Appendix IX

High Level Jottings

Among the Sipasiyan sect were many exemplary and pious personages, the performers of praiseworthy discipline: with them, however, voluntary austerity implies "religious practices" or SALUK, and consists not in extreme suffering, which they hold to be an evil, and a retribution inflicted for previous wicked deeds. According to this sect, the modes of walking in the paths of God are manifold: such as seeking God; the society of the wise; retirement and seclusion from the world; purity of conduct; universal kindness; benevolence; reliance on God; patience; endurance; contentedness; resignation; and many such like qualities. (Dabistan by Mohsin Fani, translated by Shea and Troyer, p. 76).

The true meaning of putting destructive animals to death, is the extirpation of wickedness. (ibid. p. 75).

The Mobed Sarosh, the SO;}, of Kaivan, the son of Kamkar ……He was a saint elect…..He is the author of many admired literary works and compilations; such as the Nosh Daru, sweet medicine, etc. . . . . People relate all manner of miraculous stories about him; such as his creating what was not previously in existence; revealing secret matters, and concealing what was evident; the acceptance or fulfilment of his prayers, his performing a long journey in a short space of time; his knowledge of things hidden from the senses; and his giving a description of the same; his appearing at the same time in places far distant from each other; bringing the dead to life, and depriving the living of vitality; his being enabled to hear and understand the language of animals, vegetables, minerals etc.; to produce food and wine without any visible means; to walk on the surface of water, also through fire and air; and such like. (ibid. pp. 113-115).

A person once came to Zu-I-Ulum and said:

"I propose embracing the profession of a durvesh, and breaking asunder the chains which bind me to the world."

Kaivan replied,

"It is well".

Some days after he returned to Kaivan and said:

"I am at present engaged in procuring the patched tunic, cap, wallet, and other things necessary for my profession."

Zu-l-Ulum observed:

"The profession of a durvesh consists in resigning every thing and abandoning all, manner of preparations, and not in accumulation of any kind."

(ibid.-pp. 102-103).

The duration of ante-historical empires in printless but extensive spaces of time escapes research and computation. (ibid. p. lxxvii).

Not a little care was bestowed upon the discipline and continual exercise of numerous armies…An order of battle was prescribed, in which they were to encounter the enemy; no plunder after victory was permitted; they never slew, nor treated with violence, a man who had thrown down his arms and asked for quarter. (ibid. lxxxii).

They have nevertheless among seemingly childish and absurd precepts, promulgated most luminous truths, better than which none have hitherto been known_even at the most advanced degree of civilization (ibid. xciii).

We shall view Zoroaster's hundred gates, and the remains of his Twenty-One nasks, as venerable monuments of an antique civilization, which ought never to be profaned by derision. (ibid. xciv).

The twenty-fifth gate of Zoroaster contains the remarkable precept: "Know that in thy faith there is no fasting except that of avoiding sin: in which sense thou must fast the whole year. (ibid. ci).

Upon the Persian monuments which time has spared, upon the walls of the thousand-pillared palace of Isfahan, and upon those of the Royal tombs we see no idols, but priests and kings, performing the sacrifice of fire before their "Fervers" (Farohars) "ideals of virtue and sanctity". (ibid. cii).

The most important object of all religions is to ennoble, refine, and sanctify man's inmost thoughts and feelings as well as his exterior actions. (ibid. p. clxxvii).

It is just to attribute to the Persians exclusively one of the most beautiful personifications that was ever imagined; the soul of the deceased meets at the bridge of eternity an apparition either of an attractive or repulsive form: "Who art thou?" asks the uncertain spirit, and hears the answer "I am thy life." (ibid. p. clxxvi-clxxvii).

He (Mahabad) produced the gradations of ruler and subject; of lord and servant; discipline and authority; justice and knowledge; kindness and severity; protection of the 'Zindbar' kind treatment of innoxious creatures; destruction of the 'Tundbar' or noxious animals; the knowledge of God and the ceremonies of his worship. (ibid. p. 19).

They also maintain that in same passages, the rendering the demons obedient and slaying them is a figurative made of expressing a victory gained over the pleasures of sense, and the extirpation of evil propensities: in like manner, whatever is related about the appearance of angels to virtuous and holy persons, is the revelation and vision of good spirits, whilst in a state of sleep, transport, recovery from excess, or abstraction from the body. (ibid. p. 55).

They say that Zohak's two serpents, 'do-mar' and ten fires (vices) or 'deh ak' imply irascibility and sensuality. (ibid. p. 55).

In the several passages where he is recorded to have slaughtered harmless wild asses and oppressed innoxious creatures and when similar actions are ascribed to some of the Gilshaiyan princes, there is only implied the banishment of animal propensities and passions. (ibid. p. 66).

(Miracles when murderous attempts were made by Daruj).

The King - Daran Sarun - hastened to the pillow of Zaradusht, and commanding him to be taken out of the cradle, and putting his hand to the sword, prepared to cut off the child's head; but that instant his hand was dried up, so that he left the house in pain and affliction; on which all the magicians and worshippers of Ahriman (the only worship which prevailed at that time) became quite alarmed. The magicians then formed a mountain of wood, naphtha, and sulphur, and having set it an fire, threw into the midst of it Zaradusht, whom they had by force taken from his father, and hastened with this intelligence to their King: but, through the aid of God,

"The devouring flame became as water,

"In the midst of which slumbered the pearl of Zaradusht."

(ibid. p. 219).

The Glory descends from the presence of Auharmazd, where it abides in the eternal light; it passes through heaven down to the earth; and it enters the house where the future Zaratusht's mother herself is about to be born. Uniting itself with her presence it abides in her, until she reaches the age of fifteen, when she brings fort_ her own first-born, the prophet of Iran. But before this event, as a girl she became so transcendent in splendor by reason of the miraculous nimbus of the Glory that resided in her, that at the instigation of the demons, her father is convinced that she is bewitched, and he sends her away from his home to the country of the Spitamas, in the district of Alak or Arak, to the village of Patiragtaraspo, whose son Porushaspo (A v. Pourushaspa) she marries. The Glory is therefore upon earth, ready to appear in the form of man. ("Zoroaster the Prophet of Ancient Iran, Prof. Jackson, p. 24).

In . . . roundabout way, the Pahlavi text accounts for the combination of the three elements, the glory the spirit and the body, and the child is conceived despite the machinations of the demons (ibid. p. 25).

The pregnancy of the mother, whose womb is hallowed to bear such fruit, is attended by occurrences equally remarkable and by circumstances astounding in their nature. (ibid. p. 25).

In every religion the birth of its founder must be heralded by supernatural signs and omens and accompanied by wonders and prodigies. . . . In the Avesta all Nature rejoices at Zoroaster's birth; the very trees and rivers share in the universal thrill of gladness that shoots through the world. (ibid. p. 27).

If we are to judge at least from the later literature of the Pahlavi, black art and magic practices, occult science and necromancy were the order of the time. (ibid. p. 31).

Vohuman opens his lips and begins to question the enrapt seer - this situation is alluded to in the Avestan Gathas (Ysn. 43,5 seq.) - and after bidding him to lay aside his 'garment' (or the vesture of his material body), the seraphic messenger leads away his soul in ecstatic trance into the glorious and dazzling presence of Auharmazd and the Amshaspands. No sooner does Zaratusht enter this radiant assembly than he ceases to behold

'his own shadow upon the ground, on account of the great brilliancy of the archangels'.

(ibid. p. 41).

As the veil is withdrawn from before his eyes, the several archangels appear at different times before his entranced sight. (ibid. p. 46).

In . . . various visions of Paradise which are granted to Zoroaster. . . the Prophet becomes quite well acquainted with the empyrean realms and with the celestial hierarchy of God, the angels and archangels; (ibid. p. 50).

According to Mohammedan writers, Kazwini and Ibn al- Athir, Zoroaster enters the assembly in no ordinary manner, but by a miracle; the roof parts asunder to give entrance to his hallowed person (Dabistan p. 245, footnote - Not receiving Immediate access to the King, the prophet split the upper part of the apartment where Gustasp was, and descended through the opening). (ibid. p. 60)

. . . . a shade of darkness, yet illuminated by a burst of light, ,by vision, by inspiration; then comes the final fiery outbreak of the prophetic soul in a clarion note of triumph and the transport of joyous victory. (ibid. p. 75). .

Faith of Zoroaster rapidly spread, fanned, as it was by the breath of sovereign power. (ibid. p. 82).

Even the pages of the Koran and the doctrines of Mohammed are not free from the influence of the Faith, which they vanquished by the sword. The spark of the sacred fire has never been quenched; the holy flame continues to blaze; and the Religion -of Zoroaster still lives on. Yes, and whatever may be the changing fates, it will live on, as long as there are successors worthy to bear the name of the Master_ as are the Parsis today, those faithful followers of the Creed of the Prophet of Ancient Iran. (ibid. p. 142).

"The few, to whom, that couch of flame,
That rescues them from bonds and shame
Is sweet and welcome to the bed
For their own infant Prophet spread,
When pitying Heaven to roses turn'd
The death-flames that beneath him burn'd." ^[1]

On their other Prophet, Zoroaster, there is a story told in Dion Prusacus (Orat. 36) that the love of wisdom and virtue leading him to a solitary life upon a mountain, he found it one day all in a flame, shining with celestial fire, out of which he came without any harm, and instituted certain sacrifices to God, who, he declared ,then appeared to him (see Patrick on Exodus iii; 2)." ("Lalla Rookh" p. 194).

"O Beloved, Holy, Spitama Zarathushtra! how shall we show our sense of obligations to you who gave us the Science of Sciences, FARHANGHAN FARHANG,MANTHRA SPENTA - the knowledge of knowledges, MANTHRA SPENTA!!!

You who possessed knowledge of all the planes of the universe;
you who have the highest Intelligence ASN-I-VIR;
you who are gone to the advanced stage of souls of the highest NABA NAZDISHT ANAM FRAVASHINAM class of the four classes of souls - ASHONAM, ASHAONAM, PORYO DAKAESHNAM and NABA-NAZDISHTANAM;
you who are "URURAOST ASTO" gone to the highest stage of prophets;
you whom AHURA MAZDA gave "HUDEMEM VAKHEDRAYA" "the certificate of communicating the Word;"
You who "alone heard His canons" (AEVOSASNAO GUSHATA);
you who are "MAZDO FRASASTA" "taught by MAZDA;"
you who are "HATAM HUDASTEMEM, RAEVASTEMEM, KHARENANGHUASTEMEM..."

"the Most knower of Good, the Most Wise Professor of RAE or brilliant lustre of spiritual knowledge, the Most possessor of Glorious Light among all the souls that are passing from Infoldment to Unfoldment":

-you whose Soul is beyond comparison among the mortals;
you who are "superior to YAZADS and equal to AMESHASPENDS:

- we turn with hands and eyes uplifted towards you, the RATU, the Representative the Viceroy of ARURA MAZDA! ASHEM VOHU! ! !

("The Rationale of Zoroastrian Rituals"-Ervad P. S. Masani, pp. 37-39). 

Footnotes and references:

[1]:

"The Ghebers (fire worshippers) say that when Abraham, their great Prophet, was thrown into the fire by order of Nimrod, the flame turned instantly into "a bed of roses where the child sweetly reposed" - Tavernier.