This article collects and analyses passages about male and female domestic slaves in the Persian Rivāyats. The Rivāyats consist of correspondence between Iranian and Indian Zoroastrians (Parsis) from the late fifteenth to the eighteenth centuries ce. In these letters, Parsis sought the opinions of Iranian Zoroastrians on various doctrinal and ritual issues. The passages in question cover a range of subjects, including the issue of converting household slaves to Zoroastrianism, their participation in domestic religious ceremonies, the exposure of their dead bodies in the towers of silence, and marrying female slaves. These references to slaves challenge the conventional narrative that pre-modern Zoroastrians were oppressed, marginalized, and poor communities. This narrative has overshadowed these pieces of evidence and has caused them not to be studied seriously. This paper seeks to go beyond this traditional reconstruction by examining these texts based on their context. The passages reflect the actual socio-religious issues of Zoroastrians, especially Parsis, and demonstrate their participation in the slave-owning milieu of late medieval and early modern Gujarat and Iran rather than mere anachronistic elements or rhetorical tools reflecting a scholastic treatment of a defunct legal question.

In 2017, the editio princeps of a newly discovered Middle Persian text, the “Mādayān ī Wīrāzagān” or simply “Wīrāzagān”, was published by Raham Asha. This text, which is important not only from a literary and religious perspective, but also from a mythological point of view, was previously unknown to the scholarly community. The Middle Persian original of the text is found in the Codex TD 26 (49r-62v), preserved in the library of the K.R. Cama Oriental Institute, Mumbai. The manuscript was first discovered and studied by R. Asha in March 2011. The preliminary remarks on the Mādayān ī Wīrāzagān and other texts contained in the Codex TD 26 (Ms. R 494) were published in 2012 in the journal of the same institution. Here I present a translation (accompanied by the transliteration and transcription) of the original text published on pages 3–16 of Asha's book.

This article describes the group of ninth-century Zoroastrian philosophers I call the ‘Dēnkard School’ and sketches the way they do philosophy. It presents their argument against substance dualism, which the Zoroastrians argue is in tension with the belief in repentance. From an analysis of this polemic, there follows a reconstruction of the Dēnkard School's own doctrine of the consubstantiality of body and soul. To understand these arguments, I describe some background eschatological and ontological beliefs upheld by the Dēnkard School and their specific conception of substance, which includes the notions of ownership and responsibility. Overall, the argument can be seen as a new position on a traditional problem, and so increasing the scope of philosophy in a more global perspective.

The tradition of writing in Iran has a long history, and its continuous development has, from time to time, led to new scripts. A most notable case is that of Perso-Arabic's replacement of Pahlavi script when New Persian replaced Middle Persian, resulting in Zoroastrian priests having difficulties reading and understanding their religious texts. The process of changing scripts is well attested by the tradition of Pāzand. Although Pāzand was considered one of the first types of transliteration in Iran, this tradition was also gradually abandoned due to its reliance on Avestan script, which was and continues to be uncommon. Avestan script is now found in Zoroastrian Middle Persian (Pahlavi) manuscripts, just as Pāzand was traditionally used for earlier texts. Pāzand–i.e., transcription of Middle Persian in the Avestan alphabet–was used for some time, but was eventually abandoned for scripts in common use, i.e., Persian in Persia and Gujarati and Devanagari in India. In this paper, the aim is to identify and categorize this tradition's characteristics in Pahlavi manuscripts, drawing on manuscripts from the fifty-three volumes published by the Asia Institute of the Pahlavi University of Shiraz, as listed in the Appendix.

The ancient Zoroastrian hymn of worship dedicated to the frauuaṣ̌i-s (affirmative choices) of righteous mortals and divinities refers to an important discourse that takes place between an unnamed Zoroastrian poet-sage and his mysterious rival, named Gaōtəma. The figure of Gaōtəma has intrigued Avestan scholars through the years, but the significance and the implications of Gaōtəma's identity, and of his presence in the hymn, has to date not been seriously studied. This article first examines the context in which Gaōtəma is presented in the hymn. Building upon this, it then evaluates four potential identities for Gaōtəma: Avestan, Turanian, Buddhist, and Vedic. Conducting a multidisciplinary and comparative assessment, the article eventually argues in favour of a Vedic identity for Gaōtəma, specifically that of a poet-sage who was a proponent of the Rig Vedic divinity Indra. This investigation into Gaōtəma's identity concomitantly provides important perspectives on certain aspects of the Zoroastrian religion, and often in a comparative context.

The Pahlavi syntagm zīndag ruwān (NP zende/zinde ravān), literally “living soul / soul of the living”, designates a Zoroastrian funerary ceremony to be performed by priests on behalf of a person in his/her lifetime for the benefit of his/her own soul. It is particularly ordered by that person as a pre-emptive means to ensure that the funerary prayers will be recited, even if relatives are unable to do so, and to guarantee the protection of the god Sraoša in the passing away to the afterlife. In this contribution, I discuss the most relevant aspects of this Zoroastrian ceremony that can be extracted from the Pahlavi literature, and consider that its changes from older periods until modern times are due to diachronic, diatopic and socio-economic variables.

The publication of four Gujarati travelogues written by Parsis traveling to Iran in quick succession in the 1920s marked the intensification of a relationship that had hitherto been based mainly on philanthropy directed towards the Zoroastrians of Iran. The Pahlavi regime, with its assurances of religious tolerance and equity, prompted Parsis to consider deepening their connection with Iran through trade and business investments and also examine the possibility of return to their motherland. The encounters which constitute these travelogues could be framed as experiments which helped the Parsi community in India to construct a framework for developing this relationship. The Parsi travelogues, while attempting to recover a Zoroastrian past in Iran, also try to map the future for the community by addressing its present anxieties and aspirations.

This article investigates the history of economic relations between Iran and the Parsi community of India during the Reza Shah period. Encouraged by the policies of the new Pahlavi state, Parsi entrepreneurs began a serious effort to investigate the possibilities of economic investment in Iran. The article details three Parsi economic missions that were conducted in Iran during this period, and analyzes their assessments of Iran's potential for development in fields such as energy, textile manufacturing, commercial agriculture, and modern transportation systems. As the article argues, while these Parsi-led initiatives were part of a larger history of renewed engagement between Parsis and Iranians, for a variety of political and economic reasons, by the outbreak of World War II few of the Parsi plans for investment in Iran had come to fruition. While remaining largely forestalled in the interwar period, the article also suggests that Parsi economic assessments foreshadowed many of the planning strategies carried out in Iran's post–World War II history of economic development.

The article contributes to filling the research gap concerning Iranian Zoroastrians in diaspora. Using a narrative approach, it explores how second-generation Zoroastrians raised in the United States learn and practice religion while facing the challenges of a pluralistic American society. The article includes a case study of two young Zoroastrian women interviewed in 2019, members of the Californian community. The contrastive cases shed light on the internal heterogeneity of Zoroastrianism, different ways the religion is perceived and experienced, and different ideas about future preservation of the ethno-religious heritage. The study contributes to an understanding of how Zoroastrianism evolves on a new continent and how it differs from what Zoroastrian immigrants brought from Iran.

In 1650, an encyclopedia of comparative religion known as Dabistān-i Maẕāhib (the School of Doctrines) was completed near the city of Hyderabad. Asserting that the religions of the world are reflections of a single inner truth, its author Mīrzā Ẕu'l-fiqār Āẕarsāsānī, known by the poetic penname ‘Mūbad’, travelled widely across India to record encounters with diverse religious figures. This article re-examines the composition and legacy of the Dabistān in light of new manuscript evidence relating to its author and the world he inhabited. It argues that the Dabistān's universalist project reflects a widely held theory of the interrelatedness of the macrocosm, in which sociality with diverse populations was understood to be a spiritual exercise leading to saintly perfection in the same way that venerating the cosmos and ascetic bodily practices were. The article provides a close reading of the Dabistān's shortest chapter on the religion of the Tibetans, the earliest such description in Persian. Situating the Dabistān within the diverse expressions of ‘Universal Peace’ (ṣulḥ-i kull) during the Safavid and Mughal periods, it argues that the Dabistān's project of recovering a universal theology that was attributed to ancient Iran and India led to expressions of dual religious belonging—to particular religions of revelation as well as to the universal religion of the philosophers—parallel to and connected with what Jan Assmann has termed the ‘religio duplex phenomenon’ in early modern Europe. Finally, the article briefly traces the legacy of the Dabistān into the modern period.

The free do not think of religion, doctrine, and spiritual guidance—
Those shackled by seeking liberation are not truly free.
For how long must we wander the alleyways of religion and nation?—
There is no highway through the land of verification (taḥqīq) besides heresy (ilḥād).
—‘Mūbad’ Mīrzā Ẕu'l-fiqār Āẕarsāsānī (fl. 1060s ah/1650s ce)1

The manuscripts of the Iranian Pahlavi Yasna contain two consecutive colophons, the second of which relates the story of how their common ancestor manuscript, which combines the Avestan text of the Yasna with its Pahlavi version, was created. It is argued that Rōstahm Dād-Ohrmazd produced the first Pahlavi Yasna manuscript by taking the Avestan text from one manuscript and the Pahlavi text of a manuscript by Farrbay Srōšayār. Furthermore, it is argued that Rōstahm Dād-Ohrmazd wrote this manuscript both for himself and for Mahayār Farroxzād, who was from the province of Bīšāpuhr. The manuscript of Rōstahm Dād-Ohrmazd was then copied by Māhwindād Narmāhān, who composed the second colophon. This article also discusses the first colophon as it appears in the Iranian Pahlavi Yasna manuscript T54, which differs from other manuscripts of this group as it includes a passage written by a scribe called Kāyūs. It is argued that T54 was produced by Kāyūs, who added this passage to its first colophon. Furthermore, variant readings of these two colophons in two manuscripts of the Iranian Pahlavi Yasna, which also include Kāyūs's passage, are discussed. Unlike T54, Kāyūs's passage forms a separate colophon in these two manuscripts. It is suggested the two colophons are corrected according to the mindset of their respective scribes.

This article examines the extent of the concluding section (Y 41) of the Yasna Haptaŋhāiti in light of the manuscript evidence and the section's divergent reception in a Middle Persian text known as the “Supplementary Texts to the Šāyest nē Šāyest” (Suppl.ŠnŠ). This investigation will entertain the possibility of an alternative ritual being described in the Suppl.ŠnŠ. Moreover, it argues that the manuscripts transmit the ritual text along with certain variations and repetitions while the descriptions of the extent of each section preserve the necessary boundaries of the text as a textual composition or unit.

In this paper I postulate that the original function of the srāošāuuarəza- is the recitation of the formula sraōšō astu (srōš barišnīh), and provide an analysis of the function of this formula in the Long Liturgy. It has an Indo-Iranian background and plays an important role in the Long Liturgy. Because of the dependence of previous editions on the exegetical manuscripts, the formula has never been recorded in the different variations it displays in the liturgy. Some instances have never been edited at all, and others only partially, leading to an incorrect understanding of several texts included in this formula. Furthermore, I present some thoughts about the materials, problems, and methods for the study of the Avestan priestly college and its evolution.

This article explores three important Zoroastrian legal texts from the ʿAbbasid period, consisting of questions and answers to high-ranking priests. The texts contain a wellspring of information about the social history of Zoroastrianism under Islamic rule, especially the formative encounter between Zoroastrians and Muslims. These include matters such as conversion, apostasy, sexual relations with outsiders, inheritance, commerce, and the economic status of priests. The article argues that the elite clergy responsible for writing these texts used law to refashion the Zoroastrian community from the rulers of Iran, as they had been in Late Antiquity, into one of a variety of dhimmī groups living under Islamic rule. It also argues that, far from being brittle or inflexible, the priests responded to the challenges of the day with creativity and pragmatism. On both counts, there are strong parallels between the experiences of Zoroastrians and those of Christians and Jews, who also turned to law as an instrument for rethinking their place in the new Islamic cosmos. Finally, the article makes a methodological point, namely to show the importance of integrating Pahlavi sources into wider histories of Iran and the Middle East during the early Islamic period.

The Kitāb al-muʿtamad fī uṣūl al-dīn by Maḥmūd b. Muḥammad Ibn al-Malāḥimī al-Khwārazmī (d. 536/1141) belongs to the Muʿtazilī theological works that present valuable insight into the intricate history of religions and their contacts. Recently, scholars have identified other manuscripts of this book which comprise passages absent in previously known manuscripts. The enlarged edition of 2012 now comprises the complete chapter on Zoroastrianism, of which only a short part was extant in the first edition. This article translates the whole chapter on Zoroastrianism, along with the vocalized Arabic original text, to make it more accessible to historians of Iranian religions. This translation is then followed by a discussion of the implications of this piece for the history of Zoroastrianism after Islam. After discussing the inner-textual structure of the text the inter-textual relations of this text are examined, along with al-Shahristānī’s account on Zoroastrianism. Through this comparison, it is shown that the major part of both texts most probably originates from the Radd ʿalā l-Majūs (Refutation of Zoroastrians) by Abū ʿĪsā al-Warrāq. In this way, the article shows that both al-Shahristānī’s and Ibn al-Malāḥimī’s texts are relevant for the history of Zoroastrianism in ninth-century Baghdad.