Preliminary Remarks

1

In ancient times the Persians worshipped Zeus and Cronos and all the other divinities of the Hellenic pantheon, except that they called them by different names.¹ […] But nowadays their views conform for the most part to those of the so-called Manichaeans, to the extent of their holding that there are two first principles one of which is good and has given rise to all that is fine in reality and the other of which is the complete antithesis in both its properties and its function. They assign barbarous names drawn from their own language to these entities. The good divinity or creator they call Ahuramazda, whereas the name of the evil and malevolent one is Ahriman. (Agathias, Hist., 2.24.8–9; translation by Frendo in Agathias 1975)

2

The most characteristic religious feature of pre-Islamic Iran is the embedding of its theology in an ontological, cosmological and also ethical dualism. This holds true for Mazdaism/Zoroastrianism (second millennium BCE until today) (in the following: ‘Zoroastrianism’), but also for Manichaeism (third century CE until the early second millennium). Both religions, Zoroastrianism and Manichaeism, seem to regard themselves as religions of the “two principles” (MP dō bun(ištag)). While in Manichaeism, dō bun is an emic term from the times of Mani, which the religious founder applied to the kernel of his religion during the days of his stay at the court of Šābuhr, it remains to be examined when a comparable conceptual reflection of the philosophical fundamentals took place in Zoroastrianism, and how it is related to the Manichaean solution. The two ‘philosophical’ books of the Zoroastrian Middle Persian literature, Dēnkard 3 (early ninth century) and Škand Gumānīg Wizār (probably middle of the ninth century), show that reflection about the dualistic conception of being was the key topic of Zoroastrian intellectuals.

3

Because of the significantly higher age of Zoroastrianism, it is (and was already in the early Islamic period) communis opinio that the Manichaean dualism is a reformulation of the Zoroastrian one. Although this opinion certainly includes a kernel of truth, it needs at least some complements. First, one needs to inquire about the relation between the Manichaean dualism and the dualism of the Avesta. It seems to me that the Manichaean dualism draws the radical conclusion from a Younger Avestan structural tendency. Secondly, one cannot help thinking that late antique and early Islamic Zoroastrianism came to a new shaping of its dualism under the influence of the Manichaean conception, i.e., that the Zoroastrian concept/term dō bun(ištag) is a reaction to the Manichaean concept/term dō bun. In addition to the assumption of such an external demarcating process, one should inquire both about the internal considerations and the theological-philosophical models late antique or early Islamic Zoroastrianism adopted to solve the problems generated by its own critique of the Manichaean dualistic model.

4

Thus, my paper tries to explain the genesis of the Iranian religion(s) in the late antique and early Islamic period on the basis of three dynamic elements: 1) religious competition and demarcation; 2) theoretical considerations within one religion; 3) the adoption of philosophical models.

On MP bun(išt)(ag) “principle”

5

The MP word bun (bwn) goes back to OIr *buna-/būna- (OAv būna-; YAv buna-) < *budna-, cf. Ved budhná- m.² This *bu(d)na- has the same meaning as its cognates Gr πυϑμήν m., Lat fundus or Germ Boden, “ground” and – cf. MIndic bundha- n. – “root.” The word designates low-lying things/places. In the Younger Avesta the meaning “ground (of the waters)” dominates.³ It seems that the Avesta only paves the way for the later meanings of “beginning,” “principle.” In Y 53.7, the būna- (Loc būnōi.) “vagina” or “uterus” is probably the place of the mainiiuš. drəguuatō. (cf. Y 30.5 aiiā̊. mainiuuā̊. … yə̄. drəguuā̊.).⁴ V 19.47 uses an expression bunəm. aŋhə̄uš. təmaŋhe. “(to the) ground of the dark existence,”⁵ i.e., the place of the demons. Especially this bunəm. aŋhə̄uš. təmaŋhe. is instructive because it points to a connection of “the deep place” and the place where the evil beings live.⁶ The deep place is also understood as the place without light (see PahlTr V 19.47). So buna- appears as the kernel of a semantic cluster designating deepness/evil/lightlessness. Even though the semantic inversion of this cluster already exists in the Avesta, the word buna- is not applied to these two clusters as a general term. From the evidence of the Avestan sources, we must conclude that a more abstract meaning of bun(a-) as “fundament; source⁷; principle” was not developed before the post-Avestan period.

6

The Zoroastrian sources from the period between the end of the Avestan text production⁸ and the Pahlavi texts of the ninth century are not numerous.⁹ The best and oldest information on the religious development in the post-Achaemenid period comes from the Greek Nebenüberlieferung and points to a usage of *bun(a) as “principle” in the fourth century BCE. Eudoxos¹⁰, Theopompos¹¹ and Hermippus¹² spoke of “two principles”¹³ (δύο … ἀρχάς) (cf. Gnoli 1974, 141) that were called Oromazdes and Areimanios by the Magi (Diog. Laert., Vit.Philos., Prooem. 6,8). Aristotle (384–322) uses δαίμων (≈ Av mainiiu-) as the generic term for two opposing transcendent beings of the Iranian religion.¹⁴ He designates both the ἀγαϑὸν δαίμονα as well as the κακὸν δαίμονα as the ἀρχάς:¹⁵

7

It is likely that the Middle Persian dō bun(ištag) corresponds to Gr δύο … ἀρχάς. These “two principles” are identified as Ohrmazd and Ahreman by the Greek authors. A philosophical usage of ἀρχή (“principle”) in Greek can be traced back to Anaximander (first half of the sixth century BCE), who called his highest concept, the ἄπειρον “the infinite”, an ἀρχή. Simplicius (in Phys. 150.23; cf. Aristoteles, Metaph. 983b11), says that it was indeed Anaximander who introduced the term ἀρχή (πρῶτος τοῦτο τοὔνομα κομίσας τῆς ἀρχῆς). This is remarkable because a) there is evidence that Anaximander’s ἄπειρον and cosmology is the philosophical reformulation of an Iranian cosmological model (Burkert 1963),¹⁷ and b) the topic of the “infinity of the principle(s)” is also known from the Bundahišn, a late antique text that probably has its roots in the Avesta (see below).

8

The next occurrence of the term “two principles” is (and probably not by chance) the title of Mani‘s Šābuhragān, dw bwn ʿy šʾbwhrgʾn.¹⁸ Parthian texts testify an expression dw bwn wrzg “the two great principles,” which is a designation of the fundamental dualism of the cosmos (see GW 111 (§22,3) and the expression Parth. dw bwngʾhyg/dō bunγāhīg). Parthian bun (bwn) and bunγāh (bwngʾh, bwnγʾh) “base, foundation” corresponds to MMP bwnyšt “origin, principle, foundation.”

9

In ZMP texts, the word bun has more or less the same meaning as Avestan buna-/būna-, “beginning;¹⁹ base, root, source” (in the simplex and in the first member of a compound). Only Dk 3 and ŠGW uses rarely the expression dō bun for “the two principles” (see Dk 3.383; 3.414; ŠGW 10.39 [cf. 11.383] bun. i. du., 10.42, 11.327 du. bun.²⁰).²¹ The ‘abstract’ meaning “principle” is the common meaning of the enlarged form bun-išt(-ag)(-īh) (Pāz. buniiaštaa.). This enlarged word-formation and its ‘abstract’ meaning is unknown in the Pahlavi Vīdēvdād,²² a Zoroastrian work from the Sasanid period (Cantera 1999, 2004), probably because of the translator’s intention to avoid anachronistic interpretations of Avestan words.²³

Mani, the perverter of the Abestāg and Zand …

10

From the information given by the classical authors, we can deduce that, at least beginning with the second half of the first millennium BCE, a term “principle” and a concept “the <teaching of the> two principles” existed in Iran. The prominent position, however, that Mani granted to the above term and the concept in the third century CE certainly influenced their further development and contextualization in the Zoroastrian theology.

11

Mani appeared, to his Zoroastrian counterparts, as a perverter of the holy Zoroastrian texts. According to a passage in Dādestān ī dēnīg, one of the seven Zoroastrian arch-sinners is the ahlomōγ (= frēftār “deceiver”). This “confuser of Aṣ̌a” (this is the literal meaning of ahlomōγ, a loan from Av. arta-maoγa-) is, according to the paraphrase of the term in Dd 71, the one who wardēnīd abestāg ud zand “perverted abestāg ud zand” (the holy texts which Dd 71 also calls weh-ahlāyīh “<the acts of> the Good Truth”). He is accused of a kind of ‘forgery’ of the religious writings (ayāddān):

12

The text does not provide the identity of the ahlomōγ, most likely because the intention of the Zoroastrian author was to establish a “mythical model of a heretic.” This model fits the great ‘heretics’ of the Sasanian period, Mani and Mazdak, very well, however. The lexicon of Manichaean Middle Persian, Parthian, and Sogdian includes a good number of loan words from the Zoroastrian context (see Colditz 2005). It seems that Mani had access to the (still unwritten?) Avesta (see Cantera 2004, 106–53),²⁵ probably in its Pahlavi translation(s). To give just one example: the Parthian Gyān wifrās (GW §21), edited a few years ago by Werner Sundermann, mentions a “Nask” with the name “the Living Nask” ((n)s(g) jywʾng). This Nask – jywʾng²⁶ is perhaps a folk-etymological interpretation of Zand (cf. Herders and Kleukers “Lebendiges Wort”²⁷) and points to the five “god”s (yzd) which represent the five elements and bear the names of the Gāϑās:

13

Gyān wifrās illustrates a typical aspect of Manichaean textual technique, namely the reference to the Avestan texts (probably in their Zand-form) and the combination of their names with new elements, in the case of the Gyān wifrās Aristotelian-Manichaean elements. This combination, suggested and enabled by the occurrence of the number 5 (five Gāϑās/five Manichaean elements), could possibly make a Zoroastrian critic believe that it led the Manichaeans to an esoteric interpretation of the most ‘holy’ Zoroastrian texts, and, as such, that it ‘perverted’ the ‘true’ Zoroastrian understanding of the Gāϑās.

… And its Executor

14

If we leave aside this contingent reinterpretation (an insider would have seen it as ‘perverting’) of more peripheral Zoroastrian terms and concepts, and take into consideration the conceptual kernel of Manichaeism, that is, the teaching of the ‘dō bun,’ we could describe Mani’s teaching as the fulfilment of metaphorical-conceptual tendencies that can be found only in the Avesta. The key difference between Manichaeism and Zoroastrianism is the Manichean identification of hyle (“matter”) with Evil, which leads to a simplification of the Zoroastrian double dualism of good/evil and material/immaterial.

15

In the Younger Avesta and in late antique Zoroastrianism, we can observe that the formula dark=evil presents connections to matter (although it has essentially only a mēnōg-existence,²⁸ it nests parasitically only in the material world), whereas the formula light=good carries allusions to the non-material (aṣ̌a “truth” is light, see Y 37.1). Nevertheless, the relationship between dark=evil/light=good and gētīg/mēnōg is more complex in Zoroastrianism than in Manichaeism. Historically, it indicates two different ways to situate these terms in different constellations.

16

As we have seen in V 19.47, the Younger Avesta is already acquainted with the semantic cluster of “deep = lightless / evil.” In Manichaeism, this cluster seems to be enlarged by the element of “matter.” The tertium of both, matter and Evil, is very probably lightlessness/darkness. In Avestan Zoroastrianism, in particular in the cosmology of Yt 13 and (then) Bundahišn, lightlessness is, at least implicitly, the logical consequence of the theological decision to separate light from the other (six) ‘elements’ and to oppose it to them.

17

Thus, Manichaeism creates, one might say, its theory by a superimposition of two (explicit or implicit) Avestan equations:

18

1. V 19.47 lightlessness/darkness = Evil
2. Yt 13 light/fire is separated from / opposed and superior to the other material elements (> light contra material elements)

19

The scheme of the superimposition is depicted in figure 1. The combination of Yt 13 and V 19 has a further implication. If “evil” is “lightless”, and if “lightless” is “material” (“tactile” according to the later Zoroastrian epistemology²⁹), then the inversion of the argument leads to the conclusion that the immaterial is the light which is goodness.³⁰ Mani’s worldview is consonant with notions preformed in the Younger Avesta: the identification of light with goodness and its opposition to matter. It was, as we shall see, the task of the late antique Zoroastrian theology to find arguments against Mani’s conclusion, but also to explore ways not to radically separate light from matter.

The Zoroastrian Critique of the Manichaean dō a-bun Conception…

20

It is remarkable that Mani’s radical theological-philosophical conclusion was not adopted by late antique Zoroastrianism. Yet it is a conclusion that tends to be drawn in Zoroastrian cult practices, for instance, in establishing an eternal/unpolluted fire. In the more trivial forms of Zoroastrian cosmology (see, e.g., MX 1.31-32), one could also identify a correlation between gētīg (material) and world with demons, and, on the other hand, mēnōg (spiritual) and world without demons. My explanation for this Zoroastrian non-fulfilment of what can probably be described as an overarching historical tendency—the cultural increase of abhorrence of the materia—is that a) a radical abhorrence of the materia can produce economic problems,³¹ and b) the dualistic competitor already drew a radical conclusion, that is, the damnation of the material world. According to the latter hypothesis, the Zoroastrian priests of both the pre-Islamic and the Islamic period had to find arguments against the Manichaean dualism (or against any dualism of ‘Manichaean’ expression), and to formulate a dualism in which light, darkness, and matter could be set as an alternative and convincing constellation.

21

The Zoroastrian key argument against the Manichaean identification of materia and darkness/evil is that by such an identification, the materia necessarily appears as something infinite, as one could see from Ādurbād’s argument in Dk 3.199.7 against Mani’s teaching in Dk 3.200:³²

22

Ādurfarrbay discusses the teachings of the Jews, the Manichaeans, and the Sōfistās in Dk 3.150 (a chapter dated to the early ninth century). The text claims that the Sophists teach a general a-bun, i.e., non-creation of the whole being.³⁵ In the following, the term a-bun is also applied to the Jewish and even to the Manichaean position³⁶ (where we would rather expect the use of bun, buništag, see B 169.5f., and in particular the self-designation of Manichaeism as the religion of the dō bun* [see above]).³⁷ The following text presents the Jews as declaring the necessity and possibility of one and only one a-bun (a monotheistic position). The Manichaean teaching of dō a-bun is presented and criticized as follows:

23

It seems that the Manichaeans are not criticized for their definition of dō bun as dō a-bun, in the sense of “what has no beginning.”⁴¹ For Ādurfarrbay, a true bun (see above B 169.5f.) is infinite (i.e., an a-bun “what has no beginning” is the definition of bun “principle”). Ādurfarrbay’s general argument seems to be that an a-bun (= bun) cannot be part of a “body-sky” because it cannot be material, finite.⁴² In the case of the Manichaeans, he observes that they claim an “infinite materia,” a logical incoherent concept; the report of Šahrastānī (eleventh/twelfth century)⁴³ says that in difference to the “Majūs,” the Thanawīya, and within this school the Manichaeans, claims the infinity of light and of darkness (Haarbrücker 1850–1851, I:285). Šahrastānī’s report on the “Majūs” (“Majūs” is a general term for the three Zoroastrian schools known to Šahrastānī) starts with a comparison of the schools of the “original Majūs” and the Thanawīya (Haarbrücker 1850–1851, I:275–276) shows that their key differences pertain to:

24

a) the question of an (in)finity of light (= God/goodness) and darkness (= Evil/evil) (all Majūs groups seem to claim a non-infinity of the darkness); and
b) the reconstruction of the mixture of light and darkness.⁴⁴

… And Its Consequences

25

Ādurbād’s refutation of Manichaean teachings⁴⁵ is grounded in its critique of Mānī’s giving the status of “principle” to the material element—which is, in the Manichaean perspective, identical with the evil/darkness. Ādurbād’s logical argument is, as I have indicated above, that one can define as principles only those ‘things’ that take a predicate ‘long/eternal.’ The argument leads to two conclusions. First, the materia cannot be evil, which is, in the Zoroastrian point of view, at least ‘partly eternal’;⁴⁶ secondly, only goodness and (partly) evil can claim to be ‘principles.’ Ādurbād’s answer to Mānī preserved (or, at least, ascribed to Ādurbād) in Dk 3 is nothing less than the Zoroastrian deconstruction of the fundament of Manichaean theology, a fundament that was also build on Avestan motifs (see above). This deconstruction, however, opens a theoretical gap. Zoroastrian theology must answer the following question: How, then, is the materia related to the dō buništag?

26

The really sensitive point in the argumentation is the status of light. In Dk 3.150, the Manichaeans are seemingly criticized, as said above, for their perspective on light and darkness as two infinite beings, as dō a-bun. Although Zoroastrian schools (according to Šahrastānī’s report) take different positions with regard to the status of light, they all try to define an ontological difference between the status of light and that of darkness. The general question behind the different Zoroastrian consideration is: Does ‘light’ belong to the material/finite or to the spiritual/infinite world? If we were to rephrase the same question in modern terms, we would ask: is ‘light’ a phenomenon or a concept?⁴⁷

The dualistic conception in the Bun-dahišn⁴⁸

27

The Zoroastrian catechism in Pahlavi CHP/Pand Nāmag replies very concisely to the question asked in CHP 1 buništag ēw ayāb dō “there are one or two principles?”:

28

The most prominent chapters presenting the Zoroastrian teaching of the dō buništag are the cosmogonical introductions of the Wizīdagīhā ī Zādsparam and the Bundahišn. The beginning of the WZ indeed frequently uses the word buništ(ag)(īh), often in problematic spellings (see WZ 1.12 bwšnnst’ (+bwnyšt’) ī tārīgīh “basis of darkness”; WZ 1.15 bwnsyšyt’/bwšyšyt-ē “one (of two) principles”; WZ 1.21 dō bwndhštyh/bwnyštkyh “dualism”; WZ 1.28 bwnyštʾn’/bnyštʾn’ “<both> principles”; WZ 22.5 dōīh ī bwnyštʾn’/wwnyštʾn’ “the duality of the principles”). The beginning of the Bundahišn (Bd 1.1-12)⁵³ is a great cosmogonical tableau that presents the “two principles”. The text⁵⁴ has at least three interesting aspects:

29

1) After a quotation from the text of the weh-dēn (probably the translation of an Avestan text) in Bd 1.1, Bd 1.2 starts with a philosophical definition of the essence of Ohrmazd (we find the same textual structure in Bd 1.3+4 with reference to Ahreman).
2) This definition is interesting from the perspective of content since it points to a concept of emanations.
3) The notions of finitude/infinity (kanāragōmandīh/akanāragōmandīh) are the most important subjects of debate in Bd 1.1-12.⁵⁵

30

Regarding the first point, general definitions are uncommon in the Avesta, especially definitions that serve as a starting point for further explications (as it is the case with the Bundahišn, a book that takes the reader from the most general categories to particular, accidental events of history). Because it is likely that IndBd and GrBd have a common ancestor⁵⁶ (most likely in the Sasanian period)—a *Bundahišn—, we can assume that the defining phrases as well as the philosophical features of Bd 1.1-12 are an innovation made in a period between an Avestan pre-text of the Bundahišn and this *Bundahišn.

31

Regarding the third point, GrBd 1.1, a passage that does not belong to the ‘philosophical stratum’ of Bd 1.1-12, already uses the word “infinite.” According to this text, Ohrmazd exists zamān ī akanārag “for (as?) the infinite time.” The expression zamān ī akanārag is a calque for zurwān ī akanārag “infinite time(-god).” The appearance of that Z/zurwān in the cosmogonical context (cf. WZ 1.27-28) is motivated by the idea of a “pact” between both principles which lasts for 9000 years (see Bd 1.10 and then Bd 1.24 sqq.).⁵⁷ As we can deduce from MX 8 (cf. WZ 34.35), the Z/zurwān ī akanārag enables the creation of a finite, limited time, the time of the “pact” (paymān, pašt), which is supervised by Mihr (see MX 8.15; cf. Mihr’s role in de Iside 46 as a “mediator” [μεσίτης]). It is, however, remarkable that only GrBd 1.1, but not IndBd 1.1 connects Ohrmazd with the zurwān ī akanārag. Thus, a textual interpolation (from the probably non-original philosophical passages Bd 1.2 etc.) in GrBd seems likely (cf. GrBd 1.7, 1.8). The parallel to Bd 1.1, Bd 1.3 (referring to Ahreman), shows that IndBd 1.3 has a similar textual addition. A gloss says that the existence of evil is ultimately finite (while Ohrmazd is infinite).⁵⁸

32

However, the complex philosophical discussion on “finitude”/“infinity” of the two principles in Bd 1.1-12 cannot be explained only in the frame of the figures “zurwān ī akanārag” and “time of the pact”. Since, according to Ādurbād, the notion “bun” implies “infinity” (Dk 3), we must suppose that the whole discussion in Bd 1.1–12 is an attempt both to solve the philosophical problem of two infinite beings⁵⁹ and to find a way to connect an infinite being with a finite world.

33

Regarding the second point, it seems that in adopting and discussing the terms “finitude”/“infinity,” the Zoroastrian theologians arrive at the integration of categories that not only belong to a mythological-religious but also to a scientific-philosophical discourse: the categories of time and space.⁶⁰ While the passage Bd 1.1 still says that Ohrmazd was andar rōšnīh “in the light”, Bd 1.2 explains: a) ān rōšnīh gāh ud gyāg ī Ohrmazd ud ān harwisp-āgāhīh ud wehīh zamān ī akanārag “that light is the time-space of Ohrmazd, and that omniscience and goodness are <for> the Infinite Time”; and b) Ohrmazd ud gāh ud dēn ud zamān ī Ohrmazd būd hēnd “Ohrmazd and the space and the Religion and the time of Ohrmazd exist <always>”. An attribute (Bd 1.1 “in the light”) appears now (namely as gāh, gyāg, harwisp-āgāhīh, wehīh) as part of the substance (Ohrmazd) which is characterized by its eternal existence (zamān ī akanārag). There are three of these ‘substantial attributes’: time, space, “religion” (dēn). Together with Ohrmazd/the light they constitute “the whole” (ān hāmag, IndBd 1.2) of infinite time. It seems that these attributes are conceived neither as names (as Ohrmazd’s names in Yt 1) nor as logical attributes (predicates), but as emanations (of the light, see figure 2).

34

This more philosophical approach to the concept of “god” in the beginning of the Bundahišn is not an isolated phenomenon. Also the defining beginning of Bd 1 (compare Aristotle’s structuring of a philosophical text), the whole textual structure of the Bundahišn (from the general to the particular), and, last but not least, the critical discussion of terms/concepts (especially in Bd 1.6ff.) record the impact of philosophy on a text that has its deepest roots probably in the Avestan literature. This philosophical impact leads to a risky reformulation of the concept of “god.” As we have seen, the difference of substantia (ousia) and accidens (of subject and predicate) becomes blurred in the beginning of the Bundahišn. The proposition “God is light (“licht”)” changes into “God is Light (“Licht”)” = “Light is God”, and with this change the ontological status of “light” becomes questionable. Avestan theology already knew a particular form of light, the “endless light(s)” (asar rōšnīh ← anaγrā̊ raocā̊ [always in the plural]). The term an-aγra- “endless” indicates that these lights were not seen as part of the material world. This can be concluded from the remarkable phrase Yt 8.48 akarana. anaγra. aṣ̌aonō. stiš. “the infinite, endless being of the aṣ̌auuan (= God).”⁶¹ It seems that already in the Avesta, and then again in the Bundahišn, “light” has a twofold being. It is seen as part of both the divine and the material world.

35

A possible philosophical-theological answer to claiming a twofold existence of “light” was the adoption of an Aristotelian-Neoplatonic world-model.⁶² In fact, this is what we see at least vaguely in the beginning of GrBd 1 (god / light > space/time etc.).⁶³ More obvious than in the (especially Greater) Bundahišn is the Aristotelian-Neoplatonic impact on Dk 3, a book that, in terms of its whole structure and concepts—far more than it is known in Iranian Studies—is based on a peculiar fusion of Neoplatonic philosophy and the dō buništag conception.⁶⁴ Neoplatonism was attractive to the Zoroastrian authors because it offered a solution for the conflicts between a) philosophy and theology, and b) god and the world, both of which became prominent in late Antiquity. The emanation model enabled the construction of a coherent world. “Light” is seen as a metaphor of this coherence, but also as a kind of ‘connector of the transcendent/infinite with the immanent/finite.’ The metaphorical value of light is prominent in the last chapter of Dk 3. The transmission of the text of the Dēnkard (Dk 3.420) is compared with a chain of light:

36

More interesting is, however, the chain of light⁶⁷ in text B 93.15-21,⁶⁸ a passage that belongs to the important cosmological chapter Dk 3.123. This chapter deals with an ontology that was based on a reformulation of Greek element theory (see Shaki 1970, 279–81). Passage B 93.15-21 is the attempt to bridge the gap between the “endless lights” and the inner-worldly area, the elements and their forces:

37

Other models that could bridge the gap between the two worlds and save the ‘unity of light’ also came into play.

38

Firstly, in the Bundahišn, the six Zoroastrian ‘elements’ appear in a fixed order: heaven, water, earth, plant, animal, man.⁷² Moreover, the Bundahišn (at least the Greater Bundahišn) transmits passages in which not only the seventh material element, fire, is mentioned, but in which fire both appears in an outstanding position⁷³ and it is connected to the endless lights⁷⁴ or the heavenly sphere (see GrBd 6a-j).⁷⁵ This order indicates a mediating cosmological position of fire. It has neither the same status as the other material elements heaven, water, earth, plant, animal and man, nor does it belong to the same ‘transcendent’ level as the “endless” lights.⁷⁶

39

Secondly, in GrBd 7, a system of correspondences is invented. The sublunar elements (see König 2020) correspond to the sequence of heavenly lights⁷⁷ (Iranian order):

40

The different models are both attempts to posit a distinction of the spiritual (the divine; the transcendent) from the material sphere and to posit a connection of both spheres. The materia is not light (or darkness), but it is connected with light (and darkness).

41

It seems that the different models (the emanation model; the model of a last and intermediating element fire; the correspondence model) are answers of Zoroastrian theology brought to the key question of how materia is related to the dō buništag: through light which itself exists as fire and endless lights, as material and immaterial light.⁷⁸

A Brief Note on the Age of the Zoroastrian Opposition between Light and Darkness

42

The considerations which late antique/early Islamic Zoroastrianism provided on the relation of a concept “dō bun” to the materia and to the concepts/phenomena “light” and “darkness” were both stimulated by a demarcating critique of Manichaean teaching, and directed thereupon by reflections on the nature of light. This led to the adoption and development of different models that could solve the ontological dilemmas which arose from this critique.

43

A religiously meaningful dualism between light and darkness has its roots in the Avesta. Since Anquetil/Kleuker’s analysis, Plutarch’s (first/second century AD) text de Iside 47, which elucidates the dark Parthian ages, constituted an object of discussion in Iranian Studies. Previous scholarship, however, never clearly made the observation that the Bundahišn and de Iside 47 share the same sequence of events and describe a process from cosmogony to eschatology. It would therefore not be implausible to assume that Plutarch’s account is based on a pre-Bundahišn.⁷⁹ Compare the beginning of both texts:

44

It is very likely the YAv literature is responsible for the first systematic delineation of the metaphysics of light and darkness in Zoroastrianism. Already in their YAv ‘edition’ (see Kellens 2015) the OAv texts were set into this light-dark-perspective (see Vr 14-24).⁸² In the Gāϑic verse-line Y 44.5 kə̄. huuāpā̊. raocā̊scā. dāṯ. təmā̊scā. “Which artist made light and darkness?”, Mazdā still appears as an installer of light and darkness.⁸³ Nevertheless, darkness is already the sphere of those who are deceitful (see Y 31.20); they will have darəgə̄m. āiiū. təmaŋhō. “a long (eternal?) lifetime⁸⁴ of the dark.” In the Younger Avesta, the words raocah- and təmah-⁸⁵ (ai. támas-) are assigned to the two transcendent spirits which are, in the Bundahišn, identified with the asar rōšnīh (← anaγrā̊ raocā̊⁸⁶) and the asar tārīgīh. While we could observe that Av. buna- belongs to the semantic field of the deep and dark, a semantic field that was mirrored (with the result of an emergence of the concept of a high-light⁸⁷), we now see an inverted process. The “endless lights” in H 2.15 (anaγraēšuua. raocōhuua.) receive a complement, namely the “endless darknesses” (anaγraēšuua. təmōhuua.) in H 2.33, a term that is obviously based on a secondary plural.⁸⁸

Concluding Remarks

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Historiography of Iranian religion has always emphasized that Zoroastrianism and Manichaeism represent two variants of a dualistic worldview. This dualism was seen as a characteristic feature of Iran (within a Near and Middle Eastern field of non-dualistic religions), and Manichaeism was taken as an heir of Zoroastrianism. These perspectives are by no means wrong. However, the article has tried to shift these traditional perspectives slightly. It has pointed out that the Manichaean dualism with its identification of Evil and matter, goodness and light, draws conclusions from tendencies of the theology of the Younger Avesta. In return, the Zoroastrian dualism as it is known from the writings in Pahlavi seems to be the result of a criticism of these Manichaean conclusions. In any case, the Manichaean doctrine forced Zoroastrianism to a self-reflecting discourse by which he could stabilize (if not completely and finally gain) its particular dualistic worldview.

Appendix I: Bd 1.1-12⁸⁹

Appendix II: The dualistic schools in Iran according to Šahrastānī