Part 9

Though not immortal, Ahriman was primordial. Unlike the fallen star of the morning, what he is, that he was. He did not choose Evil: he _is_ Evil as Ormuzd _is_ Good. He can create, but only things like himself. The notion that both Ormuzd and Ahriman proceeded from a prior entity, Boundless Time, is a late legend. Ormuzd and Ahriman existed always, the one in eternal light, the other in beginningless darkness. An immense vacuum divided the light from the darkness and Ahriman knew not Ormuzd, Evil knew not Good, till Good was externalised in the beneficent creation.

“Young life lowed through the meadows, the woods and the echoing mountains, Wandered bleating in valleys and warbled on blossoming branches.”

The sight of created things gave Ahriman the will to create corresponding things, evil instead of good. He made sin, disease, death, the flood, the earthquake, famine, slaughter, noxious animals. So the pieces were set down on the chess-board of being, and, as in all religions, man’s soul was the stake.

The difference from other religions lay in the determined effort to grapple with the problem of the origin of evil. The tribe of divine students among whom Mazdeism sprang up saw in that unsolved problem the great cause of unbelief, and they set themselves to solve it by the theory which J. S. Mill said was the only one which could reconcile philosophy with religion—the theory of primal forces at war. The Indian did not attempt to fathom it; the Egyptian and Assyrian set it aside; we know the offered Hebrew solution: “I form the light and create darkness; I make peace and create evil, I, the Lord, do all these things.” But this is a statement, not a solution, because though it may be believed, it cannot be thought. The attraction of the dualistic conception is shown by nothing more clearly than by the extraordinary vitality of Manichæism in the face of every kind of persecution both in the East and West, although Manichæism, with its ascription of the creation of mankind to the Evil Principle, its depreciation of woman, its out-and-out asceticism which included abstinence from animal food (a rule borrowed by Mani from the Buddhists in his journey in India) contrasts unfavourably with the faith that did not make a single demand on human nature except to be good, even as its Creator was good.

The origin of the Magians was Semitic, or, as some think, præ-Semitic and præ-Aryan. Travellers brought tales of them to the ancient world which listened with a fascinated interest, while it failed to see the importance of the mighty religious phenomenon of Israel. The “Wise men of the East” had a charm for antiquity, as they were to have for the Infant Church which never tired of depicting them in its earliest art. Mention of the “Persarum Magos” is frequent from Herodotus to Cicero, who speaks of them under that name. According to Herodotus the Magi sang the Theogony, and Pausanias describes them as reading from a book which was certainly the Avesta, though it must not be overlooked that never but once does it contain the smallest reference to them. This tribe of divine students enjoyed a high reputation at the Babylonian Court, which seems less unexpected by the light of recent research than it did when the Babylonians and Assyrians were thought to be destitute of any trace of an esoteric religion tending to monotheism. That the Magians were monotheists cannot be disputed. Probably they were skilled in astronomy and in medicine, the two sciences which almost covered what was meant then by learning in the East. Probably also they were astrologers like other searchers of the heavens, but they were not magic-workers, a calling that had a bad name. The Magi in the Gospel story are supposed to have been guided by astronomical calculations; whatever these may have been, they could not have been ignorant of the prophecy in their own Scriptures of a Virgin who should give birth to the Saviour and Judge of men. The ante-natal soul of this Virgin had been venerated for centuries in Iran. An infiltration of Messianic prophecies might induce them to conclude that the Child would be “King of the Jews.” It was not likely that they would take so long a journey to do homage to any new-born earthly king, but it was quite possible that they might go in search of the promised Saviour.

In Media we know that the people lived at one time in tribes, without kings. In one form or another, the tribal organisation existed and exists everywhere in the East. What is caste but a petrified tribal system? The first discovery which a European makes on landing on the skirts of the East, is that everything is done by tribes. The Algerian conjurors who swallow fire, drive nails into their heads and do other gruesome feats are a semi-religious tribe which has thrived from time immemorial on the exercise of the same profession. The dwarfs of the late Bey of Tunis, whom I saw at Bardo, belonged to a tribe which does nothing but furnish dwarfs. Apply to a high or worthy end this corporate pursuit of a given object and it must produce remarkable results.

The unanimous belief of the Greeks that Zoroaster was founder of the Magians is held no longer, but he is still thought to have been one of them. Moslem tradition made him the servant of a Hebrew prophet, and even serious Western students were inclined to trace Mazdeism to the Jewish prisoners who were brought into Media by the Assyrians. It is unnecessary to say that at present the Jews are regarded as the debtors.

There is no figure of a religious teacher so elusive as that of Zoroaster, and they are all elusive. But in the case of Zoroaster it is not only the man that eludes us—it is also his environment. Brahmanical India of to-day reflects as in a glass the society into which Sakya Muni cast his seed; in fact, we understand the seed-sowing better than the harvest; Buddhism at its apogee seems of the nature of an interlude in the history of the changeless East. China still throws light on its passionless sage, passionless in a sense so far deeper than the Indian recluses, who, though they knew it not, did but substitute for the passion of the flesh the more inebriating passion of the spirit. From the splendid treasury of præ-Islamic poetry, we know that the Arab race had acquired its specialised type before the Muezzin first called the faithful to prayer. The moral petrifaction of the many and the religious and patriotic ferment of the few which formed the _milieu_ of nascent Christianity, can be realised without any stretch of the imagination. Buddha, Confucius, and He that was greater than they, came into highly civilised societies in organised states; Mohammed came into an unorganised state which lacked political and religious cohesion, but the unity of race was already developed: the Emirs of the Soudan whose star set at Omdurman were the living pictures of the Arabs who first rallied to the Prophet’s banner. Of the society of Old Iran to which Zoroaster spoke, it is difficult to form a distinct idea and to judge how far it had moved away from early Aryan simplicity. We gather that it was still a society in which sheep-raising and dairy-farming played a preponderant part. Those modern expressions may serve us better than to say “shepherds” and “herdsmen,” since fixity of dwelling with the possession of what then was considered wealth seems to have been a very common case. Nomadic life lasted on, but it was held in disrepute. There appears to have been nothing like a national or warlike spirit such as that possessed by the Jews, though occasional Turanian incursions had to be repelled. There were few towns and many scattered villages and homesteads. We are conscious that these impressions derived from the Avesta may be partially erroneous. Teachers of religion only take note of political or other circumstances so far as it suits their purpose.

Zoroaster (the Greek reading of Zarathustra, which in modern Persian becomes Zardusht), was born, as far as can be guessed, in Bactria, which became the stronghold of Avestic religion and the last refuge of the national monarchy on the Arab invasion. There was a time when his existence was denied, but no one doubts it now. Eight hundred years before Christ is the date which most modern scholars assign to him, though some place him much farther back, while others think they discern reasons for his having appeared after Buddha. The legend of his life (not to be found in the Avesta) begins in the invariable way: he was descended from kings; as a young man he retired to a grotto in the desert, where he lived an austere life of reflection for seven years. Zoroaster never taught asceticism, but tradition attributes to him the season of solitude and self-collection without which perhaps, in fact as well as in fable, the supreme power over other men’s minds was never wielded by man.

Various marvellous particulars are related: he was suckled by two ewes; wild animals obeyed his voice; when thrown under the feet of oxen and horses, they avoided hurting him. In his seven years’ retirement he meditated on idol-worship, on false gods and false prophets. The people of Iran, substantially monotheist but prone to sliding into degrading superstition, offered a field for his mission. He took to him a few disciples and began to preach to as many as would hear, but he met with great difficulties. At last, he found favour with a king by curing his favourite horse, and he might have ended his days in peace but the spirit urged him to continue his apostolate. Not to princes but to peasants did he chiefly address himself; he did not call them away from their work but exhorted them to pursue it diligently. “He who cultivates the earth will never lack, but he who does not, will stand idly at the doors of others to beg food.” Labour is not an evil, man who earns his bread by the sweat of his brow is not under a curse: he is the fellow-worker with God! This was the grandest thing that Zoroaster taught. It is singular to note the affinity between his teaching and the Virgilian conception of the husbandman as half a priest. In the Middle Ages the same thought arose where one would not look for it: among those religious orders which had the luminous inspiration that in work not in indolence lay the means of salvation: “_Laborare est orare._”

The care of the God-created animals brought with it a special blessing: it was actually a way to heaven. If a friend gave us a cherished animal, should not we treat it well for that friend’s sake as well as for its own value? Would not it remind us of the giver? Would not we be anxious that he should find it in good health if by chance he came on a visit? This is how Zoroaster wished man to feel about the cow, the sheep, the dog. Auguste Comte considered domestic animals as a part of humanity. Zoroaster considered them as a trust from God.

Moslem traditions finish the story of the Mazdean prophet by telling that he was beaten to death by “devil-worshippers,” probably Turanian raiders. Zoroastrian authorities are silent about his end, which is thought to bear out the legend that it was unfortunate.

The Parsis hold that the whole Avesta was the work of Zoroaster. Much of the original material has disappeared, and although Western writers are disposed to throw all the blame on the Moslem invaders, the steady Persian tradition which accuses “Alexander the Rûman” of having caused the destruction of an important part of it, cannot be well answered by saying that such barbarism was not likely to be committed by the Macedonian conqueror. When Persepolis was reduced to ruins some of the sacred books “written with gold ink on prepared cow-skins” may have been destroyed by accident, but as it was certain that the Zoroastrian priests would do all they could to foment resistance to the hated idolater, we cannot be too sure that the deed was not done on purpose. The way of disposing of the dead set the Greeks against the Zoroastrians, and they even thought or affected to think that the dying as well as the dead were given to dogs. The Arabs, no doubt, burnt what they could lay their hands on of what was left, and it tells much for the devotion of the faithful few, the persecuted remnant in Persia, and the band of exiles who found a happier fate in India, that nevertheless the Avesta has been preserved in a representative though incomplete form, to take its place in among the sacred literatures of the world. When the Parsis return, as they hope to do, to a free Persia, they may carry the Avesta proudly before them as the Sikhs carried the Granth to the prophet-martyr’s tomb at Delhi: they have done more than keep the faith, they have _lived it_.

The present Avesta consists of five books. The Gâthâs or hymns alone really claim to have been composed by Zoroaster himself, and this claim is admitted by European scholars who disagree with the Parsis in denying that the other four books are by the same author. They are: the “Yasna,” a ceremonial liturgy, the “Vispered,” a work resembling the “Yasna,” but apparently less ancient; the “Vendîdâd,” which contains the Mazdean religious law, and the “Khordah Avesta,” a household prayer-book for the laity. The original text was written in an Aryan dialect related to Sanscrit; after a time, this tongue was understood by no one but the priests and not much by them; it was decided, therefore, to make a translation, which was called the “Zend,” or “interpretation,” or, as we should say, “the authorised version.” At first Europeans thought that “Zend” meant the original tongue in which the work was written. Curiously enough, the language into which the Scriptures were rendered was not Iranian or Old Persian, but Pahlavi, a _lingua franca_ full of Semitic words, which had been coined for convenience in communicating with the Assyrians and Syrians when they were under one king. Pahlavi was also used for official inscriptions, for coinage, for commerce; it was a sort of Esperanto. The text and the translation enjoyed equal authority, but the former was called “the Avesta of Heaven” and the latter “the Avesta of Earth.”

The first fragment of the “Avesta” that reached Europe was a copy of the “Yasna” brought to Canterbury by an unknown Englishman in 1633. Other scraps followed, but no real attempt to translate it was made till the adventurous Anquetil Duperron published in 1771 the version which he had made with the assistance of Parsi priests and which was rejected in unwise haste by Sir William Jones as a _supercherie littéraire_, chiefly on the score that its contents were for the most part pure nonsense, and hence could not be the work of Zoroaster. Germany at once was more just than England to the man who, though he had not succeeded in making a good translation, deserved the highest honour as a pioneer.

Even now that better translations are available, the Avesta is apt to dishearten the reader on his first acquaintance with it. Many passages have remained obscure, and the desire to be literal in this as in some other Oriental works has hindered the translators from writing their own languages well. It needs a Sir Richard Jebb to produce a translation which is a classic and is yet microscopically accurate. I once asked Professor F. C. Burkitt why the Septuagint did not make more impression on the Hellenic and Roman students of Alexandria by mere force of the literary power of the Bible? He replied that he thought it was to be explained by the poor degree of literary skill possessed by the Greek translators or by most of them. Another reminiscence comes to my mind here: I recollect that eminent scholar and deeply religious-minded man, Albert Réville, saying to me: “The Bible is so much more amusing than the Koran!” I am afraid one must confess that the Koran is so much “more amusing” than the Avesta. It is a good rule, however, to approach all religious books with patience and with reverence, for they contain, even if concealed under a bushel, the finest thoughts of man.

When we have grown accustomed to the outward frame of the Avesta, the inner sense becomes clearer. It is like a piece of music by Tschaikowsky: at first the modulations seem bizarre, the themes incoherent; then, by degrees, a consecutive plan unwinds itself and we know that what appeared meaningless sound was divine harmony.

The essential teaching of the Avesta is summed up in the text: “Adore God with a pure mind and a pure body, and honour Him in His works.” Force, power, energy, waters and stagnant pools, springs, running brooks, plants that shoot aloft, plants that cover the ground, the earth, the heavens, stars, sun, moon, the everlasting lights, the flocks, the kine, the water-tribes, those that are of the sky, the flying, the wild ones—“We honour all these, Thy holy and pure creatures, O Ahura Mazda, divine artificer!”

“The Voice said: Call My works thy friends.”

If the lyric note of great religious expression is rarely reached (only, perhaps, in a few pieces, such as the noble hymn to the sun-symbol), the sustained exposition of life is so reasonable and yet so lofty that to contemplate it after gazing at the extravagances of pillar-saints and Indian Yogi, signals, as it were, a return to sanity and health after the _nuit blanche_ of fever.

The “Khordah Avesta” contains this counsel or good wish: “Be cheerful; live thy life the whole time which thou wilt live.” Man is not asked to do the impossible or even the difficult: he is asked to _enjoy_. To the extreme spirituality which shrank from making even a mental image of God is joined a “this worldliness” which saw in rational enjoyment a religious duty. Instead of choosing poverty, man was ordered to make good use of wealth; instead of mortifying the flesh, he was to avoid calumny, evil-speaking, quarrels, to give clothes to the poor, to pray not only for himself but for others. If he does wrong, let him repent honestly in his heart and do some practical good work as a pledge of his repentance. The soul which grieves for its wrongdoing and sins no more comes back into the light of “God the giver, Forgiver, rich in Love, who always is, always was, always will be!” When it was asked, “What is in the first place most acceptable to this earth?” the answer came: “When a holy man walks on it, O Zarathustra!” Good men work _with_ God, who, sure of ultimate triumph, is yet Himself struggling now against the Power of Darkness. There is no religion without a good life: “All have not the Faith who do not hear it; all hear it not who are unclean; all are unclean who are sinners.” God did not send calamities to His servants, but He compassionates them in their trials: “The voice of him weeping, however low, mounts up to the star-lights, comes round the whole world.” It is no sin to desire riches: “Thy kingdom come, O Ahura, when the virtuous poor shall inherit the earth.” In spite of the sufferings of good people, even on this fair earth there is more of pleasantness for the good than for the wicked, and in the next world there is bliss eternal. I do not think that Robert Browning studied the Avesta, but to the thoroughly Zoroastrian line quoted above I am tempted to add this other which is not less so:—

“Never dreamed, though right were worsted, wrong would triumph.”

For the individual, as for the universe, Right must triumph. If the prophet of optimism has a harder task than the oracle of despair, it is, perhaps, a more profitable task.

The Parsi repeats daily, as his ancestors did before him, the so-called Honover or “Ahuna-Vairya,” or _logos_ which brings God down to man as the Gayatri lifts man up to God: “One Master and Lord, all holy and supreme; one teacher of His Law, appointed by God’s almighty will as shepherd to the weak.” The Mazdean “law” was a thought-out system to prevent idolatry and atheism, and to make men lead good lives. There is no racial exclusiveness in it: the Mazdeans had no shibboleth or peculiar sign; Zoroaster, himself a foreigner, did not appeal to a chosen people or to a miraculously evolved caste: he only knew of good men and bad. A really good man, truthful and charitable in all his ways, had three heavens open to him even though he “offered no prayers and chanted no Gâthâs”; only the fourth heaven, a little nearer the presence of God, was reserved for those who had devoted their lives to religion. Temperance was enjoined, as without temperance there could not be health. The family was sacred and marriage meritorious: children, the gift of Ahura Mazda, were recruits for the great Salvation Army of the future. Immorality was severely censured, but the victims of it were befriended. Stringent and most humane religious laws protected the _fille-mère_ from being driven “by her shame” to destroy herself or her offspring. Girls were married at sixteen: the address to young brides may be compared with that in the Rig-Veda: “I speak these words to you, maidens who wed. I say them unto you—imprint them on your hearts. Learn to know the world of the Holy Spirit according to the Law. Even so, let one of you take the other as the Law ordains, for it will be to you a source of perfect joy.”

At the time when Zoroastrianism was the State religion, the Sásánian period, we find that the kings frequently had harems. It is certain, however, that if in this as in other things the priests were complacent, they were untrue to orthodox Zoroastrian doctrine and custom, which only permitted the taking of a second wife in some rare cases, as when there was no issue by the first.

Even then, it does not seem to have been encouraged. The blot on Avestic morality is the strange recommendation of consanguineous marriages, which the Parsis interpret as far as possible in a figurative sense, but it must have been intended to be followed, though it is plain that such unions were never popular. The declared object was the hypothetical maximum purity of race: exactly the same object as that contemplated in the union of Siegemund and Siegelind in the Nibelungenlied—a curious parallel. To my mind, the desire to keep agricultural property together may have had something to do with it. The present moral ideas of the Parsis do not differ from those of Europeans, and when they requested to be placed under the English instead of the Hindu marriage law, their wish was granted.

In Avesta times the priests both married and toiled like the rest of the people. When their prosperity under the Sásánians tended to make them a class apart, they seem to have become less faithful to the ideals of their master, less stern in opposing evil in high places. It is a common experience of history. Originally they were true citizen-priests, mixing with the people as being of them. There was no life better or holier than the common life of duty and work. Isolation of any kind was contrary to the central Zoroastrian view of man as a social being. Among the wicked souls in hell, each one thinks itself utterly alone: it has no sight or knowledge of the host around it. Nothing could illustrate more powerfully than this the saying of a great French writer: “_Seul a un synonyme: mort!_” Solitude is the death of the soul.

VII

ZOROASTRIAN ZOOLOGY