The Sasanian high priest Kartir & Iconoclastic Mazdaism (241 - 275 AD)

The Sasanian high priest Kartir & Iconoclastic Mazdaism (241 - 275 AD)

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"KARTIR.....a prominent Zoroastrian priest in the second half of the 3rd century CE, known from his inscriptions and mentioned in Middle Persian, Parthian, and Coptic Manichean texts.....Kartīr’s inscriptions are the earliest indigenous written testimonies to the basic tenets of Mazdayasnianism (Zoroastrianism)...... They are therefore of the utmost importance for studying the Mazdayasnian tradition under the early Sasanians....http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/kartir

The Sasanian high priest Kartir.....c. 241 - 275 AD....Stone relief of Kartir at Naqsh-e Rajab, an archaeological site just east of Istakhr and about 12 km north of Persepolis in Fars Province, Iran.

"Kartir was probably instrumental in promoting the cause of Mazdaism (as opposed to Zurvanism, the other - now extinct - branch of Zoroastrianism, for in his inscription at Naqsh-e Rajab, Kartir makes plain that he has "decided" that "there is a heaven and there is a hell", thus putting himself at odds with the principles of (fatalistic) Zurvanism.....Nonetheless, it was during the reign of Shapur I (r. 241-272) - to whom Kartir was first appointed advisor - that Zurvanism appears to have developed as a cult, and this contradiction remains an issue of scholastic dispute. Some scholars therefore conclude, at odds with what has been stated above, that Kartir "himself held Zurvanite beliefs"......Simultaneously, Kartir was also a significant force in an iconoclastic movement that would result in the loss of favour of the shrine cults, a religious tradition alien to Indo-Iranian forms of worship that was inherited instead from the Babylonians; shrine cults had been instituted six centuries earlier by Artaxerxes II.....It was during Kartir's time as high priest that the shrines were - by law - stripped of their statues, and then either abandoned or converted into fire temples.".......https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kartir

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"Shapur I.....the second shahanshah (king of kings) of the Sasanian Empire. The dates of his reign are commonly given as c.240 - 270 A.D......Šāpūr I bestowed upon Kartīr.....various high clerical honors.....Kartīr would perform the various rituals (kerdagān) for the gods, founding Warahrān fires and caring for the priests; sealing charters (pādixšahr) for fires and Magi ... and making priests “happy and prosperous” .....All of this would bring “profit” (sūd) to Ohrmazd and the other gods, while Ahrimen and the “demons” (dēws; see DAĒVA), were harmed and *diminished.".........http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/kartir

"At this time, the rituals for the gods were increased, and great “satisfaction” (šnūdīh) came to the good creations—the gods, water, fire, and kine (gōspand), while Ahrimen and the demons received “blows” (snah/sneh). They were “opposed, hated” (bištīh), so that “(false) beliefs” (kēš) in them were no longer adhered to in the land.......Non-Mazdayasnians were “struck down” (zad) in the land, including Jews, Shamans (Buddhists), Bramans (Hindus), Christians, Nāṣrā (Nazarenes or Nazoreans), Makdags (baptists? Bailey, 1980), and Zandīgs (Manicheans)....... Idols (uzdēs) were destroyed; the “dens” (gilist) of the demons were obliterated and turned into thrones (gāh) and seats for the gods."........http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/kartir

".....during the second half of the third century when the Zoroastrian high priest, Kartir, directed the religious policy of the empire. With purist fervor to eliminate all images of deities in the realm and have only the Zoroastrian sacred fire as the focus of devotion, Kartir had ordered several Buddhist monasteries destroyed, especially in Bactria. This was because the statues and wall paintings of Buddha in them incorporated many Zoroastrian elements. For example, Buddhas were often depicted encircled with a halo of flames and an accompanying inscription or graffiti scrawl labeling them as “Buddha-Mazda.” Bactrian Buddhism, then, would have appeared to the high priest as a Zoroastrian heresy. Buddhism revived, however, after Kartir’s persecution.".....http://www.berzinarchives.com/web/en/archives/e-books/unpublished_manuscripts/historical_interaction/pt1/history_cultures_02.html

The Cambridge History of Iran: Seleucid Parthian.....By E. Yarshater

"Kartir and Manicheism......"Because of Kartīr’s involvement in the execution of Mani (c. 216–274 AD) , it has also been suggested that his inscriptions specifically targeted Mani’s teachings.... the conflict between Zurvanism and Mazdaism ....history from the time of Mani’s appearance at the court of Šāpūr until he was executed by Warahrān I in the last months of his reign..... Manicheism was important to the Mazdayasnian restoration because it was considered as a Zoroastrian heresy and priestly opposition to it “might provoke unexpected speculation and re-examination of Zoroastrian doctrine”; he also suggested that it was Kartīr’s part in the Mani debacle that earned him his promotion under Warahrān I .... the notions repeatedly stressed by Kartīr. A person is potentially good, and if he or she behaves according to the Mazdayasnian tradition, the body will reap the benefits while alive and the soul both in this life and after death. This is quite different from the Manichean conception of soul and body, with the transcendental “soul” imprisoned in the corpse-body and the material soul being composed of the basest elements of man. "...........http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/kartir

"Kartīr’s statement about his treatment of other religions has also spawned comments, notably, in Jewish scholarship on the third century. Jacob Neusner presented Šāpūr as having “encouraged Mani to expound a syncretistic doctrine capable of bringing together” the other religions “under one cult” and Kartir as having “remained submissive to the tolerant policy of the great emperor,” but, after his death, as using his power to reverse Šāpūr’s tolerant policy...... Neusner also interpreted the execution of Mani as a “judicial murder” arranged by Kartīr and his fellow Magi.".............http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/kartir

"Kartīr’s statement that he “struck down” (zad) other religions suffices to talk about a terror regime and religious obscurantism..... or to conclude that Kartīr was the “most redoubtable enemy of religious minorities” in the history of the Sasanians ..... The verb zad is a traditional, epic term for eliminating evil and does not necessarily refer to killing (which is ōzad).....All the Sasanian kings except Warahrān II were “lukewarm Zoroastrians,” so that, although Kartīr [like Zarathustra himself] “abhorred animal sacrifice” (as proved by his statement regarding Water, fire, and animals).....he had not been able to prevent Šāpūr from performing them...." .........http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/kartir

Kartir and Zurvanism......"It was the conflict between the current Zurvanism and flourishing Manicheism, both of which “always favoured universalism,” aggravated by Kartīr’s rise to power, that caused Mani’s death and was “put aside to establish Zoroastrianism as a nationalistic religion in Iran” .....He regarded Šāpūr’s Zurvanism as an established fact (referring to Boyce) and argued that Mani “never would have” called his highest god Zurwān if he had not known Zurvanism ....He concluded that the early kings each had a “court theologian” : Ardašīr had Tansar, Šāpūr had Mani, and Ohrmazd and the Warahrāns had Kartīr.."..........http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/kartir

Kartir and Shamanism...."The shamanistic aspects of the vision narrative were, apparently, first mentioned by Grigorii M. Bongard-Levin and Ėdvin A. Grantovskiĭ (1974), and were repeatedly discussed by Gignoux (1979; 1981, p. 258: journey into the beyond by a living person; 2001, chap. 4) and by James Russell (1990, p. 180: “ecstatic practice generally termed shamanistic in the study of religions”............http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/kartir

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February 2016

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Bactrian Timeline: 2500 BC - 870 AD

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2300 BC......."The Bactria–Margiana Archaeological Complex (or BMAC, also known as the Oxus civilization) is the modern archaeological designation for a Bronze Age civilisation of Central Asia, dated to ca. 2300–1700 BCE, located in present-day northern Afghanistan, eastern Turkmenistan, southern Uzbekistan and western Tajikistan, centered on the upper Amu Darya (Oxus River)....In the Early Bronze Age the culture of the Kopet Dag oases and Altyn-Depe developed a proto-urban society..... Pottery was wheel-turned. Grapes were grown. The height of this urban development was reached in the Middle Bronze Age c. 2300 BC..... It is this Bronze Age culture which has been given the BMAC name."

2000 BC....."Balkh is considered to be the first city to which the Indo-Iranian tribes moved from the North of Amu Darya, between 2000 – 1500 BC. The Arabs called it Umm Al-Belaad or Mother of Cities due to its antiquity...Bactria in ancient times was renowned for its grapes, oranges, water lilies and later sugar cane.....several natural trade routes intersect at Balkh. From there, caravans could follow the well-watered foot of the mountains westward towards Herat and Iran, or across the Oxus to Samarkand and China and all the routes across the Hindu Kush......the greatness of Balkh owes even more to those distinctive people who promoted craftsmanship and trade, created cities and wrote poetry all across the Iranian world. On the down side, Balkh was usually rich rather than powerful, and became the envy and the prize of more warlike neighbors."......http://depts.washington.edu/silkroad/cities/afghanistan/balkh.html

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1800 BC........"Shenrab Miwo......"The teacher who transmitted Bon into Tibet from Shang Shung (or Tazik) reportedly in 1800 BC. The Berlin manuscript of the Zermig has several unusual representations of Shenrap."......The Bon Religion of Tibet: The Iconography of a Living Tradition...by Per Kvaerne

1700 BC......Zarathustra......"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 no later than 1000 BC, give or take a century or so, though reputable scholars have proposed dates as widely apart as 1750 BC and '258 years before Alexander'."........http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zarathustra#cite_note-10

1600 BC......"The Proto-Indo-Iranians, from which the Indo-Aryans developed, are identified with the Sintashta culture (2100–1800 BC), and the Andronovo culture, which flourished ca. 1800–1400 BC in the steppes around the Aral sea, present-day Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan. The proto-Indo-Iranians were influenced by the Bactria-Margiana Culture, south of the Andronovo culture, from which they borrowed their distinctive religious beliefs and practices. The Indo-Aryans split off around 1800-1600 BC from the Iranians, whereafter the Indo-Aryans migrated into the Levant and north-western India.".....Anthony, David W. (2007), The Horse The Wheel And Language. How Bronze-Age Riders From the Eurasian Steppes Shaped The Modern World,

1600 B.C......."In the Rig Veda, we read that the initial relationship between the Aryan religious groups... asuras (ahura) and deva was one of coexistence. This relationship would gradually change to one of competition....The story of the differences between the asuras and devas were of course a reflection of the differences and the violent conflict between the deva and asura worshippers. While the Hindu scriptures do not directly refer to Mazda worshippers, the Zoroastrian and Persian texts talk about the conflict as one between the deva and Mazda worshippers.....Periodically, one group would win dominance over the other. Nevertheless, until, their separation into the nations of Iran and India, they did coexist....At the time of Zarathushtra's birth, Asura/Mazda worship had lost ground to Deva worship....The conflict eventually resulted in the deva worshippers living in the Central Asian kingdom, leaving or being pushed south through the Hindu Kush mountain passes into the upper Indus valley.....The Indus Valley was called Hindu (Hind or Ind) in the Avesta." ....http://www.heritageinstitute.com/zoroastrianism/aryans/religion2.htm

1500 B.C...."....The weather change in Airyana Vaeja, that pollen and tree ring analysis indicates the Chang Tang plateau in Western and Northern Tibet had a far more liveable environment than it has today - one that supported a primordial civilization - until, starting around 1500 BC, the climate become colder and drier. The climate change would have caused the population to migrate out of the northern plateau. This type of climate change from temperate to cold, and the resulting changes in the environment from comfortable and verdant to harsh and rocky, is similar to the Zoroastrian stories of a climate change during the reign of legendary King Jamshid."....http://iranian.com/posts/view/post/7621

1000 B.C.......The I Ching (Chinese: 易經; pinyin: Yìjīng; [î tɕjə́ŋ]), also known as the Classic of Changes or Book of Changes in English, is an ancient divination text and the oldest of the Chinese classics. Possessing a history of more than two and a half millennia of commentary and interpretation, the I Ching is an influential text read throughout the world, providing inspiration to the worlds of religion, psychoanalysis, business, literature, and art. Originally a divination manual in the Western Zhou period (1000–750 BC),

900 B.C..........."The King of Shambhala, King Suchandra (sometimes wrongly Sanskritized as "Chandrabhadra," Tib. Dawa Sangpo), was the one who requested teaching from the Buddha. In response to his request, the Buddha gave the first Kalachakra root tantra in 900 to 876 BC. Note: the Kalachakra calculations put quite a bit earlier than the birth of Shakyamuni Buddha (563 or 566 B.C.)"

600 B.C.......Zoroastrianism....one of the world's oldest religions, "combining a cosmogonic dualism and eschatological monotheism in a manner unique... among the major religions of the world." It was founded by the Prophet Zoroaster (or Zarathustra) in ancient Iran approximately 3500 years ago. It was the official religion of Persia (Iran) from 600 BC to 650 AD.".....

604 B.C........Lao-Tzu (Lao-Tze)........c.604 - c.521 BC...Laozi of the Daoist school urged: "Man follows earth, earth follows Heaven, Heaven follows the Way, and the Way follows nature."

551 B.C.........Confucius (c. 551 – 479 BC)....... a Chinese teacher, editor, politician, and philosopher of the Spring and Autumn period of Chinese history....Confucius's principles had a basis in common Chinese tradition and belief. He championed strong family loyalty, ancestor worship, respect of elders by their children and of husbands by their wives....Confucius said more about "human affairs" and less about "the Mandate of Heaven." Nonetheless, he also believed that "what the saint says" is in keeping with "the Mandate of Heaven."....The Mandate of Heaven is an ancient Chinese belief and philosophical idea that tiān (heaven) granted emperors the right to rule based on their ability to govern well and fairly. According to this belief, heaven bestows its mandate to a just ruler, the Son of Heaven."...Jiang, Yonglin (2011). The Mandate of Heaven and The Great Ming Code (Asian Law Series). University of Washington Press.

563 B.C......."Shakyamuni Buddha.....In 563 or 566 B.C., a prince was born to a noble family of the Shakya clan, in a very beautiful park called Lumbini Grove, which lay in the foothills of the Himalayas (in present-day southern Nepal). This beautiful park was not far from the capital city of the Shakya kingdom, Kapilavastu. The prince’s father, King Shuddhodana, named his son Siddhartha. He was a member of the Kshatriya, or royal warrior caste, and his clan lineage, the Gautamas, was ancient and pure. His mother was Mahamaya or Mayadevi, daughter of a powerful Shakya noble, Suprabuddha."...http://kagyuoffice.org/buddhism/shakyamuni-buddha/

329 B.C..........."Alexander took Bactria in 329 B.C., and made it his base for conquest and amalgamation of the Greek and Iranian civilizations.....After Alexander the Great’s victory over King Darius III at the Battle of Gaugamela in 331 BC, he had to contend with small rebellions that broke out across his empire. In the summer of 328 BC, one such rebellion occurred in the eastern satrapy of Bactria, a rebellion that would lead to a chance meeting with the beautiful Roxanne, the sixteen-year-old daughter of Oxyartes, the satrap of Bactria .....The marriage between Roxanne of Balkh and Alexander the Great took place in 327 BC."

304 B.C......."Emperor Ashoka the Great (Aśoka) lived from 304 to 232 BC and was the third ruler of the Mauryan Empire."

129 B.C......Bactria.....annexation by the Kushans (129 B.C.), whose large and powerful empire stretched from Central Asia deep into India. Balkh flourished at the crossroads as a depot and trans-shipment point for the world’s luxuries. “ From the Roman Empire the caravans brought gold and silver vessels and wine; fom Central Asia and China rubies, furs, aromatic gums, drugs, raw silk and embroidered silks; from India spices, cosmetics, ivory and precious gems of infinite variety” With the merchants came monks preaching the new religion of Buddhism, and Balkh became a center of worship and learning, famous for its Buddhist temples and monasteries."...http://depts.washington.edu/silkroad/cities/afghanistan/balkh.html

216 A.D......Mani (Middle Persian Māni and Syriac Mānī, Greek Μάνης, Latin Manes; also Μανιχαίος, Latin Manichaeus, from Syriac ܡܐܢܝ ܚܝܐ Mānī ḥayyā)....... c. 216–274 A.D.), of Iranian origin....the prophet and the founder of Manichaeism, a gnostic religion of Late Antiquity which was once widespread but is now extinct.... In 240–41 A.D. , Mani travelled to "India" (i.e. to the Sakhas in modern-day Afghanistan), where he studied Hinduism and was probably influenced by Greco-Buddhism. Al-Biruni says Mani traveled to 'India' after being banished from Persia. Returning in 242 A.D., he joined the court of Shapur I, to whom he dedicated his only work written in Persian, known as the Shabuhragan. Shapur was not converted to Manichaeanism and remained Zoroastrian."....Marco Frenschkowski (1993). "Mani".

630 A.D......."By the time the Chinese pilgrim Xuanzang (formerly spelled Hsuan Tsang) passed through Balkh (630 A.D.) on his way to the fountainhead of Buddhism in India, the city had become part of the Sassanian empire. The bazaars were still humming with trade, the countryside fertile and the great temples impressed him with their magnificence. But Xuanzang noted laxness among the monks, and the rise of Zoroastrianism. There was strife with the Turki nomads across the Oxus, and the Arab incursions were just fifteen years ahead."...http://depts.washington.edu/silkroad/cities/afghanistan/balkh.html

633 A.D....."Parsis.....According to the Qissa-i Sanjan, Parsis migrated from Greater Iran to Gujarat and Sindh between the 8th and 10th century AD to avoid the persecution of Zoroastrians by Muslim invaders who conquered Iran....When Islam became the predominant religion of areas including such present-day countries as Saudi Arabia, Yemen, and Oman, the Muslim invasion of Persia, launched by the Rashidun Caliphate in 633 AD, became a huge event in the history of the region. During these conquests, buildings and books were destroyed....Due to this persecution, Zoroastrians became refugees in India."...https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zoroastrianism_in_India

650 A.D......"Iranian-Aryan Relations with the Tibetan Empire....The Tibetan empire established by Songtsen Gampo soon grew in power that extended beyond its borders....The Yarlung dynasty appears to have continued the collaborative relationship the Zhang Zhung had with the Iranian Aryans. The relationship continued even after the Arabs had conquered the Persian empire. Since it is the Tibetans who had become the dominant eastern power in the seventh century CE, it is they who provided the Persians and Sogdians sanctury.....As they fled east, the Persians first took refuge in Sugd (Sogdiana) and their presence there has been recorded on Sogdian inscriptions in Panjakand and Paykand. Then as the Persians and Sogdians continued east into China...... the rise of Tibetan power was because of the assistance of Persian refugees fleeing from the Arab invasion of Persia in the 650s AD. According to Nikitin, when the Persians arrived in the Tibetan court, they trained the Tibetans in the art of imperial warfare. According to another author Beckwith, a Chinese source describes the Yarlung Tibetan warriors and horses as being completely clad in armour in the Sassanian fashion. An important military technological advance and advantage for the Tibetans was their newly acquired ability to produce chain mail for armour.".....http://iranian.com/posts/view/post/7621

674 A.D......."Ubayd Allah ibn Ziyad (Arabic: عبيد الله بن زياد‎) was an Umayyad general and the governor for the Umayyad Caliphate in Kufa, in what is now Iraq during the reign of Yazid I.....In 674 he crossed the Amu Darya and defeated the forces of the ruler of Bukhara in the first known invasion of the city by Muslim Arabs.

870 A.D......."In 672 an Arab governor of Sistan, Abbad ibn Ziyad, raided the frontier of Al-Hind and crossed the desert to Gandhara, but quickly retreated again. The Arab General Obaidallah (Ubayd Allah) crossed the Sita River and made a raid on Kabul in 698 only to meet with defeat and humiliation. Vincent Smith, in Early History of India, states that the Turkishahiya dynasty continued to rule over Kabul and Gandhara up until the advent of the Saffarids in the ninth century. Forced by the inevitable advance of Islam on the west, they then moved their capital from Kapisa to Wahund on the Indus, whence they contin­ued as the Hindushahiya dynasty. This was in 870 A.D. and marks the first time that the Kingdom of Shambhala actually came under Moslem domination.".....http://www.dharmafellowship.org/biographies/historicalsaints/lord-padmasambhava.htm#eightcentury

870 A.D......."The Kabul Shahi dynasties also called Shahiya ruled the Kabul Valley (in eastern Afghanistan) and the old province of Gandhara (northern Pakistan and Kashmir) during the Classical Period of India from the decline of the Kushan Empire in the 3rd century to the early 9th century A.D. They are split into two eras the Buddhist-Shahis and the later Hindu-Shahis with the change-over occurring around 870.A.D."....Sehrai, Fidaullah (1979). Hund: The Forgotten City of Gandhara

"The times that followed were turbulent ones in Central Asia. Balkh changed hands repeatedly among Arab, Persian and Turki rulers, and was sacked more than once, yet it continued to flourish. The Arab geographers Yaqubi and Moqaddasi (9th and 10th centuries) depict Balkh as it was under Samanid rule, whe Bukhara was the center of power. A large and prosperous city of mud brick some three square miles in area, it held perhaps 200,000 persons. It was surrounded by mud-brick walls pierced by seven gates. A splendid Friday Mosque occupied the center, and many more mosques were scattered among the dwellings. The fire temple in the suburbs, which Xuanzang had admired when it was a Buddhist monastery, was still noteworthy. The city was home, not only to Persians and Turks but also to communities of Jews and Indian traders. It nourished poets and scholars, lawyers and even geographers and astronomers. But peace was a sometime thing; even when Balkh came under Seljuk rule for over a century, the nomads were never far away."......http://depts.washington.edu/silkroad/cities/afghanistan/balkh.html

("Catastrophe struck in 1220 A.D., when Ghengis Khan chose to make an example of Balkh, perhaps as punishment for an uprising. One hundred thousand Mongol horsemen embarked on an orgy of slaughter and destruction that left nothing standing; a few weeks later they returned to pick off the survivors of the carnage. Balkh remained in ruins for a century.".....http://depts.washington.edu/silkroad/cities/afghanistan/balkh.html

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January 2016

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Uttarakuru and Uttaramadra in the Aitareya Brahmana (c.1000 BC)

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"Uttarakuru (Sanskrit: उत्तर कुरु) is the name of a dvipa ("continent") in ancient Hindu and Buddhist mythology......Uttarakuru country and its people are sometimes described as belonging to the real world, whereas at other times they are mythical or otherworldly spiritual beings.....Aitareya Brahmana makes first reference to Uttarakuru and Uttaramadra as real-life Janapadas. According to Aitareya Brahmana, these two nations lay beyond the Himalayan ranges (Hindukush). The Aitareya Brahmana adduces these two people as examples of republican (vairajiya) nations, where whole Janapada took the consecration of rulership.......Aitareya Brahmana again notes that Uttarakuru was a deva-kshetra or divine land......Uttarakuru also finds numerous references in Buddhist literature, sometimes as a real land and other times as a mythical region.....Ramayana testifies that the original home of the Kurus was in Bahli country. Ila, son of Parajapati Karddama was a king of Bahli, where Bahli represents Sanskrit Bahlika (Bactria)....Bahlika or Bactria may have constituted the Uttarakuru. Mahabharata and Sumangalavilasini also note that the people of Kuru had originally migrated from Uttarakutru. Bactria is evidently beyond the Hindukush.....".....Geographical Data in Early Puranas, 1972, Dr M. R. Singh

"Uttara Madra is a kingdom grouped among the western kingdoms in the epic Mahabharata. It is identified to be located to the northwest of eastern Madra with Sagala as its capital. It was situated along the ancient route called Uttarapatha extending from Vanga Kingdom in the eastern sea shore through the Gangetic Plain, Punjab, mountain passes of the Western Mountains, to the city of Balkh in Afghanistan and to the far western countries. In some parts of the epic, Uttara Madra and Bahlika are considered as the same country. Arjuna collected tribute from Uttara Madra during his northern military campaign for Yudhishthira's Rajasuya sacrifice."....https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uttara_Madra_Kingdom

"The Aitareya Brahmana (Sanskrit: ऐतरेय ब्राह्मण) is the Brahmana of the Shakala shakha of the Rigveda, an ancient Indian collection of sacred hymns.....The Aitareya Brahmana is dated variously from 1000 BC to 500 BC."....https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aitareya_Brahmana

"Jean Przylusky has shown that Bahlika (Balkh) was an Iranian settlement of the Madras who were known as Bahlika-Uttaramadras....The Kambojas, the neighbors of the Uttaramadras, here obviously refers to the Parama-Kambojas branch the Kambojas located in Trans-Hindukush regions."....An Ancient People of Panjab, The Udumbras, Journal Asiatique, 1926, p 11, Jean Przylusky showing that Bahlika (Balkh) was an Iranian settlement of the Madras who were known as Bahlika-Uttaramadras.

"The Uttaramadra was the northern branch of the Madra people who are numerously referenced in ancient Sanskrit and Pali literature. In Aitareya Brahmana (VIII.14), the Uttarakuru and the Uttaramadra tribes are stated to be living beyond Himalaya.

"Since Uttarakuru of the Aitareya Brahmana is said to lie beyond Himalaya, the Bahlika or Bactria is also beyond Hindukush (i.e ... Kurus, the Madras were also originally a people living in/around Bahlika as is suggested by Vamsa Brahmana of the Sama Veda which text refers to one Madragara Shaungayani as ... In Aitareya Brahmana, the Uttarakurus and Uttaramadras are stated as living beyond Himalaya (paren himvantam) ..."....http://www.liquisearch.com/what_is_aitareya_brahmana

"The Ramayana seems to localize the Uttarakurus in Bahlika country. According to it, Ila, son of Prajapati Karddama, king of Bahli (Bahlika) country, gave up Bahli in favor of his son Sasabindu and founded the city of Pratisthana in Madhyadesa. The princes of the Aila dynasty (which is also the dynasty of Kurus) have been called Karddameya. The Karddameyas obtained their names from river Kardama in Persia and therefore, their homeland is identified with Bahlika or Bactria. This indicates that Bahlika or Bactria was the original home of the Kuru clans.... According to Jean Przylusky, the Bahlika (Balkh) was an Iranian settlement of the Madras who were known as Bahlika-Uttaramadras...in the remote antiquity (Vedic age), the (Iranian settlement of) the Madras was located in parts of Bahlika (Bactria)--the western parts of the Oxus country. These Madras were, in fact, the Uttaramadras of the Aitareya Brahmana (VIII/14). However, in 4th c BC, this Bahlika/Bactria came under Yavana/Greek political control and thus the land started to be referenced as Bahlika-Yavana in some of ancient Sanskrit texts..".....http://www.liquisearch.com/bahlikas/kurus-bahlikas-kambojas-madras_remote_connection

".... the Uttarakurus, Uttaramadras and Kambojas-- all were located beyond the Himalaya/Hindukush ranges. Probably, the Uttarakurus were located in the northern parts of Bahlika, the Uttaramadras were in the southern parts of it and the Kambojas (=Parama Kambojas) were to the east of Bahlika, in the Transoxiana region. The ancient Bahlika appears to have spanned a large expanse of territory. The commentator of Harsha-Carita of Bana Bhatta also defines the Kambojas as Kambojah-Bahlika-Desajah i.e. the Kambojas originated in/belonged to Bahlika. Thus, it seems likely that in the remote antiquity, the ancestors of the Uttarakurus, Uttaramadras and the Parama Kambojas were one people or otherwise were closely allied and had lived in/around Bahlika (Bactria)."............http://www.liquisearch.com/bahlikas/kurus-bahlikas-kambojas-madras_remote_connection

"Astronomy played a significant role in Vedic rituals, which were conducted at different periods of a year. The Aitareya Brahmana (4.18) states the sun stays still for a period of 21 days, and reaches its highest point on vishuvant, the middle day of this period...".....https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aitareya_Brahmana

"This work, according to the tradition, is ascribed to Mahidasa Aitareya.".....Arthur Berriedale Keith (1920). Rigveda Brahmanas: The Aitareya and Kausitaki Brahmanas of the Rigveda. Mot

"The Aitareya Aranyaka is undoubtedly a composite work, and it is possible that the Aitareya Brahmana also had multiple authors."

"The Aitareya Brahmanam of the Rigveda: Translation, edited by Martin Haug...(1827-1876)..... Oriental scholar and one of the founders of Iranian studies. His contributions to Old and Middle Iranian studies remained influential well into the twentieth century....His intimate, cordial, and affable manner of communicating with Hindu brahmans and Parsi priests (dasturs) enabled him to obtain the most extended and accurate information concerning their beliefs, rites, and customs ever vouchsafed to any European....He also bought Avesta, Pahlavi, and Vedic manuscripts for his own private collection.....His lectures on Indo-Iranian philology, linguistics, and Oriental studies....Haug published his Essays on the Sacred Language, Writings and Religion of the Parsis (Bombay, 1862), which offered the first grammatical description of the Avestan language in comparison with Sanskrit.....Haug argued that Zarathushtra taught a pure, ethical monotheism and a philosophical dualism, that there was no evidence for rituals in the Gathas, and that the prophet’s teachings were corrupted by later generations."...http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/haug-martin

The Aitareya Brahmanam of the Rigveda: Translation, edited by Martin Haug.....http://www.wilbourhall.org/pdfs/vedas/aitereya/the_aitareya_brahmanam_of_the_rigveda__s.pdf

Studies in Vedic and Indo-Iranian Religion and Literature....by Kshetresh Chandra Chattopadhyay.... 1978....The University of Virginia

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Email....okarresearch@gmail.com

January 2016

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Barak Baba & the Il-khanid (Tibetan Buddhist/Muslim) Rulers of Persia (1257-1307 AD)

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"Barak Baba..........(1257-1307 AD), a crypto-shamanic Anatolian Turkman dervish close to two of the Mongol rulers of Iran, the Īlkhānid period.......http://www.iranicaonline.org

"Ahmet Karamustafa, Ph.D., associate professor of Islamic thought and Turkish literature in Arts and Sciences......his treatise on the Qalandars, a 13th-century Islamic dervish movement that also favored tambourines and psychoactive drugs, not to mention drums and naked revelry.....Among dervishes, he explains, such bizarre anti-establishment behavior was considered an intensely spiritual act of pious self-denial, an outward sign of disdain for earthly societal norms. It's an intellectual tidbit that might prove useful to anyone seeking answers to social unrest in the '60s......In his 1994 book, "God's Unruly Friends: Dervish Groups in the Islamic Later Middle Period, 1200 - 1500," Karamustafa tells of Barak Baba, who led about 100 dervishes into Syria in 1306. Baba, who made a point of thumbing his nose at authority, liked to wander around nearly naked, wearing only a red cloth around his waist and a reddish turban on his head. His turban sported buffalo horns protruding from either side......Baba's dervishes were renowned for their "immoral" ways, which included consumption of illegal foods and drugs and failure to observe the ritual Islamic fast. Like the free-spirited flower children of this century, dervishes were castigated as no-account beggars, idiots, lunatics and impostors, both by contemporary church leaders and waves of subsequent religious scholars."....http://home.earthlink.net/~drmljg/id1.html

"Barāq Bābā left Sarï Saltūq and traveled to the Il-khanid court, probably because of a reverse his master’s forces had suffered. When Barāq Bābā came into the presence of Ḡāzān Khan in Tabrīz, a tiger was unleashed on him to test his occult powers; a cry from him was sufficient to halt it in its tracks. Thereafter he enjoyed the trust both of Ḡāzān and of his successor, Moḥammad Ḵodā-banda Oljāytū (Öljeytü)..... it is possible to see in Barāq Bābā an early exponent of the potent mixture of Turkic shamanism, Sufism, and ḡolāt-Shiʿism that some two centuries later brought the Safavids to power."....http://www.iranicaonline.org/

"In 1306 AD Barāq Bābā arrived in Damascus, carrying the Il-khanid banner and a letter of appointment. His outlandish appearance aroused both disgust and amusement: He was naked except for a red loincloth (fūṭa) and extremely filthy, wearing a kind of felt turban to which cowhorns were attached on his head. His companions were similarly dressed and carried with them an assortment of bones and bells, to the accompaniment of which Barāq Bābā would dance, imitating the antics of monkeys and bears....Tapdūq Emre, the preceptor of the celebrated mystical poet Yūnos Emre, were both regarded as Barāq Bābā’s successors....Qoṭb-al-ʿAlawī’s interpretation of the ecstatic utterances contained in the resāla in conformity with the classical Sufism of Iran suggests that no clear line of demarcation separated the crypto-shamanic Sufism of Barāq Bābā and his peers from its established and orthodox counterpart. Barāq Bābā is said, indeed, to have been one of those whom Ḡāzān Khan consulted concerning the life and teachings of Mawlānā Jalāl-al-Dīn Rūmī".....http://www.iranicaonline.org/

"ḠĀZĀN KHAN......(1271-1304 AD), oldest son of Arḡūn Khan and his eventual successor as the seventh Il-khanid ruler of Persia......he was appointed governor of the eastern provinces, i.e., Khorasan, Māzandarān, Qūmes and Ray..... Ḡāzān was a Buddhist who converted to Islam.....Once firmly on the throne, Ḡāzān launched a campaign against the non-Muslims in his kingdom. Particularly affected were the Buddhists, to which the Khan had belonged before his conversion to Islam. The Buddhist baḵšīs (lamas or scholars, q.v.) were given the option either to become Muslims or to leave the country. Buddhist temples were destroyed as were many churches and synagogues.....In spite of his conversion to Islam, Ḡāzān remained loyal to different aspects of Mongol tradition, most notably the yāsā, or law code attributed to Čengīz Khan." ....http://www.iranicaonline.org/

"The Ilkhanate, a khanate that formed the southwestern sector of the Mongol Empire, ruled by the Mongol House of Hulagu...The founder of the Ilkhanate dynasty was Hulagu Khan, (1218-1265 AD).....grandson of Genghis Khan....... It was founded in the 13th century and was based primarily in Iran as well as neighboring territories......Hulagu's descendants ruled Persia for the next eighty years, tolerating multiple religions, including Shamanism, Buddhism, and Christianity, and ultimately adopting Islam as a state religion in 1295......The Ilkhanate was originally based on the campaigns of Genghis Khan in the Khwarazmian Empire in 1219–24 and was founded by Hulagu Khan, a grandson of Genghis Khan. With the fragmentation of the Mongol Empire after 1259 it became a functionally separate khanate. At its greatest extent, the state expanded into territories that today comprise most of Iran, Iraq, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Turkmenistan, Turkey, western Afghanistan, and southwestern Pakistan. Later Ilkhanate rulers, beginning with Ghazan in 1295, would convert to Islam......

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"In the period after Hulagu, the Ilkhans increasingly adopted Tibetan Buddhism. Christian powers were encouraged by what appeared to be an inclination towards Nestorian Christianity by Ilkhanate rulers, but this was probably nothing more than the Mongols' traditional even-handedness towards competing religions. The Ilkhans were thus markedly out of step with the Muslim majority they ruled. Ghazan, shortly before he overthrew Baydu, converted to Islam, and his official favoring of Islam as a state religion coincided with a marked attempt to bring the regime closer to the non-Mongol majority of the regions they ruled. Christian and Jewish subjects lost their equal status with Muslims and again had to pay the poll tax. Buddhists had the starker choice of conversion or expulsion.".....

"In Sufism, teachers of ‘crazy wisdom’ are termed ‘Malamati’ or followers of the ‘Path of Blame.’ They may find it necessary in their teaching function to incur feelings of opposition in others, in order to challenge fixed ideas and assumptions......Individuals who follow the ‘Malamati’ approach do not worry about appearances, image or the impression made on others. They incur reproach, take no care of their repute, and simplydo and say what they consider right.".....http://www.lightwinnipeg.org/Crazy%20Wisdom.pdf

"The Qalandariyyah (Qalandaris or Kalandars)..... are wandering Sufi dervishes. The term covers a variety of sects, not centrally organized.......Starting in the early 12th century, the movement gained popularity in Greater Khorasan and neighbouring regions.....Particular to the qalandar genre of poetry are terms that refer to gambling, games, intoxicants......The Qalandariya may have arisen from the earlier Malamatiyya and exhibited some Buddhist and Hindu influences."

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Email....okarresearch@gmail.com

December 2015

John Hopkins....Northern New Mexico

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The Kingdom of Zhun and Takzig/Tibetan Bon

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"The shrine of Zun in Zamindawar, which was believed to be located about three miles south of Musa Qala in today's Helmand Province of Afghanistan.......Scholars have noted several similarities between the religion of Zhun and the pre-Buddhist, religion of Tibet ......"

"CULT of ZHUN........Before Islam reached Afghanistan the population followed several religious traditions, some imported (including Zoroastrianism, Hinduism, and Buddhism), others indigenous. Of the indigenous religions we know most about the cult of Zhun (Zun), because it was described in some detail by a Chinese Buddhist pilgrim, Xuan Zang, who visited Afghanistan shortly before the Arab invasion (BOSWORTH 1984, 4-7). Based on the worship of a golden idol with ruby eyes, the cult of Zhun (widespread throughout Zamindawar and Zabulistan) survived for two centuries after the arrival of Islam. The idol was housed in a temple, in front of which stood the vertebra of a giant reptile, locally believed to be that of a dragon. The priests of Zhun seem to have possessed shaman-like abilities, for Xuan Zang describes them as having powers to control demons and other supernatural forces and being able to both heal and harm people (BoswoRTH 1984, 6).

"Zunbils ruled Zamindawar before Islamization of the area. The title Zunbil can be traced back to the Middle-Persian original Zūn-dātbar, 'Zun the Justice-giver'. The geographical name Zamindawar would also reflect this, from Middle-Persian 'Zamin-i dātbar' (Land of the Justice-giver).....Zamindawar is a historical district of Afghanistan, situated on the right bank of the Helmand River to the northwest of Kandahar.... André Wink: In southern and eastern Afghanistan, the regions of Zamindawar and Zabulistan or Zabul (Jabala, Kapisha, Kia pi shi) and Kabul, the Arabs were effectively opposed for more than two centuries, from 643 to 870 AD, by the indigenous rulers the Zunbils and the related Kabul-Shahs of the dynasty which became known as the Buddhist-Shahi...... The Zunbil kings worshipped a sun god by the name of Zun from which they derived their name. For example, André Wink writes that "the cult of Zun was primarily 'Hindu', not Buddhist or Zoroastrian... the shrine of Zun in Zamindawar, which was believed to be located about three miles south of Musa Qala in today's Helmand Province of Afghanistan."

"TIBETAN BON.........Scholars have noted several similarities between the religion of Zhun, the shamanic religions of Central Asia, and the pre-Buddhist, dragon-god religion of Tibet (Bosworth 1984, 7)......Following Afghanistan's conversion to Islam during the seventh century AD., many of the pre-existing shamanistic beliefs and practices were incorporated into the framework of Muslim cosmology. The ecstatic techniques associated with Islam's mystical Sufi tradition must have lent themselves particularly well to the assimilation of indigenous shamanistic practices."

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"The Bon religion of the royal period (seventh to ninth centuries) is said to have come from Tazig (stag gzig, Tajik/Iran) via Zhang Zhung, and Zhang Zhung is the probable source of other early components of Tibetan civilization. A pre-Buddhist shamanistic religion prevalent in early Tibet, Bon developed just west of Mount Kailash in Guge (gu ge), the capital of the ancient kingdom of Zhang Zhung. Like the Buddhists who came centuries after him, Tonpa Shenrab Miwoche (ston pa gshen rab mi bo che) combined the various native mystical cults under his own to fashion Bon, or Bön. He settled in Zhang Zhung, presently known as western Tibet's Guge region. Centered on the Tibetan Plateau, the tale of the kingdom of the Bon people is of profound importance, for it was from the Bon kingdom of Zhang Zhung that the myth of Shambhala arose. Shambhala, named Olmo Lung Ring ('ol-mo lung-rings), was considered to be one of the great centers of the Zhang Zhung culture of central Tibet. These people settled in Tibet and practiced some form of ritual Bon culture, which must have evolved from Hinduism and Zoroastrianism."....http://www.yungdrung.org/doc/Compilation_History_Zhang_Zhung.pdf

"Musa Qala ('Fortress of Moses') is a town and the district center of Musa Qala District in Helmand Province, Afghanistan. It sits at 32.4433°N 64.7444°E and at 1043 meters altitude in the valley of Musa Qala River in the central western part of the district. It is in a desolate area, populated by native Pashtun tribes......

"Sangin is a town in the valley of the Helmand River at 888 m altitude, 95 km to the north-east of Lashkar Gah. Sangin is notorious as one of the central locations of the opium trade in the south of the country, and is also a town that has traditionally supported the Taliban. It was described by British newspaper The Guardian as "the deadliest area in Afghanistan".

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"Lashkar Gah historically also called Bost (Persian: بُسْت‎‎), is the capital of Helmand Province. It is located in Lashkar Gah district, and situated between the Helmand and Arghandab rivers. The city is linked by major roads with Kandahar to the east, Zaranj to the west, and Herat to the north-west. .....Lashkar Gah was part of the Saffarids in the 9th century. It grew up a thousand years ago as a riverside barracks town for soldiers accompanying the Ghaznavid nobility to their grand winter capital of Bost. The ruins of the Ghaznavid mansions (Qala-e-Bost )......still stand along the Helmand River; the city of Bost and its outlying communities were sacked in successive centuries by the Ghorids, Mongols, and Timurids.

"The great fortress of Bost, Qala-e-Bost, remains an impressive ruin. It is located at 31° 30’ 02″ N, 64° 21’ 24″ E near the convergence of the Helmand and Arghandab Rivers, a half hour's drive south of Lashkar Gah. Qala-e-Bost is famous for its decorative arch.....As of April 2008, it was possible to descend into an ancient shaft about 20 feet across and 200 feet deep, with a series of dark side rooms and a spiral staircase leading to the bottom. In 2006 construction began on a cobblestone road to lead from the south of Lashkar Gah to the Qala-e-Bost Arch (known to readers of James A. Michener's Caravans as Qala Bist.)"

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"Zhang Zhung (transcribed Zhang Zhung, Shang Shung, Zan Zun or Tibetan Pinyin Xang Xung)was an ancient culture and kingdom of western and northwestern Tibet, which pre-dates the culture of Tibetan Buddhism in Tibet. Zhangzhung culture is associated with the Bon religion, which in turn, has influenced the philosophies and practices of Tibetan Buddhism....The Zhang Zhung culture was centered around sacred Mount Kailash and extended west to Sarmatians..... the area of Shang Shung was not historically a part of Tibet and was a distinctly foreign territory to the Tibetans.....about 950 AD, the Hindu King of Kabul had a statue of Vişņu, of the Kashmiri type (with three heads), which he claimed had been given him by the king of the Bhota (Tibetans) who, in turn had obtained it from Kailāśa.....Zhang Zhung flourished until around 700 AD, when deteriorating climate and cultural and religious changes in Tibet combined in its demise."

"The Sarmatians (Latin: Sarmatæ or Sauromatæ, Greek: Σαρμάται, Σαυρομάται) were a large confederation of Iranian people during classical antiquity, flourishing from about the 5th century BC to the 4th century AD. They spoke Scythian, an Indo-European language from the Eastern Iranian family.......Originating in Central Asia, the Sarmatians started their westward migration around the 6th century BC, coming to dominate the closely related Scythians by the 2nd century BC. The Sarmatians differed from the Scythians in their veneration of the god of fire rather than god of nature, and women's prominent role in warfare......Like the Scythians, Sarmatians were of a Caucasoid appearance....."

"The Aryan terms for deity are borrowed from fire and light. For example, 'deva' is from the root 'div' which means 'to shine'. In old Sanskrit, 'Athar' is 'fire'."..(James: 1963...pg 79)...

"According to the Bönpo tradition, although Yungdrung Bön is eternal and without an ultimate beginning in time, it originated in the present kalpa or cycle of existence in the country of Ölmo Lungring where Tönpa Shenrab descended from the celestial spheres and took up incarnation among human beings as an Iranian prince. The mysterious land of Ölmo Lungring (`ol-mo lung-rings) or Ölmoling (`ol-mo`i gling) is said to be part of a larger geographical region to the northwest of Tibet called Tazig (stag-gzig, var. rtag-gzigs), which scholars identify with Iran or, more properly, Central Asia where in ancient times Iranian languages such as Avestan and later Sogdian were spoken.".....http://bonchildren.tonkoblako-9.net/en/jewel2/03.tan

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"Zunbil, also written as Zhunbil, was a dynasty south of the Hindu Kush in present southern Afghanistan region. They ruled from the early 7th century until the Islamic conquest of Afghanistan in 870 AD. The Zunbils are believed to be an offspring of the southern-Hephthalite rulers of Zabulistan. The dynasty was related to the Kabul Shahis of the northeast in Kabul. "It follows from Huei-ch'ao's report that Barhatakin had two sons: one who ruled from after him in Kapisa-Gandhara and another who became king of Zabul......The Zunbils worshiped the sun, which they named Zun (pronounced "zoon") from which they derived their name. Their territory included between what is now the city of Zaranj in southwestern Afghanistan and Kabulistan in the northeast, with Zamindawar and Ghazni serving as their capitals. The title Zunbil can be traced back to the Middle-Persian original Zūn-dātbar, 'Zun the Justice-giver'. The geographical name Zamindawar would also reflect this, from Middle Persian 'Zamin-i dātbar' (Land of the Justice-giver).... The shrine of Zoon (sun god) was located about three miles south of Musa Qala in Helmand, which may still be traced today. Some believe that the Sunagir temple mentioned by the famous Chinese traveler Xuanzang in 640 AD pertains to this exact house of worship.".....

"It was during the governorship in Khorasan of ʿAbdallāh b. ʿĀmer for the caliph ʿOṯmān that the Arabs first appeared in Sistān, when in 652 AD Zarang surrendered peacefully, although Bost resisted fiercely. From the base of Zarang, raids were launched eastwards into Arachosia/Roḵḵaj and Zamindāvar against the local rulers, the Zunbils, and as far as Kabul, against the Kābolšāhs. A process of gradual Islamization must have begun in Sistān, although Zoroastrianism and Christianity long persisted there, certainly into the 11th century, with the Zoroastrian fire-temple at Karkuya (Karkuy) to the north of Zarang long maintained."......http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/sistan-ii-islamic-period

Iran By Patricia L. Baker, Hilary Smith, Maria Oleynik

"Mount Khwaja is also an important archaeological site: On the southern promontory of the eastern slope, the ruins of a citadel complex - known as the Ghagha-Shahr - with its remains of a fire temple attest to the importance of the island in pre-Islamic Iran. According to Zoroastrian legend, Lake Hamun is the keeper of Zoroaster's seed. In Zoroastrian eschatology, when the final renovation of the world is near, maidens will enter the lake and then give birth to the saoshyans, the saviours of humankind.... the ruins are called Qal'a-e Kafaran "Fort of Infidels" or Qal'a-e Sam "Fort of Sam," the grandfather of the mythical Rostam".....

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Email....okarresearch@gmail.com

December 2015

John Hopkins....Northern New Mexico

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The Bon Tradition & The Naubahar/NoGombad Ruins of Balkh

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"The Naubahar / No Gombad ruins are located just south of the city of Balkh and are variously described as being an ancient Zoroastrian fire temple, a pre-Zoroastrian fire temple that was converted into a Buddhist temple and then into a Islamic mosque. 'Nau' or 'no' can be translated as 'Nine'. .....'Bahar' can be translated as 'spring'.......... 'No Gombad', a more recent name, means nine domes.......The indications are that the present structure, dated between 850 - 900 AD, was built over an earlier structure that could have been constructed as early as the first century BC."

"Bon doctrine and practice appear to have evolved greatly during the past thousand years and it is at times difficult to distinguish some of Bon's original teachings from its more modern borrowings from Buddhism, Hindu Saivism (Shiva worship) and even possibly Islam."

"The question of Indo-Iranian influence on Bön has been open for a long time now. Seeking to explain some linguistic and cultural parallels, several scholars have brought forward different theories of how and when Bön could have been influenced by the Indo-Iranian culture and religion. These theories could be broadly summed up.......

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1. Traditional Bon View............"Yungdrung Bön is the original, authentic Central Asian Buddhism taught by the Buddha Tonpa Shenrab Miwo who was born in 16,017 BC (according to tradition) in the Central Asian region of Tagzig (modern-day Tajikistan and surrounding Central Asian states). Tonpa Shenrab Miwo brought Yungdrung Bön teachings to the Zhang Zhung Confederation (tribal union of 18 tribes) and Tibet (at that time only U and Tsang provinces) himself, and that is the source of most Indo-Iranian linguistic and cultural traces found in Tibetan Bön.......http://www.boandbon.com/bon&indo-iranians.html

"........living Bönpo scholars such as Yongdzin Lopön Tenzin Namdak Rinpoche - on Bön history, religion, culture and possible routes by which it may have spread in and out of the ancient Zhang Zhung Confederation. In Chapter XV the inter-connectedness of the ancient peoples (Hunnu, Syanbi, Tuyuhun'-Azha, Tokharians, Scythians and so on....

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2. "Bön (Yungdrung Bön) .......from the Iranian speaking regions in the West (such as Kushana Empire and so on) from where it reached the Tibetan Plateau prior to the introduction of Indian Buddhism per se from the South in the 8th century AD......mixed with the native culture and religion of the Tibetan Plateau producing what is now known as Yungdrung Bön. (Snellgrove, Tucci)...http://www.boandbon.com/bon&indo-iranians.html

".....regarding Aryan influence on Bon, there exists the possibility that Bon could have adopted its dualism doctrine in Central Asia from the early Indo-Iranians.."..........http://zoroastrianheritage.blogspot.com/2011/07/bon-zoroastrianism-dualism_20.html

"....the doctrine could have been brought over later by Iranians (including Sogdians) who fled to Tibet following the Islamic invasion.".........http://zoroastrianheritage.blogspot.com/2011/07/bon-zoroastrianism-dualism_20.html

"According to Kuznetsov, Bon was introduced to Tibet in the fifth century BC, when there occurred a mass migration of Iranians from Sogdhiana in north-east Iran to the northern parts of Tibet. They brought with them an ancient form of polytheistic Mithraism and the Araimic alphabet, named after Aramaiti, the Iranian Earth Goddess." .....(June Campbell: "Traveller in Space" 1968)

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3. Bön as a branch of Zoroastrianism or Mithraism.......... and Tonpa Shenrab Miwo was a priest at the court of the Persian king Cyrus the Great (c. 600 – 530 BC ) of the Achaemenid dynasty. (Gumilev, Kuznetsov).....http://www.boandbon.com/bon&indo-iranians.html

"The ancient Bon religion that survives primarily as a minority religion in Tibet today, has some interesting connections with Zoroastrianism, the pre-Zoroastrian Aryan religion of ancient Indo-Iranians, as well as the now extinct branch of Zoroastrianism, Zurvanism. Bon's theological dualism finds connections with Zurvanism, while its philosophical dualism finds connections with Zoroastrianism. In Zurvanism, the first creative principle that embodied time and space give rise to the duality of light and darkness ..."..........http://zoroastrianheritage.blogspot.com/2011/07/bon-zoroastrianism-dualism_20.html

"In about 763 AD the Uighur Buddhist ruler converted to Manichaeism...."

The Common Zoroastrian Legacy in Tibetan Bon, Siberian Bo, Ossetic Shamanism and the Ishraqi Tradition.....the pan-Eurasian Ur-religion....... the deities of the proto-Indo-Iranian, Vedic, Zoroastrian, Bönpo, Bө Murgel and Tibetan Buddhist pantheons such as Mithra-Ahura, Mitravaruna, Ahura Mazda and Hormuzd Yazad, Nyipangse, Hormusta Tengeri, Pehar and so on. ......http://www.boandbon.com/bon&indo-iranians.html

"The Number Nine.........Haúr-vatát, “heil, health, happiness” and the number 9....In the Avestan lore (HÓRDÁD YAŠT) haúr-vatát is closely associated with the number NINE, a symbol of wondrous knowledge and power......Nine is a supremely powerful and key number in the Zoroastrian tradition. Nine is the basis of much ceremonial and ritual in Zoroastrianism. Nine symbolizes a synthesis of spirit/mind and the material, a whole wisdom/knowledge of heaven and earth, wonders of the seen and unseen realms. It impressed early mathematicians that multiplications by nine always produced digits that added up to nine.....The name Haúr-vatát has changed to khordád in Persian. It has been translated as Avirdāda, udaka “waters of wisdom” and sarvapravṛttihá “source of everything” in the Sanskrit commentaries of Nairyösang on the poetic gathas."........http://authenticgathazoroastrianism.org/2014/05/30/haur-vatat-heil-health-happiness-and-the-number-9/

"The Naubahar / No Gombad ruins are located just south of the city of Balkh and are variously described as being those of a mosque, a Zoroastrian fire temple, and a fire temple that was converted into a Buddhist temple and then into a mosque. 'Nau' or 'no' can mean 'new' or 'Nine'. 'Bahar' can mean 'spring'. 'No Gombad', a more recent name, means nine domes.......The indications are that the present structure, dated between 850 - 900 AD, was built over an earlier structure that could have been constructed as early as the first century BC."

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"The Nava Vihāra (Sanskrit: नवविहार "New Monastery", modern Nowbahār, Persian: نوبهار‎‎) were two Buddhist monasteries close to the ancient city of Balkh in northern Afghanistan. The temples and monasteries of Nava Vihara are spread over a very large area about 20 kilometres (12 mi) south of Balkh above Chesme-ye Safā (Persian: چشمه صفا‎‎ "Clear Spring"), not far from the Koh e Alburz."

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4. Yungdrung Bön as a plagiarized form of Indian Buddhism............. which emerged after the 8th century AD and any Indo-Iranian - and especially Indian - influence was acquired in this process. (This is the view of many Tibetan Buddhist scholars and some Western scholars who still follow this outdated and flimsy theory.).........http://www.boandbon.com/bon&indo-iranians.html

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"Yungdrung Coin...." Yolamira, silver drachm, early type.....c. 125-150 AD......Diademed bust right, dotted border /Swastika right, Brahmi legend ..... Yolamirasa Bagarevaputasa Pāratarāja ......(Of Yolamira, son of Bagareva, Pārata King).....The names Yolamira and Bagareva betray the Iranian origin of this dynasty. The suffix Mira refers to the Iranian deity Mithra. Yolamira means "Warrior Mithra." Bagareva means "rich God."......The Pāratas were a dynasty of Indo-Scythian kings who ruled out of the area that is now Baluchistan province......from the 1st century to the 3rd century AD.....Pārata Dynastical Ruler......Yolamira, son of Bagareva (c. 125–150 AD).....Arrian describes how Alexander the Great encountered the Pareitakai in Bactria and Sogdiana.....

"The body of Shenlha Wokar is white...his ontological status is than of bonku, 'unconditioned being' or 'supreme being', corresponding to the Buddhist category of dharmakaya...His association with light suggests Manichaean influences....The colour of his body is like the essence of crystal...his ornaments, attire, and palace are adorned by crystal light..." (Paul:1982) (Hoffman:1979,pg 105) (Kvaerne:1996, pg 26)

SHENRAB...."his origins are said to be in Iran-Elam and his name is given as Mithra. The Tibetan word Tsug-Pu (gtsug.phud) meaning 'crown of the head' approximates the actual word Mithra." Campbell, June...."Traveller in Space".....New York:1996...pg 37

"On coins of the Arsacids the seated archer dressed as a Parthian horseman has been interpreted as Mithra. In the Kushan empire Mithra is among the deities most frequently depicted on the coinage, always as a young solar god."

"Chogyam Trungpa sketched in the outlines of what a Shambhala culture means. “Shambhala is our way of life. The Shambhala principle is our way of life. Shambhala is the Central Asian kingdom that developed in the countries of the Middle East, Russia, China, and Tibet altogether. The basic idea of Shambhala vision is that a sane society developed out of that culture, and we are trying to emulate that vision. That particular system broke down into the Taoist tradition and Bon tradition of Tibet, the Islamic tradition of the Middle East, and whatever tradition Russia might have. It has broken into various factions."

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Email....okarresearch@gmail.com

December 2015

John Hopkins....Northern New Mexico

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Iranian, Persian, Parsa, Persia & Iran: Distinctions

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"The name 'Persia' comes from 'Pers' which is in turn the European version of 'Pars' - an area that is today a province of Iran. .....2,500 years ago, when the present provinces of Iran were kingdoms [at one time Iran (then Airan) consisted of 240 kingdoms], Pars was known as Parsa, and the kings of Parsa established an empire that came to be known in the West as the Persian Empire - the largest empire the world have ever known to that point. In those days, Parsa was the dominant kingdom of all the Iranian or Aryan kingdoms."...http://www.heritageinstitute.com/zoroastrianism/iranpersia/

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"According to the Kār-nāmag..........Middle Persian 'Book of the Deeds of Ardashir'....... "there were in the territory of Iran two hundred and forty princes" at the beginning of Iranian Parthian Empire (247 BC – 228 AD) .....The dominant kingdom of Iran has at various times been Balkh (Bactria), Mada (Media), Parsa (Persia), Parthava (Parthia) and then Persia again. The king of the dominant kingdom was called king-of-kings (shah-en-shah in modern terms) - an emperor.".......http://www.heritageinstitute.com/zoroastrianism/iranpersia/

...."King of Kings" (šar šarrāni) .....The Persian title of a king of kings is shahanshah....associated especially with Zoroastrian Persian Achaemenid Empire......the terms used for Hindu kings to represent king of kings include Rajadhi raja , chakravarthi, Maharaja ,Perarasu,etc.......In the Pali Tripitaka, Buddha is sometimes compared to the worldly Emperor (Chakravarti), the Universal King, or the secular "King of Kings". But Buddha is also seen as the "King of the Dharma" or Dharma-raja......The first written record of its consistent use dates to Iranian Kings of the Persian Empire or Iranian High Kings of the Persian Empire (pronounced Shahanshah or Great Shahanshah). Because the Persian kings ruled in a format where conquered kings were allowed to rule over provinces (Satraps), while being loyal to the King of kings of the Persian Empire, the fact that the Persian kings ruled over other kings gave them the title king of kings......

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"...'Iran' is a relatively modern contraction of the name Airyana Vaeja (the ancient homeland of the Airya or Aryans).....Over time, Airyana Vaeja became Airan-Vej, then Eran-Vej or Airan-Vej ...... then Eran or Airan, and finally Iran......While we do not know the precise location of the originl Aryan homeland, Airyana Vaeja, the Central Asian lands that are today part of Tajikistan, north-eastern Afghanistan, and southern Uzbekistan - all east of the northeast corner of present day Iran - are strong candidates....From Airyana Vaeja the original Aryan homeland (possibly quite small in size and extent), the Aryans migrated to surrounding lands. In doing so, they formed fifteen additional kingdoms listed in the Avesta, the Zoroastrian scriptures, in a book called the Vendidad.....the migrations extended along the Aryan Trade Roads known commonly as the Silk Roads.".....http://www.heritageinstitute.com/zoroastrianism/iranpersia/

"During the reign of the subsequent Kayanian dynasty (Zarathushtra lived during the reign of Kayanian King Vishtasp) which assumed dominance over the Aryan nations, the Shahnameh no longer has the capital of Greater Iran located near Sari, but rather in Balkh (Bactria), in the north of Afghanistan today....Ancient Airyana Vaeja grew to become a federation of nations that classical Greek historian and geographer Strabo called Aryana/Ariana (Avestan Airyana). Strabo describes the different kingdoms/nations that constituted Aryana describing its borders as stretching from the Indus to Persia-Media - linked, as he noted, by a common language native to the groups...."........http://www.heritageinstitute.com/zoroastrianism/iranpersia/

"Balkh / Bactria & King Vishtasp.....The fourth Vendidad nation is Bakhdhim / Bakhdhi / Bakhdi / Balkh located in Northern Afghanistan. Among the first "hearers and teachers" of Zarathushtra's message listed in the Farvardin Yasht (13.99) was King Vishtasp. Later texts state that King Vishtasp, a king of the Kayanian dynasty, was king of Bakhdhi/Balkh, and that Zarathushtra died in Bakhdhi/Balkh, killed by a Turanian. In these texts, the Amu Darya (Oxus) river formed the north-eastern border between ancient Bakhdhi and Turan (Sugd). Further upstream, a portion of the Amu Darya river ran through Bakhdhi. .....Balkh became the capital city of the Kayanian kings and ancient Airan, the successor state to Airyana Vaeja and the predecessor state to modern Iran.".... http://www.heritageinstitute.com/zoroastrianism/aryans/location.htm

"Persian Rise to Dominance Over the Aryan Nations......About 2,500 years ago, the Parsa (Persians) rose to power to became the dominant Aryan kingdom. Dominance amongst the Aryans groups passed from the Medes to the Parsa (Persians) when the Achaemenian king Cyrus the Great (Cyrus II) established the Persian Empire in the sixth century BC by bringing the nations within the Aryan Empire ruled by the Medes under overall Persian rule. The dominance of the Aryan federation of nations had passed from Feridoon's dynasty (in Gorgan-Mazandaran, i.e. central-north Aryana) to the Kayanians (in Balkh i.e. mid-eastern Aryana) to the Medes (in north-west Aryana) and now to the Persians (in south-western Aryana).".......http://www.heritageinstitute.com/zoroastrianism/iranpersia/

"The West, influenced as it was by Greek and Latin literature, continued to call Eran 'Persia', presumably out of habit or because the rulers of Iran were Persians. That Western tradition continued into the last century until the reign of Iranian king, Reza Shah, founder of the Pahlavi dynasty. In 1935 AD, Reza Shah asked those countries with whom Iran had diplomatic relations, to stop using the name Persia and to formally refer to his country as Iran. Some Euro-centric map-makers and authors ignored this formal request and continued to use Persia as the name instead of Iran."..........http://www.heritageinstitute.com/zoroastrianism/iranpersia/

"In the 7th century AD, the Arabs conquered Iran and converted the mainly Zoroastrian population to Islam. The Arabs pronounced the name Pars as Fars (because Arabic does not have the 'p' sound).....While the words Parsi and Farsi are synonymous, today the Arabized name Farsi is used to mean the Persian language. The initial wave of Zoroastrian refugees who fled to India after the Arab invasion of Iran, now use of the authentic name 'Parsi' as their ethnic group name. ".............http://www.heritageinstitute.com/zoroastrianism/iranpersia/

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"The Vendidad.....Today, there is controversy over historical development of the Vendidad. The Vendidad is classified by some as an artificial, young Avestan text. Its language resembles Old Avestan. The Vendidad is thought to be a Magi (Magi-influenced) composition......The Vendidad consists of 22 fargards containing fragments of discussions between Ahura Mazda and Zoroaster.......some consider the Vendidad a link to ancient early oral traditions, began - perhaps substantially - before the formation of the Median and Persian Empires, before the 8th century B.C.....The name of the texts is a contraction of the Avestan language Vî-Daêvô-Dāta, "Given Against the Daevas (Demons)", and as the name suggests, the Vendidad is an enumeration of various manifestations of evil spirits, and ways to confound them." ....Kellens, Jean (1989). "Avesta". Encyclopedia Iranica

"Daeva (daēuua, daāua, daēva) is an Avestan language term for a particular sort of supernatural entity with disagreeable characteristics. In the Gathas, the oldest texts of the Zoroastrian canon, the daevas are "wrong gods" or "false gods" or "gods that are (to be) rejected.......Daeva, the Iranian language term, should not be confused with the devas of Indian religions. While the word for the Vedic spirits and the word for the Zoroastrian entities are etymologically related, their function and thematic development is altogether different. The once-widespread notion that the radically different functions of Iranian daeva and Indic deva (and ahura versus asura) represented a prehistoric inversion of roles is no longer followed in 21st century academic discourse....In the Rigveda (10.124.3), the devas are the "younger gods", in conflict with the asuras, the "older gods". There is no such division evident in the Zoroastrian texts....Old Avestan daēuua or daēva derives from Old Iranian *daiva, which in turn derives from Indo-Iranian *daivá- "god," reflecting Proto-Indo-European *deiu̯ó with the same meaning.".....https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daeva

"Kār-nāmag........KĀR-NĀMAG Ī ARDAŠĪR Ī PĀBAGĀN, a short prose work written in Middle Persian... written in the Sassanid period (226-651 AD)...... It narrates the Sasanian king Ardašīr I’s own life story—his rise to the throne, battle against the Parthian king Ardawān, and conquest of the empire by the scion of the House of Sāsān, as well as episodes concerning his heir Šābuhr and the latter’s son, Ohrmazd. .....http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/karnamag-i-ardasir

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Email....okarresearch@gmail.com

December 2015

John Hopkins....Northern New Mexico

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The Deity Oxus & Ancient Bactrian Polytheism

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"There are many gods....They are always present everywhere.....we prefer to use the term Naturalism rather than Polytheism."

"The single most important element that dominates the landscape of ancient Bactria is the river Amu Darya, the ancient Oxus, and its many tributaries. Bactria without Oxus is almost unimaginable.....yet most research has been confined to the study of the "major" religions (Buddhism, Zoroastrianism and/or Islam)...... Despite that, the local Bactrian polytheistic pantheon presents an amazing richness and forms a fascinating field of study, yet acknowledged by not many modern scholars."......THE LOCAL RIVER GOD OXUS-WAKHSH IN PRE-ISLAMIC BACTRIA.....http://www.iranianstudies.com/content/local-river-god-oxus-wakhsh-pre-islamic-bactria

"It is a river deity or aquatic deity for which we know two things for certain: that in the Hellenistic period a whole temple was dedicated to this god and that much later, in the seventh and eighth century CE, local people took its worship seriously by taking oaths on its name during their legal and economic transactions.".....http://www.iranianstudies.com

Valley of Takhti Sangin

Takht-i Sangin....The ancient town of Takht-i Sangin is located near the confluence of the Vakhsh and Panj rivers, the source of the Amu Darya, in southern Tajikistan.....The Greco-Bactrian temple site of Takht-i Sangin is believed by many to be the source of the Oxus Treasure that now resides in the Victoria and Albert Museum and British Museum. Part of greater Transoxiana and built in the 3rd Century BC, the site consists of a well-fortified citadel containing the so-called "Temple of Oxus".....Holt, F.L. (1989), Alexander the Great and Bactria: The Formation of a Greek Frontier in Central Asia: 2nd Edition, Brill Archive.

"OXYARTES......Hellenized form of the Old Persian male name Vaxšuvarda (also seen spelled as Vakhshuvarda), which was derived from older Persian Vaxšuvadarva......part of the name referring to Vakhsh, the Aramaic counterpart of the Greek river god Oksos or Oxos (known as Oxus in Latin).... Oxyartes would then be a Greek transliteration of the original Aramaic name......if one looks up the Oxus river (nowadays called Amu Darya) from which the river god derived its name (or vice versa).....Vakhsh is said to be ultimately derived from Sanskrit Vaksu. A known bearer of this name was the father of Roxana, the Bactrian wife of Alexander the Great (4th century BC)."......."Kingship in Hellenistic Bactria" by Gillian Catherine Ramsey.....http://www.behindthename.com/name/oxyartes/submitted

"In modern Takht-i Sangin, on the Uzbekistan-Afghanistan borders, along the river Amu Darya (Gr. Oxus, Bact. Wakhsh), a large temple complex has been excavated by Russian archaeologists, which bears little resemblance to typical ancient Greek religious architecture. However, this building has provided us with significant evidence for the cult of the local river god Oxus through Greek inscriptions from the time of the Greco-Bactrian kingdom. A famous stone altar base with a standing Marsyas on top, fragments from a stone perirrhanterion on the temple’s entrance and a bronze caldron preserve dedicatory inscriptions mentioning god Oxus. All names of the devotees are Iranian, but the “epigraphic habit”, god Marsyas, the caldron and the perirhanterion are a clear reference to a Greek understanding of the ritual and the cult.".....https://hellenisticmonarchies2015.wordpress.com/day-2/spyridon-loumakis/

"The popularity of the local cult of Oxus can be seen in the amount of examples of Oxus-based theophoric names found in Aramaic documents from Bactria, dated from 353 to 324 BC, possibly from the archive of the satrap of Bactria, and in the epigraphic data from the Hellenistic city of Aï Khanoum in Bactria (before the mid second c. BC). In addition, we know from ancient Greek authors that Oxy-atres was the name of Darius III’s brother (Arrian, Anabasis 7.4; Strabo, Geography 12.3.10), that Oxy-dates was a high royal Persian, imprisoned by Darius III, and later appointed satrap of Media by Alexander III (Arrian, Anabasis 3.20; 4.18) and that Oxy-artes was one of the four powerful noblemen of Bactria who resisted the advance of Alexander III’s army (Arrian, Anabasis 3.28; 4.18-21; 6,.5; 7.4; 7.6; Diod. Sic., Historical Library 2.6.2)."....Spyridon Loumakis (Concordia University): “Oxus-Wakhsh: A Local River God in Hellenistic Bactria”......https://hellenisticmonarchies2015.wordpress.com

".... this unique temple, which mixes Hellenistic and local Iranian religious traditions in many levels (sacred setting, ritual, cult) was extremely significant for the eastern most border of the Hellenistic world in central Asia, based on three arguments: (a) on the temple’s variety and richness of offerings (more than eight thousand excavated objects of alabaster, clay, terra cotta, bone, ivory, semiprecious stones, glass, textiles, iron, bronze, silver and gold), (b) on its monumental proportions, which manifest the concentration of great political and economic power, and (c) on the abundance of arms dedicated to the temple, probably the biggest assemblage in the entire Central Asia, with different types of offensive and defensive armour, from Hellenistic, Middle Eastern and Sarmatian-Scythian origins.".....Spyridon Loumakis......https://hellenisticmonarchies2015.wordpress.com

"In the extremely beautiful spot where the Vakhsh and Pyanj rivers flow together and give birth to the Amu Darya lie the ruins of the Takhti Sangin temple, a Zoroastrian temple of the Achaemenid Persian period.....During the silk-road period it was a center where merchants visited by land and river. Here, it is believed, the Oxus Treasure pieces were found in 1877; beautiful objects of incredible elegance and beauty..... the Takhti Sangin temple has various legends. Signs of different religions have been found, indicating that the temple existed as a strategic point of trade between the east and west....it takes two days to explore Takhti Sangin and other small castles along Amu Darya river and Tigrovaya Balka Nature Reserve.... unfortunately, the story of the temple is different, its location right in the border with Afghanistan means that few can currently get permission to visit.."....by Bahodur Sheraliev.....

"...northeastern Bactria (that is, the Hindu Kush region) was known as Kafiristan ("Land of the Infidels" in Persian) because of the people's fierce resistance to Islam and unique polytheism (different than Hinduism).....

"The Oxus region is home to archaeological relics of grand civilisations, most notably of ancient Bactria, but also of Chorasmia, Sogdiana, Margiana, and Hyrcania. However, most of these ruined sites enjoy far less fame, and are far less well-studied, than comparable relics in other parts of the world....most of the ruins have been neglected by the modern world – largely due to the region's turbulent history.....

Ayaz Kala of Khwarezm (Chorasmia), today desert but in ancient times green and lush

"The Oxus is the largest river (by water volume) in Central Asia. Due to various geographical factors, it's also changed its course more times (and more dramatically) than any other river in the region, and perhaps in the world.......The source of the Oxus is the Wakhan river, which begins at Baza'i Gonbad at the eastern end of Afghanistan's remote Wakhan Corridor......The Oxus proper begins where the Panj and Vakhsh rivers meet, on the Afghanistan-Tajikistan border...... the land that was the region's showpiece in the antiquity period: Bactria. The Bactrian heartland can be found south of Sogdiana, separated from it by the (relatively speaking) humble Chul'bair mountain range. Bactria occupies a prime position along the Oxus river: that is, it's the first section lying downstream of overly-rugged terrain; and it's upstream enough that it remains quite fertile to this day, although it's significantly less fertile than is was millennia ago...... surprisingly little is known about the details of ancient Bactria today. ....The capital of Bactria was the grand city of Bactra, the location of which is generally accepted to be a circular plateau of ruins touching the northern edge of the modern-day city of Balkh. These lie within the delta of the modern-day Balkh river (once known as the Bactrus river), about 70km south of where the Oxus presently flows. In antiquity, the Bactrus delta reached the Oxus and fed into it; but the modern-day Balkh delta (like so many other deltas mentioned in this article) fizzles out in the sand......Balkh is believed to have been inhabited since at least the 27th century BC.....due to decades of military conflict in the area, access continues to be highly restricted, for security reasons.".....Forgotten realms of the Oxus region...http://greenash.net.au/

"....in Upper Bactria is the archaeological site of Takhti Sangin. This ancient ruin can be found on the Tajik side of the border; and since it's located at almost the exact spot where the Panj and Vakhsh rivers meet to become the Oxus.....The principal structure at Takhti Sangin was a large Zoroastrian fire temple, which in its heyday boasted a pair of constantly-burning torches at its main entrance. Most of the remains at the site date back to the 3rd century BC, when it became an important centre in the Greco-Bactrian kingdom (and when it was partially converted into a centre of Hellenistic worship); but the original temple is at least several centuries older than this, as attested to by various Achaemenid Persian-era relics.....Takhti Sangin is also the place where the famous "Oxus treasure" was discovered in the British colonial era (most of the treasure can be found on display at the British Museum to this day)..... Takhti Sangin has been studied only sporadically by modern archaeologists.....Forgotten realms of the Oxus region...http://greenash.net.au/

"In Dancing With the Sacred, Karl Peters proposes that the sacred is the dance of life (a form of god). He develops an understandable naturalistic theism in which the Universe is not governed by a personal supernatural God. This determination is not atheistic, for the concept of the divine is preserved in a system of non-personal processes within the natural world. Nature produces variations that generate new aspects of existence that are creative but without design.".....Dancing With the Sacred: Evolution, Ecology, and God - Trinity Press International, 2002,

"The Oxus River, identified as the world river that descends from the mythological High Hara.....Hara Berezaiti, "High Hara", the mythical mountain that is the origin of the *Harahvatī river.....Harahvati Aredvi Sura Anahita, the source of all waters in the world that descends from the mythical Mount Hara.....Another source of spiritual home that made Bactria sacred was a great temple of the ancient Iranian goddess, Anahit (in Pahlavi or Middle-Persian) and Anahita (Ânâhitâ) in the Avesta hymns. The temple was so rich that often it attracted the needy Syrian kings who sat out to plunder it....Anahita is a water goddess whose origins go back to Central Asia from where her worship spread through Persia all the way to the Middle-East....According to the Avesta, the water goddess Anahita was the mother of the god of Victory known as Mithra...The female protectress of Balkh, Anahita goddess of the Oxus, in Alexander’s day. Anahita’s magnificent gilded statue had been gifted by one of Darius’s predecessors, Artaxerxes II. Thousands had come to licentious rites in the precinct of the ‘High girdled one clad in a mantle of gold, on her head a golden crown with rays of light and a hundred stars clad in a robe of over thirty otter skins of shining fur’….. "......http://www.iranchamber.com/geography/articles/balkh.php

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Email....okarresearch@gmail.com

November 2015

John Hopkins....Northern New Mexico

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