The Avesta

Tradition:
Zoroastrian
Form:
scripture
Approx. date:
c. 1000 BCE
Written down in:
Greco-Latin epoch

The Zoroastrian scripture in its surviving Sasanian-era compilation: Yasna (sacrificial liturgy), Visperad (extended liturgy), Yashts (hymns to specific yazatas), Vendīdād (priestly purity code), Sîrôzahs (thirty-day calendar invocations), and Khordeh Avesta (everyday prayer-book). James Darmesteter (Parts I–II, Sacred Books of the East vols. 4 and 23, 1880–1883) and L.H. Mills (Part III, vol. 31, 1887).

Source context· Persian stream · Ancient Persian cultural impulse
Stream
Persian
Cultural impulse
Ancient Persian (2nd post-Atlantean cultural age)
Composed
c. 1000 BCE
Written down
Greco-Latin (4th post-Atlantean cultural age) manuscript epoch
Soul-faculty
Sentient Soul

What this work carries

The Avesta surfaces the wisdom of the ancient Persian epoch carried by Zarathustra: the cosmic polarity of Ahura Mazdao as Sun-Being of light against Ahriman as Angra Mainyu of darkness. The surviving Sasanian compilation preserves liturgical, hymnic, and purity-code strata that descend from the originally oral teaching of the second post-Atlantean cultural epoch.

Language frame

Composed in Avestan (Old and Younger), the corpus is stratified into Yasna, Visperad, Yashts, Vendīdād, Sîrôzahs, and Khordeh Avesta — a layered liturgy rather than a unified scripture. The Darmesteter and Mills translations in the Sacred Books of the East render this priestly compilation into a 19th-century philological frame.

Steiner’s engagement

  • GA 90a, 1904-07-18Steiner names the sacred book of the Persians and clarifies the term 'Zend' in relation to 'Avesta'.
  • GA 124, 1910-12-12Steiner identifies the Zend-Avesta as the divine-spiritual word of ancient Persia and notes that the principle of rewriting sacred documents for each epoch — practiced there — is no longer carried on today.
  • GA 325, 1921-05-22Steiner traces the progression of human consciousness from the ancient Indian civilization into what is expressed in the Avesta, marking a distinct stage in the evolution of cognition.
  • GA 36Steiner, engaging Spengler's physiognomic view of history, notes the closeness of certain later doctrines to the Persian theologians of the later Avesta with their teachings on the store of grace of the holy ones and on absolute guilt.
  • GA 117a, 1910-01-04Steiner names Zoroastrianism as one of the pre-Christian spiritual streams converging in the Incarnation of Christ.

Cross-tradition congruence

  • Vedic hymnic liturgyThe Yasna's sacrificial liturgy and the Yashts' hymns to specific yazatas stand in structural congruence with the Vedic Saṃhitās addressed to individual devas, both preserving an older oral cult-language.
  • Manichaean light-darkness dualismThe Avestan polarity of Ahura Mazdao and Angra Mainyu is the direct ancestor of the Manichaean polarity of light and darkness, mediated through Sasanian Iran.

Vendīdād

c. 550 BCE · trans. Darmesteter (parts I–II, 1880–1883) and Mills (part III, 1887)

The 'Law Against the Daēvas' — 22 fargards of priestly law on purity, demonology, and exorcism, including the Yima creation-myth (Fargard II). James Darmesteter's translation (Sacred Books of the East vol. 4, 1880).

1 sections · 107,769 words

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Yashts

c. 550 BCE · trans. Darmesteter (parts I–II, 1880–1883) and Mills (part III, 1887)

Twenty-one hymns to individual yazatas (divinities) — Mithra, Anāhitā, Tištrya, Verethraghna, and others. The Yashts preserve some of the oldest mythological material in the Avesta. Darmesteter's translation (Sacred Books of the East vol. 23, 1883).

1 sections · 101,516 words

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Sîrôzahs

c. 550 BCE · trans. Darmesteter (parts I–II, 1880–1883) and Mills (part III, 1887)

Two short formulas (Sîrôzah I and II) invoking each of the thirty yazatas presiding over the thirty days of the Zoroastrian month. Mills's translation (Sacred Books of the East vol. 23, 1883).

1 sections · 4,168 words

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Yasna

c. 550 BCE · trans. Darmesteter (parts I–II, 1880–1883) and Mills (part III, 1887)

The principal liturgical text — 72 chapters recited by the priest at the Yasna ceremony, with the Gāthās (Zarathustra's own hymns) at its heart. L.H. Mills's translation (Sacred Books of the East vol. 31, 1887).

1 sections · 125,027 words

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Visparad

c. 550 BCE · trans. Darmesteter (parts I–II, 1880–1883) and Mills (part III, 1887)

An extension to the Yasna of 23-27 short chapters invoking the ratus (lords of being) of every part of creation; recited during the Visperad ceremony of the six seasonal festivals. Mills's translation (Sacred Books of the East vol. 31, 1887).

1 sections · 8,415 words

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Khordeh Avesta

c. 550 BCE · trans. Darmesteter (parts I–II, 1880–1883) and Mills (part III, 1887)

The 'Little Avesta' — short prayers (Āfrīnagāns, Gāhs, Niyāyishes) said by laity at the five times of day and at the six seasonal festivals (Gāhanbārs). Mills's translation (Sacred Books of the East vol. 31, 1887).

1 sections · 6,429 words

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