Penetration of dualism in Zoroastrian scripts
Philosophy of religion among Iranians (Part 10)

Farid Shoulizadeh:  Deetjen Lepsius writes that after Zarathushtra, for a long period of time, the Moghan (priests) were leaders of his religion.  This period of time, which Deetjen Lepsius talks about, is the same period which I wrote about in the previous parts of this series, as the Avesta era.  But, this period was full of ups and downs.  If we observe the different parts of Avesta carefully, we will see the amount of direct influence of these ups and downs on the minds of the composers of Avesta.  The contents of the texts of each writer directly depends on his insight and understanding of Gathas and other parts of Yasna, and also on the historic closeness to the language of these hymns.  On one side, we see composers who, in a poetic style, write hymns in praise of Ahura Mazda, in the Yasht prayers and on the other side, other religious leaders have written the Visparad chapters and the melodious ‘Khordeh Avesta’ prayers and the Vandidad
laws.  When reading these parts it is sometimes clearly noticed that the writer of one sentence or one verse or even one chapter digresses from the main zone of the ideology of Avesta, which is ‘pantheism’ and the two alter ego and homeostasis powers created by Ahura Mazda as taught by Zarathushtra, and get caught in the desert of dualism.
 
Some parts of the more recent (younger) script of Avesta, like the first chapter of Vandidad and also some Pahlavi scripts, clearly bring up the dualistc idea.  In these scripts the topic of Zoroastrian combative powers by the names of ‘ormozd’ and ‘Ahriman’ are introduced.  From tHormozd’ and ‘Ahriman’ are introduced.  From the point of view of the writers of these scripts Hormozd is the creator of whatever is good and Ahriman spreads evil and mischief against these good creations…  The reasons for these battles are explained extensively, in scripts like Bondahesh, parts of Deenkerd, Shekandgamanik Vichar, and…  Believers of dualism think that the battle begins with the attack of Ahriman from never ending darkness, in the lower layers of the spiritual world, on the world of goodness (Hormozd) or the never ending light, which is on the higher layers.  In these scripts it is written that since Hormozd is the essence of wisdom and
knowledge and was aware that from invasion of Ahriman, mixing of two powers of creation and its consequence which is annihilation of Ahriman, He created the world which is the tool for separation of their destinies.  Since 3000 years passed after the creation, Ahriman created the devils and attacked the world of light and radiance.  Hormozd agreed with Ahriman to continue the battle for 9000 years.  Since Ahriman, being the power of ignorance and darkness, was unaware of the end of this battle and his annihilation, he accepted the 9000 years battle. Then, Hormozd made Ahriman confused and stupefied by praying the Ahunvar’ prayer (Yatha Ahu) and Ahriman fell unconscious into the world of darkness.  Ahriman was unconscious in darkness for 3000 years.  When he gained consciousness Hormozd had completed creation of the world.  From a hole in the sky Ahriman attacked the world of existence but as he entered the hole in the sky it closed and he was
trapped in the world of material and limited time, which as written in Shekandgamanik Vichar, was a trap that Hormozd had laid for Ahriman.
 
The dualists believed that driving away Ahriman was only possible with the help of good creation and creation was only able to do this through limited time and so, with the creation of time, both creatures had to be created: the creation of Hormozd and creation of Ahriman.  So, Hormozd gave limitation to eternal time and gave light to the bodies of his creatures.  On the other hand, Ahriman made his creatures’ bodies from dark grey and against each of good creatures of Hormozd he created evil and heinousness.  Based on such belief whatever was, in their opinion, harmful, heinous and wrong belonged to Ahriman.  The symbols of goodness, in their opinion, were timely rainfalls, light, good and moderate seasons, health, abundance and plentitude, honesty, sweet smelling odors and animals like dog, horse, cow, sheep and…  which had useful roles in their lives.  The symbols of evil, in their opinion, were darkness, famine, winter and severe cold,
diseases and illness, untruth and ill characters, bad smell, and animals like wolf, snake, frog, tortoise and… which they thought not to be useful.
 
Where should we search for appearance of this dualism?  Why didn’t the religious men and the interpreters, in a period of history of the Zoroastrian religion, succeed in gaining correct knowledge of the philosophy of polarity risen from the teachings of Gathas, which is, the two alter ego and homeostasis forces created by Ahura Mazda, and by mistake interpreted the philosophy that has risen from pantheism as dualism?  Why, in the interpretations of these religious men, the essence and spirit of Ahura Mazda is considered same as His creature, i.e., Spenta Minoo (the crescent power) and then, by mistake Ahura Mazda is placed in confrontation with his other creature, which is Angra Minoo (the diminishing power)?  Where is this mistake in interpretation?
I think the main reason for not understanding the worldview of Zarathushtra is complete oblivion of the ancient language of Gathas and even Yasna, in the period of these religious men.  This oblivion seriously caused a mental split and an ideological gap among these religious men.  The cause of this historic oblivion and straying away from the fundamental teachings of the Zoroastrian religion, i.e., the divine Gathas hymns, should be sought in the destructive invasion of enemies of Iran and the period of intermission and silence for the monotheistic religion.
 
Gathas is a spiritual and divine revelation.  The contents of the text are heavy from its literary and philosophic point of view and this by itself makes translation and understanding of the text very difficult.  In the beginning of the Sassanian era, when high rank mobeds, like Kartir and Tensir, started interpreting Gathas into Pahlavi language (Zandgahan), they had the same difficulty, because for many years before Ardeshir Papakan became king of Iran the Avesta language had become obsolete and completely forgotten and was only used as the sacred language of Avesta.  Besides the oldness of the language, what made translation of Gathas more difficult and also makes it difficult today, is its expansive range of vocabulary, which is specific of Gathas and not found in many other parts of Avesta.  It was for this reason that in the period of Ardeshir Papakan and his successors Gathas was not properly understood.  In fact, what is available today by
the name of Zandgahan (the Pahlavi interpretation of Gathas) is just a collection of guesses of the translator and is insignificant compared to today’s Avestaology and the word to word translation of Gathas from Avesta language, based on the physiology science and grammatical structure of the Avesta language
For deeper study interested readers may refer to two very valuable books, i.e., History of Zoroastrianism by Dastoor Dr Manekji and Zoroastrian Civilization by Nushirvanji Dahala.
 
 

Translation by Rowshan Lohrasbpour