CHAPTER XV.
PROMULGATION OF THE FAITH OF ZARATHUSHTRA
The Avestan people. The races that formed the Zoroastrian fold were the Bactrians, the Medes, and the Persians, who successively rose to political independence in Ancient Iran. The Bactrians of the Northeast, the Medians of the Northwest, and the Persians of the Southwest, were politically welded into one Persian nation, under the Achaemenian empire. This process of blending these different peoples into one homogeneous nation under the creed of Zoroaster was completed by the time of the conquest of Persia by Alexander the Great.
Zoroastrianism takes its root in Eastern Iran. The Later Avestan texts speak of King Vishtaspa as the very arm and pillar of Zoroastrianism, the defender of the Faith, who gave an impetus to the religion, which until then had experienced only an extremely chequered career, and who made the faith known and renowned throughout the world.[1] With all the zeal and fire characteristic of converts Zarathushtra's followers worked actively for the promulgation of the faith. The authors of the Younger Avestan period depict Zarathushtra as saying that he will exhort the people of house and clan, town and country to embrace the Mazdayasnian religion and teach them to practise it faithfully in their thoughts, their words, and their deeds.[2] The zealous priests invoke Chisti, the heavenly associate of Daena, or religion, to grant them a good memory and strength for their body.[3]
Athravans, the Zoroastrian priests of Eastern Iran. The generic name for priest in the Avestan texts is āthravan, derived from ātar, 'fire.' It corresponds to the Skt. ātharvan, the fire-priest of the Indo-Iranian period. The atharvan, it is said, twirled Agni or fire and, like Prometheus, brought it from the
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