Ancient Faiths And Modern Part 13

In Siddartha's teaching there is, as we have seen, an absence of the element of prayer. According to his view, each man is regarded, to a certain extent, as the author of his own destiny. Man, in his opinion, must ever be influenced by the actions of other men--he may, for example either be caressed or tormented, yet, under both circ.u.mstances, he is instructed to retain equanimity of mind. He is not to pray for prosperity, nor to supplicate that trials may be removed. He is to face and overcome every trial by his resolute will, and not to waste time in praying not to be led into temptation.

Again, in Buddha's writings, and in those of his followers, there is an absence of those obscene tales with which the Old Testament abounds. We seek in vain for counterparts of the story of Lot and his daughters, of Onan, of Joseph and the wife of Potiphar, of Judah and Tamar, David and Bathsheba, Amnon and his sister, Zimri Cozbi and Phinehas, and the like. It is true, that in some Buddhist writings, there is a cosmogony introduced more preposterous than that in the Bible; but there are no parallels to the tales of Noah, of Moses, and of Israel in Egypt, the desert, and Palestine. Indeed, when we remember that Sakya Muni was an Oriental, accustomed to inflated language, we are struck by the plainness of his speech.

If we now ask ourselves, as earnest practical Christians--that is, as men, anxious and eager to attain to religious truth, and desirous of teaching only those things which would tend towards sound edification and to a pure morality--what parts of the Bible most offend sense of propriety, we should answer, that they are its untenable cosmogony; its preposterous accounts of the longevity of the men reported as being the earliest formed; the legend of the flood; the origin of the rainbow; the tales of Moses, Pharaoh, the plagues of Egypt, the sojourn in the desert, the capture of Canaan, the miraculous battles, in which each man of Israel put a thousand enemies to flight. We would wholly expunge the fabulous account of Elijah and Elisha; the ravings after vengeance uttered by the prophets; the apocryphal episodes described in the books of Jonah and Daniel, every obscene story, and disgusting speech and writing, whether uttered as a threat against Israel or his enemies.

In like manner we would wish to expunge, from the teaching of Jesus, everything relating to the immediate destruction of the world--everything connected with community of goods, the advantages of beggary, and the potency of faith and prayer. We would suppress every miracle, and say nothing of a resurrection of the dead Jesus. We would equally abandon any attempt to describe Heaven or h.e.l.l, or any intermediate state.

When all these were removed from the Bible, we positively should have very little left, except a certain amount of morality which is sound, and a large portion which is radically bad. To make such an emendated book as perfect as possible, we might, with great advantage, correct it from the teaching of Buddha or from the sayings of Socrates, Plato, Epic-tetus, and even of Confucius; and when all was completed, it would be found that all men, everywhere, have had instinctive notions, more or less definite, of morality, but have allowed their animal pa.s.sions to overcome their better feelings. Far too many of us know the good, but yet the bad pursue.

This investigation would most distinctly disprove the a.s.sertion, that G.o.d has selected a very small percentage of His creatures for objects of His care, and those who have charity towards all men would greatly rejoice thereat. Individually we cannot bear to eat, however hungry we may be, whilst we see others near us without food--our pleasure is heightened when we divide our luxuries with others; just so we believe it should be in religion--none should rejoice at the idea that he is one of the few that are to be saved, nor should anyone repine, as Jonah did, when he finds that the tender mercies of G.o.d are over all his works.

To simplify the matter as far as possible, I have drawn up the following parallel between Buddhism and Christianity:--

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[Ill.u.s.tration: 264]

[Ill.u.s.tration: 265]

[Ill.u.s.tration: 266]

[Ill.u.s.tration: 267]

In the next chapter I propose to examine, as far as authorities will permit, the religion of the Persians--a nation intervening, to a great degree, between the old Aryan and the Shemitic races.

CHAPTER VII.

The Medo-Persians and Pa.r.s.ees. Artfulness of theologians. They systematically break the ninth commandment. Frauds in orthodoxy. A man may use false weights innocently, but is punished, nevertheless. In theology ignorance does not justify deceit. Case in trade. Professional blindness. A law for punis.h.i.+ng adulteration of truth is wanted. Mosaism and Zoroaster. Pa.r.s.ees and Christians. Moses and Zoroaster. The ancient magi. The Persians. Conflicting ideas of G.o.d in Bible. The source of the Biblical theology. Cyrus. Inquiry into the authenticity of the Avesta.

The book condemned. Account of the Medo-Persian faith from Herodotus.

Period of introduction of the Devil to the Bible. Summary. Comparison and contrast. Introduction to next chapter.

In every ancient, and, indeed, in every modern, faith which I have yet examined, I have been shocked with the manner in which it has been represented by interested opponents. Whether they are Romanists or Protestants, Evangelicals or Ritualists, Orthodox or Non-conformists, all our divines endeavour to prove their own tenets to be the best, by blazoning everything which is good, and veiling from sight everything which is doubtful. This being so, it is not at all surprising that Christians generally should try to exalt the religion professed by themselves over that propounded by others, whom they designate "heathens." But though it is not strange that very human partisans should act thus, it is marvellous to find that all the ardent disciples of Jesus, without an exception, that I know of, should, in their dealings with mankind, systematically break the ninth of those commandments which they a.s.sert were given by G.o.d to man, upon Mount Sinai All of them bear false witness against their neighbour, and give incorrect accounts of themselves in addition. They resemble, indeed, those Dutch merchants whom Was.h.i.+ngton Irving describes, so pleasantly, in his history of New York, who had two sets of weights, a heavy lot by which to purchase, and a light set by which to sell Such traders we call "fraudulent;" and I a.s.sert that every so-called orthodox polemic whose books I have read deserves the same epithet. Their fraud is shown by the misrepresentations that they make, both of the creed which they uphold and the one which they oppose. The heterodox and the so-called atheist may be trusted, at least, to tell the truth.

In saying this, I do not a.s.sert that everyone gives false witness knowingly, any more than I would blame a tradesman for using false scales, or weights, if he could demonstrate that he had purchased them as true, and could show that he had never tampered with them. Yet the law would punish such a man for their use, arguing that he ought to have made inquiry. In one of the large towns of Great Britain, on one occasion, a merchant, believed to be both religious and honest, sold to a broker a cargo of stuff which had no existence, and, when the delivery had to be made, the first destroyed himself, and the second was adjudged to be a culpable bankrupt, because he had taken the existence of the oil for granted, without investigation. Just so it is with ordinary divines; they a.s.sume certain statements in their own religious book to be true--they are taught to shut their eyes to the absurdities in the same volume, and to explain away, in one manner or another, everything which militates against common sense. By this plan they contrive to sell, as sterling stuff, something which is made of base material, without knowingly being parties to a fraud. In the same way a shopman may, on the word of the manufacturer, dispose of a piece of goods as wholly silk, although he has a shrewd presumption that the fabric contains a large proportion of cotton. For such individuals we have the proverb, "there are none so blind as those who will not see." But these very theologians of whom we are speaking, when they are dealing with the sacred books, ordinary customs, ritual, and the like, of other people, having a different religion to their own, are exact, in the extreme--every absurdity is exhibited ruthlessly; every legend is ridiculed; every discrepancy is magnified; and everything which betrays ignorance, or want of scientific knowledge, is paraded with inglorious ceremony. On the other hand, everything good which is to be found therein is, if possible, suppressed. A book, which was, for a long time, a standard one amongst our divines, ent.i.tled, _Christ and Many Masters_, is particularly open to this charge. In it there is throughout a _suppressio veri_, a _suggestio falsi_, and scarcely a page that does not bear false witness. If there were a law to punish those who adulterate or falsify "truth," our magistrates would be kept extremely busy.

As an inquiry into the realities of Buddhism has led us to the belief that the origin of Christianity may be found in the doctrines of the son of Maya, which were adopted with certain Judaic modifications by the sons of Elizabeth and Mary--so it is highly probable that what is called Mosaism has been built upon the teachings of the Persian or Median theology, said to have been founded by Zoroaster. Perhaps it would be difficult to find any modern evidence of the likelihood of this hypothesis more powerful than the fact that at the present day the Jews and the Pa.r.s.ees fraternize almost like brothers. The latter in England, and, I understand, elsewhere, select, when they can, the house of a Hebrew wherein to lodge, rather than that of any man of another nation.

To this testimony, such as it is, we must add another which is very telling, viz., that almost every modern orthodox writer who has treated of Zoroaster, has declared that the prophet of Persia drew his inspiration from the lawgiver of Israel The priority of the latter being a.s.serted, and the second place having been given to the former, the matter was supposed to be proved, and the Persian, after having been regarded as a copy of the Hebrew, was consigned to oblivion.

There can be little doubt, however, that the teachings of Zoroaster had more life in them than those either of the Jew or the Christian, for the Pa.r.s.ee always and even to the present day, and in every position of life, may lay claim to the t.i.tle of nature's gentleman, which very few of the disciples of Jesus or of Moses could pretend to until very recently. The morality of these religionists is excellent. In every relation of life they endeavour to be, to do, and to think that which is right--and though there may be black sheep amongst them, the proportion of these to the main body is small In no period of their history, so far as I can learn it, have the Zoroastrians been as brutal as the Christians were so long as they had the power--nor have they ever introduced into their wors.h.i.+p figures of men, women, or children with the apparent intention of honouring or adoring them, or the a.s.sertion that such things a.s.sisted their devotions. Being strictly monotheists, they have not split up the G.o.dhead into three males influenced by a female who is the spouse of one and mother of a second; nor have a.s.serted that the one great Creator is compounded of a father, a son, and a pigeon, with a woman for an intercessor with her celestial consort. Nor do the Pa.r.s.ees build vast temples for the Almighty to dwell in, neither do they reduce any portion of the Omnipotent to the necessity of residing in a bit of bread shut up for many a long day in a box. On the contrary, the modern followers of Zoroaster wors.h.i.+p "the father" in spirit and in truth--not with eye service as men-pleasers, but with singleness of heart, fearing G.o.d (Col. iii. 22.), thus being, as we are told, the very men whom the Almighty seeketh (John iv. 23, 24).

The first resemblance between the Persian and the Jewish lawgiver to which we would call attention, is the mythical nature of both. The Hebrew who believes in Moses can show no other ground for his faith than a number of books which tell of Moses, his genealogy, his acts, his laws, his character, and his death. Yet when an independent inquirer subjects these books, and the accounts which they contain, to a rigid examination, he finds evidence that the writings are fabrications of a period at least a full thousand years after the era of their supposed epoch--probably more; and that all collateral testimony and all internal evidence drawn from the books themselves disprove the actual existence of Moses. To the scholar, the Hebrew lawgiver is as apocryphal or fict.i.tious a being as Hercules, Romulus, and our own king Arthur. Nor is this belief of the critic shaken when he finds that the history of Moses is interwoven with miraculous legends--credit them he cannot; but he may pause before he determines to see in them evidence of fabrication. He cannot fairly deny the existence of Jesus of Nazareth, because many marvellous stories were told of him, nor would a similar cause alone lead him to a.s.sert that Francis of a.s.sisi was a mythical individual.

But whichever way the careful philosophical inquirer may decide the questions at issue, he will remember that many strange stories are told of the conception, birth, and life of Zoroaster, and that the critic must mete out equal justice, both to the Jew and to the Persian. Again, impartial inquirers find themselves unable to determine, with anything approaching to accuracy, either by internal evidence or contemporary remains--the positive epoch when the tale about Moses was originated. It is true that the Bible seems to afford foundation for a chronology in a few parts, as, for example, in the historical books; but these are so completely contradicted by genealogies in other parts that we cannot trust them. After stripping away every doubtful sc.r.a.p from Jewish history, all we can find is, that Moses was first talked of, familiarly, after what maybe called the Grecian Captivity of Jerusalem (see _Obadiah, Ancient Faiths, &c._t Vol. ii.), and that he was said to be the author of the ceremonial, moral, and political laws which were framed for the Jewish nation, and which were a.s.siduously taught to the Hebrews after the Babylonish captivity.

The followers of Zoroaster are equally ignorant of the real history of their prophet, and are equally unable to demonstrate the claim of the Zend Avesta to be a true account of the teaching of the Persian sage, as are the Jews to prove the antiquity of their laws and nation. Putting on one side all those which may be regarded as modern fancies, the first mention made of the Prophet is in the first Alcibiades of Plato, which we may imagine was written shortly after B.c. 412, in which year that distinguished Greek citizen negociated a treaty between Athens and Persia. Plato, when speaking of the education of the sons of the kings of Persia, says (_Bohn's_ edition, Vol. iv., p. 344), "At fourteen years of age, they who are called the royal preceptors, take the boy under their care. Now these are chosen out from those who are deemed most excellent of the Persians, men in the prime of life, four in number, excelling (severally) in wisdom, justice, temperance, and fort.i.tude.

The first of these instructs the youth in the learning of the Magi, according to Zoroaster, the son of Oromazes--now by this learning is meant the wors.h.i.+p of the G.o.ds--and likewise in the art of kingly government." But Herodotus, writing about B.c. 450, when giving, in Book i, c. 131, an account of the religion of the Persians, makes not only no mention of Zoroaster, but attributes to that nation a form of wors.h.i.+p differing from what is supposed to be pure Zoroastrianism;* but he mentions--and it seems to be a significant fact, that it is not lawful for a Persian to sacrifice unless one of the Magi is present, who sings an ode concerning the original of the G.o.ds which, they say, is an incantation.

* There is strong constructive evidence, from the nature of the Aryan Mythology, from the pages of the Vedas, from the anthropological resemblances between Persians, Caucasians, Greeks, Latins, Germans, British, and others; from the linguistic alliances between what have been called the Indo- Germanic races; and from a variety of other sources, each small in itself, but strong in the aggregate, for the belief that the origin of the Aryan mythology, or the Vedic religion as it is otherwise called, may be traced to Bactria or to Ancient Persia. Persia is spoken of by Plato as if her people carried the dynasties of their kings far back into eternity. (First Alcibiades, Bohn's edition, vol. iv., p.

343). Herodotus again (Book i., c. 131) tells us that the Persians from the earliest times have sacrificed to the sun and moon, to the earth, fire, water, and the winds, that they sacrifice on high places, have no divine statues, nor do they build temples. Now this is almost entirely a description of the old Aryan religion. The sun, for example, is Surya, Aryama, Mitra, Vivaswat, Martunda, Savitor, Sura, Ravi, Varuna, Indra Yama, Vishnu, and Krishna (Moor's Hindoo Paillhcon, p. 287). The moon is Chandra and Soma, and the origin of these words is to be found in the Persian as well as in the Sanscrit writings (Moor's H. P., p. 284-5). The Earth is Prit'hivi, 11a, Lakshmi, and Vasta. Fire is the powerful Agni. The water is Nara, or Narayana (Moor's JET.

P., 74), from which all things came (see Water in Ancient Faiths), and the Winds are Maruts and Vaya. To these deities, individually or collectively, the modern Hindoo offers prayer and praise; and the hymns of the Rig Veda, such as we have them edited by Max Muller and Wilson, are copies probably of the same chants which accompanied the sacrifices of the Ancient Persians.

This seems to indicate that the Persian religion was then undergoing some supervision by rulers who had a different faith to that held at a later period. When we next turn to Herodotus, Book L, c. 101, we find that the Magi were one of the six tribes which composed the Medes; and we notice that Phraortes, the son of Deioces, reduced the Persian kingdom under the dominion of the Medes about B.c. 650. If, then, we regard Zoroaster as being the founder of the Magi, we must throw back his epoch considerably further than this date. But even if we accept this conquest as the era of the Pa.r.s.ee prophet, we find that Zoroaster preceded the first public promulgation of the Mosaic law amongst the Jews.*

* Time of Zoroaster.--Dr. Hang, who is no mean authority in everything which concerns Zoroastrianism, states in an able resume of the evidence, that we cannot a.s.sign a later date to the prophet than 2300 years before Christ. He quotes from Diogenes Laertius who affirms that Xanthos of Lydia, b.c.

600-450, states, that Zoroaster lived 6000 years before Xerxes invaded Greece; from Pliny who, on the authority of Aristotle, says that the teacher preceded Plato by 6000 years; from Hermippus of Smyrna, who studied Magism B.c.

250, and averred that the founder of that sect lived 5000 years before the Trojan war; and from Pliny, to show the general belief of ancient Greek authors that Zoroaster lived many thousand years before Moses. Dr. Haug says (I am quoting from "A Lecture on an Original Speech of Zoroaster, with Remarks on his Age, by Dr Haug" London: Triibner & Co., 1865), that the traditional books of the Pa.r.s.ees say Zerdosht (another form of the more familiar Greek name) lived 300 years before Alexander invaded Persia. Our author adds that Hermippus, in 250 b.c., speaks of two millions of verses of Zoroastrian origin, and infers that these would require 1000 years for their growth. He then points out the relations.h.i.+p between the Iranian and the Yedic religion, and Zoroaster's antagonism to the latter, and argues that this must have happened ere the Aryans invaded the Punjaub, 2000 years B.c. Dr. Haug then inquires into the probable source whence the Greeks drew their ideas respecting the antiquity of Zerdosht, and argues, with great show of reason, that they consulted the chronology of the Babylonian priests. He shows that a trustworthy record was kept which went back to 2284 b.c., this he concludes, from data given by Berosus, was the year when Babylon was conquered by the Medes;--and from Synkellos he shows that the founder of the dynasty of the eight Median tyrants over Babylon was called Zoroaster.

But this word, Zarathustra, in the original, signifies a high priest, and to distinguish him from other hierarchs the prophet is called Zarathustra Spitama, in the Zend Avesta--hence this king is supposed not to be the prophet him self, but a descendant from him, and a priest in the order which was founded by the original Zerdosht. This again points to the fact that the Babylonians could only know anything about the founder of Magism from the Medes themselves, and they might, from want of any accurate chronology, a.s.sign to Zoroaster any date they liked--just as, with many a semi-civilized nation 'a long time may be converted into ten, a hundred, a thousand, or a million years.' Haug does not endeavour to a.s.sign any particular date to the era of Zoroaster beyond expressing the opinion that he might have lived one or two hundred years before the Median conquest of Babylon, and that this occurrence was probably one of the results of the ferment which his doctrines caused. "He preached, like Moses, war and destruction to all idolaters and wicked men, and said that he was commissioned by G.o.d to spread the religion of Ahura Mazda. Daring his life-time, and shortly after his death, his followers seem to have engaged in incessant wars with their religious antagonists, the Vedic Indians, which struggle is well known in the Sanscrit writings as that between the Asuras (Ahura) and Devas (the Hindu G.o.ds). But afterwards they spread westward and invaded the countries of other idol wors.h.i.+ppers in order to uproot idolatry, and establish everywhere the good Mazdayan religion. They really appear to have changed the order of things in Babylon when they conquered it, and spread a new creed, for they are spoken of by Berosus as tyrants." Zoroaster was the first prophet of truth who appeared in the world, and kindled a fire which thousands of years could not entirely extinguish."

When Moses was first talked about we know not, but at the time of Samuel, David, and Josiah he was unknown. We have no reason to believe that the Hebrews ever came into contact with, or ever heard of the Persians, until after the Babylonish conquest, followed by that of Cyrus; consequently, if the Jewish law first propounded contained nothing akin to the doctrines and laws of Zoroaster, and subsequent publications did so, we should naturally conclude that the last were copied. It is unnecessary to tell the student of biblical history that the Jews were for many years under the dominion of the Persians and Medes, and that Nehemiah, one of their great men, after the Babylonian captivity, was a personal, though humble, friend, of the king of Persia--i.e., if we take his account of himself for true.

Of the fact of there being two distinct doctrines respecting the Almighty in the Old Testament no scholar has a doubt. In the one, G.o.d is represented as the sole Being who rules and influences the world: whatsoever was done He was regarded as the doer of it. He had no powerful enemy who could thwart His will, no adversary who could withstand Him successfully. In the other the existence of two rival powers is distinctly recognised--Jehovah and Satan--the Aryan Mara, the tempter, who plot and counterplot against each other, and even condescend to personal wrangling. The most conspicuous example which we can give of these two doctrines is to be found in 2 Sam. xxiv. 1, in which we are told that Jehovah moved David to number Israel, whereas in 1 Chron. xxi. 1, evidently written by a modern scribe, we find that Satan, the adversary, was he who incited the king to perform this deed.

We see the duality of persons conspicuously put forward in the first and second chapters of Job, in which Satan is represented as being at large, not being even under the surveillance of Jehovah. See also 1 Kings xxii.

20-23, wherein we find Jehovah at a loss how to bring about a certain result, and a.s.sisted out of a dilemma by a lying spirit--who can do what the Lord could not effect! We may say that the story is a fiction, but no Hebrew dare have spoken thus of Jehovah had he ever heard of Moses and his laws.

As we cannot imagine that a revelation from G.o.d to the Hebrews would be thus changeable, we can come to no other conclusion than that the Jewish writings were of human origin, and their first doctrines modified by those of other nations to whom the Hebrews were subjects or enslaved. To this consideration we may add, that when the Israelites came in contact with the Medes and Persians, they were merely a 'posse' of slaves, a crowd of prisoners removed from their own land without a shadow of power, or any influence, and only anxious to induce those who had conquered their late masters, the Babylonians, to have pity on their misery, and restore them to beggared Jerusalem. The idea of the Hebrews gaining friends by endeavouring to induce the Persian Magi to change their faith and embrace that of the poor and probably despised Jew is preposterous. On the other hand, there would be every possible inducement for the Hebrews to study the faith of that people whose G.o.d had given them victory over the Chaldeans. See in corroboration of this Ps. cx.x.xvii., especially the two last verses.

We may regard the question before us in yet another light, If we are to allow that the words of Isaiah are correct, which describe Cyrus as G.o.d's shepherd (ch. xliv. 28), and as anointed by Jehovah Himself, we cannot conceive that the religion which he professed was opposed to that entertained by the Hebrew prophet. As it is morally impossible that Cyrus and his hierarchy were taught their religion by any Jew, it follows that the Persian faith can lay the same claim to inspiration as the Hebrew, if the latter were not indeed almost identical with it.

If, then, we insist upon the latter being "a true revelation," we must concede the same to the former, or if we p.r.o.nounce the Persian religion to be of human invention, we must pa.s.s a similar verdict upon the Jewish.

When we are upon the horns of such a great dilemma we may well pause.

It is indeed almost impossible for orthodox divines to make a selection which p.r.o.ng of the fork is the worst. If we elect to say our belief is, that the primitive teaching of the Hebrew was G.o.d-given and a true revelation, we cannot put faith in those scriptures which tell us of a devil who fights with Jehovah, and is generally victorious. If, on the other hand, we hold that the Christian notions of the Creator and Satan are true, we must regard the Zoroastrian teaching as inspired; and the early Jewish writings as unworthy of credit--of human invention and heterodox. Theologians will probably elect to remain in a state of uncertainty on this subject. Philosophers, on the contrary, will escape from it at once by a.s.serting their conviction that both the Hebrew and the Magian religion are wholly of human invention.*

* When commencing this chapter, it was my intention to amplify what I have already said in Vol. II. respecting the Magian religion, by giving an a.n.a.lysis of the celebrated Zend Avesta, a translation of which into French, by Anquetil du Perron, I had recently procured for the purpose.

As I was aware that Dr Haug, a learned scholar, believed the original to be trust-worthy, I read the translation in good faith, but I soon began to doubt whether the book was what it professed to be, for to my mind it bore internal evidence of having been fabricated at a comparatively recent period by some one who was familiar both with the Aryan and the Mosaic, if not the Christian, doctrines and literature. I felt that I should not be acting honestly unless I took such steps as lay in my power to satisfy myself upon this point The essay was therefore laid aside for a considerable time, until, indeed, every available source of information had been searched. After my inquiry was over the text was resumed as above.

But in the middle, or perhaps we might say upon the threshold of our inquiry, we must pause to examine into the amount of confidence which can be given to those under whose guidance we are invited to place ourselves. Such investigations are too frequently omitted. Those who have faith in the Bible usually decline to search into the grounds of their belief, and, in like manner, those who have always heard the author of the Zend Avesta quoted as trustworthy are apt to take everything which it may say as correct. To avoid this error, I have consulted all the volumes of the transactions of the Royal Asiatic Society of London, and have found therein sufficient to throw the gravest doubts upon the great antiquity of the Pa.r.s.ee religion. It will be an useful task if I attempt to cla.s.sify the evidence on each side, and to draw an inference therefrom. Our knowledge respecting the Magian religion which the Bactrian* prophet founded, is built, with the exception of the notices in Greek and Latin authors, already quoted, upon the work known as the Avesta. This is written in a language called Zand,** and there are within it parts, which are written in another tongue, to which the name of Pahlavi has been given, and from these the sacred books of the Pa.r.s.ees have been translated into French by Anquetil du Perron, into German by Spiegel, and into English by Haug. All these writers a.s.sume that the language referred to is Ancient Persian, and closely allied to the Sanscrit, and Haug especially endeavours to demonstrate that the Avesta, and the origin of the religion of the Pa.r.s.ees, must be as old as the time of the Vedas, inasmuch as the same sort of legends, the same names, and, to a certain extent, the same genii, are to be found in both. There is not absolute ident.i.ty, however, for those which are spoken of as good by the Vedas are treated as bad in the Avesta. Viewed from this point, Haug a.s.signs to the Zand volumes an age of about four thousand years, and he supports his belief by a reference to the length of time which would be required to make up the two million verses attributed to Zoroaster by some Greek author. In the conclusion that both the Zand and the Pahlavi are very ancient Persian tongues, it is stated that the majority of German and French critics agree.

* Zoroaster is said by many early writers to have been a king in Bactria.--Smith's Dictionary, s.v.

** The word "Zend" is more familiar to many than the form "Zand;" but I have adopted the latter, as also the spelling of Pahlavi, from an essay by Mr Romer, with an introduction by Professor Wilson, in Vol. IV., Royal Asiatic Society's Journal.

But on the other hand, such orientalists as Sir William Jones, Colonel Vans Kennedy, Mr Thomas, and Mr Romer, and indeed all British oriental scholars, regard both the Zand and the Pahlavi as b.a.s.t.a.r.d languages, never spoken, and wholly fabricated by a comparatively modern priesthood, for the express purpose of making the holy books which they wrote comprehensible only by themselves. Such scholars show that the Zand and Pahlavi are built upon a Sanscrit, Arabic, and modern Persian model, and that the Pa.r.s.ee Pahlavi is very different to the Pehlevi of the Sa.s.sanian coins, and, in Vol. IV., Transactions of Royal Asiatic Society, Mr Romer supports this conclusion by a number of pa.s.sages in the various languages referred to. It is also a.s.serted that many words in the Avesta have been borrowed from the Arabic, and others from the Sanscrit tongues, possibly, also, from the Greek. Being unable, from my comparative ignorance of Eastern language, to form a decided opinion on independent grounds, all that I can say is, that it does really seem to be proved that the religious books of the Par-sees are not so ancient as they have been by many supposed to be.

The question which next arises for our consideration is, whether such volumes represent the tenets of an ancient faith, or whether they are the fabrication of men who have, possibly in the wreck of an old wors.h.i.+p, brought about by war or other calamity, endeavoured to create a new religion out of the relics of one or more old ones. In favour of the antiquity of the Avesta are the facts that the great G.o.d, Ahura Mazdao, seems to be almost identical with the Aura Mazda of the Persepolitan inscription of Darius. But in proof of its untruthfulness as a representative of pure Persian tradition, we find the book introducing Devs and Ahuras,--the counterpart of the Devas and Asuras of the Vedas, only reversing their character--we also see Indra mentioned as a devil, whilst Siva and Mitra are introduced as Sharva and Miltra. (Haug's _Essays on the Pa.r.s.ee_, Bombay, p. 230, 1862). If, therefore, we allow that there is some of the old Zoroastrian doctrine to be found in the Avesta, we must equally grant that such teaching has been modified by hatred of a rival faith. Yet herein is another question, viz., Was the antagonism between the doctrines of the Avesta and of the Vedas contemporary with the origin of the two systems, or was the teaching of the Avesta the result of its author's coming into hostile conflict with Vedic teachers, as they possibly might have done after Alexander had opened a highway for intercourse between Persia and Hindostan?

On weighing the subject as impartially as I can, it seems to me that the Avesta contains a great deal of the Ancient Persian faith, but that it will be the safest plan for us to describe what is known of the Persian and Median faith from other sources, rather than take our information mainly from this doubtful source. Herodotus tells us of his own knowledge (B. i, c. 131, seq.), that the Persians, about b.c. 450, did not erect statues, temples, or altars--that they sacrificed on lofty hills to high heaven, the sun, moon, fire, water, and the winds, and that this had been a custom from time immemorial Sacrifice was attended by a priest or magus, and prayer and praise were offered, not for themselves alone, but for all the Persians, and especially for the king.

In about the year 521 B.c., Darius, king of the Medes, caused be made, in three languages, upon a rock at Behistun, an inscription of considerable length. The one which is in the Persian tongue has been translated by Rawlinson (_Royal Asiatic Society Journal_, vol 10). In it, the king acknowledges Auramazda as his G.o.d, and speaks of him as the Jews did of Jehovah. This epithet is explained by two Sanscrit roots (Op cit., vol. x., p. 68), and may be paraphrased as "The Lord or giver of life," "The great Creator," or "The Eternal," and the king in a doubtful pa.s.sage refers to "the evil one" (?), who by lies deceived the rulers of certain states, inducing them to rebel, and then left them to be conquered by the Ormazd-governed Darius. In the Babylonian copy "lies"

are as it were personified. Whilst in the Scythian version, translated by Mr Norris (Op cit. vol. xv., p. 144), we find the account run thus: "These are the provinces which became rebellious, 'the G.o.d of lies'

made them rebel that they would subvert the state, afterwards Ormaza delivered them into my hand." The "lies," or the G.o.d of lies, we very naturally a.s.sociate with the being whom we call in our time the devil, who is spoken of (John viii. 44) as a liar, and the father of falsehood, who was so from the beginning [--Greek--], and consequently regarded as coeval with the "father of light."

We next turn to such evidence as is given us in the book of Job. We select this ancient writing in consequence of the strong internal evidence there is, that it was written by some one about the period of the Achaemenian dynasty living in Persia (see Rawlinson in _Journal of B. A. Soc_., vol. 1, new series, p. 230). In Job we find two distinct powers spoken of, the one being the Good G.o.d, and the other Satan the opposer. The last is regularly described as if he had the power to cause war, devastation, tempest, disease, and death, for ch. ii., v. 6, lets us infer that he might have killed Job had he been so minded and G.o.d allowed the bargain, and in verse 19 of the same chapter we find him killing all the sons and daughters of the patriarch. Job clearly recognised the necessity of sacrifice for purification, for sanctification, and he seems not to have offered this upon any altar, in any temple, or with the intervention of any priest. It is clear that Job had never heard of Moses or the writings a.s.signed to him. The persecuted patriarch and his friends all believe that punishment in this life is the result of offences committed against the Good G.o.d, but all seem to be singularly free from the idea that Satan is the cause of Job's sufferings either directly or indirectly. There is throughout the book no reference made to a preceding or a succeeding condition of man, such as obtained amongst the Brahmins, and it is doubtful whether the Persians believed in heaven or h.e.l.l. When man died he was supposed to perish. Hence we conclude that the doctrine of the resurrection was not prevalent at the time the story was written, and in the country where the writer of the book of Job resided. Equally unknown to that author, whoever he was, were the ideas about angels, ministers of G.o.d, or disembodied spirits. These were of Babylonian origin. We must now, to carry on the thread of the argument, recal to mind the fact that Babylon was taken by the Medes and Persians, that the rulers of the united people often made that city their residence, that Herodotus tells us (B. 1, c. 135) that "the Persians are of all nations most ready to adopt foreign customs," and I may notice, in pa.s.sing, that the same authority states that the two nations were scrupulously truthful, ceremoniously cleanly, and intolerant to leprosy. It is well known, moreover, that even after the commencement of our era Babylon was the chief seat of Babbinic and Talmudic lore.

When we examine into the religion of the Babylonians we find that they believed in the existence of angels--minis-, ters of the Supreme--intelligences,--unseen by man, yet powerful to act in his favour, or against him. If we rightly interpret many of the engraved gems which were executed by the Chaldees, we can only come to the conclusion that they believed in a Devil, a Typhon, or spirit of destruction.

We next must call attention to the fact that the Jews were conquered by the Babylonians, and enslaved in Mesopotamia for very many years--that they were subsequently emanc.i.p.ated by the Medo-Persians, and that the latter, whom from the inscription of Darius we believe to have been devout, permitted and even encouraged the Israelites to entertain the faith which they then held, and even a.s.sisted them to rebuild their temple. This permission, and the friendliness of Nehemiah with the Median monarch, seem to show a great similarity, if not an ident.i.ty, between the Persian and the Jewish creeds.