Iranian religion

Introduction

      diverse beliefs and practices of the culturally and linguistically related group of ancient peoples who inhabited the Iranian Plateau and its borderlands, as well as areas of Central Asia from the Black Sea to Khotan (modern Ho-tʾien, China). The northern Iranians (referred to generally as Scythians [Saka] in classical sources), who occupied the steppes, differed significantly from the southern Iranians. In religion and culture both the northern and southern Iranians had much in common with the ancient Indo-Aryans, although there was much borrowing from Mesopotamia as well, especially in western Iran. From at least the time of the rise of the Median empire, Iranian religion and culture has had a profound influence upon the Middle East, as also the Middle East upon Iran.

      This account will take the conquest of the Achaemenian Empire by Alexander the Great as a somewhat arbitrary date for the close of the period of ancient Iranian religion, even though these influences have continued through later history and some forms of Iranian religion have persisted to the present day. It will also treat ancient Iranian religion, insofar as possible, apart from Zoroastrianism. Unless otherwise indicated, all spellings of Iranian names and terms are given in reconstructed forms that often differ from the Avestan spellings of the Zoroastrian canon.

      For a full account of that religion, see Zoroastrianism. For historical background, see Iran, history of (Iran, ancient).

Sources of knowledge

 Modern understanding of ancient Iranian religion is impeded by the limitations of the available sources, which are inevitably of two sorts: textual and material.

      Textual sources are both indigenous and foreign, the latter being primarily Greek, although for purposes of historical reconstruction the ancient Indian Vedic literature is indispensable. The main problem with the Greek sources, the most important of which is Herodotus, is that the information they contain is not always very reliable, either because it is outright erroneous or because it is based on misunderstandings. The main indigenous sources are the Achaemenian royal inscriptions in the Old Persian language (with Akkadian, Elamite, and Aramaic translations) and the Avesta, the sacred scriptures of Zoroastrianism, in a language called Avestan. The royal inscriptions, especially those of Darius (Darius I) (522–486 BC) and his son Xerxes (Xerxes I) (486–465 BC), for the most part eloquent pieces of propaganda, are rich in references to religion. In addition to the information they contain, they have the great advantage of being fixed in time and place. Matters are quite otherwise in the case of the Avesta, which is the principal source of knowledge of ancient Iranian religions.

      Like the Bible, the Avesta is a collection of a variety of texts composed over what appears to be a considerable span of time by different authors, which has endured editing and redaction at several points during the history of its development. The text that is now extant represents only a fragment of what remained in the 9th century of the late Sāsānian Avesta compiled under the direction of Khosrow I (AD 531–579). Summaries of the contents of the Sāsānian Avesta show that it was an enormous collection containing texts in Avestan (Avestan language) as well as in—and predominantly so—Pahlavi (Pahlavi language), the language of Sāsānian Zoroastrianism. In spite of the relatively recent date of the existing Avesta, it contains matter of great antiquity, of which the Gāthās (or “Songs” of Zoroaster) and much of the Yashts are among the oldest. The Gāthās contain expressions of Zoroaster's religious vision which, in many ways, is a complicated reinterpretation of inherited Iranian religious ideas. The Yashts are collections of verses dedicated to the various deities. Most of the Yashts, though touched up with Zoroastrian terminology and ideas, have little to do with anything specifically Zoroastrian. The gods invoked are essentially the gods of pre-Zoroastrian Iran. Unfortunately, there is little agreement as to when Zoroaster lived, though most scholars agree that he lived some time between about 1200 and 600 BC. It does not seem possible to date the Yashts much more precisely, except to believe that their redaction (not necessarily composition) may have first taken place in the 5th century BC.

      As mentioned above, the earliest religious texts of the closely related Indo-Aryans (principally the Rigveda) are indispensable for making historical reconstructions of the development of Iranian religion. The Rigveda, a collection of more than 1,000 hymns to various deities, can be dated to a period from approximately 1300 to 900 BC. Apart from the Achaemenian inscriptions, there is no secure evidence that religious compositions were reduced to writing until the late Arsacid or early Sāsānian periods. Thus, unlike the other religions of the Middle East, the Iranian religions had no written texts in the ancient period. All religious “literature” was oral, in both composition and transmission.

      Material sources are much more limited and are, for the most part, restricted to western Iran. The remains of Achaemenian architecture and art, by far the most important of the material sources, provide abundant evidence of imperial articulation of religious symbols and show a thorough dependence on Middle Eastern precedents.

Origin and historical development

      During the second half of the 2nd millennium two groups of culturally and linguistically related peoples who called themselves “Arya” (Aryan) migrated from the steppes down into the Middle East, the Iranian Plateau, and the northwestern part of the Indian subcontinent. One group, the Indo-Aryans, settled in Anatolia and in India. The other, the Iranians, settled in greater Iran. These people were originally seminomadic pastoralists whose chief economic base was cattle, primarily bovines but also sheep and goats. They bred horses which they used for riding and pulling chariots in warfare and sport. It is not at all clear how rigidly their society was originally segmented. There were specialists in religious matters, and men who could afford horses and chariots were reckoned as warriors and leaders. By the Achaemenian period there developed a more rigid division of society into four basic classes: priests, nobles, farmers/herdsmen, and artisans. Society generally was patriarchal, and male dominance was strongly reflected in the religion. Like the ancient Israelites, as the Iranians occupied the land they became increasingly dependent upon agriculture and settled in villages and towns. During this process they were certainly influenced by the indigenous populations, of whose religion almost nothing is known, except by inference from elements of Iranian religion that have no reflex in the Veda or among other Indo-Europeans.

      Owing to their common origin, Iranian and Indo-Aryan religions are very similar. From a comparative study of both groups, it is possible to reconstruct, in general features, the early forms of Iranian religion for which there is no direct documentation. The pantheon, similar to those of other Indo-European peoples, embraced a large number of deities, both female and, predominantly, male. Some of these were personifications of natural phenomena, others of social norms or institutions. There appear to have been two major groups of deities, the daiva (deva)s and the ahura (asura)s. Daiva (literally “heavenly one”; Vedic deva, Latin deus) is derived from the common Indo-European word for “god,” and this is the meaning it has in the Vedas. Among many Iranians and in Zoroastrianism the daivas were regarded as demons, but this belief was not pan-Iranian. The ahuras (“lords”; Vedic asura) were certain lofty sovereign deities, in contradistinction to the other deities called bagha (Vedic bhaga, “the one who distributes”) and yazata (“the one to be worshiped”). At the head of the pantheon stood Ahura Mazdā, who was particularly connected with the principle of cosmic and social order and truth called arta in Vedic (Avestan asha). Closely associated with him was another ahura named Mithra (Vedic Mitra), the god who presided over covenants. In Iran there were two gods with martial traits quite similar to those of Vedic Indra, Mitra, and Vrthraghna. Among female deities the Earth, Spantā Aramati, and the sacred river, Ardvī Sūrā, were most prominent. A sacrificial ritual yazna (Avestan yasna, Vedic yajña) was performed in which fire and the sacred drink hauma (Avestan haoma, Vedic soma) played an important part. The principal officiant at the sacrifice was the zautar (Vedic hotar).

      As with other ancient religions, the cosmological dichotomy of chaos and cosmos figured in both myth and worldview. The most prominent and unique feature of ancient Iranian religion was the development of dualism, primarily expressed in the opposition of Truth (arta) and Falsehood (drug, drauga). Originally confined to ideas of social and natural order opposed by disorder and chaos, a dualistic ideology came to permeate all aspects of life. The pantheon was divided between the gods and demons. Especially under the influence of the Magi (magus), members of a priestly tribe of Median origin, the animal kingdom was divided up between beneficent animals and noxious creatures. Even in vocabulary there developed a system of “ahuric” and “daivic” words for such things as body parts: for example, the word zasta was used for the hand of a righteous person, and gava for the hand of an evil person. It is important to note that this was not a Gnostic system, like those that flourished in the Middle East during the early centuries of the Common era, as there was no myth of evil matter coming into being through the corruption and fall of a spiritual being.

      Except for a mostly legendary line of eastern Iranian kings, the kavis, the last of whom was Zoroaster's patron Vishtāspa (Greek Hystapes), the only historical information on the relation of religion to political authority comes from the Achaemenian period in western Iran. The ideology of kingship was closely tied to the supreme deity, Ahura Mazdā, through whose will the kings ruled. The Achaemenian kings had to contend with the power of the Median priesthood, the Magi. Their origin is unclear, but according to classical sources they presided at all religious ceremonies where they chanted “theogonies.” That they were deeply involved in politics is seen from the attempt of the magus Gaumāta to seize the throne upon the death of Cambyses II. Although Darius persecuted the Magi, they remained powerful and eventually became the official priesthood of the empire. They were probably responsible for articulating a thoroughly dualist ideology and contributing to Zoroastrianism its zealous preoccupation with ritual purity. In addition, they were famous throughout the ancient world as wonder-workers.

Mythology (myth) and cosmology

      Since all the sources for Iranian myths, whether classical authors or indigenous texts, are post-Zoroastrian, it is often difficult to discern what elements of the myths are Zoroastrian innovations and what elements are inherited. It is particularly hard to resolve this problem owing to the nature of Zoroastrianism itself as a religion that has always drawn heavily on already existing ideas and that has accommodated itself to various forms of Iranian religions. As is the case with ancient religions generally, Iranian religions did not possess one unified collection of myth. What one finds are fragments of a wide variety of myths exhibiting many variations on common themes.

Creation of the cosmos

      Both the Avesta and the Achaemenian inscriptions have little to say about creation in the sense that they contain nothing comparable to the Babylonian Enuma elish or to the traditions of Genesis 1–3. What is primarily emphasized is the power and majesty of Ahura Mazdā as creator of heaven and earth. However, beside Ahura Mazdā is an ancient Indo-Iranian god called Thvarshtar (Vedic Tvaṣṭar; “Artisan”), who also appears in Zoroaster's system of the Beneficent Immortals under the name Spanta Manyu (Spenta Mainyu) (“the Beneficent Spirit”). Thvarshtar functions in many ways as Ahura Mazdā's creative aspect. While in the Gāthās and the Younger Avesta, Spanta Manyu is paired with his evil antagonist Ahra Manyu (“the Evil Spirit”; Ahriman in Middle Persian), in other, later sources, it is Ohrmazd (Middle Persian for Ahura Mazdā) himself who is paired with Ahriman. Although there are cryptic allusions in the Avesta to creations of the two antagonistic spirits, the first discursive exposition of the creation of the world by the two spirits occurs in Plutarch (De Iside et Osiride 47), where he says that the Persians “tell many mythical tales about the gods, such as the following. Oromazes (i.e., Ahura Mazdā) born from the purest light, and Areimanios (i.e., Ahriman) born from gloom, strive in war with one another.” The dualistic idea of two primordial spirits, called twins by Zoroaster, goes back to an Indo-European prototype. As far as this myth can be reconstructed, it seems that there were primordial twins before the creation of the world. They came into conflict. One, whose name was “Man” (Iranian *Manuʾ (Manu), “man”), killed the other, “Twin” (Iranian Yama; Avestan Yima), and from the dismembered body he fashioned the world, using the skull for the sky, the flesh for the earth, the bones for mountains, and so forth. In another Iranian variant of this myth Yama appears as the first mortal and the first ruler. The period of his rule, described as a golden age when there was neither death nor old age, neither hot nor cold, and so on, comes to an end when falsehood enters Yama's speech. The royal Glory (Khvarnah) flees from Yama and takes refuge in the cosmic sea. Yama is then overthrown by a serpentine tyrant named Azhi Dahāka (“Dahāka the Snake”), whose rule ushers in a period of drought, ruin, and chaos. In turn, Azhi Dahāka is defeated by the hero Thraitauna, who establishes the legendary line of kings called kavis.

      Zoroaster seems to have been the first religious thinker to conceive an eschatological (eschatology) myth concerning a future saviour who will rescue the world from evil, an idea that has been greatly elaborated in Zoroastrianism. It may have been influential in the development of the concept of the Messiah in postexilic Judaism. Iranian religion also had a variant of the Noah's (Noah) Ark myth. In this myth, Yama appears as the first herdsman and leader of humankind. After a long rule during which he has to enlarge the earth three times owing to overcrowding, Ahura Mazdā tells him that a great winter is coming and advises him to prepare for it by building a gigantic three-story barnlike structure (vara) to hold pairs of animals and seeds of plants. From the fragmentary version of the myth that has survived, it appears that the vara is actually a sort of paradise or island of the blessed, though this story originated as a pastoralist myth about the building of the first winter cattle station by the culture hero.

Cosmography

      The Iranians conceived of the cosmos as a three-tiered structure consisting of the earth below, the atmosphere, and the stone vault of heaven above. Beyond the vault of heaven was the realm of the Endless Lights, and below the earth was the realm of darkness and chaos. The earth itself rested on the cosmic sea called Varu-Karta. In the centre of the earth was the cosmic mountain Harā, down which flowed the river Ardvī. The earth was divided into six continents surrounding the central continent, Khvaniratha, the locus of Aryāna Vaijah, the Aryan land (i.e., Iran).

Cultic practices, worship, and festivals

      In sharp contrast to the peoples of the Middle East, the Iranians did not make images of their deities, nor did they build temples to house them, preferring to worship in the open. Worship of the gods was performed primarily in the context of a central ritual called yazna, which corresponds in a great many details to the Vedic yajña. It is interesting to note that both rituals, though they have undergone some changes over the millennia, are still performed by Zoroastrians and Hindus in what must be the oldest continuously enacted ritual known. The plan of the yazna, as far as it can be reconstructed, was essentially that of a highly stylized festive meal offered to an honoured guest, the sacrificer being the host and the deity the guest. Although it is not known precisely when or how frequently the yazna was held (in Zoroastrianism it became a daily ritual), the reason for holding a yazna was to enter into communion with a divine being either for a specific purpose (to obtain offspring or a victory, and so on) or for general welfare, or as an expression of piety. As a ritual meal, the yazna followed the established rules of hospitality: the guest was sent an invitation; on his arrival from afar he was greeted, shown to a comfortable seat, given meat and a refreshing and invigorating drink, and entertained with song extolling his great deeds and virtues. Finally, the guest was expected to return the hospitality in the form of a gift.

      Of utmost importance was fire. In ancient Iran, fire was at once a highly sacred element and a deity. Thus, the word ātar denoted simultaneously “fire” and “Fire,” every instance of fire being a manifestation of the deity. Since burned offerings were not made, the role of Ātar, like that of his Vedic counterpart Agni, was principally that of intermediary between heaven and earth, between humans and gods. Beyond the sphere of the yazna, fire was always treated with utmost care as a sacred element. Whether in the household hearth or, at a later period, in fire temples, the sacred fire had to be maintained with proper fuel, kept free from polluting agents, and above all never permitted to go out or be extinguished.

      More important than the meat offering of an animal victim was the preparation of the divine drink hauma (haoma) (Vedic soma). As with fire, hauma was regarded as both a sacred drink and as a powerful deity. Probably the greatest part of the yazna was devoted to the pressing of the hauma. Although there have been a number of proposals for the identification of the plant whose juices were extracted for the ritual drink, all have fallen short of absolute proof, and some, such as the toxic mushroom Amanita muscaria, are not worth consideration. In any case, an understanding of the religious meaning of hauma does not depend on a botanic identification. The word hauma itself derives from a verb “to press, extract” and thus literally means the thing that has been pressed out of the stems or stalks (ãsu) of whatever plant was being used—i.e., juice. In this process the stalks were first soaked in water, then pounded. In Zoroastrianism this has been done with a metal mortar and pestle, but originally the stalks were pounded between two pressing stones, a lower and an upper. The juice, described as yellow, was filtered and mixed with milk, to cut the bitter taste, and perhaps with water too. Since the resulting drink was consumed immediately, it is clear that it was not alcoholic but rather was a mind-altering drug. The Yasht to Hauma says, “All other intoxicants are accompanied by Wrath with the horrible club, but that intoxication which is Hauma's is accompanied by gladdening Truth (arta).” This brief statement can be amplified by the far more extensive descriptions of the Rigveda, where soma is not only offered to the gods but also taken by poets to enhance their insight and creative powers in their search for truth. Also, hauma, invoked for victory, was taken as a stimulant by warriors going into battle, and various heroes of Iranian myth and legend are remembered as primary practitioners of its cult.

      As mentioned above, a comfortable seat was provided for the god or gods invited to yazna. Originally this consisted of special grasses strewn on the ground in front of the altar. In Vedic terminology this seat was called the barhiṣ (Avestan barzish, “cushion”), while in Zoroastrianism a cognate word, Avestan barəsman (Iranian barzman), is used for a bundle of sticks—later thin metal rods—that is manipulated by the priest.

      It is likely that from a very early period a priest, the zautar (Vedic hotar), was required to properly carry out the yasna. The zautar might be assisted by a number of other ritual specialists. With the priest or priests acting on behalf of the sacrificer, the god or gods were invoked through the intermediary of Fire. The sacred drink was prepared and the victim led up. When the god arrived he was seated on the barzman and given food (parts of the slaughtered victim) and drink, after which he was entertained with song. Finally, the host-sacrificer put in a request for a return gift: heroic sons, long life, health, or victory, for example. In a certain sense, then, the entire ritual followed the old Latin dictum do ut des (“I give so that you may give”), in providing a means of inducing the powerful deities to act with favour toward human beings. Yet it also made possible communion between the divine and human realms. Deities could also be addressed directly in prayer with the supplicant standing erect with upraised arms; prostration was unknown.

      Of further importance is the song of praise directed to the divine guest. Much of the poetic portions of the Avesta and almost all of the Rigveda must be understood in this ritual context. That is to say, ancient Indo-Iranian poetry was religious in nature and specifically composed for those ritual occasions when the gods required songs of praise to make them well disposed to their worshipers. The obscurity of Zoroaster's Gāthās and of many Vedic hymns can best be understood when it is realized that the intended audience was not humans but rather the gods.

      During the year there were various festivals, mostly relating to the agricultural and herding cycles. By far the most important was that of the New Year, which is still celebrated by Iranians with great festivity.

Human nature

      In the Zoroastrian formulation of the myth of creation, humans are created for the noble purpose of aiding in the repulsion of the Evil Spirit. Whether or not this concept is pre-Zoroastrian, it shows that in Iranian religion human nature was held to be essentially good, in the sense that there was no myth about the baseness of the human condition such as that found in Babylonian mythology (for example, in the Enuma elish). Humans have free will and determine their own destinies as a result of their ethical choices.

      In addition to the body (tanū), it was held that an individual consisted of a number of spiritual elements that loosely fall under the category of souls. These are (1) the animating force (ahu), (2) the breath of life (vyāna), (3) mind/spirit (manah), (4) the soul (ruvan; Avestan urvan), (5) the protective spirit (fravarti; Avestan fravashi), and (6) the spiritual double (dainā; Avestan daēnā). In Zoroastrianism, where belief in the day of judgment is central, it is the ruvan that is held accountable for a person's actions during life and that suffers reward or punishment in the life to come. At the time of judgment the ruvan encounters the dainā, which is an embodiment of the sum of its deeds during life, manifested as either a beautiful maiden or an ugly hag. Depending on how these deeds are weighed, the soul either crosses safely the Chinvat Bridge to the other world or falls into the abyss. The fravarti (fravashi) is a deity who acts as a protective spirit of each individual and is also an ancestor spirit; together all the fravartis form a warrior band, similar in some ways to the Vedic Maruts.

Major deities

Ahura Mazdā

      Ahura Mazdā (“Wise Lord”) was probably the chief god of the pre-Zoroastrian pantheon. In both the religion of Zoroaster and that of Darius (Darius I) and Xerxes, he was worshiped as the supreme god, almost to the exclusion of all others. First of all he is the creator of the universe and the one who establishes and maintains the cosmic and social order, arta. Darius proclaims him as “the great god . . . who created this earth, who created yonder heaven, who created man, who created happiness for man, who made Darius king.” Throughout his inscriptions, Darius speaks not only of the source of the authority of the kingship as deriving from Ahura Mazdā, but also makes it clear that his own establishment of political stability over the chaos of rebellion and his maintenance of order through law imitates the divine model set by the Creator. Using the ancient Indo-European poetic device of interrogative discourse, Zoroaster asks, “Who is the original father of arta? Who established the paths of the sun and the stars? Who is it through whom the moon now waxes now wanes? Who supports the earth below and (keeps) the heavens (above) from falling down? Who yokes the two steeds to the wind and the clouds? . . . Who fashioned honoured Devotion together with Dominion? Who made . . . a son respectful of his father?”

      In neither the Avesta nor the Achaemenian inscriptions is Ahura Mazdā identified with a natural phenomenon. Since, however, in the hymn to the goddess Rti (Reward), Ahura Mazdā is identified as her father and Spanta Aramati (Earth) as her mother, it is implied that he has taken over, to some extent, the role of the Indo-European Father Heaven (*Diēus Pater, Vedic Dyāus Pitar), who is mythologically paired with Mother Earth. Furthermore, the Greek historian Herodotus seems to have made this identification when he wrote, “Zeus, in their (the Persians') system, is the whole circle of the heavens.” Other Greek sources commonly equate Zeus with Oromazes (Ahura Mazdā), because of Ahura Mazdā's position as father and chief god of the pantheon. As his name implies, he seems to have been sought by his worshipers for wisdom and insight, and, to judge by the intense experiences of Darius (whether or not his professions are genuine) and of Zoroaster, he was probably the object of a personal devotion that appears to have been lacking with other deities.

Mithra

      Beside Ahura Mazdā, Mithra is the most important deity of the ancient Iranian pantheon and may have even occupied a position of near equality with him. In the Achaemenian inscriptions Mithra, together with Anāhitā, is the only other deity specifically mentioned. Although the ancient pantheon contained an individual sun god, Hvar Khshaita, in the eastern Iranian traditions reflected in the Avesta, Mithra has a hint of connection with the sun, more specifically with the first rays of dawn as he drives forth in his chariot. In western Iran the identification was complete, and the name Mithra became a common word for “sun.” In spite of his connection with the sun, Mithra functioned preeminently in the ethical sphere. The word mithra was a common noun that meant “covenant, contract, treaty” and, as such, Mithra was the god Covenant, the celestial deity who oversaw all solemn agreements that people made among themselves and who severely punished anyone who broke the terms of a covenant, whether it was between individuals or between countries or other sociopolitical entities. In his capacity to find out the covenant breaker, he is described as sleepless, ever-waking, having 1,000 ears, 10,000 eyes, and a wide outlook. He is portrayed as a great warrior brandishing his mace while driving in his chariot to battle, where he intervenes on behalf of those faithful to treaties by throwing the treaty-breakers (mithra-drug) into panic and defeat. As a sovereign deity, Mithra bore the standing epithet varu-gavyūti, meaning “one who (presides over) wide pasture lands”—i.e., one who keeps under his protection (another of his epithets was pāyu, “protector”) the territories of those who worship him and abide by their covenants. It should be mentioned that Mithra gave his name to a mystery religion, Mithraism, which was popular throughout the Roman Empire, but whose Iranian origins are difficult to trace.

Anāhiti

      One of the longest Avestan Yashts is to the powerful goddess whose full name is given as Ardvī Sūrā Anāhitā, literally “the damp, strong, untainted.” In fact, the long name seems to combine two originally separate names and, hence, two deities. First, Ardvī Sūrā is the Iranian name of the heavenly river goddess who in the Rigveda is called Sarasvatī (Sarasvati). In this role, she brings fresh water to the earth, filling streams, rivers, and seas as she flows from Mount Hukarya to the Varu-Karta sea. Second, Anāhiti is a separate goddess of uncertain origin whose cult seems to have been popular originally in northeastern Iran. The name probably meant “untaintedness, purity (both moral and physical).” It is interesting that the Greek Anaitis ('Αναιτι[sigmav]) preserves the Old Iranian form of the name, while Anāhit(a), of the Avestan and Old Persian, shows a more recent linguistic form. Unlike any other Iranian deity, she is described in great detail in the Yashts, especially in respect to her clothing and ornamentation, to such an extent that one assumes a dressed cult image must be the source of the description. This is confirmed by the fact that Artaxerxes II mentions her. Then, too, the Babylonian historian Berosus reports that this king had many images of her made and distributed. Since the Iranians did not traditionally make images, it may be assumed that Anāhiti's cult borrowed heavily from Mesopotamian models. The Mesopotamian goddess Ishtar probably provided the clearest model, though the details of Anāhiti's dress, her beaver coat, for example—show significant differences. There were other striking similarities: Ishtar was the goddess of war and patroness of the palace, while the greater part of Anāhiti's Yasht is devoted to her martial traits and her patronage of Iranian heroes and legendary rulers (in post-Achaemenian Iran Anāhiti was intimately connected with kingship and the shah). In addition, both goddesses were important for fertility.

Vrthraghna

      The mighty deity of war Vrthraghna had martial traits in common with Mithra and with the Vedic war god Indra. In post-Achaemenian times he was syncretistically equated with Hercules and was a favourite deity of monarchs, some of whom took his name. The name Vrthraghna means “the smashing of resistance or obstruction,” and in his capacity as the god who guaranteed his people the ability to overcome all enemy resistance, his name came to be understood in the general sense of “Victory.” In connection with rulership and the granting of victory, he bore the epithet bara-khvarnah, “bearing the Glory.” Like Mithra in his martial aspects, Vrthraghna represented an ideal type of warrior. For the earliest immigrants onto the Iranian Plateau he personified the aspirations of the Aryans seeking to win new territory from an entrenched indigenous population, while for later populations he became the divine manifestation of the will to world conquest.

      Among all the deities Vrthraghna preeminently possesses the power to undergo various transformations, both anthropomorphic and theriomorphic. Rich mythologies may have existed concerning these avatars, but only 10 forms have been recorded: the Wind (the god Vāyu), bull, stallion, rutting camel, wild boar, a 15-year-old man (15 was considered to be the ideal age), falcon, ram, goat, and hero. All have in common aggressive force and virility, while in some violence is conspicuous. Particularly graphic is the description of him as the “ferocious wild boar with sharp teeth and tusks, a boar that kills at one blow . . . who, overtaking his opponent . . . strikes (him) down with a toss of his head . . . until he smashes the vertebrae, the pillars of life, . . . (and) mixes on the ground the bones, hair, brains, and blood.”

Rashnu

      Like Mithra, with whom he was often associated, Rashnu was an ethical deity, the divine judge who ultimately presided over legal disputes among men. His name, derived from the same Indo-European verb, *reg (“to be, make straight, direct, judge”), as are the German words for “judge,” Richter, and “law,” Recht. In particular, he appears to have been the god of oaths and ordeals administered during trials. In many ways he carried out the judicial functions of the Vedic god Varuṇa, who among other things, was the ultimate judge presiding over oaths, and who was frequently inseparable from the Vedic Mitra. While it remains unclear whether or not Ahura Mazdā exercised any judicial function, together Rashnu and Mithra seem to have acted in complementary areas of law: Mithra was concerned specifically with covenants of all sorts, while Rashnu had more general jurisdiction over legal matters, especially those of a criminal nature, in that he is invoked as the one who “best smite(s), who best destroy(s) the thief and the bandit at this trial.”

Tishtrya and Tīri

      Astral deities seem to have figured much more prominently in ancient Iranian religion than in Vedic religion, and this may well be attributed to the influence of Babylonian science on the Iranians, particularly the western groups. In the Avesta such stars and constellations as Ursa Major, the Pleiades, Vega, Fomalhaut, and the Milky Way are mentioned, but the most important astral deities seem to have been Tishtrya and Tīri. An entire Yasht is devoted to Tishtrya, who, for reasons that remain obscure, is identified with the star Sirius. Even though the heliacal rising of Sirius would have occurred at the season of drought, his principal myth involves a battle with a demonic star named Apausha (“Nonprosperity”) over rainfall and water. In a combat that was reenacted in a yearly equestrian ritual, Tishtrya and Apausha, assuming the forms of a white stallion and a horse of horrible description, respectively, battle along the shores of the Varu-Karta sea. Initially Apausha is victorious, but after receiving worship Tishtrya conquers him, driving him away “along a path the length of a race course.” At this point Tishtrya causes the cosmic sea to surge and boil, and then another star, Satavaisa (Fomalhaut), rises with the cloud-forming mists that are blown by the bold Wind in the form of “rain and clouds and hail to the dwelling and the settlements (and) to the seven continents.” As one of the stars “who contains the seeds of waters” (i.e., who cause rain), Tishtrya was also intimately connected with agriculture. He battled and defeated the shooting stars, identified as witches, especially one called “Bad Crop” (Duzhyāryā). In Zoroastrianism, Tishtrya was at some point, probably in late Achaemenian times, identified with the western Iranian astral deity, Tīri (Mercury in Sāsānian astronomy), about whom little is known save that a very important agricultural festival, the Tīragān, as well as the 4th month and the 13th day of the Zoroastrian (Zoroastrianism) calendar, bears his name.

William W. Malandra

Additional Reading

Émile Benveniste, The Persian Religion According to the Chief Greek Texts (1929), is the first effort to analyze the Greek texts. William W. Malandra, An Introduction to Ancient Iranian Religion (1983), is an anthology of texts from the Avesta and the Achaemenian inscriptions with an introduction and extensive commentary. Margaret Cool Root, The King and Kingship in Achaemenid Art (1979), provides a thorough and insightful analysis of the imperial use of visual symbols. M. Schwartz, “The Religion of Achaemenian Iran,” in Ilya Gershevitch (ed.), The Cambridge History of Iran, vol. 2 (1985), pp. 664–697, is also informative. Geo Widengren, Die Religionen Irans (1965), is a good handbook. A more up-to-date handbook is Mary Boyce, A History of Zoroastrianism (1975– ), which contains a rich bibliography and takes a different approach from that of Widengren.William W. Malandra

* * *