Book completed
Mar. 20th, 2024 02:32 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
eve_primeIn Search of Zarathustra: Across Iran and Central Asia to Find the World’s First Prophet, by Paul Kriwaczek. About 20 years ago I read a book that made unusual connections between the culture of western medieval Europe with the ancient Scythians, the people who lived in what is now Ukraine, and recently I was wondering what this book was. And then I found it properly shelved on my bookshelves, so I read it again. This time I’m going to summarize what’s going on in each of the chapters, for my future reference.
The first chapter is a rambling but interesting account of the author’s various encounters with remnants of the Zoroastrian religion, during his many years travelling and living in Central Asia. From this point he works backwards through history.
Chapter 2 is about Nietzsche, whose phrase “Also Sprach Zarathustra” was used by Richard Strauss in the music later adapted to the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey. We learn that Nietzsche thought his work was overthrowing the ideas our culture got about “good” versus “evil” from Zarathustra and that we needed to transcend conventional ideas of morality. Of course the Nazis later thought this was great.
Chapter 3 is the one I remembered, in which we learn that the Albigensian heresy in western Europe (the Cathars) was because of the religious beliefs they shared with the Bogomils in Bosnia, in which the material world was evil. The author traces these religious ideas to the Visigoths, and from them back to the Scythians, who were influenced by the Zoroastrians, and considers other aspects of European medieval culture to have also come from the Visigoths. “Wherever the new masters settled, in today’s France, Spain, Eastern Europe and the Balkans, the new “Gothic” way of life took over, with its heavy cavalry and mounted aristocracy, its social division between rulers and ruled, its music, poetry, art and craftsmanship, as well as its special status for women.”
In Chapter 4, we learn about the prophet Mani, who equated “good” with light and “evil” with dark. Chapter 5 is about the Roman god Mithras, who seems awfully familiar to the Persian (Zoroastrian) Mithra, although there is actually no certain link between them, and the original Mithra didn’t seem to have anything to do with slaying a bull, as was typically shown in the iconography for Mithras.
Chapter 6 is also interesting, tracing the idea of an “end times” back to the Zoroastrians, who had ruled over the Jews for long enough that they probably inspired the addition of this idea into Judaism, and from there of course to Christianity. Then in Chapter 7, we learn about the people who still practice Zoroastrianism in modern times, and the author tells us that much of what is unique about the Shi’ite branch of Islam appears to be very much inspired by Zoroastrian thought, still living on in Iran today.
The author’s research appears solid, and when he’s speculating, he says so. His writing style, however, downplays the speculative aspect and makes it feel as though the connections he makes are better attested than they may actually be. Nevertheless, it’s all fascinating and thought-provoking.
The first chapter is a rambling but interesting account of the author’s various encounters with remnants of the Zoroastrian religion, during his many years travelling and living in Central Asia. From this point he works backwards through history.
Chapter 2 is about Nietzsche, whose phrase “Also Sprach Zarathustra” was used by Richard Strauss in the music later adapted to the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey. We learn that Nietzsche thought his work was overthrowing the ideas our culture got about “good” versus “evil” from Zarathustra and that we needed to transcend conventional ideas of morality. Of course the Nazis later thought this was great.
Chapter 3 is the one I remembered, in which we learn that the Albigensian heresy in western Europe (the Cathars) was because of the religious beliefs they shared with the Bogomils in Bosnia, in which the material world was evil. The author traces these religious ideas to the Visigoths, and from them back to the Scythians, who were influenced by the Zoroastrians, and considers other aspects of European medieval culture to have also come from the Visigoths. “Wherever the new masters settled, in today’s France, Spain, Eastern Europe and the Balkans, the new “Gothic” way of life took over, with its heavy cavalry and mounted aristocracy, its social division between rulers and ruled, its music, poetry, art and craftsmanship, as well as its special status for women.”
In Chapter 4, we learn about the prophet Mani, who equated “good” with light and “evil” with dark. Chapter 5 is about the Roman god Mithras, who seems awfully familiar to the Persian (Zoroastrian) Mithra, although there is actually no certain link between them, and the original Mithra didn’t seem to have anything to do with slaying a bull, as was typically shown in the iconography for Mithras.
Chapter 6 is also interesting, tracing the idea of an “end times” back to the Zoroastrians, who had ruled over the Jews for long enough that they probably inspired the addition of this idea into Judaism, and from there of course to Christianity. Then in Chapter 7, we learn about the people who still practice Zoroastrianism in modern times, and the author tells us that much of what is unique about the Shi’ite branch of Islam appears to be very much inspired by Zoroastrian thought, still living on in Iran today.
The author’s research appears solid, and when he’s speculating, he says so. His writing style, however, downplays the speculative aspect and makes it feel as though the connections he makes are better attested than they may actually be. Nevertheless, it’s all fascinating and thought-provoking.
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