The Persians and the First Persian Empire
Maccedonian and Parthian Interregnum
The Sassanian or Second Perian Empire
Difficulties and interpretation
The economic and political background
The two spirits in the dead sea scrolls
The wives of Ahura Mazdah
The "persevers-creators': Ahura and Mithra
The nature of Zoroaster's reform
Prototype of the Holy Spirit
Changed tone of the seven chapters
Veneration of material things
The three forms of Zoroastrianism
The fourfold confession of faith
Zoroaster and animal sacrifice
Sacrificial bull and Haoma rite
Haoma, the drink of immortality of the Indo-Iranaians
Haoma, as sacrifice and sacrament
Haoma, victim, priest, and god
Iranian Mithra and Roman Mithras
The Pre-Zoroastrain Mithra
Mithra, compact and warlord
The Daeva-worshippers and Mithra
The separation of Mithra from Ahura
Mirthra as contract and king
Mithra as terrible warlord
Mithra, Sraosha, and Rashnu
Mithra's plaint to the wise lord
Mithra's descent to earth
Haoma consecrates himself Mithra's priest
Mithra initiated into the 'good religion'
Ahura and Mithra reunited
Mithra and the Holy Spirit
The revised cult of Ahura and Mithra
The Daevas and their worshippers
The Daeva-worshippers and Mithra
Roman Mithras and his immolation of the bull
Yima and the bull-sacrifice
Ahriman's slaughter of the bull
Bull-sacrifice at the end of time
Ahriman-Areimanios in the Mithraic mysteries
The bull-sacrifice of man's first parents
His subterranean paradise
Yima the Prototype of Ahriman?
Yima and Mithra in the Avesta
Cautes and Cautopates in the Mithraic mysteries
6. Fravashi-Vayu-Khwarenah
Ahura Mazdah's Veneration of other deities
Primitive and "Caltholic" Zoroastrianism
The god of Darius the great
The "Zoroastrianism" of Darius
The Daiva-Inscription of Xerxes
Xerxes' "un-Zoroastrianism" of Darius
Popular religion in Western Iran
Zoroastrianism and the popular cults
The religion described by Strabo
decline and fall of "Catholic" Zoroastrianism.
8. In search of an orthodoxy
Revival of Zoroastrianism by the Sassanians
In search of an orthodoxy
Zurvanism predominant in the third century AD
The eclecticism of Shapur I
The high priest Karter and the "Zandiks"
Aturpat and the "Fatalists"
The Zurvanism of Yezdigird II and his grand Vizier
The synthesis of Khusraw I
Study of Indian and Greek works
The second decline and final fall of Zoroastrianism
9. The varieties of Zurvanism
Priestly brothers: Manushchihr and Zatspram
The influx of Greek and Indian ideas
The "Zandiks" and "Dahris"
"Classical" and materialist Zurvanism
The Zandik ontology and metaphysics
The dualist interpretation of evolution
A Zurvanite view of evolution
The three types of Zurvanism
Zurvan and the pact between Ohrmazd and Ahriman
Zurvan, the one and the many
Ohrmazd and Ahriman in Mythological Zurvanism
Main differences between Zurvanism and Orthodoxy
Aberrant versions of the Zurvanite myth
The four elements and their prototypes
Emergence of the finite from the infinite
The emergence of consciousness and the Genesis of evil
The changelessness of created being
Az, the weapon of concupiscence
The "endless form" or Macrocosm
The Zurvanite and the Manichean Az
Az, a borrowing from Buddhism?
Essential "Zoroastrianism" of classical Zurvanism
The wickedness of the female
The defection of woman to Ahriman
The defilement of man by women
The god of the resurrection
The fatalism of Firdausi's epic
The orthodox attitude to fate
Orthodoxy's reaction to the three types of Zurvanism
finite and infinite in the orthodox account
The weapon of Ohrmazd and Ahriman
The perdurance of Ohrmazd's creation
Ohrmazd's instrument, the endless form
Ahriman's instrument, concupiscence
Zurvanite origin of these "instruments"
Creation of truth and falsehood
Creation of the bounteous immortals and their demonic counterparts
The Heavenly sphere of Macrocosm
A variation derived from India
Man's fravashis consent to descend to earth
Ahriman's revival and assault against the material world
Ahriman imprisoned in the material world
The re-creation of plant and animal life and of man: man's second fall
body, vital spirit, soul, image, and external soul
The Gravashi or external soul
Essential goodness of man
Relationship of soul to body
Concupiscence, the enemy of soul and body alike
The interconnexion of bodily health and virtue
Primacy of spirit over matter
Self-love the foundation of all love
The solidarity of mankind
The indwelling of the good mind
14. The religion and the king
The interconnexion of the Zoroastrian religion and the Sassanian Empire
The mean as cosmic principle
The mean as the treaty between Ohrmazd and Ahriman
The mean, the essence of reason
Virtue, the mean between contrary vices
Wisdom or reason in man and God
Wisdom as creative principle
Ahriman's lack of wisdom and reason
Concupiscence, the misuse of reason and desire
Man's Khwarr (Khwarenha) and concupiscence
The good religion in essence and manifestation
Royalty the material complement of the good religion
Royalty the bond between god and man
The nature of the discarnate soul
The Frashkart or final rehabilitation
Ohrmazd's master-plan for the overthrow of evil
The three phases of Ohrmazd's plan
The destruction of Az and Ahriman (Zurvanite version)
The meaning of Ahriman's destruction
The disintegration of evil (Orthodox version)
The resurrection of the body
The role of Saoshyans and the final bull-sacrifice
Purgation by molten metal
The "final body" and renewal of all things
The marriage of matter and spirit.
