

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narrating the history of Zartust, and offered to interpret it, if he would undertake to paraphrase it, in Persian verse, for the information of others.

33. After mentioning Z.'s grandfather and father, descended from king Frêdûn, a frightful dream of his mother is related, in which she sees herself attacked by wild beasts eager for the destruction of her son, who drives them away. She relates her dream to an astrologer, who prognosticates a wonderful career for the unborn child; but this dream is an addition to the Pahlavi texts.

34. The child is born, and laughs at birth, exciting admiration among the women and dismay among the magicians. Dûrânsarûn, their chief, comes to see the child. and tries to kill him with a dagger; but his hand 'is withered, and the magicians carry off the child, who is exposed to death from fire, oxen, horses, and wolves, but all in vain, as his mother brings him home safe on each occasion. Another magician, named Bartarûsh, then foretells that Z. cannot be destroyed, and will establish a new religion; and he repeats this to the child's father, naming Gustâsp as his future protector. This narrative corresponds with Dk. VII, iii, 2-31; but then follows the addition that he was confided to the care of an old man, named Barzînkarûs, till he completed his seventh year.

35. Then Dûrânsarûn and Bartarûsh went together to see him, and tried their magic arts upon him in vain (ibid. 32, 33). Afterwards, when Z. was sick, Bartarûsh supplied him with filthy drugs, but he threw them on the ground, which seems to be another version of Zs. XVIII, 5, 6. Then follows a paraphrase of Dk. VII, iii, 34-48, and Zs. XX, 4, 5; XXI, 1-20, 23-27, with some additional remarks about worship and the Avesta being taught to Z. The conferences with the six archangels are more detailed than in Zs. XXII, and more ritualistic in their tendency.

36. When Z. returns to the earth, he is met by the demons and magicians, who oppose him, but are killed or dispersed by the utterance of an Avesta text; in which account we have an extreme condensation of Dk. VII, iv, 36-46, 57-62. He then goes to the court of king Gustâsp,

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where he is hospitably received by the king, surrounded by his princes and wise men. With the latter Z. enters into argument, and overcomes them all successively. This is repeated, till all the learned of the realm are vanquished in argument, in the course of three successive days.

37. Then Z. produces the Avesta and Zand, and reads a chapter; but the king hesitates to accept it, until he learns more about it; and Z. retires to his lodgings. In the meantime, the wise men form a conspiracy to ruin Z., by secreting in his lodgings,, with the connivance of his doorkeeper, many of the impure things used by sorcerers. The next day, while the king and Z. are examining the Avesta, the wise men denounce Z. as a sorcerer; his lodgings are searched, and the impurities are brought to the king, who becomes angry and commits Z. to prison.

38. Now the king had a magnificent black horse, and when Z. had been a week in prison, this horse fell sick, and was found with its four feet drawn up to its belly. When the king was informed, he summoned his wise men, but they could suggest no remedy; so the king and all his people remained fasting all day and lamenting, and the jailer forgot to take any food to Z. till the evening, when he told Z. about the state of the black horse.

39. Z. requested the jailer to inform the king that he could cure the horse; and the king, on hearing this the next day, releases Z., who undertakes to restore the horse's limbs to their natural state, on receiving four solemn promises, one for the cure of each leg. Three of these promises are that the king, his son Isfendyâr (= Spend-dâd), and the queen, should each undertake to accept his religion and never forsake it; and the fourth promise is that the false accusation of sorcery, made by the wise men, should be investigated.

40. After each promise Z. prays vehemently, and each limb is restored to use. While, on the confession of Z.'s doorkeeper, the wise men are convicted of fraudulent deceit, and are sent to execution. The Persian version is here a highly embellished paraphrase of Dk. VII, iv, 64-70, especially in the horse episode.

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41. King Gustâsp next asks Z. to pray for information as to the king's future position in the other world, also that he may become invulnerable, omniscient as to worldly affairs, and immortal; but Z. tells him that he must be satisfied with the first wish for himself, and the remaining three for other persons. The next day, while the king is sitting in court with Z. present, horsemen arrive, who are the archangels Bahman and Ardabahist, with the spirits of the Khûrdâd and Gusâsp fires. They are sent to testify the truth of Z.'s mission, and to urge the king to accept the religion; this he does, and they then depart; when Z. informs the king that his four wishes will be granted, as he will soon see. For some of these details see Dk. VII, iv, 74-82.

42. Zartust then performs the Darun ceremony, having provided wine, perfume, milk, and a pomegranate. After reciting prayers from the Avesta, he gives the wine to the king to drink, who then falls into a trance and sees his own future position in heaven, and those of others. His son Peshôtan receives the milk which makes him immortal. The perfume, or incense, is given to Gâmâsp who obtains knowledge of all events till the resurrection. And Isfendyâr, the warlike son of Gustâsp, eats one grain of the pomegranate and becomes invulnerable. The Pahlavi versions are silent about the king's four wishes and their fulfilment, except such hints as may be conveyed in Dk. VII, iv, 84-86. Afterwards, Z. reads the Avesta to the king and comments upon it; concluding with praises of the creator.

43. To this narrative Zartust Bahrâm adds a further episode of Z. asking for immortality, at the time when he went with Bahman to confer with the creator. His request is refused, but the creator gives him a drop of liquid to drink, like honey, and he sees everything in both worlds, as in a vision. When he wakes up, he relates what he saw in heaven and hell; and also describes a tree with seven branches of gold, silver, copper, brass, lead, steel, and mixed iron, respectively, overshadowing the world. The creator explains that these seven branches represent seven

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powerful personages who arise in successive ages of the world. The golden branch is Z. himself, the silver is Gustâsp, the copper is an Askânian king, the brass is Ardashîr the Sâsânian, the lead is king Bahrâm (Gôr), the steel is Nôshêrvân who destroys the heretic Mazdak, and the mixed iron is the malicious monarch who upsets the true faith. Then follow many details of the lamentable evils which then occur; and when the Hazârahs 1 appear, the condition of Irân becomes still worse, as described in Byt. II, III, until the arrival of king Bahrâm the Hamâvand from India, and Peshôtan from Kangdiz, who restore the Irânian monarchy and religion.

44. This additional narrative is evidently a paraphrase of the Pahlavi Bahman Yast, translated in S.B.E., vol. v, pp. 191-23,5; and that Pahlavi text appears to be merely an enlarged edition of Fargard VII of the Sûdkar Nask, of which a short summary is given in Dk. IX, viii.

45. From the foregoing epitome of the Persian Zartust-nâmah, it will be evident that its author's information was a combination of the statements still surviving in Dk. VII and Zs. XII-XXIII, so far as they suited his fancy and convenience. Many statements are omitted, others either condensed, or greatly elaborated; but very few novelties can be detected. excepting such as are clearly due to the writer's own imagination. Whether any small residuum of these novelties can be attributed to other sources than the Persian writer's fancy, must remain doubtful until some older authority for such details is discovered,

46. With regard to Z's vision of heaven and hell, which is mentioned in Zartust Bahrâm's final episode, his immediate informant was certainly Byt. II, 11-13; but the original authority was the Spend Nask, as summarized in Dk. VIII, xiv, 7, 8, although Dk. VII omits this incident, and Zs. XXI, 21, 22 merely mentions the bodily appearance of the omniscient wisdom, without referring to Z.'s vision. The details of the conferences with the six archangels,

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which are summarized in Dk. VIII, xiv, 9, as having existed in the Spend Nask, are also omitted in Dk. VII, though briefly stated in Zs. XXII.

47. It is worthy of notice that Z. was first sent to offer his religion to the Kîgs and Karaps and their sovereign, Aûrvâîtâ-dang the Tûr (see Dk. VII, iv, 2-20), who seem to have received his doctrines favourably, excepting his advocacy of Khvêtûk-das 1, which led to their rejection of his proposal. He was next sent to the Karap Vêdvôîst (ibid. 21-28), whom Aûharmazd had hitherto befriended; but this Karap was rejected for illiberality and arrogance. Z. then went to Parshad-tôrâ in Sagâstân (ibid. 31-35), taking some Hôm-water with him, to cure an infirm bull belonging to this chieftain, as soon as the latter had accepted the religion in public; the chieftain assented to the religion, though only privately, but this was sufficient to obtain the cure of his bull. It was only after these three trials that the conversion of king Vistâsp was attempted.

48. There is some difficulty in understanding the exact difference between the primeval religion and that taught by Zaratûst. When Dk. VII, i, 9-11 speaks of Aûharmazd talking with Masyê and Masyâôî; or Hadish tells them of Aûharmazd, the archangels, and the Ahunavair (ibid. 12, 13); or the sacred beings are said to have taught them the primitive arts (ibid. 14), or we are told of the existence of demons in the times of Hôshâng and Tâkhmôrup (ibid. 18, 19); or of Ashavahistô in the time of king Pâtakhsrôbô (ibid. 34); it may be urged that the mention of these beings in connection with the men of those times is no proof that their existence was known then. Because it only shows that the old writers, being satisfied that these beings existed in their own time and were immortal, only logically assumed that they must have existed in former times. The really weak point in their argument being the assumption of the existence of such beings in their own time.

49. Safer conclusions may be formed by noticing the

p. xxvi

dogmas that Zaratûst most strongly advocates and reprobates. When he goes to his first conference (Dk. VII, iii, 56-62) he goes in search of righteousness. When he went to Aûrvâîtâ-dang, as mentioned above, he advocated the praise of righteousness, scorn of the demons, and the observance of ceremonies; but it was only his scorn of the demons, which took the form of Khvêtûk-das, that the Karaps really rejected. In Dk. VII, iv, 14, he says, 'worldly righteousness is the whole worship of the demons, and the end of the Mazda-worship of Z.' Though the Hôm plant was sacred before Z.'s birth (ibid. ii, 22-47), the Hôm-water (ibid. iv, 29-35) seems to have been a distinctive token of Z's religion; also chanting the Ahunavair (ibid. iv, 38, 41, 42, 56, 61) and the Avesta in general (ibid. 63). The perverted religion and demonizing of the Kîgs and Karaps appear to have been the worst faults he had to find with them (ibid. 64, 67). And the archangels tell Vistâsp that the world requires the good religion which proceeds through Z.'s recitation, so he should chant the Ahunavair and Ashem-vohû, and not worship the demons (ibid. 79, 80). Again, when Dûrâsrôb and Brâdrôk-rêsh partake of food with Pôrûshâspô and Zaratûst (ibid. iii, 34, 38), the latter does not object to the form of worship proposed, but to the person selected to conduct it; and he then proclaims his own reverence for the righteous and the poor.

50. From these statements we may conclude that the old writers, who have handed down these legends from ancient times, were of opinion that Zaratûst was not so much the founder of a totally new religion, as he was a reformer who retained as much of the prior religion as was not seriously objectionable. While strongly insisting upon the necessity of reverencing all good spirits, he strictly prohibited all propitiation of evil spirits. His law was to resist and destroy all that is evil and injurious to man, and to respect and honour all that is good and beneficial to him. According to the legends, he seems to have found little gross idolatry, in the form of image-worship, to reprobate. From the times of the idol-worship encouraged by Dahâk in Bâpêl (Dk. VII, iv, 72), and of the destruction of the

p. xxvii

celebrated idol-temple on the shore of Lake Kêkast by Kai-Khûsrôî (ibid. i, 39; Mkh. ii, 95), we find nothing in the legends about this form of idolatry, till 'the oppressiveness of infidelity and idol-worship,' shortly after the downfall of the Sâsânians, is lamented (Dk. VII, viii, 6). Demon-worship (ibid. iii, 35; iv, 30; vii, 17, 36, 37; viii, 7, 34), although a term sometimes applied to idolatry, seems to be often used in its literal sense of 'worship of evil spirits,' one form of which is described by Zaratûst (ibid. iv, 47-53).

51. Another interesting study, for which these Zoroastrian legends supply materials, is the traditional chronology which they contain; and how far it will be found, upon examination, to harmonize with the system stated in Bd. XXXIV, or to explain the manifest inaccuracies of that system. The matter is rather complicated, but the Zoroastrian system can be connected with the European system of chronology with some degree of probability.

52. The epoch of Zoroastrian chronology is 'the coming of the religion,' but it has long been doubtful whether this event was the birth of Zaratûst, or his going to conference with the sacred beings, or the acceptance of the religion by Vistâsp. Any doubt, however, as to the meaning of the phrase, has now been removed by the statement in Dk. VII, viii, 51, that the first century of the religion is that from the time when Zaratûst came forth to his conference, which event happened when be was thirty years old (ibid. iii, 51, 60, 62). It is also stated, in Bd. XXXIV, 7, that Vistâsp reigned thirty years before the coming of the religion, that is, before Zaratûst went to his conference. From these data it is evident that the traditional Zoroastrian chronology makes the birth of Zaratûst coincide with the accession of Vistâsp.

53. The nearest date to these events, which is well defined in both the Zoroastrian and European systems of chronology, is that of the death of Alexander, near midsummer in B.C. 323, which Bd. XXXIV, 7, 8, places 972 years after the coming of the religion, that is, after the thirtieth year of Vistâsp's reign. And if this were the first

p. xxviii

year of the religion, the death of Alexander must have occurred in its 273rd year, according to the Bundahis.

54. But this has to be reconciled with the statement in Zs. XXIII, 12, that, after its 300th year, 'the religion is disturbed and the monarchy is contested;' which statement is expressed more definitely by AV. I, 2-6, when it asserts that the religion remained in purity for 300 years, but then Alexander came to Irân and destroyed the monarchy. If these statements be accepted literally, they imply that Alexander invaded Irân either in the 300th year of the religion, or shortly after that date, but certainly not before it. We cannot place Alexander's invasion of Irân itself at a later date than the battle of Gaugamela (B.C. 331); and if this were the 300th year of the religion, the death of Alexander (B.C. 323) must have occurred in its 308th, instead of its 273rd year, and the coming of the religion would have to be put back thirty-five years. This may be done with some plausibility by assuming an omission of thirty-five years between the reigns of Hûmâî and Dârâî, where the Bundahis passes from traditional to historical personages. Alexander's invasion must also have been a good and sufficient reason for the dissolution of the hundred-discipledom, or priestly college, established by Sênô, which lasted only till the 300th year, as Zs. XXIII, 11 informs us.

55. If we now adopt the abbreviations A.R. for 'anno religionis' and B.R. for 'before the religion,' we are prepared to compile the following synopsis of Zoroastrian Chronology according to the millennial system of the Bundahis, extended to the end of time, but dealing only with traditional matters, combined with the European dates of the same events, deduced from the synchronism of A.R. 300 with B.C. 331, as stated above in § 54:—

B.R. 9000, B.C. 9630. Beginning of the first millennium of Time; and formation of the Fravashis, or primary ideas of the good creations, which remain insensible and motionless for 3000 years (Bd. I, 8; XXXIV, i).

"    6000, B.C. 6630. Beginning of the fourth millennium, when the spiritual body of Zaratûst is framed together, and remains 3000 years with the archangels (Dk. VII, ii, 15, 16), while

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the primeval man and ox exist undisturbed in the world, because the evil spirit is confounded and powerless (Bd. I, 20, 22; III, l, 3, 5; XXXIV, 1).

"     30, B.C. 660. Accession of Kat-Vistâsp (Bd. XXXIV, 7). Vohûmanô and Ashavahistô descend into the world with a stem of Hôm (Dk. VII, ii, 24). Zaratûst is born (ibid. v 1).

p. xxx

B.R. 23, B.C. 653. Z. is seven years old when two Karaps visit his father, and Dûrâsrôbô dies (Dk. VII, iii, 32, 34, 45).

[Here ends the fragment of the old millennial system preserved in the Bundahis which omits thirty-five years in

p. xxxi

this place, as explained in § 54, with the effect of postponing the end of the millennium. It then proceeds to finish the chronology in its own fashion; mentioning only three historical names, which are here added; the thirty-five omitted years being also inserted.]

"    3028, A.D. 2398. The renovation of the universe occurs at the end of the fifty-seventh year of Sôshâns (ibid. 4, 7).

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36. We must suppose that the millennial chronology, which the Bundahis discontinues in the middle of the tenth millennium, was originally completed to the end of Time, as attempted in this synopsis, in accordance with the statements in Byt. and Dk. But the allusions to future events and denunciations of coming evils were, no doubt, of a mythological or general character, such as those still surviving in Dk. VII, vii, 29-32; viii, 40, 41, 44-46, 48-60; ix-xi. Whenever we meet with seemingly prophetic descriptions and denunciations, which clearly allude to historical events, such as those in Dk. VII, vii, 3-28; viii, 2, 10, 23, 32-36, 42, 43, 47, 61 they must, of course, be treated as interpolations of a later date than the events themselves. And there are several passages that may belong to either class.

57. It has been already shown, in § 54, that the death of Alexander, which the Bundahis places in A.R. 273, must have occurred in A.R. 308 according to other traditional records. If this error of thirty-five years stood alone, it might be considered accidental; but when we find that the Bundahis supplies only 284 years for the Askânians, to fill up the whole interval of 548 years between Alexander and Ardashîr, son of Pâpak, we must conclude that these two errors were intended for the purpose which they both fulfil, that of postponing the end of the tenth millennium. On the other hand, the Sâsânians who ruled for 425 years, are allowed 460 years in the Bundahis, which just counterbalances the thirty-five years omitted after the time of Hûmâî. This third error may be considered unintentional, as it probably arose from counting the year of each succession twice over, first in the reign of the deceased king, and again in that of his successor.

58. The extent to which the Bundahis chronology is distorted, by these three errors, will be better understood on inspection of the following tabular statement than from any description of the results, merely observing that the year of the religion (A.R.) is given according to Bundahis dates in the first column, and according to real dates in the second. Several intermediate events have been inserted,

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for the sake of illustration, and each of their Bundahis dates includes its proper proportion of the errors 1:—

59. The object of preparing this statement has been to ascertain the reason for the intentional errors in the Bundahis chronology, and the probable period at which they were introduced. It has been mentioned, in § 57, that the effect of both the errors, which are not accidental, has been to postpone the end of the tenth millennium, but they also postpone the dates of some other events which are mentioned in the Zoroastrian legends.

60. Thus, we are told in Dk. VII, vii, 9, that benightedness arises after A.R. 400, which is postponed by the errors from B.C. 231 to 78, but both of these times seem to have been equally unpropitious to the Zoroastrians. Then we learn (ibid. 10, 11) that in the fifth and sixth centuries, say A.R. 440-560, orthodoxy is still upheld by four successive high-priests. This period is postponed by the errors from B.C. 191-71 to 156-36 (see p. xxxi, n. 2), and Zoroastrianism was probably flourishing the whole time. So far, no reason for the alterations can be discovered, as the vague description of events, supplied by the old writer, appears to be

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just as applicable to the original periods as to the altered ones.

61. We are further informed (Dk. VII, viii, 2-45) that much evil and misery occur in the ninth and tenth centuries (A.R. 800-1000), at all events until, the birth of Aûshêdar (ibid. 55-57) in A.R. 971; and such events as war, invasion, fall of monarchy, oppression, persecution, infidelity, and apostasy are mentioned. Aûshêdar confers with the archangels in A.R. 1001 (ibid. 58-60), and the evils afterwards pass away till A.R. 1400-1500 (ibid. ix, 3), when frightful winters occur. The evil period A.R. 800-971 was originally A.D. 170-341, or from the middle of the reign of Vologeses III to the middle of that of Shahpûhar II. But the Bundahis postpones this period to A.D. 451-60, or from the time of the Armenian revolt in the reign of Yazdakard II, to that of the first total defeat of a Persian army by the Arabs near Dhû-Qâr in the reign of Khûsrô II. The evil times were probably expected to continue till the end of the millennium, or later, as in the case of Zaratûst himself; for Aûshêdar does not go to his conference till A.R. 1001, and might not be expected to begin to preach till A.R. 1011. These dates, originally A.D. 371-381, comprising the remainder of the reign of Shahpûhar II, would be altered by Bd. to A.D. 636-645, a period which includes the last two great battles with the Arabs, that decided the downfall of the Sâsânian dynasty, thou h king Yazdakard III lived some six years longer as a fugitive 1.

62. It is hardly possible that king Ardashîr (A.D. 221-241) and his chancellor Tanvasar, when collecting and revising their sacred books, would have compiled the original traditional system of chronology, however general might have been the terms in which the evils were described by the records they possessed, because it would have been a voluntary confession that they had no power to remedy

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the evils of their own time. But if they found the system in an ancient document, they might have been quite willing to admit that evils existed, owing to their enemies, which would have become much worse if they had not been mitigated by their own exertions. In fact, an old document prophesying evil which actually occurred at the time specified, could be used as evidence of the truth of their religion, and would therefore be carefully preserved. And it is quite certain that, if they had altered the chronology of an old document which foretold the time of the downfall of the monarchy, they could not have correctly guessed that time before the downfall occurred. For these reasons we must conclude that the original system of chronology, handed down by the Bundahis, was neither compiled nor altered in the time of Ardashîr.

63. For the long reign of Shahpûhar II (A.D. 309-379) the original tradition predicted not only a continuation of evil times, but also the birth and education of a new apostle, Aûshêdar, for the next millennium, who was expected to put an end to evil for about four centuries. His birth was to take place in A.D. 341, and his conference was to commence in 371. These dates are so well defined that, if we could discover any important religious teacher to whom they could refer, we might be justified in believing that the original chronology was compiled in his time. Unfortunately, we know very little of the internal history of Persia during this reign; there was war with the Romans in 337-350 and 358-363, and on the eastern frontiers in the intervening period also a persecution of the Christians, beginning about 339 all of which fairly represent the predicted evils.

64. Regarding the priesthood and religious history of the reign, we have only the traditions handed down in Pahlavi texts to guide us. In these we are told that Âtûrpâd, son of Mâraspend (Dk. VII, vii, 19), was born in the steel period (Dk. IX, viii, 4), and lived in the reign of king Shahpûhar II, son of Aûharmazd (AV. p. 145 n), being high-priest over the religion (Dd. XXXVII, 36). He also collected and preserved the Nasks (Dk. VIII, i, 22),

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and, after he had proved his orthodoxy by ordeal (Sg. X, 70, 71), the king proclaimed his intention of not allowing any more heterodoxy (Dk. IV, 27 1). In his old age he obtained a son, after devout prayer, and named him Zaratûst (Pandnâmak, 1); but this son also bore the Avesta title of Avarethrabau (Dk. VII, vii, 20, 21; VIII, xiii, 18), who is called the son of Râstare-vaghent in Yt. XIII, 106, showing that this latter Avesta title was adopted by Âtûrpâd himself. Finally, we meet with another Âtûrpâd, son of Zaratûst, described in Peshotan's Dk. III, cxxxvii, 2, as high-priest in the reign of Yazdakard I (A.D. 399-420), son of Shahpûhar, and also mentioned in Pahl. Yas. p. 120, II. 14, 15 Sp. (translated in Dk. VIII, i, 7 n).

65. We have here, evidently, three successive high-priests, father, son, and grandson, and all celebrated men. The father had been employed in collecting and revising, or probably translating, some of the sacred books, and then, after a religious discussion, submitted himself to the ordeal of melted metal, as a test of his orthodoxy. The king was convinced, and his proclamation meant persecution of the heterodox, such as was commenced about A.D. 339, as regards the Christians. So that we may safely assume that Âtûrpâd's ordeal took place shortly before this date, and probably shortly after 337, when the Roman war commenced. As we must also certainly assume that the original chronology could not have come into existence at a much later date than 341, when so remarkable an event as the birth of a new apostle was fixed by it to occur, we have to consider who this apostle could have been; and whether it may not have been intended to identify him with Âtûrpâd's own son.

66. In the first place, is such a suspicion consistent with known dates? To represent Aûshêdar, according to the original chronology, the son must have been born A.D. 3411 (§ 63); and we may suppose that the time of Aûshêdar's conference (371) would represent the time of Âtûrpâd's

p. xxxvii

death, when his son succeeded him in the high-priesthood. if Âtûrpâd were aged eighty-one at his death, he would have been fifty-one at the birth of his son, or approaching old age; and he would have been born in 290, or nineteen years before the king. His grandson may have been born in 365, when his father Zaratûst was twenty-four, and may have succeeded that father in the high-priesthood about 400, the second year of king Yazdakard I. As all these dates are reasonably consistent with the few facts that are known, there seems to be no impossibility in the hypothesis that the original chronology of Aûshêdar's birth may have had some connection with the date of the birth of Âtûrpâd's son. The dates assumed, with regard to these three high-priests, which may be slightly varied, are as follows:—

67. On the other hand, we must recollect that the time of the birth of Aûshêdar was not an isolated date which could be varied at pleasure, to suit any circumstances that might arise; but it was intimately connected with the dates of birth of three other apostles, which were each placed at the same distance from the ends of three other millenniums. It would perhaps be more difficult to suit a new millennial system of chronology, to the accidental year of a particular child's birth, than to have the child born in a particular year of an old system already existing. And, if so, it may be safer to assume that Âtûrpâd, knowing the year of the expected birth, took measures to secure the fulfilment of the prophecy, so far as the birth was concerned. If the child did not turn out so capable of regenerating the world as had been expected, that was a matter for posterity to explain. Under such circumstances of merely seeming fulfilment of a single particular, fraudulently obtained, the original prediction might be of any age.

68. It does not appear that the priestly councillors assembled by Khûsrô I (Byt. 1, 7), made any alteration in

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the original chronology, although they slightly revised the Pahlavi Vendidad. In fact, the priests, who must have been long expecting the end of Zaratûst's millennium, were probably looking forward for the approaching downfall of the Sâsânian monarchy, which might readily be understood, as the surest sign of the termination of this period, from such statements as those in Dk. VII, viii, 1, 2. At any rate, the alterations in the chronology, for the purpose of postponing the end of the tenth millennium till A.D. 635, would not have been made till some time after the termination of the monarchy in 651, but probably long before the compilation of the Bundahis about 900. The effects of these alterations upon the dates of the evil ninth and tenth centuries, and upon those of the birth, conference, and preaching of Aûshêdar, have been already stated in § 61. And their object has evidently been to adapt the old predictions as much as possible to real events; for which purpose also, the predictions themselves have probably been often made more definite than they were originally.

69. It follows, from the foregoing investigation, that the original chronology must have existed A.D. 341, and, in fact, we have found no sufficient reason for supposing that it was compiled as late as Sâsânian times. While the alterations, we find in the Bundahis, could have hardly been made till after 651.

70. Regarding the age in which Zaratûst lived, the dates stated in the synopsis of traditional chronology (§ 55), are B.C. 660-583, while the reign of Vistâsp, which extends to the fabulous length of 120 years, or 660-540, evidently represents a short dynasty, including Hystaspes and his next four forefathers, if we accept the traditional identification of Vistâsp with the father of Darius I. But the names of those four forefathers, which are known on the unimpeachable authority of the Behistûn inscription of Darius himself, render it almost impossible to accept this traditional identification, as they differ totally from those of the forefathers of Vistâsp in the Avesta. The two dynasties are as follows:—

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[paragraph continues] Unless it can be shown that these two series of names have the same meaning in two different languages, there seems little chance of proving the identity of the two dynasties. We may, however, quote the instances of the high-priest Âtûrpâd = Âtare-pâta and his son Zaratûst = Zarathustra being called Râstare-vaghent and Avarethrabau, respectively, in the Avesta (see § 64); but these latter names seem more like titles than translations.

71. The date of Zoroaster and his religion has formerly been fully discussed by Windischmann 2 and others, and the question has been lately re-examined by Williams Jackson 3. He divides the ancient statements, that have been made on the subject, into three classes: those which declare that Zaratûst lived before B.C. 6000, those which associate his name with Ninus and Semiramis, and the native tradition which, as we have seen, places his life in the period B.C. 660-583. Singularly enough, the oldest writers, those who lived only two to four centuries after the traditional period of the lifetime of Zaratûst, are those who report that he lived some 6000 years before that period. Pliny the Elder (Nat. Hist. XXX, 2) quotes Eudoxus (B.C. 368) as stating that Zaratûst existed 6000 years before the death of Plato, that is, B.C. 6347, which is also confirmed by Aristotle. And he quotes Hermippus (about B.C. 250) as placing him 5000 years before the Trojan war, that is, B.C. 6184. A third mode of describing this period

p. xl

seems to have been used by Xanthus of Lydia (B.C. 500-450) 1 who stated that Zaratûst lived 6000 years before Xerxes, as quoted by Diogenes Laertius, that is, B.C. 6485.

72. Three or four other classical writers mention similar statements, and Jackson points out that these extravagant dates are probably owing to the European writers misunderstanding Persian statements with reference to the pre-existence of Zaratûst's Fravashi. It will, in fact, be seen from the synopsis (§ 55) that the traditional account is that the spiritual body of Zaratûst was framed together as early as the beginning of the fourth millennium, which occurred B.C. 6630, and this may be accepted as a close approximation to the three dates, B.C. 6347, 6184, and 6485, indicated by the ancient writers, considering that their statements are made in even thousands of years.

73. Pliny also mentions, on the authority of other writers who are not named, that another Zoroaster, a Proconnesian, lived a little before the time of Osthanes who accompanied Xerxes to Greece (B.C. 480). And, so far as time is concerned, this Zoroaster might have been the traditional Zaratûst who died 103 years before this journey of Osthanes.

74. The old statements about Zoroaster or Oxyartes, the Magian king of Bactria in the time of Ninus and Semiramis, can hardly refer to the traditional Zaratûst who is never represented as a king, although the supreme Zarathustra of the Avesta was apparently a ruling priest. The time in which this Bactrian lived is also very uncertain, for though Semiramis has recently been placed about B.C. 800, her position in Albîrûnî's tables is certainly 1200 years earlier.

75. It seems, therefore, that the ancient statements, regarding the date of Zaratûst, reported by Pliny and corroborated by a few other classical writers, can be fully explained from the traditional system of chronology used in Pahlavi texts, by identifying the classical Zoroaster of the seventh millennium B.C. with the traditional Zaratûst

p. xli

in his ante-natal spiritual state, after he had ceased to be a mere Fravashi, or primary idea, and had become an intelligent, moving, and personal existence, but still a spirit. While the later Zoroaster of Pliny, who flourished before the fifth century B.C., must have lived about the same time as the same traditional Zaratûst after he came into the worldly existence, and may reasonably be identified with him, although Pliny had little information to give about him.

76. It will be noticed that this explanation depends entirely upon the peculiarly artificial system of the traditional chronology, in which the whole of time is assumed to consist of twelve millenniums devoted to different purposes; and if this particular system had not been in use at the time the statements, quoted by Pliny and Diogenes: Laertius, were made, those statements could not have been explained as referring to the same individual. But if they do not refer to the same individual, we have only the options of rejecting all the statements, or believing an impossible date to be literally correct; neither of which decisions would be altogether satisfactory to a judicious mind. The only reasonable conclusion seems to be that the chronology based upon the twelve millenniums was in use in the fifth century B.C., about which time the earliest quoted statement seems to have been made.

77. It will also be observed that this millennial chronology is inextricably associated with the idea of the primeval existence of all good creations in the state of Fravashis. These are described as spiritual existences who remained three millenniums unthinking, unmoving, and intangible (Bd. I, 8); and the next three millenniums they still remained undisturbed by evil, mankind being represented, for that period, by Gâyômard in the world (Bd. XXXIV, i) and by the spiritual form of Zaratûst in heaven (Dk. VII, ii, 15), while the animals were symbolized by the primeval ox for the same period. Six millenniums, which are half the duration of time, were thus appropriated to Fravashis, spiritual and embodied, probably before the birth of Plato, if we may rely upon classical statements; and it must have

p. xlii

been before this date that the series of millenniums was arranged for all future history, till Time was expected to merge once more into Eternity at the renovation of the universe.

78. As we have seen that Zoroastrian tradition is very consistent in fixing the date of Zaratûst's activity about the end of the seventh century B.C., it may be asked, why have Avesta scholars so strongly insisted upon its greater antiquity? They may have had several reasons, but three, at least, were important. First, they had the classical statements which, as we have seen (§ 71), generally placed Zaratûst as far back as the seventh millennium B.C., on the testimony of persons who lived from two to four centuries after the traditional date of Zaratûst's death. No one, of course, could believe in the literal accuracy of the number of millenniums, which referred, as we have seen, to an imaginary period of spiritual existence, but this number was considered merely as an exaggeration which might be reduced to any amount that seemed reasonable. At the same time, this evidence for antiquity was quite sufficient, in the second place, to discredit the traditional date, of which these old authorities seemed ignorant, though it was a period then comparatively recent. And, if this discredit had not been sufficient to shake the faith of Avesta scholars in the traditional date of Zaratûst, they still had a third reason for their scepticism, when they discovered that the language of the Avesta was not merely a sister of Sanskrit, but that a large portion of it was sister to the oldest Sanskrit with which they were acquainted, and which appeared to them certainly older than the time of Gautama Buddha, who lived about one generation later than the traditional Zaratûst.

79. How far Avesta scholars were justified in their conclusions must be left for future ages to determine; at present we have no really historical information about the origin of Zoroastrianism, and must still consider it as decidedly prehistoric; though, it may be admitted that the Parsi calendar, as used in Persia, so far agrees with tradition, that it still bears witness to its own original institution in

p. xliii

the reign of Darius Hystaspes, as will be seen from the following details.

80. The Parsi year consists of twelve months, each consisting of thirty days, with five additional days added at the end of the year, and the total number of 365 days never varies, so that, whenever a leap-year occurs in our calendar, the beginning of the Parsi year retreats one day in the Christian calendar. In this manner, the total number of days which the beginning of the Parsi year has retreated, since the institution of their calendar, records the number of leap-years which would have occurred in the same period of Christian years, if the regular leap-years had existed the whole time; and four times the number of leap-years would be the total number of years. But as leap-years have not been used the whole time, we have to calculate from astronomical data.

81. In the first place, we want to know at what season the Parsi year originally began, and we learn this from Bd. XXV, 7, 20, where we are told that the winter of the rectified year ends with the five extra days, and the spring begins with the first month; which means that the rectified year begins with the vernal equinox. We also have to observe that, retreating at the rate of one day every four years, the beginning of the year retreats all round the year in 1460 years; and we know from general history that the period, with which we have to deal, is much more than 1460 years and less than 2920. Then we have to ascertain the exact length of the tropical year, which astronomers say is 365.2422 days, with an infinitesimal decrement, quite inappreciable in the period we have in view.

82. We may calculate back from any vernal equinox which occurs not too far from noon, say that of March 22, 1865, when the beginning of the Parsi year, according to Persian reckoning, had retreated to August 24, 1864, or 210, days, in addition to a previous retreat of a whole year of 365 days, or altogether 575 days since the establishment of the calendar. So that the difference between the Parsi year of 365 days and the correct tropical year of 365.2422 days had then accumulated to a total of 575 days. Dividing

p. xliv

the accumulated error of 575 days by the annual increment of 0.2422 of a day, we obtain a quotient of 2374 years, including A.D. 1865, as the time in which this error had accumulated, and this carries us back to B.C. 510 as an approximate date of the establishment of the Parsi calendar, with the first day of the year coinciding with the vernal equinox.

83. This date is, however, liable to some modifications for errors of observation on the part of the ancient astronomers, one of which errors, being constantly in one direction, must be taken into account. These old observers were not aware of the effect of refraction, which always makes the night seem somewhat shorter than it is in reality; and this would lead them to antedate the vernal equinox by rather more than a day; so that they would observe an apparent equinox in B.C. 505 on the same day in the Parsi year as that on which the real equinox occurred in B.C. 510. The most probable date of the establishment of the Parsi calendar is therefore B.C. 505, with a margin of four to eight years in either direction for accidental errors of observation.

84. A few years before this period we know, from the cuneiform inscriptions of Behistûn, that Darius Hystaspes used an older calendar, when recording his early victories over insurgents, which consolidated his empire. It was a time when he was introducing many reforms in the government, and, being a believer in Auramazdâ, his most influential advisers would probably be Zoroastrian priests. If they thought it necessary to reform the old calendar, the adoption of strictly Zoroastrian names for the new months and days in the Parsi calendar would be fully explained.

85. But, besides this ordinary civil calendar, in which new-year's day was constantly retreating, the Persians had a rectified calendar for religious purposes, which intercalated an extra month from time to time, for the purpose of bringing new-year's day forward again to the vernal equinox, and restoring the festivals to their proper seasons. It is this calendar which is used in Bd. XXV, and its days

p. xlv

and months are distinguished by the epithet vehîkakîg, (veh + îk + ak + îg), 'belonging to what is really good,' or vehîkak, 'belonging to the really good,' which, in this connection, may be best expressed by the word 'rectified.'

86. This intercalation is described by Albîrûnî in various passages 1 which inform us that, after the new-year's day had retreated more than a month from the vernal equinox, the king would order the priests to arrange for the solemn proclamation of an extra month to be intercalated, between the last month of the year and the five extra days, by merely moving those five days from the end of the twelfth month to the end of the first month of the next year. The effect of this was to put an extra month into the earlier year which, beginning with the first month, would also end with the first month augmented by the five extra days as the usual termination of the year. All following years would begin with the second month, and end with the first month and the five extra days, until the second intercalation, when a year of thirteen months and five days would be again obtained, by merely moving the five extra days to the end of the second month which would thus become the last month of the year, while the third month would begin the year until the third intercalation. By these means, any number of intercalations could be made without any additional month being named, and the position of the five extra days always indicated the end of the rectified year, and that the rectified first month, which followed them, was to become the last month of the preceding year at the next rectification, or intercalation.

87. If the Parsi calendar, as used in Persia, were established B.C. 505, as we have calculated, it ought to have been rectified by an intercalation of one month about each of the following years:—B.C. 381, 257, 133, 10, A.D. 115, 239, 363, 487, 610. Albîrûnî (p. 121), however, has recorded only one intercalation of two months in the time of Yazdakard I (A.D. 399-420), son of Shahpûhar, when the

p. xlvi

five extra days were removed to the end of the original eighth month Âbân, where they remained until Albîrûnî's own time (Alb. p. 56), about A.D. 1000. The reason for intercalating two months at once, was because the time for the seventh intercalation (A.D. 363) was already long past; so the eighth was added three or four score years in advance, being due in 487.

88. All that Albîrûnî says about this double intercalation is quite in accordance with the original establishment of the calendar by Darius Hystaspes, and would render any date more than thirty-seven years later than his reign impossible 1. With regard to the earlier intercalations (which must have occurred to account for the movement of the five extra days) that of A.D. 115 was neither in the reign of Vologeses I, nor in that of Vologeses III, one of whom must have been the Askânian renovator of the Avesta. That of A.D. 239, if carried out punctually, would have been at the extreme end of the reign of Ardashîr; but the intercalations seem to have been usually delayed, as in the case of that of 363 which was delayed for thirty to fifty years, although it ought to have been carried out under the direction of one of those ultra-orthodox high-priests, Âtûrpâd son of Mâraspend, or his son Zaratûst, in the reign of Shahpûhar II.

89. It is worthy of notice that the names of both the days and months, which have come down to us in this calendar of Darius, include the names of the six Ameshaspentas, which, according to Darmesteter's hypothesis, were not invented till the time of Vologeses I, in the first century A.D. We have positive evidence that the calendar of twelve months of thirty days each, with five extra days to complete the year, must have been established in the time of Darius. This fact being recorded mechanically by the extent of the retreat of the Persian Parsis' new-year's day down to the present time, and by the number of months intercalated in their religious calendar down to the fifth

p. xlvii

century A.D., being known from the position of the five extra days in the rectified calendar. We have no evidence of any change of names having been made in this calendar at any time; and only positive and indisputable evidence could be admitted, because reformers of calendars are hardly ever satisfied with mere change of names, and the calendar itself is a permanent witness that no alteration can have been made in any other particular, since the time of Darius.

90. Darmesteter's theory of a late origin for the Avesta having been mentioned, it may be allowable to add, that the likelihood of this theory does not increase upon closer examination. It is a brilliant hypothesis, very carefully prepared to meet ordinary criticism; but it does not appear to convince Avesta scholars in general, for want of sufficient evidence, as it is very necessary to distinguish carefully between possibilities and probabilities; the former being not admissible as evidence, unless corroborated by positive facts. Its chief use has been in checking the tendency to exaggerate the age of the Avesta, but it seems itself to be an exaggeration in the opposite direction, a returning swing of the ever-restless pendulum of judgment. On the other hand, the traditional age of the religion cannot be fairly considered as exaggerated, for the chief difficulty in accepting it as sufficiently old, is that the nearer our researches penetrate to that time the less real light we obtain.

E. W. WEST.            

April, 1897

p. xlviii

ABBREVIATIONS USED IN THIS VOLUME.

A.D. for Anno Domini; Alb. for Albîrûnî's Chronology of Ancient Nations, translated by Sachau; A.R. for Anno Religionis; Ar. for Arabic; AV. for the Book of Ardâ-Vîrâf; Av. for Avesta; B for Bombay MS. of Dînkard, brought from Irân in 1783; B.C. for Before Christ; Bd. for Bundahis (S.B.E. v, 1-151), and Band (volume); Beh. for Behistûn inscription; BK for an old copy of K35, made when this MS. was more complete than it is now; B.R. for Before the Religion; Byt. for Bahman Yast (S.B.E. v, 189-235); Chald. for Chaldee; Chap. for chapter; Chaps. for chapters; Dd. for Dâdistân-i Dînîk (S.B.E. xviii, 1-276); Dk. for Dînkard (S.B.E. xxxvii, 1-397, 406-418, and this volume); ed. for editor or edition; Ep. for Epistles of Mânûskîhar (S.B.E. xviii, 277-366); Études irân. for Études irâniennes; Farh. Oîm, for Farhang-i Oîm-aêvak; gen. for genitive case; Gesch. der Sas. for Geschichte der Perser und Araber zur Zeit der Sâsâniden; Gf. for the Tale of Gôst-î Fryânô; Heb. for Hebrew; Ibid. for ibidem; Ind. vers. for Indian version; J. for Jâmâsp's old MS.; K for University Library at Kopenhagen; L for India Office Library at London; l. for line; ll. for lines; Mkh. for Mainyô-i Khirad (S.B.E. xxiv, 1-113); MS. for manuscript; MSS. for manuscripts; n. for footnote; nom. for nominative case; p. for page; Pahl. for Pahlavi; Pers. for Persian; pp. for pages; Pt. for Peshotan's old MS.; S.B.E. for Sacred Books of the East; Sd. for Sad-dar (S.B.E. xxiv, 253-361); Sg. for Sîkand-gumânîk Vigâr (S.B.E. xxiv, 115-251); Sls. for Shâyast-lâ-shâyast (S.B.E. v, 237-406); Sp. for Spiegel's edition; T for Tehmuras's MS. of Dd., Zs., &c.; Vd. for Vendidad, ed. Geldner; Vig. for Vigîrkard-î Dînîk; Visp. for Visperad, ed. Geldner; vol. for volume; Westerg. Frag. for Westergaard's Fragments; Yas. for Yasna, ed. Geldner; Yt. for Yast, ed. Geldner; W. for Geiger's Yâtkâr-i Zarîrân; Z. for Zaratûst; Zs. for Selections of Zâd-sparam, first series.

Footnotes

xii:1 This name can be read Shêdâsfas in Byt. III.

xiv:1 The MSS. have 528, but this would be twenty-eight years before the accession of Mânûskîhar, see the synopsis in § 55.

xxiv:1 Those specially belonging to the latter millenniums, probably meaning the people who were expected to make most of the last two centuries intolerably wicked.

xxv:1 For the meaning of this term, as defined by the texts which use it, see S.B.E., vol. xviii, pp. 389-430.

xxxi:1 He became king of Macedon B.C. 336, and of Persia in 331.

xxxi:2 The erroneous dates in the Bundahis chronology (see § 57) alter this period to B.C. 156-36.

xxxiii:1 The basis of calculation is the real date of each event and real century, but the Bd. date of each Bd. century. The only Bd. data are 284 years from the death of Alexander to the accession of Ardashîr, and 460 years from the latter to the death of Yazdakard III, as stated in § 57.

xxxiv:1 The authorities consulted, for Persian historical facts and dates, have been Nöldeke, Aufsätze zur persischen Geschichte; and A. von Gutschmid, Geschichte Irans und seiner Nachbarländer von Alexander dem Grossen bis sum Untergang der Arsaciden: edited by Nöldeke.

xxxvi:1 See S. B, E., vol. xxxviii p. 415.

xxxix:1 These were the reigning sovereigns, but the last two are descended from a collateral branch, and their actual pedigree is as follows:—Kavi Kavâta, Kavi Aipivanghu, Kavi Pisanangh, Manus, Uzava, Aurvadaspa, Kava Vistâspa. (Bd. XXXI, 28, 29).

xxxix:2 Zoroastrische Studien, von Fr. Windischmann, edited by Spiegel, 1863; pp. 121-163, 260-313.

xxxix:3 On the date of Zoroaster, by A. V. Williams Jackson; Journal of American Oriental Society, vol. xvii, pp. 1-22.

xl:1 There are some doubts as to the correctness of these dates.

xlv:1 Sachau's Albîrûnî's Chronology of Ancient Nations, pp. 12, 13, 38, 53-56, 194, 185, 220, 221.

xlvi:1 If the calendar had been established thirty-eight years after the death of Darius, the seventh intercalation would not have been due till one year after the death of Yazdakard I.