ABSTRACT
The Zoroastrian conception of human existence is essentially a joyful and life-affirming one that has been adhered to with courage by its believers through times of severe persecution and rejection.
Zoroaster was a prophet of ancient Iran (Persia) who claimed to speak directly with his God.1 His teaching proclaimed a state of eternal struggle between good and evil and he held that human beings are free to choose between right and wrong. It has been maintained that he was the first prophet of monotheism in that he rejected the polytheism of the early Iranian religion and elevated just one of its ahuras, or ‘lords’, to the position of a supreme deity. The claim that Zoroastrianism is monotheistic is a debatable one. It has been the subject of prolonged scholarly controversy and is still a live issue.2 Zoroaster’s doctrine is embodied in seventeen psalms, the gathas, which are thought to have been his own work and which, along with liturgical writings, are part of the Avesta, the Zoroastrian holy book of which only a portion is extant.
