Lyrics :

I ain’t looking for confession
I ain’t come to raise the dead
I ain’t much for you to offer
Just a cargo of tears and of pain

I ain’t come here for forgiveness
I’m not paying for my sins
I betrayed you my sweet Jesus
I have chosen hell on Earth

[Chorus]
I will get away with murder
I will get away with crime
It’s the innocence I rape
I won’t stop until I’m done

[Verse 2]
I ain’t come here for a coffee
I ain’t looking for no fun
Don’t expect me to be sober
Well you know I’m running wild

I don’t wear no crown of thorns
Well you know I never pray
I won’t offer no salvation
I was born to raise some Hell

[Chorus]
I will get away with murder
I will get away with crime
It’s the innocence I rape
I won’t stop until I’m done

[Verse 3]
In the garden, met my old friend
He’s the one with many names
You have always been like a brother
Good to have you back again

Now I wear my graveyard suit
And I smoke a black cigars
I sing ‘Hosanna, Hosanna’
At the funeral of the god

[Chorus]
I will get away with murder
I will get away with crime
It’s the innocence I rape
I won’t stop until I’m done

[Bridge]
We ain’t come here for forgiveness
We’re not paying for our sins
We betrayed you our sweet Jesus
We have chosen hell on Earth

By Mana Neyestani

" Almas " The Most Expensive Caviar In The World Comes From Iran

Almas caviar comes from Iran making it extremely rare and extremely expensive. The only known outlet is the Caviar House & Prunier in London England’s Picadilly that sells a kilo of the expensive Almas caviar in a 24-karat gold tin for £16,000, or about $25,000. Coincidentally, it is also where you can find the most expensive meal in Britain. The Caviar House also sells a £800 tin for those on a smaller budget.

Beluga caviar is composed of pea-sized, gray eggs. In general, the lighter the color, the more expensive it is. The grades are: 0 (darkest color), 00 (medium toned), and 000 (lightest color). The 000 grade is the most expensive and is sometimes referred to as “royal caviar”. In terms of texture, royal caviar is often described as rich and silky.

All caviar has an extremely short shelf life, so if you’re able to afford it, make sure you eat it all!

Track List :

01. Fra Verdenstreet – (In English : From The World Tree)
02. Jeg Faller – (In English : I Am Falling)
03. Valen – (In English : Fallen)
04. Vanvidd – (In English : Madness)
05. Enhver Til Sitt – (In English : Each Man To His Own, meaning “Each Man Gets What He Deserves”)
06. Budstikken – (In English : The Message)
07. Til Hel Og Tilbake Igjen – (In English : To Hel And Back Again)

Musically “Fallen” is like a cross between “Belus” and something new, inspired more by the début album and “Det Som Engang
Var” than by “Hvis Lyset Tar Oss” or “Filosofem”. The sound is more dynamic – we mastered the album as if it was classical music – and I was more experimental than I was on “Belus” in all respects.
Lyricwise it is similar to the début album, in the way that it is more personal and focuses on existential issues, but the mythological untertone known from “Belus” is still there. I have also included some ambient tracks – a short introduction and a longer conclusion.

“Fallen” was recorded and mixed during two weeks in Grieghallen studios, using a Spectar bass with alembic electronics on a VOX AC50 amp from 1965, a Ludwig drum kit (with a 26 inch kick) from 1975, a Neumann M149 microphone and stereo Schoeps CMTS 501 U microhpones for vocals, an OBH Nordica Harmony 6487, a custom Stig instrument and a Peavey 23 guitar on a Peavey 6505 (120 Watt) amp.

The picture on the front cover of “Fallen” is a part of a painting, “Élégie” (Eng. “Elegy”), by William Adolphe Bouguereau.

PS.
Yes, both “Fallen” and “Valen” translates into English as “Fallen”.

“Fallen” has been released worldwide on Byelobog Productions on the 7th March 2011.

Produced and mixed by Mikael Åkerfeldt.
Music and lyrics by Mikael Åkerfeldt.

The track, which was originally featured on the God Of War: Blood & Metal digital EP (2010), will see its first and only physical incarnation with this special release. Side B of the 7″ is etched with the band’s logo and jacket artwork was created by longtime Opeth collaborator Travis Smith, with direction from Mikael Åkerfeldt.

The album, which took almost three years to be completed, was recorded this summer after the band spend a few days in Germany on pre-production with Waldemar Sorychta. The recording took place on two different locations in Switzerland and the mix has been done by extreme metal specialist Russ Russell in Kettering (England)

Lux Mundi will consist of 10 to 12 new songs including first single “Antigod” and live monster “Soul Invictus”.

Swiss metallers Samael have just revealed the cover artwork of their forthcoming album, entitled Lux Mundi.

Vorphalack (vocals, guitar) commented: “For the cover artwork of Lux Mundi I envisioned a series of rays starting or ending at the centre of the cover. I wasn’t even thinking about any kind of motives, just black on black using a matte and shining black to make the rays apparent. I spoke about that with Patrick (Pidoux) who did the artwork of Solar Soul and Above and he came out with that idea upon which we immediately all agree.”

Patrick Pidoux commented: “I draw a very graphic version of an eye which represents sight, the first human sense able to capture light.”

Lux Mundi will contains 12 original new tracks including “Antigod”, “Soul Invinctus”, “Pagan Trance”, “The Truth Is Marching On”, “Of War”, “The Shadow Of The Sword”… The album will be released in April 2011.

The claims of a correlation of lunar phases to human behavior do not hold up under scientific scrutiny. Over the past 30 years, even more evidence has emerged to stress that this is pseudoscience.

The theory is sometimes also referred to as the Transylvanian hypothesis or the Transylvanian effect in scholarly literature.

Origins

The exact origins of this theory are ambiguous historically, because paleolithic moon artifacts from many cultures predate written history. This belief has been around for many centuries. The term lunacy itself is derived from the name of Luna, the Roman moon goddess. The connection between the words lunar and lunatic can also be demonstrated in other languages, such as in Welsh, where these two words are lloer and lloerig. Perhaps the most famous myth arising from this theory is the legend of the werewolf.

Scientific research on theory

Some studies support the possibility of a lunar effect. For example, a study concluded that schizophrenic patients show signs of deterioration, in terms of quality of life and mental well-being, during the time of a full moon. Some researchers have studied positive correlations between physiological changes such as induced seizures in epileptic patients and non-epileptic subjects, and the full moon period. A 2004 study found a statistically significant correlation between the lunar effect and hospital admissions due to gastrointestinal bleeding, particularly among males.

Other studies refute assertions of a lunar effect. In a study published by Epilepsy & Behavior, Sallie Baxendale and Jennifer Fisher of University College London hypothesized that if the moon phase were influential on epileptic seizures that this would be due to the moon’s contribution to nocturnal illumination, rather than its waxing or waning state, and that significant correlations would not be apparent if local cloud cover were controlled for. A significant negative correlation between the mean number of seizures and the fraction of the moon illuminated by the sun (ρ = -0.09, P < 0.05) was found in 1571 seizures recorded in a dedicated epilepsy inpatient unit over 341 days. This correlation disappeared when the local clarity of the night sky was controlled for, suggesting that it is the brightness of the night and the contribution the moon phase makes to nocturnal luminance, rather than the moon phase, that may influence the occurrence of epileptic seizures.

Psychologist Ivan Kelly of the University of Saskatchewan (with James Rotton and Roger Culver) did a meta-analysis of thirty-seven studies that examined relationships between the moon’s four phases and human behavior in 1996. The meta-analysis revealed no significant correlation. They also checked twenty-three studies that had claimed to show correlation, and nearly half of these contained at least one statistical error.

A study of 4,190 suicides in Sacramento County over a 58-year period showed no correlation to the phase of the moon. A 1992 paper by Martens, Kelly, and Saklofske reviewed twenty studies examining correlations between Moon phase and suicides. Most of the twenty studies found no correlation and the ones that did report positive results were inconsistent with each other.

Psychiatrist Arnold Lieber of the University of Miami reported a correlation of homicides in Dade County to moon phase, but later analysis of the data — including that by astronomerGeorge Abell — did not support Lieber’s conclusions. Kelly, Rotton, and Culver point out that Lieber and Carolyn Sherin used inappropriate and misleading statistical procedures. When more appropriate tests were done, no correlation between homicides and the phase of the moon was found.

Astronomer Daniel Caton analyzed 70,000,000 birth records from the National Center for Health Statistics, and found no correlation between an increased birth rate and the full moon phase. Kelly, Rotton, and Culver report that Caton examined 45,000,000 births and found a weak peak around the third quarter phase of the Moon, while the full moon and new moon phases had an average or slightly below average birth rate.

In 1959 Walter and Abraham Menaker reported that a study of over 510,000 births in New York City showed a 1 percent increase in births in the two weeks following the full moon. In 1967 Walter Menaker studied another 500,000 births in New York City, and found a 1 percent increase in births in the two-week period centered on the full moon. In 1973 M. Osley, D. Summerville, and L. B. Borst studied another 500,000 births in New York City, and they reported a 1 percent increase in births before the full moon. In 1957 Rippmann analyzed 9,551 births in Danville, PA and found no correlation between the birth rate and the phase of the moon.

A fifteen month study in Jacksonville, Florida revealed no lunar effect on crime and hospital room admittance. In particular:

• There was no increase in crime on full moons, according to a statistical analysis by the Jacksonville Police Department. Five of the fifteen full moons had a higher than average rate of crime while ten full moons had a lower than average rate. The higher-than-average days were during warmer months.
• Statistical analysis of visits to Shands Hospital emergency room showed no full moon effect. Emergency room admissions may have more to do with the day of the week.

Further research may provide further clarification on the lunar effect and what aspects of human behavior and physiology may or may not be affected.

Religion and folklore

Across the world, there has been an abundance of pseudoscientific theories and superstitions based on this premise. One theory claims that the moon has a perceived relationship tofertility is due to the corresponding human menstrual cycle, which averages 28 days. The cycle of lunar phases is 29.53 days long. However, only about 30 percent of women have a cycle length within two days of the average.

According to some traditions, prior to the advent of modern techniques, surgeons would supposedly refuse to operate on the full moon because of the increased risk of death of the patient through blood loss.

In the news

As with most folklore and urban legends, the notion behind the lunar effect has also found its way into the news. For example, it has been alleged that the full moon may have influenced voter behavior in the US 2000 presidential election.

Police in Toledo, Ohio claimed that crime rises by five percent during nights with a full moon, while police in Kentucky have also blamed temporary rises in crime on the full moon. This was based on there being three car chases within a four-hour period.

Senior police officers in Brighton announced in June 2007 that they were planning to deploy more officers over the summer to counter trouble they believe is linked to the lunar cycle.In January 2008, New Zealand’s Justice Minister Annette King suggested that a spate of stabbings in the country could have been caused by the lunar cycle.In October 2009, British politician David Tredinnick asserted that during a full moon “[s]urgeons will not operate because blood clotting is not effective and the police have to put more people on the street.”

Imperfect Harmonies, the new album from Serj Tankian will be available to purchase on September 7 on iTunes and in stores. The iTunes LP comes with exclusive photos, a bonus track, and even interactive lyric sheets that you can play with the music!

There’s even going to be a limited edition version of the album that you’ll only be able to get exclusively through SerjTankian.com, so stay tuned for details.

Imperfect Harmonies tracklist :

01. Disowned Inc.
02. Borders Are…
03. Deserving?
04. Beatus
05. Reconstructive Demonstrations
06. Electron
07. Gate 21
08. Yes, It’s Genocide
09. Peace Be Revenged
10. Left Of Center
11. Wings Of Summer

History

Adrian Hates was originally a classically trained guitarist and pianist, and subsequently bassist ofGarden of Delight. He initiated the Diary of Dreams project in the late 1980s, taking the name from one of his early classical guitar compositions, ‘Tagebuch der Träume’. The first album, ‘Cholymelan’, appeared in 1994 on the Dion Fortune label.

Encouraged by this success, Adrian formed his own label Accession and released a string of albums over the following years, building a loyal fanbase each step of the way. The second album ‘End of Flowers’ was released in 1996, expanding on the darkwave sound of the debut. ‘Bird Without Wings’ followed a year later, whilst the more experimental work ‘Psychoma?’ arrived in 1998.

The first sign of consolidation came in 1999, when a compilation album ‘Moments of Bloom’ appeared, containing two reworked tracks from each album. The next two albums ‘One of 18 Angels’ and ‘Freak Perfume’ (plus its companion EP ‘PaniK Manifesto’) made greater use of electronic rhythms, resulting in greater club play and wider recognition for the band.

Their 2004 ‘Nigredo’ (a concept album inspired by a mythology the band designed themselves) saw a move back towards the more subtle, sparse concepts of old, but still featuring bursts of their more recent, dance-oriented sound. Songs from the Nigredo tour were later released on the live CD ‘aLive’ and the companion DVD ‘Nine In Numbers’. The next Diary of Dreams album ‘Nekrolog 43’ was released in 2007, offering a greater variety of moods and concepts than previous works. Adrian Hates claims to be influenced, both lyric wise and artwork wise, by the German 1909-1935 expressionism and the “beauty of ugliness” in the course of his work.

The ninth album entitled “(if)” was released on 13 March, 2009. On February 17, 2010 Adrian announced he is back in the studio recording a new album, and on March 26, 2010 he released “A Collection Of…” which is a best-of compilation album.

Website : http://www.diaryofdreams.de

In Zoroastrianism, the Creator Ahura Mazda is all good, and no evil originates from Him. Thus, in Zoroastrianism good and evil have distinct sources, with evil (druj) trying to destroy the creation of Mazda (asha), and good trying to sustain it. Mazda is not immanent in the world, and His creation is represented by the Amesha Spentas and the host of other Yazatas, through whom the works of God are evident to humanity, and through whom worship of Mazda is ultimately directed. The most important texts of the religion are those of the Avesta, of which a significant portion has been lost, and mostly only theliturgies of which have survived. The lost portions are known of only through references and brief quotations in the later works of (primarily) the 9th-11th centuries.

Zoroastrianism is of great antiquity.In some form, it served as the national- or state religion of a significant portion of the Iranian people for many centuries before it was gradually marginalized by Islam from the 7th century onwards. The political power of the pre-Islamic Iranian dynasties lent Zoroastrianism immense prestige in ancient times, and some of its leading doctrines were adopted by other religious systems. It has no major theological divisions (the only significant schism is based on calendar differences), but it is not monolithic. Modern-era influences have a significant impact on individual/local beliefs, practices, values and vocabulary, sometimes complementing tradition and enriching it, but sometimes also displacing tradition entirely.

Faravahar (or Ferohar), one of the primary symbols of Zoroastrianism, believed to be the depiction of a Fravashi (guardian spirit)

Terminology

The term Zoroastrianism (pronounced /ˌzɒroʊˈæstri.ənɪzəm/) was first attested by the Oxford English Dictionary in 1874, in Archibald Sayce’s Principles of Comparative Philology. The first surviving reference to Zoroaster in Western scholarship is attributed to Thomas Browne (1605–1682), who briefly refers to the prophet in his 1643 Religio Medici. The OED records 1743 (Warburton, Pope’s Essay) as the earliest reference to Zoroaster.

The term Mazdaism (pronounced /ˈmæzdə.ɪzəm/) is a typical 19th century construct, taking Mazda- from the name Ahura Mazda and adding the suffix -ismto suggest a belief system. The March 2001 draft edition of the OED also records an alternate form, Mazdeism, perhaps derived from the FrenchMazdéisme, which first appeared in 1871. The Zoroastrian name of the religion is Mazdayasna, which combines Mazda- with the Avestan language wordyasna, meaning “worship, devotion”.

In the English language, an adherent of the faith commonly refers to him- or herself as a Zoroastrian or, less commonly, a Zarathustrian. An older, but still widespread expression is Behdin, meaning “follower of Daena“, for which “Good Religion” is one translation. In the Zoroastrian liturgy, the term Behdin is also used as a title for an individual who has been formally inducted into the religion (see navjote for details).

Basic beliefs

Zoroaster; portrayed here in a popular Parsi Zoroastrian depiction. This image emerged in the eighteenth century.

• There is one universal and transcendental God, Ahura Mazda, the one uncreated Creator to whom all worship is ultimately directed.
• Ahura Mazda’s creation—evident as asha, truth and order—is the antithesis of chaos, evident as druj, falsehood and disorder. The resulting conflict involves the entire universe, including humanity, which has an active role to play in the conflict.
• Active participation in life through good thoughts, good words and good deeds is necessary to ensure happiness and to keep the chaos at bay. This active participation is a central element in Zoroaster’s concept of free will, and Zoroastrianism rejects all forms of monasticism.
• Ahura Mazda will ultimately prevail over evil Angra Mainyu/Ahriman (see below), at which point the universe will undergo a cosmic renovation and time will end (cf: Zoroastrian eschatology). In the final renovation, all of creation—even the souls of the dead that were initially banished to “darkness”—will be reunited in Ahura Mazda returning to life in the undead form. At the end of time a savior-figure [a Saoshyant] will bring about a final renovation of the world (frasho.kereti), in which the dead will be revived.
• In Zoroastrian tradition the malevolent is represented by Angra Mainyu (also referred to as “Ahriman”), the “Destructive Principle”, while the benevolent is represented through Ahura Mazda’s Spenta Mainyu, the instrument or “Bounteous Principle” of the act of creation. It is through Spenta Mainyu that transcendental Ahura Mazda is immanent in humankind, and through which the Creator interacts with the world. According to Zoroastrian cosmology, in articulating the Ahuna Vairya formula Ahura Mazda made His ultimate triumph evident to Angra Mainyu.
• As expressions and aspects of Creation, Ahura Mazda emanated the Amesha Spentas (“Bounteous Immortals”), that are each the hypostasis and representative of one aspect of that Creation. These Amesha Spenta are in turn assisted by a league of lesser principles, the Yazatas, each “Worthy of Worship” and each again a hypostasis of a moral or physical aspect of creation.

Other characteristics

• Water and fire: In Zoroastrianism, water (apo, aban) and fire (atar, adar) are agents of ritual purity, and the associated purification ceremonies are considered the basis of ritual life. In Zoroastrian cosmogony, water and fire are respectively the second and last primordial elements to have been created, and scripture considers fire to have its origin in the waters. Both water and fire are considered life-sustaining, and both water and fire are represented within the precinct of a fire temple. Zoroastrians usually pray in the presence of some form of fire (which can be considered evident in any source of light), and the culminating rite of the principle act of worship constitutes a “strengthening of the waters” (see Ab-Zohr). Fire is considered a medium through which spiritual insight and wisdom is gained, and water is considered the source of that wisdom.
• Proselytizing and conversion: While the Parsees in India have traditionally been opposed to proselytizing, probably for historical reasons, and even considered it a crime where the culprit may face expulsion,Iranian Zoroastrians have never been opposed to conversion and the practice has even been endorsed by the Council of Mobeds of Tehran. While the Iranian authorities do not permit proselytizing within Iran, Iranian Zoroastrians in exile have actively encouraged missionary activities, with The Zarathushtrian Assembly in Los Angeles and the International Zoroastrian Centre in Paris as two prominent centres. Iranian-American politician Trita Parsi and Swedish artist and philosopher Alexander Bard are two of the most well-known modern converts.^{[citation needed]}
• Inter-faith marriages: As in many other faiths, Zoroastrians are strongly encouraged to marry others of the same faith, but this is not a requirement of the religion itself. Rather, it is a creation of those in India. Some members of the Indian Zoroastrian community (the Parsis) contend that a child must have a Parsi father to be eligible for introduction into the faith, but this assertion is considered by most to be a violation of the Zoroastrian tenets of gender equality, and may be a remnant of an old Indian legal definition (since overruled) of Parsi. This issue is a matter of great debate within the Parsi community, but with the increasingly global nature of modern society and the dwindling number of Zoroastrians, such opinions are less vociferous than they were previously.
• Life, death and reincarnation: In Zoroastrian tradition, life is a temporary state in which a mortal is expected to actively participate in the continuing battle between truth and falsehood. Prior to being born, the soul (urvan) of an individual is still united with its fravashi, of which there are as very many, and which have existed since Mazda created the universe. During life, the fravashi acts as a guardian and protector. On the fourth day after death, the soul is reunited with its fravashi, and in which the experiences of life in the material world are collected for the continuing battle in the spiritual world. For the most part Zoroastrianism does not have a notion of reincarnation, at least not until the final renovation of the world. Despite this, followers of Ilm-e-Kshnoom in India believe in reincarnation and practice vegetarianism, two principles unknown to Orthodox Zoroastrianism.
• Disposal of the dead: In Zoroastrian scripture and tradition, a corpse is a host for decay, i.e., of druj. Consequently, scripture enjoins the “safe” disposal of the dead in a manner such that a corpse does not pollute the “good” creation. These injunctions are the doctrinal basis of the fast-fading traditional practice of “ritual exposure”, most commonly identified with the so-called “Towers of Silence” for which there is no standard technical term in either scripture or tradition. The practice of ritual exposure is only practised by Zoroastrian communities of the Indian subcontinent, where it is not illegal, but where alternative disposal methods are desperately sought after diclofenac poisoning has led to the virtual extinction of scavenger birds. Other Zoroastrian communities either cremate their dead, or bury them in graves that are cased with lime mortar.

History

Although older (roughly early first millennium BCE, see Zoroaster), Zoroastrianism only enters recorded history in the mid-5th century BCE.Herodotus’ The Histories (completed c. 440 BCE) includes a description of Greater Iranian society with what may be recognizably Zoroastrian features, including exposure of the dead (see Tower of Silence).

Perhaps more importantly, The Histories is a primary source of information on the early period of the Achaemenid era (648–330 BCE), in particular with respect to the role of the Magi. According to Herodotus i.101, the Magi were the sixth tribe of the Medians (until the unification of the Persian empire under Cyrus the Great, all Iranians were referred to as “Mede” or “Mada” by the peoples of the Ancient World), who appear to have been the priestly caste of the Mesopotamian-influenced branch of Zoroastrianism today known as Zurvanism, and who wielded considerable influence at the courts of the Median emperors.

Farvahar. Persepolis, Iran.

Following the unification of the Median and Persian empires in 550 BCE, Cyrus II and later his son Cambyses II curtailed the powers of the Magi after they had attempted to sow dissent following their loss of influence. In 522 BCE, the Magi revolted and set up a rival claimant to the throne. The usurper, pretending to be Cyrus’ younger son Smerdis, took power shortly thereafter. Owing to the despotic rule of Cambyses and his long absence in Egypt, “the whole people, Persians, Medes and all the other nations” acknowledged the usurper, especially as he granted a remission of taxes for three years (Herodotus iii. 68).

According to the Behistun Inscription pseudo-Smerdis ruled for seven months before being overthrown by Darius I in 521 BCE. The “Magi”, though persecuted, continued to exist. A year following the death of the first pseudo-Smerdis (named Gaumata), a second pseudo-Smerdis (named Vahyazdāta) attempted a coup. The coup, though initially successful, failed.

Whether Cyrus II was a Zoroastrian is subject to debate. It did however influence him to the extent that it became the non-imposing religion of his empire, and its beliefs later allowed Cyrus to free the Jews and allow them to return to Judea when the emperor took Babylon in 539 BCE. Darius I was certainly a devotee of Ahura Mazda, as attested to several times in the Behistun inscription. However, whether he was a follower of Zoroaster has not been conclusively established, since devotion to Ahura Mazda was (at the time) not necessarily an indication of an adherence to Zoroaster’s teaching.

Darius I and later Achaemenid emperors, though acknowledging their devotion to Ahura Mazda in inscriptions, appear to have permitted religions to coexist. Nonetheless, it was during the Achaemenid period that Zoroastrianism gained momentum. A number of the Zoroastrian texts that today are part of the greater compendium of the Avesta have been attributed to that period. It was also during the later Achaemenid era that many of the divinities and divine concepts of proto-Indo-Iranian religion(s) were incorporated in Zoroastrianism, in particular those to whom the days of the month of the Zoroastrian calendar are dedicated. This calendar is still used today, a fact that is attributed to the Achaemenid period. Additionally, the divinities, or yazatas, are present-day Zoroastrian angels(Dhalla, 1938).

The Behistun Inscription, Iran.

Almost nothing is known of the status of Zoroastrianism under the Seleucids and Parthians who ruled over Persia following Alexander the Great’s invasion in 330 BCE. According to later Zoroastrian legend (Denkard, Book of Arda Viraf), many sacred texts were lost when Alexander’s troops invaded Persepolis and subsequently destroyed the royal library there. Diodorus Siculus’s Bibliotheca historica, which was completed c. 60 BCE, appears to substantiate this Zoroastrian legend (Diod. 17.72.2–17.72.6). According to one archaeological examination, the ruins of the palace of Xerxes bear traces of having been burned (Stolze, 1882). Whether a vast collection of (semi-)religious texts “written on parchment in gold ink”, as suggested by the Denkard, actually existed remains a matter of speculation, but is unlikely. Given that many of the Denkards statements-as-fact have since been refuted among scholars, the tale of the library is widely accepted to be fictional (Kellens, 2002)

Late antiquity

When the Sassanid dynasty came into power in 228 CE/AD, they aggressively promoted the Zurvanite form of Zoroastrianism and in some cases persecuted Christians. When the Sassanids captured territory, they often built fire temples there to promote their religion. After Constantine, the Sassanids were suspicious of Christians not least because of their perceived ties to the Christian Roman Empire. Thus, those Christians loyal to the Patriarchate of the Church of the East—which broke with Roman Christianity in the Nestorian schism—were tolerated and even sometimes favored by the Sassanids.

A form of Zoroastrianism was also prominent in the pre-Christian Caucasus region ( especially modern-day Azerbaijan ). During the periods of their suzerainty over the Caucasus, the Sassanids made attempts to promote the religion there as well.

Well before the 6th century, Zoroastrianism had spread to northern China via the Silk Road, gaining official status in a number of Chinese states. Remains of Zoroastrian temples have been found in Kaifeng and Zhenjiang, and according to some scholars, remained as late as the 1130s. But by the 13th century, the religion had faded from prominence in China. However, many scholars assert the influence of Zoroastrianism (as well as later Manicheism) on elements of Buddhism, especially in terms of light symbolism.

Middle Ages

In the 7th century, and over the course of at least 16 years (several decades in the case of some provinces), the Sassanid Empire was overthrown by the Arabs. Although the administration of the state was rapidly Islamicized and subsumed under the Umayyad Caliphate, “there was little serious pressure” exerted on newly subjected people to adopt Islam.Islamic jurists considered only Muslims to be perfectly moral, and “unbelievers might as well be left to their inequities, so long as these did not vex their overlords.”

There were also practical considerations: “because of their sheer numbers, the conquered Zoroastrians had to be treated as dhimmis (despite doubts [of the validity of this identification] that persisted down the centuries),” which made them eligible for protection. Thus, in the main, once the conquest was over “local terms were agreed on”, and the Arab governors protected the local populations in exchange for tribute. The Arabs adopted the Sassanid tax-system, both the land-tax levied on land owners and the poll-tax levied on individuals.This is called jizya, a tax levied on non-Muslims living in Muslim Caliphates (i.e., the dhimmis). In time, this poll-tax came to be used as a means to humble the non-Muslims, and a number of laws and restrictions evolved to emphasize their inferior status. But under the early orthodox caliphs, as long as the non-Muslims paid their taxes and adhered to the dhimmilaws, administrators were enjoined to leave non-Muslims “in their religion and their land.” (Caliph Abu Bakr, qtd. in Boyce 1979, p. 146).

Thus, though subject to a new leadership and harassed, once the horrors of conquest were over, the Zoroastrians were able to continue in their former ways. But there was however a slow but steady social and economic pressure to convert.The nobility and city-dwellers were the first to convert, with Islam more slowly being accepted among the peasantry and landed gentry. “Power and worldly-advantage” now lay with followers of Islam, and although the “official policy was one of aloof contempt, there were individual Muslims eager toproselytize and ready to use all sorts of means to do so.”

In time, a tradition evolved by which Islam was made to appear as a partly Iranian religion. One example of this was a legend that Husayn, son the fourth caliph Ali and grandson of Islam’s prophet Muhammad, had married a captive Sassanid princess named Shahrbanu. This “wholly fictitious figure” was said to have borne Hussain a son, the historical fourth Shi’aimam, who claimed that the caliphate rightly belonged to him and his descendants, and that the Umayyads had wrongfully wrested it from him. The alleged descent from the Sassanid house counterbalanced the Arab nationalism of the Umayyads, and the Iranian national association with a Zoroastrian past was disarmed. “So, it was no longer the Zoroastrians alone who stood for patriotism and loyalty to the past.” The “damning indictment” that becoming Muslim was equivalent to becoming Un-Iranian only remained an idiom in Zoroastrian texts.

With Iranian support (especially Persian support), the Abbasids overthrew the Ummayads in 750, and in the subsequent caliphate government – that nominally lasted until 1258 – Iranians received marked favor (if they were Muslim) in the new government, both in Iran and at the capital in Baghdad. This too mitigated the antagonism between Arabs and Iranians, but sharpened the distinction between Muslims and non-Muslims. The Abbasids zealously persecuted heretics, and although this was directed mainly at Muslim sectarians, it also created a harsher climate for non-Muslims. And although the Abbasids were deadly foes of Zoroastrianism, the brand of Islam they propagated throughout Iran became in turn ever more “Zoroastrianized”, making it easier for Iranians to embrace Islam.

The 9th century was the last in which Zoroastrians had the means to engage in creative work on a great scale, and the 9th century has come to define the great number of Zoroastrian texts that were composed or re-written during the 8th-10th centuries (excluding copying and lesser amendments, which continue for some time thereafter). All of these works are inMiddle Persian (free of Arabic words) dialect of that period, and written in the difficult Pahlavi script (hence the adoption of the term “Pahlavi” as the name of the variant of the language, and of the genre, of those Zoroastrian books). If read aloud, these books would still have been understandable to the laity. Many of these texts are responses to the tribulations of the time, and all of them include exhortations to stand fast in their religious beliefs. Some, such as the Denkard, are doctrinal defenses of the religion, while others are explanations of theological aspects (such as the Bundahishn’s) or practical aspects (e.g., explanation of rituals) of it. About sixty such works are known to have existed, of which some are known only from references to them in other works.

Two decrees in particular encouraged the transition to a preponderantly Islamic society.The first edict, adapted from a Arsacid and Sassanid one (but in those to the advantage of Zoroastrians), was that only a Muslim could own Muslim slaves or indentured servants. Thus, a bonded individual owned by a Zoroastrian could automatically become a freeman by converting to Islam. The other edict was that if one male member of a Zoroastrian family converted to Islam, he instantly inherited all its property.

Under Abbasid rule, Muslim Iranians (who by then were in the majority) increasingly found ways to taunt Zoroastrians, and distressing them became a popular sport. For example, in the 9th century, a deeply venerated cypress tree in Khorasan (which Parthian-era legend supposed had been planted by Zoroaster himself) was felled for the construction of a palace in Baghdad, 2000 miles away. In the 10th century, on the day that a Tower of Silence had been completed at much trouble and expense, a Muslim official contrived to get up onto it, and to call the adhan (the Muslim call to prayer) from its walls. This was made a pretext to annex the building. Another popular means to distress Zoroastrians was to maltreat dogs, these animals being sacred in Zoroastrianism. Such baiting, which was to continue down the centuries, was indulged in by all; not only by high officials, but by the general uneducated population as well.

Despite these economic and social incentives to convert, Zoroastrianism remained strong in some regions, particularly in those furthest away from the Caliphate capital at Baghdad. InBukhara (in present-day Uzbekistan), resistance to Islam required the 9th century Arab commander Qutaiba to convert his province four times. The first three times the citizens reverted to their old religion. Finally, the governor made their religion “difficult for them in every way”, turned the local fire temple into a mosque, and encouraged the local population to attend Friday prayers by paying each attendee two dirhams.The cities where Arab governors resided were particularly vulnerable to such pressures, and in these cases the Zoroastrians were left with no choice but to either conform or to migrate to regions that had a more amicable administration.

Among these migrations were those to cities in (or on the margins of) the great salt deserts, in particular to Yazd and Kerman, which remain centers of Iranian Zoroastrianism to this day. Yazd became the seat of the Iranian high priests during Mongol Il-Khanate rule, when the “best hope for survival [for a non-Muslim] was to be inconspicuous.” Crucial to the present-day survival of Zoroastrianism was a migration from the northeastern Iranian town of “Sanjan in south-western Khorasan”, to Gujarat, in western India. The descendants of that group are today known as the ‘Parsis’ – “as the Gujaratis, from long tradition, called anyone from Iran” – and who today represent the larger of the two groups of Zoroastrians.

Also in Khorasan in the northeastern Iran, a 10th century Iranian nobleman brought together four Zoroastrian priests to transcribe a Sassanid-era Middle Persian work titled Book of the Lord (Khwaday Namag) from Pahlavi script into Arabic script. This transcription, which remained in Middle Persian prose (an Arabic version, by al-Muqaffa, also exists), was completed in 957 and subsequently became the basis for Firdausi’s Book of Kings. It became enormously popular among both Zoroastrians and Muslims alike, and also served to propagate the Sassanid justification for overthrowing the Arsacids (i.e., that the Sassanids had restored the faith to its “orthodox” form after the Hellenistic Arsacids had allowed Zoroastrianism to become corrupt).

The struggle between Zoroastrianism and Islam declined in the 10th and 11th centuries as by then most of the country was Islamic. By then, local Iranian dynasties, “all vigorously Muslim,” had emerged as largely independent vassals of the Caliphs. In the 16th century, in one of the early letters between Iranian Zoroastrians and their co-religionists in India, the priests of Yazd lamented that “no period [in human history], not even that of Alexander, had been more grievous or troublesome for the faithful than ‘this millennium of the demon of Wrath’.

Relation to other religions and cultures

It is believed that key concepts of Zoroastrian eschatology and demonology have had influence on the Abrahamic religions. On the other hand, Zoroastrianism itself inherited ideas from other belief systems and, like other “practiced” religions, accommodates some degree of syncretism.

Many traits of Zoroastrianism can be traced back to the culture and beliefs of the prehistorical Indo-Iranian period, that is, to the time before the migrations that led to the Indians andIranians becoming distinct peoples. Zoroastrianism consequently shares elements with the historical Vedic religion that also has its origins in that era. An example is the relation of the Zoroastrian word Ahura (Ahura Mazda) and the Vedic word Asura (meaning demon). They are therefore thought to have descended from a common Proto-Indo-Iranian religion. However, Zoroastrianism was also strongly affected by the later culture of the Iranian Heroic Age (1500 BCE onwards), an influence that the Indic religions were not subject to. Moreover, the other culture groups that the respective peoples came to interact with were different, for instance in 6th-4th century BCE Western Iran with Fertile Crescent culture, with each side absorbing ideas from the other. Such inter-cultural influences notwithstanding, Zoroastrian “scripture” is essentially a product of (Indo)Iranian culture, and—representing the oldest and largest corpus pre-Islamic Iranian ideology—is considered a reflection of that culture. Then, together with the Vedas, which represent the oldest texts of the Indian branch of Indo-Iranian culture, it is possible to reconstruct some facets of prototypical Indo-Iranian beliefs. Since these two groups of sources also represent the oldest non-fragmentary evidence of Indo-European languages, the analysis of them also motivated attempts to characterize an even earlier Proto-Indo-European religion, and in turn influenced various unifying hypotheses like those of Carl Gustav Jung or James George Frazer. Although these unifying notions deeply influenced the modernists of the late 19th- and early 20th century, they have not fared well under the scrutiny of more recent interdisciplinary peer review. The study of pre-Islamic Iran has itself undergone a radical change in direction since the 1950s, and the field is today disinclined to speculation.

Zoroastrianism is often compared with the Manichaeism, which is nominally an Iranian religion but has its origins in the Middle-Eastern Gnosticism. Superficially, such a comparison may be apt as both are uncompromisingly dualistic and Manichaeism nominally adopted many of the Yazatas for its own pantheon. Gherardo Gnoli, in Eliade, Mircea (ed.), The Encyclopaedia of Religion, MacMillan Library Reference USA, New York, 1993, volume 9, page 165, has this to say: “…we can assert that Manichaeism has its roots in the Iranian religious tradition and that its relationship to Mazdaism, or Zoroastrianism, is more or less like that of Christianity to Judaism”. As religious types they are however poles apart: Manichaeism equated evil with matter and good with spirit, and was therefore particularly suitable as a doctrinal basis for every form of asceticism and many forms of mysticism. Zoroastrianism on the other hand rejects every form of asceticism, has no dualism of matter and spirit (only of good and evil), and sees the spiritual world as not very different from the natural one and the word “paradise” (via Latin and Greek from Avestan pairi.daeza, literally “stone-bounded enclosure”) applies equally to both. Manichaeism’s basic doctrine was that the world and all corporeal bodies were constructed from the substance of Satan, an idea that is fundamentally at odds with the Zoroastrian notion of a world that was created by God and that is all good, and any corruption of it is an effect of the bad. From what may be inferred from many Manichean texts and a few Zoroastrian sources, the adherents of the two religions (or at least their respective priesthoods) despised each other intensely.

Many aspects of Zoroastrianism are present in the culture and mythologies of the peoples of the Greater Iran, not least because Zoroastrianism, was a dominant influence on the people of the cultural continent for a thousand years. Even after the rise of Islam and the loss of direct influence, Zoroastrianism remained part of the cultural heritage of the Iranian language-speaking world, in part as festivals and customs, but also because Ferdowsi incorporated a number of the figures and stories from the Avesta in his epic Shāhnāme, which in turn is pivotal to Iranian identity.

Avestan

The Avesta is the religious book of Zoroastrians which contains a collection of sacred texts. The history of the Avesta is found in many Pahlavi texts. The twenty-one nasks were created by Ahura Mazda and brought by Zoroaster to Vishtaspa. Here, two copies were created, one which was put in the house of archives, the other put in the Imperial treasury. During Alexander’s conquest of Persia, the Avesta was burned and the scientific sections that the Greeks could use were dispersed among themselves. The Avesta had been attempted to be restored under the reign of King Valax of the Arsacis Dynasty. During the Sassanid Empire, Ardeshir ordered Tansar, his high priest to finish the work that King Valax had started.Shapur I sent priests to locate the scientific text portion of the Avesta that were in the possession of the Greeks. Under Shapur II, Arderbad Mahrespandand revised the canon to ensure its orthodox character while under Khosrow I, the Avesta was translated into Pahlavi.

The compilation of these ancient texts was successfully established underneath the Mazdean priesthood and the Sassanian emperors. Unfortunately, only a fraction of the texts survive today. The later manuscripts all date from this millennium, the latest being from 1288, 590 years after the fall of the Sassanian Empire. The texts that remain today are the Gathas,Yasna, Visperad and the Vendidad. Along with these texts is the communal household prayer book called the Khordeh Avesta, which contains the Yashts and the Siroza. The rest of the material from the Avesta are called “Avestan fragments”.

Middle Persian/Pahlavi

Middle Persian and Pahlavi works created in the 9th and 10th century contain many religious Zoroastrian books as most of the writers and copyists were part of the Zoroastrian clergy. The most significant and important books of this era include : Denkard, Bundahishn, Menog-i Khrad, Selections of Zadspram, Jamasp Namag, Epistles of Manucher, Rivayats, Dadestan-i-Denig and Arda Viraf Namag. All Middle Persian texts written on Zoroastrianism during this time period are considered secondary works on the religion, and not scripture. Nonetheless, these texts have a strong influence on the religion.

The Prophet Zoroaster

Zoroastrianism was founded by the Prophet Zoroaster (or Zarathustra) in ancient Iran. However, it is debated to exactly when he lived as there are estimates running from 1700 BCE to 500 BCE existing. The precise date of the founding of Zoroastrianism is uncertain. An approximate date of 1500-1200 BCE has been established through archaeological evidence and linguistic comparisons with the Hindu text, the Rig Veda. However there is no way of knowing exactly when Zoroaster lived as he lived in what to his people were prehistoric times.

Zoroaster was born in either Northeast Iran or Southwest Afghanistan. He was born into a Bronze Age culture with a polytheistic religion, which included animal sacrifice and the ritual use of intoxicants. This religion was quite similar to the early forms of Hinduism in India. The name Zoroaster is a Greek rendering of the name Zarathustra. He is known as Zarathusti inPersian and Zaratosht in Gujarati. Zoroaster’s birth and early life are little documented. What is known is recorded in the Gathas – the core of the Avesta, which contains hymns thought to be composed by Zoroaster himself. Born into the Spitama clan, he worked as a priest. He had a wife, three sons and three daughters. Zoroaster rejected the religion of the Bronze Age Iranians with their many gods and oppressive class structure, in which the Karvis and Karapans (princes and priests) controlled the ordinary people. He also opposed animal sacrifices and the use of the hallucinogenic Haoma plant (possibly a species of ephedra) in rituals.

The vision of Zoroaster

When Zoroaster was thirty years old, he went into the Daiti river to draw water for a Haoma ceremony, when he emerged, he received a vision of Voluh Manah. After this Voluh Manah took him to the other six Amesha Spentas where he received the completion of his vision. This vision radically transformed his view of the world, and he tried to teach this view to others. Zoroaster believed in one creator God, teaching that only one God was worthy of worship. Furthermore, some of the deities of the old religion, the Daevas (Devas in Sanskrit), appeared to delight in war and strife. Zoroaster said that these were evil spirits and were workers of Angra Mainyu, God’s adversary.

Zoroaster’s ideas did not take off quickly and at first he only had one convert: his cousin Maidhyoimanha. The local religious authorities opposed his ideas. They felt their own faiths, power, and particularly their rituals, threatened, because Zoroaster taught against over-ritualising religious ceremonies. Many ordinary people did not like Zoroaster’s downgrading of the Daevas to evil spirits. After twelve years, Zoroaster left his home to find somewhere more open to new ideas. He found such a place in the country of King Vishtaspa (in Bactria). The King and his queen, Hutosa, heard Zoroaster debating with the religious leaders of his land, and decided to accept Zoroaster’s ideas and made them the official religion of their kingdom. Zoroaster died in his late 70s. Very little is known of the time between Zoroaster and the Achaemenian period except that during this period Zoroastrianism spread to Western Iran. By the time of the founding of the Achaemenid Empire, Zoroastrianism was already a well-established religion.

Principal beliefs

Ahura Mazda is the beginning and the end, the creator of everything that can and cannot be seen, the Eternal, the Pure and the only Truth. In the Gathas, the most sacred texts of Zoroastrianism thought to have been composed by Zoroaster himself, the prophet acknowledged devotion to no other divinity besides Ahura Mazda.

Daena (din in modern Persian) is the eternal Law, whose order was revealed to humanity through the Mathra-Spenta (“Holy Words”). Daenahas been used to mean religion, faith, law, even as a translation for the Hindu and Buddhist term Dharma, often interpreted as “duty” but can also mean social order, right conduct, or virtue. The metaphor of the “path” of Daena is represented in Zoroastrianism by the muslin undershirtSudra, the ‘Good/Holy Path’, and the 72-thread Kushti girdle, the “Pathfinder”.

Daena should not be confused with the fundamental principle asha (Vedic rta), the equitable law of the universe, which governed the life of the ancient Indo-Iranians. For these, asha was the course of everything observable, the motion of the planets and astral bodies, the progression of the seasons, the pattern of daily nomadic herdsman life, governed by regular metronomic events such as sunrise and sunset. All physical creation (geti) was thus determined to run according to a master plan—inherent to Ahura Mazda—and violations of the order (druj) were violations against creation, and thus violations against Ahura Mazda. This concept of asha versus the druj should not be confused with the good-versus-evil battle evident in western religions, for although both forms of opposition express moral conflict, the asha versus druj concept is more systemic and less personal, representing, for instance, chaos (that opposes order); or “uncreation”, evident as natural decay (that opposes creation); or more simply “the lie” (that opposes truth, righteousness). Moreover, in his role as the one uncreated creator of all, Ahura Mazda is not the creator of druj, which is “nothing”, anti-creation, and thus (likewise) uncreated. Thus, in Zoroaster’s revelation, Ahura Mazda was perceived to be the creator of only the good (Yasna 31.4), the “supreme benevolent providence” (Yasna 43.11), that will ultimately triumph (Yasna 48.1).

In this schema of asha versus druj, mortal beings (humans and animals both) play a critical role, for they too are created. Here, in their lives, they are active participants in the conflict and it is their duty to defend order, which would decay without counteraction. Throughout the Gathas, Zoroaster emphasizes deeds and actions, and accordingly asceticism is frowned upon in Zoroastrianism. In later Zoroastrianism this was explained as fleeing from the experiences of life, which was the very purpose that the urvan (most commonly translated as the “soul”) was sent into the mortal world to collect. The avoidance of any aspect of life, which includes the avoidance of the pleasures of life, is a shirking of the responsibility and duty to oneself, one’s urvan, and one’s family and social obligations.

Thus, central to Zoroastrianism is the emphasis on moral choice, to choose between the responsibility and duty for which one is in the mortal world, or to give up this duty and so facilitate the work of druj. Similarly, predestination is rejected in Zoroastrian teaching. Humans bear responsibility for all situations they are in, and in the way they act to one another. Reward, punishment, happiness and grief all depend on how individuals live their life.

In Zoroastrianism, good transpires for those who do righteous deeds. Those who do evil have themselves to blame for their ruin. Zoroastrian morality is then to be summed up in the simple phrase, “good thoughts, good words, good deeds” (Humata, Hukhta, Hvarshta in Avestan), for it is through these that asha is maintained and druj is kept in check.

Through accumulation several other beliefs were introduced to the religion that in some instances supersede those expressed in the Gathas. In the late 19th century, the moral and immoral forces came to be represented by Spenta Mainyu and its Satanic antithesis Angra Mainyu, the “good spirit” and “evil spirit” emanations of Ahura Mazda, respectively. Although the names are old, this opposition is a modern Western-influenced development popularized by Martin Haug in the 1880s, and was in effect a realignment of the precepts of Zurvanism(Zurvanite Zoroastrianism), which had invented a third deity, Zurvan, to explain a mention of twinship (Yasna 30.3) between the moral and immoral. Although Zurvanism had died out by the 10th century the critical question of the “twin brothers” mentioned in Yasna 30.3 remained, and Haug’s explanation provided a convenient defence against Christian missionaries who disparaged the Parsis for their “dualism”. Haug’s concept was subsequently disseminated as a Parsi interpretation, thus corroborating Haug’s theory and the idea became so popular that it is now almost universally accepted as doctrine.^{[citation needed]}

Achaemenid era (648–330 BCE) Zoroastrianism developed the abstract concepts of heaven, hell, personal and final judgment, all of which are only alluded to in the Gathas. Yasna 19 (which has only survived in a Sassanid era (226–650 CE) Zend commentary on the Ahuna Vairya invocation), prescribes a Path to Judgment known as the Chinvat Peretum or Chinvat bridge (cf: As-Sirāt in Islam), which all souls had to cross, and judgment (over thoughts, words, deeds performed during a lifetime) was passed as they were doing so. However, the Zoroastrian personal judgment is not final. At the end of time, when evil is finally defeated, all souls will be ultimately reunited with their Fravashi. Thus, Zoroastrianism can be said to be auniversalist religion with respect to salvation.

In addition, and strongly influenced by Babylonian and Akkadian practices, the Achaemenids popularized shrines and temples, hitherto alien forms of worship. In the wake of Achaemenid expansion, shrines were constructed throughout the empire and particularly influenced the role of Mithra, Aredvi Sura Anahita, Verethregna and Tishtrya, all of which, in addition to their original (proto-)Indo-Iranian functions, now also received Perso-Babylonian functions.