Introduction
The Zoroastrian doctrine of creation we find in Pahlavi literature is the result of a process of development. In its basic conception of creation it is rooted in the Avesta, but it also contains elements that seem to go beyond the Avestan horizon. These elements particularly pertain to the account of the formation of the heavenly bodies. In the Pahlavi text entitled Bundahišn “Original Creation,” which is the most comprehensive work we have on Zoroastrian teachings about creation, the doctrine of the formation of the heavenly bodies is supplementary to the standard doctrine of creation of the gētīg world.Footnote 1 According to the Pahlavi account of creation, the formation of the stars, the moon and the sun is dependent on the developments that occur in the primal terrestrial realm in the wake of the attack by Ahriman. This dependence is remarkable. The five planets are absent in the doctrine’s uranology, matching in this respect the Avestan scheme. In the perspective of the cosmology and astrology of Pahlavi literature, where the planets play a constitutive role, the Bundahišn doctrine of the formation of celestial bodies appears anomalous.Footnote 2 The basic structure of the doctrine can be traced back to the epithets of the moon and stars in the Avesta that combine the names of the constituents of the primal gētīg creation with the Avestan noun ciϑra- “brilliant form.” However, the Pahlavi doctrine also shows conceptual developments and the influence of other sources. I recall that the Avesta consists of oral compositions that have been preserved because they were used in ritual and (mostly) composed to be recited in ritual, hence we should not expect to find there narratives or expositions of the written sort. But precisely because of their discursive taciturnity the canonized texts could prompt speculative elaborations particularly after they were written down, which must have taken place during Sassanid period. Zoroastrian Pahlavi texts that discuss matters of cosmogony show that in general the interpretation of the indigenous religious lore was shaped in important respects by Greek philosophy. This is not peculiar to Zoroastrianism, of course. All post-Hellenistic thinking, religious or otherwise, from the western Mediterranean to the Indus came under the powerful influence of Greek philosophy. We can see the extent of this influence on Zoroastrian writings in the polemic work Škand-gumānig Wizār and in speculative texts such as Dēnkard 3.191–4 and the more comprehensive works Bundahišn and Wizīdagīhā ī Zādspram. This essay is mainly concerned with the account of the formation of celestial bodies in three Pahlavi texts, the (Iranian) Bundahišn, Wizīdagīhā ī Zādspram and the Pahlavi Rivāyat.Footnote 3
I should like to make it clear that the topic treated in this article has nothing to do with the Pahlavi microcosm-macrocosm doctrine, whether in the form of melothesia or the Puruṣa-style correspondence of human body parts and cosmic components. There is a substantial literature on the latter topic.Footnote 4 The Pahlavi doctrine of the formation of the heavenly bodies is a speculative development of a specific Avestan topos. I analyze the process of the elaboration of this doctrine and bring out the mythic motifs on which it is ultimately based.
I
In the Zoroastrian Pahlavi account of creation, Ohrmazd creates the gētīg world in six constituents in six stages: sky, water, earth, plant, cow, human being (see, for example, Bd 1.53; D 3.123). The seventh constituent of the world, namely fire, is not strictly speaking a “creation” since it is directly derived (in its luminosity) from the divine element of “endless lights” (asar-rošnīh); it infuses and vivifies the entire living world (see Bd 1a.5; WZ 1.25). The six original creations were singular—however this may be difficult to imagine in the case of water. The one-to-one relation of the mēnōg types (kirb or ēwēnag) with their gētīg counterparts in the primal creation gives way to the one-to-many relation of the mēnōg types with their gētīg tokens following the assault of Ahriman.Footnote 5 The mēnōg type of plant being itself singular gives rise to a single plant in the primal gētīg world, and similarly for the other creations. This is why it makes sense to use the term archetype for these original gētīg creations.Footnote 6
The account of the creation of bovine and human archetypes in the Bundahišn is as follows:
(Bd 1a.14) panǰom gāw ī ēk-dād brēhēnīd andar Ērān-wēz pad mayānag ī gēhān pad bār ī rōd ī Weh Dāitī kū mayānag ī gēhān. spēd ud rōšn būd čiyōn māh kē-š bālāy se nāy paymānīg u-š dād ō ayārīh āb ud urwar čē-š andar gumēzišn zōr ud waxšišn az ēn bawēd.
Fifth, [Ohrmazd] formed the archetypal cow in Ērānwēz, [which is] in the middle of the world, on the shore of Weh Dāitī river, that is, in the middle of the world. It was white and luminous like the moon,Footnote 7 whose height measured three nāys, and he [i.e. Ohrmazd] gave [the cow] water and plants for support, since in the [world of] mixture strength and growth will be from these.
(Bd 1a.15) šašom Gayōmard brēhēnīd rōšn čiyōn xwaršēd u-š čahār nāy paymānīg bālāy būd pahnāy čiyōn bālāy rāst pad bār ī rōd ī Dāitī kū mayānag ī gēhān +estād. Gayōmard pad hōy ārag ud gāw pad dašn ārag u-šān dūrīh ēk az did dūrīh-iz az āb ī Dāitī čand bālāy xwad būd čašōmand ud gōšōmand ud uzwānōmand ud daxšagōmand būd.
Sixth, [Ohrmazd] formed Gayōmard luminous like the sun, and Gayōmard measured four nāys in height, [his] width equaled [his] height, [and] set him standing on the shore of Weh Dāitī river, that is, in the middle of the world. Gayōmard was on the left side and the cow on the right, and their distance from one another and also from Dāitī river was as much as their heights,Footnote 8 and he had eyes and ears and tongue and reproduction organ.
Gayōmard’s appearance is “like the sun,” and the luminosity and whiteness of the gāw make her appear “like the moon.” The comparisons appear to be made primarily on the basis of the luminous appearance of the two primordial creations. This account of creation is found almost verbatim in WZ 2.8–10, which indicates its authoritative nature. As we will see, the luminous appearance of human and bovine archetypes has ancient Iranian lineage.
In the Bundahišn the luminous forms of the gētīg archetypes are invoked to account for the formation of the heavenly bodies (rōšnān). This peculiar conception is the node of the Pahlavi account. I would like to explain what it means, where it comes from, and how it is put together as a doctrine. In the Avesta the heavenly bodies are said to be created by Ahura Mazdā (mazdaδāta-).Footnote 9 They struggle alongside other deities against the dark forces of disorder and destruction. But in the Avesta, as far as I can see, there is no explicit teaching about their creation (but see below). Yt 13.57 tells us that the stars, the moon and the sun remained motionless in the same place (yōi para ahmā
hame gātuuō / darəγəm hištəṇta +afrašūmaṇtō) before Ahriman’s assault (daēuuanąm parō 
baēšaŋha
/ daēuuanąm parō draomōhu); and that along with the “endless lights” they constitute the heavenly lights (strąm måŋhō hūrō anaγranąm raocaŋhąm).Footnote 10 It is very likely that they are understood to be consubstantial with the “endless lights,” as fire is thought to be. This would be in conformity with their divine status. The idea that the heavenly bodies remained motionless before the assault of Ahriman is standard in Zoroastrian Pahlavi texts:
(Bd 2.19) tā madan ī ēbgat māh ud xwaršēd ud awēšān stāragān ēstād nē raft hēnd abēzagīhā zaman hamē widard ud hamwār nēm-rōz būd pas az madan ī ēbgat ō rawišn ēstād hēnd ud tā frazām az ān rawišn nē ēstēnd.
Until the coming of the assault the moon and the sun and the stars stood still and did not move; time passed without events and it was constantly midday. After the occurrence of the assault [they] were set in motion and until the end [they] do not desist from that motion.Footnote 11
Y 19.8 might seem to suggest that the heavenly bodies are thought to derive from the “endless lights” in their luminosity and “fashioned in bodily form” (hū ϑβarštō kəhrpiia) from those lights. In a sense, this may be true of creation in its entirety, which is reflected in the Pahlavi doctrine of creation.Footnote 12 But there are also some indications that in the Avesta, as later in Pahlavi literature, the formation of the heavenly bodies was thought to be mediated by the celestial (mainiiauua-) “forms” of the primal terrestrial creations (cf. Vr 2.4). These two conceptions may not be contradictory after all, as we will see.
II
I cite at length the relevant passages from the Bundahišn:
(Bd 7.1) gōwēd pad dēn kū ka Gannāg-Mēnōg andar dwārist nē pad sāl ud māh ud rōz čē tēz pad zamān be mad. nazdist ō se ēk ī ēn zamīg dudīgar ō panǰ ēk ī ēn zamīg sidīgar ō ēn zamīg hamāg be mad pas ō urwar. ēg Ohrmazd ān ī awēšān kirb abar grift ud abar awēšān stārag-pāyag burd ud frāz ō stāragān dād ast rōšnīh ī awēšān stāragān kē nūn abāz ō gētīg tābēnd.
It is stated in [our] religion that when the Evil Spirit rushed into [the world], he came, not in the course of a year or a month or a day, but in a flash. He came, first, to one third of the earth, second, to one fifth of the earth, third, to the entire earth, and then to the plant. Then Ohrmazd took their form and carried it to the station of the stars and gave it to the stars. The luminosity of the stars is [from the forms of the earth and the plant], which now shine back onto the terrestrial world.Footnote 13
(Bd 7.2) čiyōn gōwēd kū axtarān āb-čihrag ud zamīg-čihrag ud urwar-čihrag hēnd.
As it is said [in the religious tradition]: stars are water-nature or earth-nature or plant-nature.Footnote 14
(Bd 7.3) awēšān āb-čihragān Tištar ud Tarahag ud Azarag ud Padēwar ud Pēš-parwēz ud haft stārag kē Parwēz xwānēnd ud awēšān āb-sardagān ān ī zamīg-čihr<agān> Haftōring ud Mēx ī mayān ī āsmān awēšān zamīg-sardagān ān ī urwar-čihrag abārīg ǰud az awēšān.
The water-nature [stars] are Sirius and Tarahag and Azarag and Padēwar and Pēš-parwēz and the seven stars called the Pleiades—these are the watery species. The earth-nature [stars] are Ursa Major and the Pole Star which is in the center of the sky—these are the earthy species. The plant-nature stars are the rest, aside from these.Footnote 15
(Bd 7.4) pas Gannāg-Mēnōg ō gāw mad. gāw ō nēm-rōz ālag pad dašn dast ōbast. nazdist ān ī dašn pāy ō ham burd.
Then the Evil Spirit set on the cow. The cow fell on her right hand towards south. First she pulled in her right foot.Footnote 16
(Bd 7.5) Ohrmazd ān ī gāw kirb ud ēwēnag abar grift ō māh abespārd čiyōn ast ēn rōšngar ī māh ī abāz ō gēhān tābēd.
Ohrmazd took the cow’s form and type and consigned it to the moon, for this is the illuminator of the moon that shines back to the world.
(Bd 7.6) čiyōn gōwēd kū māh ī gōspand-tōhmag kū ēwēnag ī gāwān ud gōspandān pad māh-pāyag estēd.
When it is said that the moon [possesses] the seed of the beneficent animals, this means that the type of the cattle and sheep exists at the moon station [or level].Footnote 17
(Bd 7.7) pas ka ō Gayōmard mad Gayōmard ō nēm-rōz rōn <pad> hōy ālag ōbast. nazdist-iz ān ī hōy pāy ō ham burd.
After that [the Evil Spirit] set on Gayōmard, Gayōmard fell on the left side facing south. He first pulled in his left foot.
(Bd 7.8) Ohrmazd ān ī ōy kirb abar grift ō xwaršēd abespārd čiyōn ast ēn rōšnīh ī xwaršēd kē ō gēhān padiš tābēd.
Ohrmazd took his form and consigned it to the sun, for the luminosity of the sun is this [i.e. the form of Gayōmard] which shines onto the world [by the sun].
(Bd 7.9) čē gāw ōwōn būd čiyōn māh ud Gayōmard ōwōn būd čiyōn xwaršēd. Ohrmazd pad gētīg frāz brēhēnīd ka ēbgat mad ul ō azabar burd kū tā abāz ō xwēš buništ tābēnd ud dēwān-iz ān xwarrah ō xwēšīh nē rasēd kū padiš pādixšā(y) bawēnd. agar nē ēdōn kard hād ān rōšnīh ō gētīg nē tābist hād. handāzag ī ātaxš ka brāh az asar-rōšnīh awiš paywast estēd ka abrōzēnd rōšnīh ō azabar dahēd ō xwēš buništ ī-š aziš āmad.
For the cow was [luminous] as the moon and Gayōmard was [luminous] as the sun. Ohrmazd devised for the gētīg world that when [the Evil Spirit’s] onslaught came [the forms of the two] are taken up above so that they shine back onto their original source and so, too, that the demons would not possess that Xwarrah by means of which they could become rulers [of the world]. If this had not been done, that light [i.e. of the sun and the moon] would not have shone on the world, like the fire that derives its radiance from the endless lights: when they kindle it, it gives its light upwards to its own source whence it came.
It is almost certain that in this context kirb and ēwēnag are used jointly in order to designate more accurately one and the same entity, namely the luminous archetypal form.Footnote 18 Recall that the uniquely created cow and the first human are described in Bd 1a.14–15, as “white and luminous like the moon” and “luminous like the sun.” Since this etiology of the luminosity of celestial bodies is not limited to the Bundahišn, it must be a Zoroastrian teaching. We find it in the Wizīdagīhā ī Zādspram and the Pahlavi Rivāyat. I have translated āb-čihrag as “water-nature” and similarly for the other two terms in Bd 7.2. These three terms are taken from the Avesta, which, there too, are used to characterize and classify stars. Avestan afšciϑra- does not mean “containing the seed of water” or even “watery-nature,” but expresses the idea that the brilliance of the star characterized by the epithet is due to the (celestial) “brilliance” or “scintillating form” of water, and similarly for the other two terms zəmasciϑra- and uruuarō.ciϑra-. These three astral epithets are analogical products of the extension of the mythic conceptions that associate the primal man and primal cow, respectively, with the sun and the moon. Water, earth and plants, too, must have celestial connection. The systematizing intention of the speculative extension seems clear.Footnote 19 The Pahlavi literal equivalents of the Avestan terms were understood (which is reflected in my translation) in accordance with the semantic development of čihr “nature” that brought it into contact with the acceptation of tōhmag as (originative) substance. Thus we find not only āb-čihrag but also āb-tōhmag (WZ 3.7Footnote 20) said of the star Tištar. I will come back to these issues. The following passages from the Wizīdagīhā ī Zādspram describes the resurrected in the tan ī pasēn.
(WZ 35.59) u-šān rāmišn-iz ī ēk az dīd ham ēwēnag ān {ī} wuzurg rōšnīh ī az kirb <ud> ēwēnag abar būm hamē tābīhēd kē-š pad +nigāhbedīh az Gayōmard be padīrift az xwaršēd abar wisānīhēd nēmāg-+ē ō Gayōmard paymōzīhēd +kē bun tōhmag ī mardōmān būd nēmāg-+ē ō hamōyēn hāmist kē-š tōhmag būd hēnd meh-rōšnīhā ud keh-rōšnīhā.
And their mutual enjoyment is in a similar manner. The great luminosity [i.e. of the sun] that has continually shone from the form and type [i.e. of human beings] on earth, which [the sun] had received from Gayōmard for safekeeping, [now] separates from the sun, [and] half of it is put on by Gayōmard who was the primal seed of human beings, half of it by all who are his family, with greater or lesser luminosity.Footnote 21
(WZ 35.60) +u-šān ān ast paymōzan +ī bāmīg a-zarmān a-marg.
And this is their clothes, shining, ageless, immortal.
The tan ī pasēn mirrors the original condition, except that Gayōmard receives only half of the luminous substance that was his before Ahriman’s assault. The relevant texts from the Pahlavi Rivāyat are the following. (The paragraphs are not cited in full.)
(PRDD 65.3) kirb ud ēwēnag ī āb ud zamīg pad star pāyag be dād estēd ud star ēk ēk and čand kadag-masāy pad wīst ud dō āyēnd ud šawēnd u-šān wīst ud dō asp āhanǰēd kirb ud ēwēnag ī star az kirb ī xwēš ud ēwēnag ī xwēš ēk az ān <ī> āb ud zamīg ud urwar.
The form and type of water and earth have been established at the level of the stars. The stars are each the size of a house, and in twenty-two [they] come and go, and twenty-two horses draw them; the form and type of the stars [which] is the same as their own form and their own type is from that of the water or the earth or the plant.
(PRDD 65.4) kirb ud ēwēnag ī gōspandān pad māh pāyag dād estēd.
The visible form and type of beneficent animals have been established at the level of the moon.
(PRDD 65.8) ud girdag ī māh hammis dō frasang drahnāy ud dō frasang pahnāy ud rōšnīh ī māh čē az tan ī māh +ēnyā az kirb ud ēwēnag gōspandān pad ×māh pāyag.Footnote 22
The disk of the moon is altogether two parasangs in length and two parasangs in width; and the light of the moon, which is distinct from the body of the moon, is from the form and type of beneficent animals [which exists] at the level of the moon.
(PRDD 65.13) girdag ī xwaršēd and čand ērān-wēz … rōšnīh ī xwaršēd čē az mēnōg ī xwaršēd ēk az kirb ud ēwēnag ī mardōmān.
The disk of the sun is the size of Ērānwēz … the luminosity of the sun, which is the same as the spirit of the sun, is from the form and type of human beings.
There are in fact two distinct themes in the Pahlavi texts which I have cited from the Bundahišn, Wizīdagīhā ī Zādspram and the Pahlavi Rivāyat. The two themes were assimilated together and are almost indistinguishable. They are: (1) the etiology of the luminous form of the heavenly bodies; and (2) the presence of archetypal forms at the levels of the stars, the moon and the sun. The basis of their assimilation in the Pahlavi texts must ultimately be the celestial connection of the bovine and human archetypes, although the respective connections have different genealogies. Only the Pahlavi Rivāyat talks about the kirb ud ēwēnag of the water, earth and plant. I have already mentioned that the association of the stars with the three “forms” must be analogical. It is clear from PRDD 65.8 and 65.13 what the author intends by this: the luminous form of the stars is due to the mēnōg form of the water, or the earth or the plant. If the luminosity of the stars is due to the mēnōg forms of the three gētīg creations, these forms must be present at the level of the stars. In other words, at issue is the first theme, not the second: the author infers the “presence” of the luminous forms on the stars from their being understood as the cause of the astral light. How was the problem of the discrepancy between the number of the forms and that of the stars resolved? Perhaps it was not perceived as a problem. Generally speaking, the mēnōg form is understood both as a singular entity and as luminous ethereal substance (cf. Bd 1.43); or sometimes this, sometimes that (e.g. the mēnōg of the wind). Moreover, the authors of the doctrine could appeal to the authority of the Avesta (afšciϑra-, etc.). Indeed, as I mentioned, the etiology of astral light appears to be a speculative elaboration of the Avestan epithets.
The second theme is in my view inflected through Plato’s theory of forms; or, putting it more strongly, the specifically Zoroastrian elements in it are speculatively developed within the frame of Platonic theory of forms.Footnote 23 The most important of these Zoroastrian developments is given in Bd 7.9: Ohrmazd takes the bovine and human archetypal forms to their respective celestial stations, which would explain the presence of the two forms there. Perhaps the same process was supposed for the three forms associated with the stars. In the context of Zoroastrian speculations about the nature and structure of the world, the semantic fields of tōhm(ag) and kirb overlap, both fundamentally understood as rōšnīh.Footnote 24 Thus, Ohrmazd takes the tōhm of the primordial cow to the moon, as in Bd 6e2–3 and WZ 3.50, as well as her kirb. In the second theme, the issue is not the etiology of the moon’s luminosity but of the genus-species relation between the archetypal form stationed at the moon and the terrestrial animal species produced from it. Thus WZ 3.50 can say ānōh ān tōhm pad rōšnīh ī māh be pālūd u-š was čihragīhā be wīrāst “there [Ohrmazd] purified that seed by the moon’s light and arranged many natural species.” It is in this frame that we must place the idea that the tōhmag of the bovine archetype is taken to the moon and from it the species of beneficent animals are produced. This meets the objection of the author of the Bundahišn at Bd 7.6.Footnote 25 In the Bundahišn author’s view, the notion that it is the cow’s tōhmag (understood as semen) that is transferred to the moon by Ohrmazd is a misunderstanding of the presence of the bovine ēwēnag on the moon. It must have been popular even amongst the clergy, thus drawing the author’s corrective clarification. From what he says, we may gather that the misconception was due to a confusion between the two senses of the term tōhmag, that is to say, as semen and originative substance.Footnote 26 The misunderstanding that provoked our author’s corrective remark nonetheless succeeded in displacing the (Platonic) doctrine of the presence of the ēwēnag of the constituents of the gētīg world in the celestial sphere. That misunderstanding appears to persist even among scholars, helped by a mistaken understanding of Av. ciϑra-, MPer. čihr.Footnote 27
III
This observation brings us to the first theme. I mentioned above that the epithets composed of the names of the primal gētīg creations and ciϑra- and used of the heavenly bodies are not of the same vintage. The three classificatory epithets used of the stars are the analogical product of priestly speculations that extended the celestial valence of the bovine and human archetypes to the other three terrestrial creations. The epithets afšciϑra-, zəmasciϑra- and uruuarō.ciϑra- are thus artificial and to this extent devoid of descriptive content. If nonetheless we were to ask what they could be taken to mean, e.g. by our Pahlavi authors, and whether the star described by one of these epithets was envisaged to “possess the seed” of, for example, the water, or whether the epithet rather was taken to specify the cause of the luminous form of the star—in order to decide between these alternatives we have to consider how things stand with the celestial connection of the bovine and human archetypes. In other words, we should ask: what is the basis for associating these two archetypes, respectively, with the moon and the sun, and how solid (e.g. ancient) is this association? As it happens, we can unequivocally answer this question: the basis of the association is the apparent forms of the archetypes. We have ancient testimonies of this belief.
Recall that according to the Zoroastrian doctrine of creation Gayōmard is described not only “luminous like the sun” (WZ 2.10, B 1a.15) but also as roundish: u-š čahār nāy paymānīg bālāy būd pahnāy čiyōn bālāy “measured four nāys in height and width” (Bd 1a.15). In the case of gāw ī ēk-dād only the height is specified: three nays (WZ 2.9, Bd 1a.14). This is peculiar, for if we suppose that the intention behind the dimensions of Gayōmard is to make him have the appearance of the sun (i.e. luminous and round; also cf. Bd 1.43), why not do the same with the gāw ī ēk-dād? Three possible explanations come to mind. One is that the bovine archetype, too, was thought to have a roundish form, and being obvious, it is not explicitly mentioned. The relevant passage in the Pahlavi Rivāyat may be adduced in support of this view: PRDD 46.15 u-š sē nāy pad bālāy ud pahnāy būd “her height and width was three nāys.” However, there are indications that this description of the cow’s body is adopted from that of Gayōmard’s which was understood to be the standard. The clearest sign of this analogical development is the presentation in the passage of the process of genetic propagation of “all the species of the beneficent animals,” which is modeled on that of human beings.Footnote 28 The second possible explanation is that the frontal aspect of bovine body is already roundish (or close enough), and hence no statement to this effect regarding the bovine archetype is necessary—unlike the frontal aspect of the human body.Footnote 29 This has certain plausibility, but our testimonies seem to point to another basis of the comparison of the cow and the moon: the bovine head—with the horns. This is in my view the right explanation. (I will return to this topic below.)
In the case of the primordial man there are testimonies (at least three as far as I know) in which the likening of him to the sun involves his roundish body. One is the Bundahišn text cited above. The second is the story of the birth (or rather abortion) of the solar figure Vivasvant in the shape of an egg (mārtāṇḍá- “coming from a dead egg”) in a number of Vedic and Brāhmanic texts.Footnote 30 In one of these texts (TS VI 5.6) it is explicitly stated that this egg-shaped figure is the ancestor of human beings; in another (ŚB III 1.3.3.4) we find a more explicit description of its roundish shape: “he was as big transversely as he was vertically.”Footnote 31 It thus appears that the Bundahišn description of the appearance of Gayōmard does indeed have ancient roots. Both Gayōmard and Mārtāṇḍa are roundish solar figures that are the ancestors of mortal (human) beings.Footnote 32
The third testimony is from Plato’s Symposium (189e5–190b4). In the course of his speech praising love, Aristophanes gives the following account of its ubiquitous presence in human life. Originally, human beings were shaped differently than they are at present, he says.
[T]he shape of each human being was completely round, with back and sides in a circle; they had four hands; they had four hands each, as many legs as hands, and two faces, exactly alike, on a rounded neck … Now here is why there were three kinds … The male kind was originally an offspring of the sun, the female of the earth, and one that combined both genders was an offspring of the moon, because the moon shares in both. They were spherical, and so was their motion, because they were like their parents in the sky.Footnote 33
Fearing their power, Zeus cuts these extinct humans straight down the middle and thus produces the normal humans with one head, two legs, and so on.Footnote 34 Each half now seeks his or her severed half, which is in effect love (Symp. 191c9–191d3). The etiological intent of the myth explains the doubling up of the limbs. Sphere and circular motion are of course perfect shape and motion in Platonic cosmology. These spherical humans are divine beings by shape and motion and descent. And such a divine origin of course suits a divine being such as Eros. It thus may seem that this myth is purely Platonic. But we have seen the presence of a parallel physiognomy and genealogy in Vedic and Zoroastrian literature. In fact Greeks regularly associated the divinity of the sun, the moon and the earth with the “barbarians,” and in particular Egyptians and Persians. Herodotus (Hist. 1.131) reports that the Persians worship the sun, the moon, fire and water, and do not believe that the gods have human form as the Greeks do.Footnote 35 Further, in Plato’s late cosmology it is rather the cosmos itself which is divinized as embodying the divine nous “intelligence” and the souls are associated with the stars. The specific contributions made to the myth by the etiology of love on the one hand and by the Platonic conception of the perfection of the spherical shape and motion on the other are thus reasonably discernable. In accordance with the other two testimonies, it can be suggested that the core of Aristophanes’ myth consisted of the genealogy of a primal human race whose descent from the sun, the moon, or the earth was reflected in the roundish shape of their bodies.
The celestial connection of bovine and human archetypes always bears on the appearance or form of these primal beings, which may be more specifically determined. We just saw one such determination (i.e. the roundish body). It is understandable that in the Zoroastrian context, the luminosity of their bodies is particularly the point of emphasis. In view of the geographical and religious diffusion of the mytheme of solar and lunar valence of the human and bovine primal beings we can reasonably postulate a Proto-Indo-European lineage for it. In Greek myth Io “moon” is a priestess of the sanctuary of Hera in Argos where she is noticed and pursued by Zeus. In order to hide Io and his affair with her, Zeus transforms her into a heifer. Hera finds out and asks for cow-Io and sets Argos Panoptes to guard her. In another version of the love affair (in Aeschylus, Hiketides), Hera transforms Io into a cow in order to prevent Zeus from continuing his amorous relations with her. Zeus responds by turning himself into a bull and mating with her. The myth is attested in a number of versions from the seventh (in the Ehoiai) through fourth century BCE in tales and images, which reflects its popularity.Footnote 36 In Prometheus Bound (585–7) when Io first meets the bound Prometheus she describes her condition in these terms: “I am well-wearied enough by many, many wanderings, nor can I learn in what way I am to escape my torment. Do you hear the voice of this maiden who is horned like a cow?”Footnote 37 The horns are of course also lunar, as her name makes clear. It is true that pictorial representations of the moon are regularly in crescent form, but mythic discourse has the freedom to present the complete lunar cycle in composite form as the head of a white cow. Mythic image (e.g. Io) signifies all the aspects, not just one. Nothing in the night sky is more noticeable than the regularly changing shape of the moon. It was the main instrument of measuring month and year in the ancient world until well into the first millennium BCE.Footnote 38
In the Gāthic account of creation, for example, the moon is represented by its phases (Y 44.3dd’): k
yā må uxšiieitī nərəfsaitī ϑβā
“through whom the moon now waxes now wanes?”Footnote 39 Lunar phases are essential in mythic and ritual conception and representation of the moon. Here we have a clear indication that the cow represents the moon thanks to her horned visage. This phenomenology must be the basis of their assimilation in myth, which may take the form of the etiology of the lunar form, i.e. in its complete monthly cycle, or, conversely, of the lunar genealogy and nature of the cow. We saw that both aspects are found in the treatment of the myth in Zoroastrian Pahlavi texts, the latter as the presence of bovine archetype at the moon. The treatment is in accordance with the Avestan testimony. The dedicatory phrase that opens the Māh Yašt (7.0) concisely brings the two aspects together hinged on (the phenomenology of) the bovine archetype: måŋhahe gaociϑrahe, g
ušca aēuuō.dātaiiå, g
ušca pouru.sarəδaiiå xšnaoϑra “with gratification of the moon that has the brilliant form of the cow, of the archetypal cow, of the bovine genus with many species.” These considerations leave hardly any doubt about the meaning of the Avestan epithet of the moon gaociϑra-: the moon has the luminous appearance of the cow.Footnote 40 The lunar valence of the bovine archetype is also represented in the tauroctony scene of the Mithraea: the head of the sacrificial bull points to the image of the moon in the celestial vault. The sacrificial bull signifies the moon. In Mithraic astrology Taurus is the sign of the moon’s “exaltation.”Footnote 41 Although we do not have any Mithraic account of the myth, it is generally agreed that the sacrifice was understood by the adherents of the mystery as the generation of the living world.Footnote 42 The moon-cum-bull allows ritual-iconographic rendition of Mithraic astrology; and at the same time, the sacrificial lunar bull is understood to be life-giving.Footnote 43 Thus, the two aspects that we noted in the Zoroastrian treatment of the lunar connection of the bovine archetype, namely the bovine etiology of the luminous form of the moon and the lunar origins of animal species (through sacrifice of the cow), have firm ancient roots. The second theme is inflected in the Zoroastrian doctrine by the prism of the Platonic theory of forms: the origin is conceived as transcendent (bovine) “form” present at the moon.
The celestial connection of the human archetype, too, must be original, but it does not seem to have phenomenological basis. The connection takes a curious form in the (Middle Persian) Manichaean account of the creation of the first human couple. The demoness of lust Āz through a giant couple produces a pair of male and female progeny. Although the body of their (male) offspring has an evil lineage, his gyān “soul” is made “of divine light and beauty” (’c h’n rwšnyy ’wd xwšn). His form too has a divine origin.
’wd h’n nr cyhr ‘yg yzd”n, ‘yš ’c rh dyd, h’ncyš pdyš phyqym’d ’wd dysyd … ’wd k’ h’n nr d’m z’d, ’ygyš nwxwyr n’m nyys’d, ’y xwd gyhmwrd.Footnote 44
And the male form (čihr) of the gods [i.e. of the Third Messenger] which was seen by her [Āz] from [afar at] the celestial Wheel—exactly according to it [the first man] was formed and shaped … And once that male creature was born, he was given the name Noxwīr [“first man”], who is no other than Gēhmurd.
The story does not specify the form given to the first man other than that it is the apparent form of the Third Messenger. Incidentally, the word čihr in the passage can only mean “apparent form” (see the Appendix).Footnote 45
Let us go back to the Avesta. Aside from Gaiia-marətan (Gayōmard), Yima (Jam) is also a primal man and a solar figure. Not only does he share the sun’s epithet xšaēta- (probably “brilliant”) but he is actually described as huuarə.darəsa- “having the appearance of the sun” (Y 9.4). His father is Vīuuaŋvhaṇt-, “who shines far and wide.” Yima is a semi-divine figure in Vīdēvdād 2.Footnote 46 We thus have in him a testimony to the solar connection of the primal man. It seems reasonable to think that Yima’s solar appearance means that he scintillates like the sun. Yima’s sunlikeness must perhaps be understood to apply to his visage rather than his entire body. In any case, it is likely that the Avestan Gaiia-marətan displaced the sunlike Yima as the primal man and ancestor of human beings, especially of the Airiia people.Footnote 47 In this capacity he takes over the solar status of Yima. The solar characteristics of Gayōmard, as we have seen, are explicit. For his descendants he is the archetype whose features they inherit, and once they are resurrected in the fullness of time, they share in Gayōmard’s luminous form, which the sun will have returned to him (and them). This image is also present in the Avesta, even if in a less explicit manner.
aonō frauua
īm yazamaide
haca frāϑβərəsa
We worship the pre-existent soul of Gaiia-marətan who was the first to listen to Ahura Mazdā’s thought and teachings; from whom [Mazdā] fashioned the family of Airiia peoples, the scintillating appearance of Airiia peoples.
Whereas in the case of Yima the attributed splendor clearly pertains to his corporeal appearance, the usage of ciϑra- in the Avesta obliges us to envisage the “scintillating form” of Gaiia-marətan as that of his soul. I say this not because I want to render the attribution more plausible, i.e. less vulnerable to phenomenological scruples. It is what our textual evidence requires. The Avestan noun ciϑra-, in all its attestations, signifies a numinous appearance. It manifests an otherwise invisible quality, be it of the nature of the sacrifice, as in Y 12.4 or 58.1,Footnote 48 or the character of the soul. The negative usage of Y 12.4 is isolated (if we discount Y 32.3Footnote 49). It could be that the noun became a technical item of ritual language and developed into a neutral term amenable to positive or negative usage. In FrW 10 (Yt 22.39–40) it pertains to the soul of the righteous.
āunąm frauua
aiiō.
haca maniiao
zaraϑuštra aēšąm ciϑrəm vahištāa
ca manaŋha
.The association of the soul in both substance and form with the celestial sphere or divine element is not limited to Iranian mythology. It is a regular and fundamental notion of Greek philosophy from the Presocratics (the sixth century BCE) to the Neoplatonists (the fifth century CE). In fact, it may well be that the Presocratics adopted the notion from Iran, which became a basic feature of Greek psychology and cosmology through Plato, as Burkert has repeatedly argued.Footnote 51 For Anaximenes, air is the cosmic archē, but it also constitutes the soul, the substance of the soul.Footnote 52 For Heraclitus, fire is the primal cosmic and divine element; soul is composed of fire, and upon death the joyous “bright” soul joins the cosmic fire or aithēr.Footnote 53 For atomists, only the atoms of fire and soul are spherical.Footnote 54 For Anaxagoras, upon death a person’s soul as nous joins the cosmic nous, which was apparently taken by Euripides to mean that the soul was composed of divine aithēr and eventually goes back to the circle of heaven as the body goes to the earth.Footnote 55 Diogenes of Apollonia associates Anaxagoras’ nous with divine air eminently present in the human being qua soul.Footnote 56 In the Phaedo, Plato postulates an affinity or rather a basic homogeneity between transcendent forms and the soul. Once released from the prison of the body the truly virtuous (= philosophical!) soul returns to its celestial abode, where the divine forms are, to live “like a god.”Footnote 57 Drawing on allusions in the Timaeus, Aristotle posits a fifth element, namely the aithēr: it is the stuff from which the celestial spheres and the stars and souls are constituted.Footnote 58 In the Laws, Plato declares as the most fundamental principle of philosophy that the (cosmic) soul is the original mover and is thus primary with respect to all bodies, and explicitly associates it with the stars.Footnote 59
Recall that in Manichaeism the bright appearance (čihr) of the primal man is an imprint of the form of the Third Messenger. Manichaeism inherited the strict synonymy or co-referentiality of divinity and light from Zoroastrianism, whether directly or indirectly (e.g. through Neoplatonism). The original divine element is light, uncreated and without limit; it is apparently the being (stī) of the gētīg creation in the mēnōg state and of the gods themselves, which again shows that light is the one and only mēnōg element, despite being visible (cf. Bd 1.52). As we saw, it is explicitly stated in PRDD 65.13 in respect of the sun and in Bd 1.43 in respect of the gētīg world in the mēnōg state. The one phenomenological characterization of the celestial (divine) realm in the Gāthās is that it is luminous (Y 30.1, 32.2, 43.16), and the most significant features of the final apotheosis of the gētīg world are that the sun will never move again from its highest position in the sky and that the resurrected will have immortal luminous bodies. In fact, immortality equals having a body made of light.Footnote 60 Thus the situation of the creation in respect of its luminous substance is restored to what it was prior to Ahriman’s assault.Footnote 61 In sum, the association of the soul (and through it the primal man) with the celestial sphere is mediated through light. The light-being as it is in its pure state (the mēnōg of rōšnān) corresponds to the form or appearance of the soul and the primal man: luminous and round. It is fitting indeed that the highest gētīg creation is paired with the mēnōg of the sun in particular.Footnote 62 It is not clear to me what the original relation between the celestial nature of the soul and the solar status of the archetypal man was. Were they independent mythemes and brought together in Zoroastrianism? The prehistory of the celestial nature of the soul in Zoroastrianism is obscure. In any case, it seems that the key notion in the convergence (if there was one) must have been the luminosity of the soul. The context of the Zoroastrian reception of the Platonic theory of transcendent forms was thus wholly favorable. This reception produced the doctrine of the formation of the heavenly bodies that we know from Pahlavi texts, namely the etiology of the luminosity of the heavenly bodies hosting the archetypal forms of the gētīg creations. It may well be that the Platonic theory of forms and the psychology that accompanied it starting from the Phaedo are philosophical elaborations of the ancient Iranian teaching about the celestial origin of the soul.
Conclusion
Zoroastrian doctrine of the formation of the heavenly bodies (rōšnān) teaches that they owe their luminous form (and substance) to the archetypal forms of the primal gētīg creations. The rudiments of this doctrine are apparent in the Avesta. In fact, it is a presumption to call the Avestan evidence rudiments. They may well be visible signs of a proper teaching more or less similar to the Pahlavi doctrine in one of its aspects, i.e. the etiology of the luminosity of the heavenly bodies. The Avestan epithets of the moon and the stars are significant in this respect. The ancient roots of the doctrine are the lunar and solar valence of the bovine and human archetypes. I tried to show that these in turn may be traced back to the bovine representation of lunar phases in myth and ritual and to the solar genealogy of the original race of human beings or of the primal man, respectively. This latter seems to have converged with the idea of the celestial nature of the soul in Zoroastrian speculations. The second aspect of the Zoroastrian doctrine of the heavenly bodies, namely their hosting the “forms” of the gētīg creations, is a Platonizing conception. This inflection is not at all surprising. The influence of Greek philosophy is evident in Zoroastrian Pahlavi cosmological speculations.
I argued that the supplementary status of the doctrine of the formation of celestial bodies in Pahlavi literature, that is to say, its dependence on the doctrine of the creation of the primal gētīg beings, may be traced to the Avestan epithets of the moon and the stars. Thus, the Pahlavi doctrine may be considered to be an elaboration of what was thought to be the conception underlying those epithets. But it is also possible that a version of the Pahlavi doctrine was already present in the Avestan period. Y 19.8 gives a list of the creations that matches in order and number the canonical Zoroastrian list of Pahlavi literature: the sky, the water, the earth, the plant, the “quadruped cow,” and the “biped righteous man,” followed by the “sun fashioned in bodily form.” Or perhaps the Avestan epithets of the celestial bodies and the order of creation reflected in this list were the basis of the speculative elaboration of the Pahlavi doctrine.
The Pahlavi noun čihr has the two related meanings of “nature”Footnote 63 and “apparent form,” and no other meaning.Footnote 64 All its derivations, such as čihrag “visage,” čihrīg “natural,” čihrēnīdan “to form or endow with nature,” and all the compounds where it is a component, such as hu-čihr “beautiful,” čihr-šnāsīh “physics (i.e. study of natural phenomena),” mazg-čihrīh “being of marrow nature,” xwēš-čihrīh “being of its own nature,” yazdān-čihrīh “being of divine nature,” ayōxšust-čihrīh “being of metal nature” are to be translated in accordance with those two meanings.
D 7.1.3 weh dēn čihr ud dahišn ud rawāgīh (transcription modified) means “the nature, creation and propagation of the good religion,” contra Molé: “la semence de la Bonne Religion, sa création et sa propagation.”Footnote 65 Cf. WZ 4.3 dēn ī māzdēsnān ka āwām az gētīg-rāyēnišnīh abāz ō mēnōg-čihrīh hamē wardīhist pad zamīg paydāg būd “Dēn ī Māzdēsnān when she passed from being arranged in the gētīg state back to having the nature of mēnōg was manifest on the earth.”Footnote 66
D 7.1.4 weh dēn čihr Ohrmazd xēm u-š dahišn pad ham-niyābīh ī fradom dām Wahman Amahraspand (transcription modified) means “the nature of the good religion is Ohrmazd’s own character (i.e. nature), and its creation (took place) in collaboration with the first created being, Wahman the Amahraspand” (cf. Bd 1.52), contra Molé: “sa semence est le tempérament même d’Ohrmazd; sa création résulte de la première créature, l’Amahraspand Vahman.”Footnote 67
D 7.3.9 abar čē ēwēnag margēnēd kē rāy Purušasp az wišobišn ī az-iš abē-čihr bawēd Durušasp pursīd Footnote 68 (transcription modified) “Purušasp consulted Durušasp about how he may kill (Zardušt) while remaining unmarked by the destruction (of Zardušt).” Purušasp asks how he could avoid being implicated in the murder.
The curse that hōm yazad directs against those who do not offer him the parts that Ohrmazd has allocated to him in PRDD 26.4 includes the following: andar mān ī ōy zāyēnd mardōm ī čihr ī ǰādūgān “in his house are born people who have sorcerers’ nature,” i.e. disposition, contra Williams: “In his house people of the line of sorcerers will be born,”Footnote 69 which in any case is oxymoronic, i.e. its usage contradicts its alleged meaning.
The Sassanid kings’ phrase kē čihr az yazdān, notwithstanding the Greek version of the phrase (ek genous ϑeōn),Footnote 70 does not mean “whose descent is from the gods,” contra Zimmer.Footnote 71 The Greek version cannot be assumed to be a “translation,” in the sense we use this word today, of the Middle Iranian versions. If čihr was in fact used in line with what we know of the Zoroastrian concept of “brilliant appearance” or even simply to mean “nature of the gods,”Footnote 72 could the Greek version of the phrase “translate” such a conception? For the (Hellenistic) Greek speaker what was understandable, not to say expected, was that the king should claim divine descent, and this is what he got. To allow čihr to mean “descent” in the phrase is tantamount to maintaining that in one and only one instance the term has that sense. On what evidence? Zimmer is impressed by the alleged “remarkable similarity” of the Pahlavi phrase to Y 32.3aa’ a
yūš daēuuā vīspåŋhō, akā
manaŋhō stā ciϑrəm, which he translates: “But you daēvas all, you are progeny of evil thought.”Footnote 73 Once again, “descent” is not the same thing as “progeny.” Do speakers of any European language use the same word to refer to both their descent or origin and their progeny or offspring?Footnote 74 The idea that one and the same word can have both meanings is problematic. Second, the actual Middle Persian translation of the Gāthic phrase demonstrates that Middle Persian čihr cannot mean anything like “descent.” Here is the Pahlavi translation: ēdon ašmā harwisp kē dēw hēd ā-tān az akōman ast tōhmag [kū-tān tōhmag az ānōh kū akōman-iz]Footnote 75 “Thus you all who are Dēw, your tōhmag is from Akōman [i.e. your tōhmag is from there where Akōman too (is from)].” Here is the perfect opportunity for the Middle Persian translator to use čihr in the alleged meaning of “descent” (or “offspring”), but instead he uses tōhmag. The Pahlavi translation shows that ciϑra- was taken to mean “origin” in the passage, and that čihr did not mean that. Zimmer’s evidence actually proves the opposite of his supposition. Finally, although using the direct relative pronoun (kē) to render the oblique kē-š is attested in Middle Persian, it is very rare. For the meaning that Zimmer ascribes to the phrase (“whose descent is from the gods”) one expects *kē-š čihr az yazdān.
Old Persian ciça- must have the same range of meaning as Avestan ciϑra-. The instances (three, all seemingly in compounds) are too few and ambiguous to make a definitive judgment possible. Nonetheless we can make the following observations. The burden of proof lies with those who advocate a meaning for the term that leaves the semantic range of Avestan ciϑra- and particularly Middle Persian and Parthian čihr.Footnote 76 The compound dipiciça- posited by Schmitt for a badly damaged word at DB IV, 89, if it is to be accepted, must mean something like text presentation, i.e. “version,” as Huyse suggests, or “transcript,” according to Shayegan, or “text,” according to Tuplin.Footnote 77 Lecoq and Tavernier translate its Elamite equivalent tippime (or tuppime) as “text” or “inscribed text.”Footnote 78 Zimmer proposes to take the Old Persian term “as an expression for ‘the line, the series’, i.e., corresponding to our ‘alphabet’: ciça- here refers to the cuneiform signs specially created, after the Akkadian model, to write down Darius’ ‘Aryan’ language (called Old Persian today).”Footnote 79 He believes this would be in keeping with the etymology 2 ciϑra- < 2ci-ϑra- he posits, meaning “carrying on the line,” from PIE *√k
ei “to arrange in serial order.”Footnote 80 If so, dipiciça- would mean something like inscribing or writing in line, since dipi- certainly means inscription or writing. What does the term ciça- add to dipi-? Were there ever inscriptions that were not “in line”? If it is said that what is meant is linguistic as opposed to pictorial inscription (“corresponding to our ‘alphabet’”) and that this is the semantic contribution of ciça- to the compound, then it has to be explained why this is needed in the passage in question, since dipi- on its own precisely means writing or (linguistic) inscription (at DB IV, 42, 48, etc.).
The term ariyaciça- (e.g. DNa 14–15 ariya : ciça; XPh 13 ariyaciça) is generally translated as “of Aryan lineage.” The assumption has never been explained. It must be at least in part based on the context. It is a compound that occurs in an apparently rhythmic passage:
(DNa 8–15) adam : Dārayavauš : xšāyaϑiya : vazraka : xšāyaϑiya : xšāyaϑiyānām : xšāyaϑiya : dahyūnām : vispazanānām : xšāyaϑiya : ahyāyā : būmiyā : vazrakāyā : dūraiapiy : Vištāspahyā : puça : Haxāmanišiya : Pārsa : Pārsahyā : puça : Ariya : Ariya : ciça.Footnote 81
I am Darius, the great king, king of kings, king of lands of all peoples, king in this great earth far and wide, the son of Vištāspa, an Achaemenid, a Persian, son of a Persian, an Aryan, having the Aryan ciça-.
The pleonasm of the supposed “an Aryan, having Aryan lineage” is allowed without further ado perhaps because of the preceding “a Persian, son of a Persian.” Reference is also made to Yt 13.87, which looks very similar in phraseology. For Yt 13.87, too, a pleonastic expression is supposed: “from whom [i.e. Gaiia-marətan] Mazdā fashioned the family of Aryan peoples, the lineage of Aryan peoples.”Footnote 82 I argued above that Y 13.87 ciϑra- refers to the “scintillating appearance” of the primal man (the “luminous form” of his soul as an a
auuan-) that connects him with the celestial sphere. The advocates of rendering ciϑra- as “lineage” in the Avestan passage owe an explanation of the resultant pleonasm of their translation. But the similarity of the Avestan and Old Persian expressions is striking and may reasonably be assumed to convey a common conception. If so, the Old Persian ariyaciça- must signify the same quality that Airiia peoples (airiia- da
iiu-) inherit from Gaiia-marətan at Yt 13.87, their “bright appearance.” As for pārsa pārsahyā puça “a Persian, the son of a Persian,” it may be an expression of ethnic or cultural lineage, as it is still used to claim a lineage (real or imaginary) in Modern Persian; or the hyperbolic phrase may carry a polemical intent which would have been transparent in the context, e.g. “Persian” may refer to the putative lifestyle of a Persian.
It is hardly possible to judge in isolation whether the name ciçantaxma- is to be translated as “brave by descent” or as “remarkably brave.”Footnote 83 In my view, the arguments presented in this article rule out the former. In sum, none of the texts Zimmer adduces unambiguously bears out the etymology he proposes for the cognate Avestan, Old Persian and Middle Persian terms.
In his lecture on the concept of Iran, de Blois, too, relates Yt 13.87 and DNa 8-15, but in an unexpected manner. Like other scholars, he translates Yt 13.87 ciϑra- as “seed” and suggests that the phrase ciϑrəm airiianąm da
iiunąm indicates the fifth and highest level of social grouping (after nmāna-, vīs-, zaṇtu-, and da
hu-) in the Avesta: the Airiia tribes (da
hu-) “together form the ‘seed of the Aryan tribes’ that is mentioned in Yašt 13.” The “seed of the Aryan tribes” (ciϑrəm airiianąm da
iiunąm) designates the most comprehensive grouping of the “Aryan tribes.” While each of the four levels of grouping attested in the Avesta has a leader (e.g. nmānō.pati-, etc.), the “seed of the Aryan tribes” (i.e. the highest level) does not have a leader. De Blois suggests that the head of the “whole Zoroastrian church,” the zaraϑuštrō.təma- (the most Zarathuštra-like), might have corresponded at the fifth level to the leaders of the other four levels. “Thus, the enumeration of the dignitaries jumps over the rank of the ‘seed of the Aryan tribes’ and replaces him by the spiritual leadership of the entire church, a man whose authority was, one must assume, recognised both by the Aryan and by the non-Aryan tribes.”Footnote 84 Before considering how, in de Blois’ view, this interpretation of Yt 13.87 bears on Darius’ inscription at Naqš-e Rustam, I should like to draw attention to the dubious nature of this construction. In effect, de Blois theorizes into existence a level of social organization on the basis of an untenable interpretation of the significance of the ratu- zaraϑuštrō.təma-, which he believes would provide a reference for Yt 13.87 ciϑrəm airiianąm dax´iiunąm “the seed of the Aryan tribes” (in his translation).
Do we know what position zaraϑuštrō.təma- occupies in the Avestan society? From its occurrence at Vr 9.1 in the apparently descending order of mazdā-, zaraϑuštra-, zaraϑuštrō.təma- one may surmise that zaraϑuštrō.təma- designates the present successor of Zarathuštra in a supposedly unbroken chain, as Kellens seems to maintain.Footnote 85 If so, the term must signify an office, the head of a “religious” organization. The supreme rank of this (supposed) office may be assumed for or in the viewpoint of Avestan authors. I emphasize the qualification because it is very likely that this perspective is distortive of the social reality we are trying to reconstruct. How extensive was the organization that was headed by the zaraϑuštrō.təma-? We do not know for sure (see below), but whatever image we form of its extension (and the pertinent complexity) must be commensurate with the type of society to which it pertains. It could not have been extensive either in geography or in (effective) authority. We cannot even tell whether the “church” headed by the ratu- zaraϑuštrō.təma- was inclusive or factious. This latter possibility cannot be ruled out, given the superlative term used to designate its head. What was the relation between this organization and the four levels of social grouping of Avestan society?
Our evidence tells us that there were four levels of social organization, because there were only four levels of government: nmānō.pati-, vīs.pati-, zaṇtu-pati- and da
hu.pati-. Y 19.18 lists five ratu- (“religious” authority?Footnote 86) in an apparently ascending order: nmāniia- “pertaining to family,” vīsiia- “pertaining to clan,” zaṇtuma- “pertaining to tribe,” dāx´iiuma- “pertaining to people” and zaraϑuštra- “pertaining to Zarathuštra.” This list matches that of Yt 10.115, except that in the latter the fifth and highest rank is called zaraϑuštrō.təma-.Footnote 87 If we assume that the final terms of the two lists designate one and the same office, we will be in a position to know more about the extension of the organization headed by the zaraϑuštrō.təma-, and its relation with the four levels of social organization. According to Y 19.18, “peoples” or “lands” (daŋ´hu-) other than Raγā have five levels of “religious” authority (ratu-) mentioned above. “Zoroastrian Raγā” (raγa zaraϑuštriš), however, is quadri-ratu- (caϑru.ratuš), namely nmāniia-, vīsiia-, zaṇtuma- and zaraϑuštra-. Keeping in mind that we hardly know anything about the relation between the pati- (something like “governor”) and the ratu- (“religious” authority), we may venture the following picture of the ratu- zaraϑuštrō.təma-. It was located in Raγā, where it occupied the position that the ratu- dāx´iiuma- held in the other (Zoroastrian) “political” communities (daŋ´hu-).Footnote 88 If the ratu- zaraϑuštrō.təma- indeed signified the highest religious office across Airiia lands, its authority was symbolic (or “religious”) in the territories that were organized at the daŋ´hu- level, but in Raγā it performed a quasi “political” role because of the tribal division of this particular land. One may speculate that the aspiration of the ratu- zaraϑuštrō.təma- to such a position in the politically organized communities (again, if such in fact was the case) was based on its pretension to being the office once occupied by Zarathuštra himself. In any case, it did not correspond to a level of social organization above the daŋ´hu-. Hence, de Blois’ “religious leader of the whole Zoroastrian church” does not provide any support for his thesis of a “fifth level” of socio-political organization.
But even if there was a fifth level of grouping, why does de Blois think that Yt 13.87 ciϑrəm airiianąm dax´iiunąm “the seed of the Aryan tribes” (according to his translation) refers to such a social organization? What is it about this phrase or about the phrase plus its context that makes such an inference plausible? If what is crucial is that it designates the “genealogical organisation” of the airiia-, as de Blois claims,Footnote 89 so, too, does Yt 13.87 nāfō airiianąm da
iiunąm “the family of Airiia peoples,” even more meaningfully. The only reason that de Blois chooses ciϑra- is that it is ostensibly matched in the Old Persian DNa 14–15 ariya: ciça. But the parallel collocation of ariya-/airiia- and ciça-/ciϑra- on its own does not prove anything if one cannot plausibly argue that ciϑrəm airiianąm dax´iiunąm refers to a category of social grouping. According to the usual translation of Yt 13.87 (including de Blois’), worshippers venerate the pre-existent soul (frauua
i-) of Gaiia-marətan from whom Mazdā formed the “race (nāfah-) of the Aryan peoples,” the “seed (ciϑra-) of the Aryan peoples.” How does this context warrant de Blois’ view about the reference of ciϑra- to the “genealogical organisation” of the Airiia? Besides, so far as “genealogy” is concerned, such a view suppresses the knowledge that Gaiia-marətan is the ancestor of all human beings and not just the Airiia. In fact, the privileging of the Airiia peoples to the exclusion of others in Yt 13.87 is dependent on the designation of Gaiia-marətan as the ancestor of the a
auuan- people in particular, that is to say, in a particular respect: the Airiia peoples who inherit the ciϑra- “the luminous form” (of the soul) precisely as a
auuan-. Here is an indirect argument for the interpretation of ciϑra- I proposed in the article.
De Blois’ interpretation of DNa 8–15 is no less problematic. According to him, “Son of Vištāspa” signifies the “patrilineal family, his *māna-”; “an Achaemenid,” “his clan, or vīϑ-”; “a Persian, son of a Persian,” “his tribe, his dahiyu-”; and finally “an Aryan, of Aryan seed” designates “in just the same way that Yašt 13 speaks of ciϑrəm airiianąm dax´iiunąm” “all the Aryans tribes.” “So the Aryans are a ‘seed’ (ciϑra-, ciça-) which encompasses various tribes (dahiyu-), among them the Persians.” Although the third level of Avestan society (the zaṇtu-) is missing, de Blois says, the “Old Persian system is fundamentally identical with that in the Avesta. There are four levels of social organisation: the family (nmāna-, *māna-), the clan (vīs-, vīϑ-), the tribe (daŋ´hu-, dahiyu-), and finally the common seed (ciϑra-, ciça-) of the Aryan tribes.”Footnote 90 I am not sure what to make of the assurance that the two social systems are “fundamentally identical” if the third Avestan level is said to be lacking in the Old Persian one, which then ends up with four rather than five levels. The tendentiousness of this schematization of DNa 8–15 can easily be seen in the fact that the word dahiyu- in the Achaemenid inscriptions generally refers to territories rather than (ethnic) tribes, each with its specific tributary burden to the empire (even if in a couple of cases tribal designations are used), and these territories were not all “Aryan”—unless one allows that dahiyu- is simultaneously a political-geographical category in the imperial nomenclature and the appellation “tribe” in the “Old Persian system.”Footnote 91
In a sense, de Blois knows that his scheme of the Avestan and Achaemenid social systems is untenable, precisely with regard to the “airiia/ariya level” he is keen to establish. Yt 13.87 “suggests,” he says, that “there was also a fifth level of genealogical organisation, namely that of the seed (ciϑra-), and that the airiia- belong to this level.”Footnote 92 Once he postulates his “fifth level” he has to find evidence for it. If there is such a social organization there has to be a corresponding authority. In the absence of an *airiia.pati- he has no choice but to assign the role to the ratu- zaraϑuštrō.təma- (the “religious leader of the whole Zoroastrian church”). The “genealogical organisation of the Aryan tribes” has to be then linked with the “leader of the whole Zoroastrian church,” without which it remains an arbitrary assertion. But, at the same time, in acknowledging that there were “non-Aryan,” “large groups of people” with Zoroastrian components, de Blois undermines what he has erected. For, if the “authority” of the “spiritual leadership of the entire church” was “recognised both by the Aryan and the non-Aryan tribes,”Footnote 93 and thus the “church” included both “Aryan and non-Aryan tribes,” the “genealogical organisation” of the airiia- loses its (supposed) single basis in the Avesta. In the absence of a specifically Aryan ratu- zaraϑuštrō.təma- nothing remains of the “Aryan seed” qua a level of social organization. The same malaise dogs his conception of the Old Persian ariya-ciça, as we just saw. Thus, in his concluding summary de Blois leaves out the thesis of “genealogical organisation” altogether and reverts to the traditional conception of the Airiia:
in the Old Iranian languages airiia/ariya is the name of a unitFootnote 94 encompassing an assortment of tribes who considered themselves to be genetically related. It does not designate a political or religious entity. There is no “lord of the Aryan seed” corresponding to the ‘lords’ of the tribe, the moiety, the clan, and the household.Footnote 95
One wonders then what remains of the thesis of the “Aryan seed.”
/š´/š) are unified in accordance with the etymological principles of their distribution in Hoffmann and Forssman, Avestische Laut- und Flexionslehre.
is’ intervention makes their motion regular: the frauua
is “showed (them) the paths that support a
a” (y
… paϑō daēsaiiən a
aonīš); in effect, paϑō should be amended to paϑ
acc. fem. pl. of paϑā- “path.” Malandra’s translation reverses the role of the daēuuas. It is unlikely, contra Pirart, Les Adorables de Zoroastre, 204, that the phrase “endless lights” is determined by “the stars, the moon, the sun.” Rather, all four terms determine “the paths that support a
a.” We find the same four terms in Y 1.16 in the same ascending order. According to Hintze and Lincoln, Yt 12.29–37 counts nine celestial levels. See Hintze, “The Cow that Came from the Moon,” 60; Lincoln, “Treatment of the Planets in Medieval Zoroastrianism,” 273 note 7. I am not convinced that the passage intends to count the celestial levels. Yt 12.32 stārō yōi spəṇtō.mainiiauua does not mean “the stars that contain the Good Mind,” contra Lincoln, but something like “the stars which pertain to the beneficent-spiritual [sphere].” Cf. Y 1.11.
manaŋhō is turned into a genitive in the translations based on the premise that ciϑrəm is a predicated adjective?), the supposed semantics (why translate “descent” as “offspring” in situ?)—these considerations favor its treatment as an adverb in Y 32.3. See also Ahmadi, “Avestan ciϑra-.” To these grounds must be added the form and etymology of the word. See Wackernagel and Debrunner, Altindische Grammatik. Vol II.2, 849. See my discussion of Zimmer’s alternative etymology in the Appendix.
i (a kind of protective spirit) of Gaiia Marətan (the primordial being, later Gayomard) … , from which (= out of his body parts) he (viz. Ahura Mazda) created the family (vel sim., lit. ‘navel’) of the Aryan lands, the progeny of the Aryan lands” (Zimmer, “The Etymology of Avestan,” 144). As far as I know, the idea that human beings are created by the god from the primal man’s “body parts” is not found anywhere in Zoroastrian texts.
