the evils of their own time. But if they found the system in an ancient document, they might have been quite willing to admit that evils existed, owing to their enemies, which would have become much worse if they had not been mitigated by their own exertions. In fact, an old document prophesying evil which actually occurred at the time specified, could be used as evidence of the truth of their religion, and would therefore be carefully preserved. And it is quite certain that, if they had altered the chronology of an old document which foretold the time of the downfall of the monarchy, they could not have correctly guessed that time before the downfall occurred. For these reasons we must conclude that the original system of chronology, handed down by the Bundahis, was neither compiled nor altered in the time of Ardashir.
63. For the long reign of Shahpühar II (A.D. 309-379) the original tradition predicted not only a continuation of evil times, but also the birth and education of a new apostle, AüshéZar, for the next millennium, who was expected to put an end to evil for about four centuries. His birth was to take place in A. D. 341, and his conference was to commence in 371. These dates are so well defined that, if we could discover any important religious teacher to whom they could refer, we might be justified in believing that the original chronology was compiled in his time. Unfortunately, we know very little of the ‘nternal history of Persia during this reign; there was war with the Romans in 337-350 and 358-363, and on the eastern frontiers in the intervening period ; also a persecution of the Christians, beginning about 339; all of which fairly represent the predicted evils.
64. Regarding the priesthood and religious history of the reign, we have only the traditions handed down in Pahlavi texts to guide us. In these we are told that Átürpád, son of Máraspend (Dk. VII, vii, 19), was born in the steel period (Dk. IX, viii, 4), and lived in the reign of king Shahpühar II, son of AüharmazZ (AW. p. 145 n), being high-priest over the religion (Dd. NN VII,360. He also collected and preserved the Nasks (Dk. VIII, i, 22),
XXXVI PAHLAVI TEXTS.
and, after he had proved his orthodoxy by ordeal (Sg. X, 70, 71), the king proclaimed his intention of not allowing any more heterodoxy (Dk. IV, 27!). In his old age he obtained a son, after devout prayer, and named him Zara- tüst (Pandnámak, 1); but this son also bore the Avesta title of Avarethrabau (Dk. VII, vii, 20, 21; VIII, xiii, 18), who is called the son of Rástare-vaghezt in Yt. XIII, 106, showing that this latter Avesta title was adopted by ÁAtürpág himself. Finally, we meet with another Atürpád, son of Zaratüst, described in Peshotan's Dk. III, cxxxvii, 2, as high-priest in the reign of Yazdakard I (A.D. 399-420), son of Shahpühar, and also mentioned in Pahl. Yas. p. 120, ll. 14, 15 Sp. (translated in Dk. VIII, i, 7 n).
65. We have here, evidently, three successive high-priests, father, son, and grandson, and all celebrated men. The father had been employed in collecting and revising, or probably translating, some of the sacred books, and then, after a religious discussion, submitted himself to the ordeal of melted metal, as a test of his orthodoxy. The king was convinced, and his proclamation meant persecution of the heterodox, such as was commenced about A.D. 339, as regards the Christians. So that we may safely assume that ÀÁtürpád's ordeal took place shortly before this date, and probably shortly after 337, when the Roman war commenced. As we must also certainly assume that the original chronology could not have come into existence at a much later date than 341, when so remarkable an event as the birth of a new apostle was fixed by it to occur, we have to consider who this apostle could have been; and whether it may not have been intended to identify him with Atüzpáz's own son.
66. In the first place, is such a suspicion consistent with known dates? To represent Aüshégar, according to the original chronology, the son must have been born A. D. 341 ($63); and we may suppose that the time of Adshédar’s conference (371) would represent the time of Atdrpad’s
' See S. B. E,, vol, xxvii, p. 415.
INTRODUCTION. xxxvii
death, when his son succeeded him in the high-priesthood. If Atürpág were aged eighty-one at his death, he would have been fifty-one at the birth of his son, or approaching old age; and he would have been born in 290, or nineteen years before the king. His grandson may have been born in 365, when his father Zaratüst was twenty-four, and may have succeeded that father in the high-priesthood about 400, the second year of king Yazdakard I. As all these dates are reasonably consistent with the few facts that are known, there seems to be no impossibility in the hypothesis that the original chronology of AüshéZar's birth may have had some connection with the date of the birth of Âtûrpâd’s son. The dates assumed, with regard to these three high- priests, which may be slightly varied, are as follows : —
Atürpád, born 2996, high-priest 320, died 371. Zaratüst, , 341, » 371, » 400. Atfirpad, ,, 365, p 400, ,, 420, or later.
67. On the other hand, we must recollect that the time of the birth of Afishédar was not an isolated date which could be varied at pleasure, to suit any circumstances that might arise; but it was intimately connected with the dates of birth of three other apostles, which were each placed at the same distance from the ends of three other millenniums. It would perhaps be more difficult to suit a new millennial system of chronology, to the accidental year of a particular child’s birth, than to have the child born in a particular year of an old system already existing. And, if so, it may be safer to assume that ÁtürpáZ, knowing the year of the expected birth, took measures to secure the fulfilment of the prophecy, so far as the birth was concerned. If the child did not turn out so capable of regenerating the world as had been expected, that was a matter for posterity to explain. Under such circumstances of merely seeming fulfilment of a single particular, fraudulently obtained, the original prediction might be of any age.
68. It does not appear that the priestly councillors assembled by Khüsró I (Byt. I, 7), made any alteration in
XXXVili PAHLAVI TEXTS.
the original chronology, although they slightly revised the Pahlavi Vendidad. In fact, the priests, who must have been long expecting the end of Zaratüst's millennium, were probably looking forward for the approaching downfall of the Sásánian monarchy, which might readily be understood, as the surest sign of the termination of this period, from such statements as those in Dk. VII, viii, 1, 2. At any rate, the alterations in the chronology, for the purpose of postponing the end of the tenth millennium till A. D. 635, would not have been made till some time after the ter- mination of the monarchy in 651, but probably long before the compilation of the Bundahis about goo. The effects of these alterations upon the dates of the evil ninth and tenth centuries, and upon those of the birth, conference, and preaching of Aüshégar, have been already stated in $61. And their object has evidently been to adapt the old predictions as much as possible to real events; for which purpose also, the predictions themselves have prob- ably been often made more definite than they were originally.
69. It follows, from the foregoing investigation, that the original chronology must have existed A.D. 341, and, in fact, we have found no sufficient reason for supposing that it was compiled as late as Sásánian times. While the alterations, we find in the Bundahis, could have hardly been made till after 651.
70. Regarding the age in which Zaratüst lived, the dates stated in the synopsis of traditional chronology (8 55), are B. C. 660-583, while the reign of Vistásp, which extends to the fabulous length of 120 years, or 660-540, evidently represents a short dynasty, including Hystaspes and his next four forefathers, if we accept the traditional identifica- tion of Vistasp with the father of Darius I. But the names of those four forefathers, which are known on the unim- peachable authority of the Behistün inscription of Darius himself, render it almost impossible to accept this tra- ditional identification, as they differ totally from those of
the forefathers of Vistasp in the Avesta. The two
dynasties are as follows :—
Introduction. Xxxix
Behistün : Hakhamanis Avesta: Kavi Kaváta
K aispis Kava Usa
Ariyárámna Kava Husrava
Arsháma Aurvadaspa
Vistaspa Kava Vistáspa!.
Unless it can be shown that these two series of names
have the same meaning in two different languages, there
seems little chance of proving the identity of the two
dynasties. We may, however, quote the instances of the
high-priest Atarpad=Atare-pata and his son Zaratüst—
Zarathustra being called Rastare-vaghewt and Avarethra-
bau, respectively, in the Avesta (see § 64); but these
latter names seem more like titles than translations.
71. The date of Zoroaster and his religion has formerly been fully discussed by Windischmann ? and others, and the question has been lately re-examined by Williams Jackson?. He divides the ancient statements, that have been made on the subject, into three classes: those which declare that Zaratüst lived before B.C. 6000, those which associate his name with Ninus and Semiramis, and the native tradition which, as we have seen, places his life in the period B.C. 660-583. Singularly enough, the oldest writers, those who lived only two to four centuries after the traditional period of the lifetime of Zaratüst, are those who report that he lived some 6000 years before that period. Pliny the Elder (Nat. Hist. XXX, 2) quotes Eudoxus (B.C. 368) as stating that Zaratüst existed 6000 years before the death of Plato, that is, B.C. 6347, which is also cun- firmed by Aristotle. And he quotes Hermippus (about B.C. 250) as placing him 5000 years before the Trojan war, that is, B.C. 6184. A third mode of describing this period
1 These were the reigning sovereigns, but the last two are descended from a collateral branch, and their actual pedigree is as follows :—Kavi Kaváta, Kavi Aipivanghu, Kavi Pisanangh, Manus, Uzava, Aurvadaspa, Kava Vistáspa (Bd. XXXI, 28, 29).
2 Zoroastrische Studien, von Fr. Windischmann, edited by Spiegel, 1863 ; pp. 121-165, 260-313. ;
* On the date of Zoroaster, by A. V. Williams Jackson; Journal of American Oriental Society, vol. xvii, pp. 1-22.
xl PAHLAVI TEXTS.
i an
seems to have been used by Xanthus of Lydia (B.C. 500-
450)! who stated that Zaratüst lived 6000 years before
Xerxes, as quoted by Diogenes Laertius, that is, B.C. 6485.
72. Three or four other classical writers mention similar statements, and Jackson points out that these extravagant dates are probably owing to the European writers mis- understanding Persian statements with reference to the pre-existence of Zaratüst's Fravashi. It will, in fact, be seen from the synopsis ($ 55) that the traditional account is that the spiritual body of Zaratüst was framed together as early as the beginning of the fourth millennium, which occurred B.C. 6630, and this may be accepted as a close approximation to the three dates, B.C. 6347, 6184, and 6485, indicated by the ancient writers, considering that their statements are made in even thousands of years.
73. Pliny also mentions, on the authority of other writers who are not named, that another Zoroaster, a Proconnesian, lived a little before the time of Osthanes who accompanied Xerxes to Greece (B.C. 480). And, so far as time is con- cerned, this Zoroaster might have been the traditional Zaratüst who died 103 years before this journey of Osthanes.
74. The old statements about Zoroaster or Oxyartes, the Magian king of Bactria in the time of Ninus and Semi- ramis, can hardly refer to the traditional Zaratüst who is never represented as a king, although the supreme Zara- thustra of the Avesta was apparently a ruling priest. The time in which this Bactrian lived is also very uncertain, for though Semiramis has recently been placed about B.C. 800, her position in Albirüni's tables is certainly 1200 years earlier.
75. It seems, therefore, that the ancient statements, regarding the date of Zaratüst, reported by Pliny and cor- roborated by a few other classical writers, can be fully explained from the traditional system of chronology used in Pahlavi texts, by identifying the classical Zoroaster of the seventh millennium B.C. with the traditional Zaratüst
es DEL S
| There are some doubts as to the correctness of these dates.
