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Zarathushtra Spitama | |
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𐬰𐬀𐬭𐬀𐬚𐬎𐬱𐬙𐬭𐬀 𐬯𐬞𐬌𐬙𐬁𐬨𐬀 | |
_02_(cropped).jpg) Modern depiction of Zoroaster featured at the Fire Temple of Yazd. | |
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| Born | Unknown, traditionally c. 624–599 BC[a] |
| Died | Unknown, traditionally c. 547–522 BC (age 77)[b] |
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| Known for | Spiritual founder, central figure, prophet and composer of the Gathas in Zoroastrianism Prophet in the Baháʼí Faith and in the Ahmadiyya branch of Islam |
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Zarathushtra Spitama,[c] more commonly known as Zoroaster[d] or Zarathustra,[e] was an Iranian religious reformer who challenged the tenets of the contemporary Ancient Iranian religion, becoming the spiritual founder of Zoroastrianism.[f] Variously described as a sage or a wonderworker; in the oldest Zoroastrian scriptures, the Gathas, which he is believed to have authored, he is described as a preacher[g] and a poet-prophet.[h][10] He also had an impact on Heraclitus, Plato, Pythagoras, and the Abrahamic religions, including Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.[11][12][13]
He spoke an Eastern Iranian language, named Avestan by scholars after the corpus of Zoroastrian religious texts written in that language. Based on this, it is tentative to place his homeland somewhere in the eastern regions of Greater Iran (perhaps in modern-day Afghanistan or Tajikistan), but his exact birthplace is uncertain.
His life is traditionally dated to sometime around the 7th and 6th centuries BC, making him a contemporary of Cyrus the Great, though most scholars, using linguistic and socio-cultural evidence, suggest a dating to somewhere in the second millennium BC.[14][15][2] Zoroastrianism eventually became Iran's most prominent religion from around the 6th century BC, enjoying official sanction during the time of the Sassanid Empire, until the 7th century AD, when the religion itself began to decline following the Arab-Muslim conquest of Iran.[16] Zoroaster is credited with authorship of the Gathas as well as the Yasna Haptanghaiti, a series of hymns composed in Old Avestan that cover the core of Zoroastrian thinking. Little is known about Zoroaster; most of his life is known only from these scant texts.[11] By any modern standard of historiography, no evidence can place him into a fixed period and the historicization surrounding him may be a part of a trend from before the 10th century AD that historicizes legends and myths.[17]
- ^ Shahbazi 1977, p. 26.
- ^ a b Lincoln 1991, pp. 149–150: "At present, the majority opinion among scholars probably inclines toward the end of the second millennium or the beginning of the first, although there are still those who hold for a date in the seventh century."
- ^ Boyce 1996, pp. 3, 189–191.
- ^ Stausberg, Vevaina & Tessmann 2015, p. 61.
- ^ Nigosian 1993, pp. 15–16
- ^ Shahbazi 1977, pp. 25–35
- ^ Malandra 2005, : "Controversy over Zaraθuštra's date has been an embarrassment of long standing to Zoroastrian studies. If anything approaching a consensus exists, it is that he lived ca. 1000 BCE give or take a century or so [...]".
- ^ Kellens 2011, : "In the last ten years a general consensus has gradually emerged in favor of placing the Gāthās around 1000 BCE [...]".
- ^ Tavernier 2007, pp. 314.
- ^ West 2010, p. 17
- ^ a b West 2010, p. 4
- ^ Boyce 1996, pp. 3–4.
- ^ "How Zoroastrianism influenced the Western world". 2017.
- ^ Boyce 1996, p. 3
- ^ West 2010, pp. 4–8
- ^ Boyce 2001, pp. 1–3
- ^ Stausberg, Vevaina & Tessmann 2015, pp. 60–61.
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