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Romanised transliteration as printed by the translator, not the original script. This is what we hold.
1Controversies were to the taste of both sects: Gotama, in the GAtakas, seems to pass all his life in confounding heretics ; and late tradition ascribes to Zoroaster, as one of his most 1 Farg. XI, 9. liv VENDIDAD. glorious feats, the defeat and conversion of a great Indian sage Kangragaka. § 7. Buddhism was brought beyond the Indus as early as Asoka’s reign, though it was only under the Graeco- Bactrian kings (250-125 B.C.) and under the Indo-Greeks (first century before Christ) that it spread widely in the eastern provinces of Iran. One of the greatest Indo- ' Greeks, Menander—Milinda, was revered as a Buddhist saint. In the middle of the first century B.c. Bactriana was famed for its Buddhist priests, the Zapavato., the Shamans. In the first century of our era, Kanishka’s coins present, in an instructive eclecticism, all the deities of the Indo-Scythian empire, Greek gods, Brahmanical devas, Buddha, and the principal yazatas of Mazdeism. If therefore the alleged allusions to Buddhism are accepted, the Avesta passages where they occur cannot have been written earlier than the second century before our era, though they may bear a later date, as Buddhism was uprooted from Eastern Iran only by Islam. § 8. We have already seen that Alexander was known to the composer of the Hém Yast, nay more, that it must be posterior to the fall of the Greek domination in Iran (about 150 B.C.). There was time enough for Greek influence to permeate the Zoroastrian schools, and so it did. § 9. The doctrine of the Magi on the duration of the world prevalent during the Achaemenian period is known from Theopompus, a writer contemporary with Philip and Alexander. The existence of the world is divided into periods of three thousand years. During the first two periods Ormazd and Ahriman reign alternately ; during the third period they struggle, and destroy each other's work; at the end, Ahriman is conquered and men live happily, needing no food and casting no shadow. This same doctrine is found in Zoroastrian books, but with a characteristic difference. The world lasts four periods of three thousand years each: the third period is filled, as in Theopompus, with the mixture and conflict of the two principles; the fourth period, that opens with the apparition of Zoroaster and the true religion, ends with the ruin of INTRODUCTION, V. lv Abriman, the resurrection and future life. But in the first two periods the agreement ceases. In the pre-Alexandrian conception, each period belongs to each of the two principles in turn; the spirit of the Zoroastrian doctrine is quite mystical During three thousand years the world had only a spiritual, unseen form, and it remained uncorrupted, unmoving, not perceptible. In the next period of three thousand years, it received material form and began to move, though it was still free from Ahriman.
2In the next period of three thousand years, it received material form and began to move, though it was still free from Ahriman. § 10. That period of spiritual, ideal existence of the world, preceding its material and sensible apparition, reminds one strikingly of the Platonic ideas, and it can hardly have entered Zoroastrianism before Greek philosophy penetrated the East. This hypothesis will seem less bold than it does at first sight, if we remember that, on the confession of old Parsi tradition itself, texts on ‘ generation and corruption’ (yahvQnishn u-vindsishn), recovered from the Greeks, were embodied in the sacred books as late as the end of the third century of our era; and that the. high-priest Tansar, the man who played so important | a part in Ardashir’s religious revolution, was expressly represented as a member of the Platonic sect. Without | pressing conclusions too hard as to facts and dates, this much can be safely inferred from the preceding, that | Platonic doctrines had found their way to Persia in the first centuries of the Christian era. Platonism of course means Neo-Platonism, that is to say that philosophic compound, inspired by the spirit of Plato, which permeated all the speculations of the centuries before Christ and long after, and which finds its first and most influential expression in Philo Judaeus. In Philo is found, as far as I know, the first exact parallel to the Avesta doctrine mentioned above. As God perceived that no work can be beautiful but from a beautiful model, and that any sensible object needs an ideal archetype, ‘ when he wanted to create this visible world, he first drew the intelligible one’ (Bovdnbels tdv dpardy rovrovt xécpov bnutovpyjoat, mpoeferizov rév vontdv). The dpatds xdéopos is the gaéthya sti, the ronrds is the mainyava. lvi VENDIDAD. § 11. The first Genius under Ahura is Vohu Mané, ‘Good Thought,’ who is his first spiritual creation and the moving principle of the world. He was created first of all beings; through him in the beginning Ahura created the world and the religion ; and Ahura takes his advice before proceeding to any of his acts. Besides being his first creation and the instrument of his other creations, he is the type of mankind. At last, in the next world, he is the intercessor between Ahura and man.
3Besides being his first creation and the instrument of his other creations, he is the type of mankind. At last, in the next world, he is the intercessor between Ahura and man. When we define Vohu Mané in the words of the Avesta, we define the Logos: and inversely Vohu Mané may be defined in the same terms as Philo’s Adyos @eios : ‘as the first manifestation of the divine powers, he is the first-born, the first archangel of God; as an ideal type of human nature, he is the perfect man.’ Like Vohu Mané in the GAthas and still more, the Logos is the instrument of creation. Like him, he is the perfect intercessor, for he applies to the Father to obtain for men the forgiveness of sins and plenty of benefits. As Zarathustra applies to Vohu Mané for his first instruction, so is the Logos the messenger of God, his elect, the transmitter of his revelations. Both Philo’s Logos and the Avesta Vohu Mané are God’s first-born and first instrument, the ideal man, the intercessor, the revealer. § 12. If Vohu Mand is a Zoroastrian adaptation of the Logos, it will follow that the Amshaspands themselves are a post-Alexandrian development; for Vohu Mané is the type of the Amshaspands. As Vohu Mané was chosen to represent mankind, so there grew up round this initial ideal divine abstractions that might be attached, somehow, to the other departments of nature to help like Vohu Mané, and with him, in the creation of the world. This is the series of the six Amesha Spentas: Vohu Mané, Good Thought, _ reigning over Man (and cattle). Asha Vahista, Perfect Righteousness, _,, Fire. Khshathra Vairya, Good Royalty, ” Metals. Spenta Armaiti, Pious Modesty, » Earth. Haurvatat, Health, ” Waters. Ameretat, Immortality, ” Plants. Here again Philo presents us with a striking parallel. INTRODUCTION, VI. lvii
The source text as printed, transcribed diplomatically. Where the source language uses a non-Latin script that reaches us only through a Victorian romanisation, this layer is labelled transliteration, because that is what we hold.
Romanised transliteration as printed by the translator, not the original script. This is what we hold.
1Controversies were to the taste of both sects: Gotama, in the GAtakas, seems to pass all his life in confounding heretics ; and late tradition ascribes to Zoroaster, as one of his most 1 Farg. XI, 9. liv VENDIDAD. glorious feats, the defeat and conversion of a great Indian sage Kangragaka. § 7. Buddhism was brought beyond the Indus as early as Asoka’s reign, though it was only under the Graeco- Bactrian kings (250-125 B.C.) and under the Indo-Greeks (first century before Christ) that it spread widely in the eastern provinces of Iran. One of the greatest Indo- ' Greeks, Menander—Milinda, was revered as a Buddhist saint. In the middle of the first century B.c. Bactriana was famed for its Buddhist priests, the Zapavato., the Shamans. In the first century of our era, Kanishka’s coins present, in an instructive eclecticism, all the deities of the Indo-Scythian empire, Greek gods, Brahmanical devas, Buddha, and the principal yazatas of Mazdeism. If therefore the alleged allusions to Buddhism are accepted, the Avesta passages where they occur cannot have been written earlier than the second century before our era, though they may bear a later date, as Buddhism was uprooted from Eastern Iran only by Islam. § 8. We have already seen that Alexander was known to the composer of the Hém Yast, nay more, that it must be posterior to the fall of the Greek domination in Iran (about 150 B.C.). There was time enough for Greek influence to permeate the Zoroastrian schools, and so it did. § 9. The doctrine of the Magi on the duration of the world prevalent during the Achaemenian period is known from Theopompus, a writer contemporary with Philip and Alexander. The existence of the world is divided into periods of three thousand years. During the first two periods Ormazd and Ahriman reign alternately ; during the third period they struggle, and destroy each other's work; at the end, Ahriman is conquered and men live happily, needing no food and casting no shadow. This same doctrine is found in Zoroastrian books, but with a characteristic difference. The world lasts four periods of three thousand years each: the third period is filled, as in Theopompus, with the mixture and conflict of the two principles; the fourth period, that opens with the apparition of Zoroaster and the true religion, ends with the ruin of INTRODUCTION, V. lv Abriman, the resurrection and future life. But in the first two periods the agreement ceases. In the pre-Alexandrian conception, each period belongs to each of the two principles in turn; the spirit of the Zoroastrian doctrine is quite mystical During three thousand years the world had only a spiritual, unseen form, and it remained uncorrupted, unmoving, not perceptible. In the next period of three thousand years, it received material form and began to move, though it was still free from Ahriman.
2In the next period of three thousand years, it received material form and began to move, though it was still free from Ahriman. § 10. That period of spiritual, ideal existence of the world, preceding its material and sensible apparition, reminds one strikingly of the Platonic ideas, and it can hardly have entered Zoroastrianism before Greek philosophy penetrated the East. This hypothesis will seem less bold than it does at first sight, if we remember that, on the confession of old Parsi tradition itself, texts on ‘ generation and corruption’ (yahvQnishn u-vindsishn), recovered from the Greeks, were embodied in the sacred books as late as the end of the third century of our era; and that the. high-priest Tansar, the man who played so important | a part in Ardashir’s religious revolution, was expressly represented as a member of the Platonic sect. Without | pressing conclusions too hard as to facts and dates, this much can be safely inferred from the preceding, that | Platonic doctrines had found their way to Persia in the first centuries of the Christian era. Platonism of course means Neo-Platonism, that is to say that philosophic compound, inspired by the spirit of Plato, which permeated all the speculations of the centuries before Christ and long after, and which finds its first and most influential expression in Philo Judaeus. In Philo is found, as far as I know, the first exact parallel to the Avesta doctrine mentioned above. As God perceived that no work can be beautiful but from a beautiful model, and that any sensible object needs an ideal archetype, ‘ when he wanted to create this visible world, he first drew the intelligible one’ (Bovdnbels tdv dpardy rovrovt xécpov bnutovpyjoat, mpoeferizov rév vontdv). The dpatds xdéopos is the gaéthya sti, the ronrds is the mainyava. lvi VENDIDAD. § 11. The first Genius under Ahura is Vohu Mané, ‘Good Thought,’ who is his first spiritual creation and the moving principle of the world. He was created first of all beings; through him in the beginning Ahura created the world and the religion ; and Ahura takes his advice before proceeding to any of his acts. Besides being his first creation and the instrument of his other creations, he is the type of mankind. At last, in the next world, he is the intercessor between Ahura and man.
3Besides being his first creation and the instrument of his other creations, he is the type of mankind. At last, in the next world, he is the intercessor between Ahura and man. When we define Vohu Mané in the words of the Avesta, we define the Logos: and inversely Vohu Mané may be defined in the same terms as Philo’s Adyos @eios : ‘as the first manifestation of the divine powers, he is the first-born, the first archangel of God; as an ideal type of human nature, he is the perfect man.’ Like Vohu Mané in the GAthas and still more, the Logos is the instrument of creation. Like him, he is the perfect intercessor, for he applies to the Father to obtain for men the forgiveness of sins and plenty of benefits. As Zarathustra applies to Vohu Mané for his first instruction, so is the Logos the messenger of God, his elect, the transmitter of his revelations. Both Philo’s Logos and the Avesta Vohu Mané are God’s first-born and first instrument, the ideal man, the intercessor, the revealer. § 12. If Vohu Mand is a Zoroastrian adaptation of the Logos, it will follow that the Amshaspands themselves are a post-Alexandrian development; for Vohu Mané is the type of the Amshaspands. As Vohu Mané was chosen to represent mankind, so there grew up round this initial ideal divine abstractions that might be attached, somehow, to the other departments of nature to help like Vohu Mané, and with him, in the creation of the world. This is the series of the six Amesha Spentas: Vohu Mané, Good Thought, _ reigning over Man (and cattle). Asha Vahista, Perfect Righteousness, _,, Fire. Khshathra Vairya, Good Royalty, ” Metals. Spenta Armaiti, Pious Modesty, » Earth. Haurvatat, Health, ” Waters. Ameretat, Immortality, ” Plants. Here again Philo presents us with a striking parallel. INTRODUCTION, VI. lvii
The source text as printed, transcribed diplomatically. Where the source language uses a non-Latin script that reaches us only through a Victorian romanisation, this layer is labelled transliteration, because that is what we hold.
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