Bibliographia Iranica

A predominantly bibliographic blog for Iranian Studies

Tag: Parsis

  • The Zoroastrian World

    The Zoroastrian World

    Rose, Jenny, Albert De Jong & Sarah Stewart (eds.). 2026. The Zoroastrian World. New York: Routledge.

    Although Zoroastrians in the contemporary world are numerically few – estimated recently at less than 150,000 across the globe – their ancient Iranian ancestors ruled vast areas of the Near East for over a millennium. From the mid‑sixth century BCE to the mid‑seventh century CE, the historical contribution of the ‘Mazda-worshipping’ religion to the intellectual, cultural, and political development of the region was momentous. The migration of some Zoroastrians to north-western India also had a significant social and economic impact on early modern and modern India. From the mid-seventeenth century until the present, Zoroastrianism has also played an important role in European discourse.

    Written by a distinguished team of international contributors, including many Zoroastrians, The Zoroastrian World presents a global guide to Zoroastrianism from the earliest period to the modern day, offering original perspectives through substantial thematic contributions on the lived experience of Zoroastrian communities across the world. This volume is organised into five distinct sections:

    • Imagining Zoroastrianism
    • The Developing Zoroastrian World
    • Living Realities: Zoroastrian Narrative and Symbol in the Modern World
    • Contemporary Challenges in the Zoroastrian World
    • Creative Contributions from the Zoroastrian World

    The Zoroastrian World provides an authoritative and accessible source of information on topics relating to the Zoroastrian religion, with a particular focus on interdisciplinary connections. The volume is essential reading for students engaged in studies of Religion, Philosophy and Ethics; Ancient and Modern Iran; the Near and Middle East; Central Asia; South Asian Religions; and Cultural History. The Zoroastrian World is intended for all curious readers, who seek to know more about this ancient, enduring religion.

    The editors are excited to showcase the original artwork ‘The Garden of the Universe’ by Hormazd Narielwalla as the cover of this book.

    The Open Access version of this book is available at PDF.

    Table of Contents

    Introduction

    Jenny Rose, Albert de Jong, and Sarah Stewart

    Part 1.  Imagining Zoroastrianism

    1. How Zoroastrianism imagined itself

    Albert de Jong

    2. Recasting Zoroastrian dualism within the Greek philosophical imagination

    Maria Cristina Mennuti

    3. Imagining Zoroastrianism in the light of the Maga Brahmanas and the Kambojas

    Antonio Panaino

    4. Zoroastrianism in the Chinese imagination

    Jeffrey Kotyk

    5. Zoroastrianism/Persian religion in the Hebrew Bible

    Jason M. Silverman

    6. Zoroastrianism in the Babylonian Talmud

    Geoffrey Herman

    7. Manichaean, Christian, and Mandaean Views of Zoroastrianism

    Jason D. BeDuhn and Paul C. Dilley

    8. Zoroastrianism in early Arabic sources

    Kayla Dang

    9. The European ‘rediscovery’ of the Ancient Persians and their worldview

    Olivia Ramble

    10. The history of the study of Zoroastrianism

    Albert de Jong

    11. Zoroastrianism and Freemasonry in colonial-era India and Britain: imagining Zoroastrianism and re-imagining Freemasonry

    Simon Deschamps

    12. A ‘Persian history’? Achaemenid history and Zoroastrian reception in Gore Vidal’s Creation

    Charlotte Howley

    13. The fascination of the flame: Zoroastrianism and tourism

    Jenny Rose and Sarah Stewart

    Part 2. The Developing Zoroastrian World

    HISTORY

    14. Imagining Ahura Mazda: the earliest form of Zoroastrianism

    Almut Hintze

    15. Persian religion in the Achaemenid Empire

    Amirardalan Emami

    16. Zoroastrianism in the religious context of the Arsacid Empire

    Lucinda Dirven

    17. Zoroastrianism in the Sasanian Empire

    Albert de Jong

    18. Zoroastrianism in Iran from the Arab conquests to the mid-nineteenth century

    Kiyan Foroutan

    19. Zoroastrianism in India: from the migrations of the Parsis to the late eighteenth century

    Shervin Farridnejad

    SOURCES

    20. The developing Zoroastrian world and orality

    Philip G. Kreyenbroek

    21. The oldest sources for Zoroastrianism: Avestan and Old Persian

    Amir Ahmadi

    22. “A jewel of wisdom literature in the Pahlavi tradition of Zoroastrianism” 

    Alan Williams

    23. The meaning of Persian Zoroastrian literature

    Albert de Jong

    24. A historical overview of Parsi writing in Gujarati

    Meher Mistry

    25. Zoroastrian literature in English from the nineteenth to early twentieth centuries

    Jenny Rose

    MATERIAL EVIDENCE

    26. Central Asian expressions of Zoroastrianism

    Michael Shenkar

    27. Central Asian Zoroastrianism: can a case be made for Sogdiana?

    Pavel Lurje and Kersi B. Shroff

    28. Zoroastrianism in Anatolia and the Caucasus

    Matthew P. Canepa

    29. The ‘fire-worshippers’ of Georgia

    Sarah Stewart

    Part 3. Living Realities: Zoroastrian Narrative and Symbol in the Modern World

    30. The role of Parsi Zoroastrians in the evolution of British colonial India

    Omar Ralph

    31. Zoroastrian politics in the era of the Constitutional Revolution in Iran (1905-1911)

    Janet Kestenberg Amighi

    19. Reconciling Persianate and Western forms of knowledge: esotericism as Zoroastrian hermeneutics in colonial India

    Mariano Errichiello

    20. Calling on divine help: Parsi religious expressions in Mumbai, Navsari, and Surat

    Khojeste P. Mistree

    ZOROASTRIAN COMMUNITIES IN DIASPORA

    34. Zoroastrian communities outside India and Iran

    Rashna Writer

    35. A personal account of migrating to North America

    Tanya Hoshi

    36. Teach your children well: Zoroastrian religious education

    Jenny Rose and Sarah Stewart

    DIGITAL APPROACHES TO ZOROASTRIANISM

    37. The use of digital resources in studying the Zoroastrian religion

    Edward N. Surman

    38. Digital projects in Zoroastrianism

    Céline Redard

    39. The impact of the digital world on internal Zoroastrian discourse

    Nazneen Engineer

    Part 4. Contemporary Challenges in the Zoroastrian World

    INTERNAL CHALLENGES

    40. Demographic issues and identity in twenty-first-century India: Jiyo Parsi

    Shernaz Cama

    41. The reverberations of the dokhmenashini debate in Mumbai and Zoroastrian death rituals practiced in India

    Dorothea Lüddeckens and Ramiyar Karanjia

    PERSPECTIVES ON THE ZOROASTRIAN PRIESTHOOD

    42. Perspectives on the Parsi priesthood in India

    Kerman Daruwalla

    43. Perspectives on the Zoroastrian priesthood in Iran

    Mobed Ramin Shahzadi and Mobedyar Parva Namiranian

    44. Perspectives on the Parsi priesthood from the UK: an interview with Ervad Yazad T. Bhadha

    Sarah Stewart

    45. Perspectives on the Parsi priesthood from the United States: an interview with Zerkxis Bhandara

    Sarah Stewart

    46. Who speaks for Zoroastrianism today?

    Ruzbeh Hodiwala

    THE CHANGING ROLES OF MEN AND WOMEN

    47. The changing roles of men and women within the Iranian Zoroastrian community

    Shahin Bekhradnia

    48. The changing roles of Parsi men and women in India

    Nazneen Engineer

    49. Care for the Zoroastrian elderly in India

    Dinshaw K. Tamboly

    50. A caring model for the elderly in the UK

    Zubin Sethna and Rozy Contractor

    EXTERNAL CHALLENGES

    51. Zoroastrianism and human rights

    Niaz Kasravi

    52. Zoroastrianism and the environment: reviving the forests of Doongerwadi in Mumbai, India

    Rashneh N. Pardiwala

    53. Zoroastrian approaches to business ethics and sustainable development in contemporary times

    Edul Daver

    Part 5. Creative Contributions from the Zoroastrian World

    54. ‘First Darling of the Morning’: an interview with Parsi novelist, Thrity Umrigar

    Jenny Rose

    55. A larger laughter: the unique legacy of Parsi theatre

    Meher Marfatia

    56. The house of song

    Raiomond Mirza

    57. Devotional poetry and songs of the Zoroastrians of Iran

    Farzaneh Goshtasb

    58. “I yam what I yam”: a conversation with screenwriter, director and photographer, Sooni Taraporevala

    Jenny Rose

    59. The Garden of the Universe: an interview with artist Hormazd Narielwalla

    Sarah Stewart

    60. Identity and silk: the emergence and re-emergence of Sino-Parsi trade textiles

    Firoza Punthakey Mistree

    61. “You have to crack a few eggs to make a Parsi omelette”: an interview with chef and culinary author, Farokh Talati

    Jenny Rose

    62. Memories of growing up in Iran, Persian food, Zoroastrian festivals, and life as an author and cookery writer: an interview with Shirin Simmons

    Sarah Stewart

    63. How Parsis helped make India a cricketing nation

    Mihir Bose

  • Zoroastrianism in India and Iran

    Buhler, Alexandra. Zoroastrianism in India and Iran: Persians, Parsis and the flowering of political identity. London: Bloomsbury Publishing.

    This book examines the Zoroastrian community in the late Qajar and early Pahlavi period beyond the borders of Iran to trace this Parsi-Persian relationship. A major theme is the increase in philanthropy directed to the Zoroastrians of Iran by the Parsis and the involvement of the British in encouraging Parsi feelings of patriotism towards Iran. The book shows that not only were Parsis affected by events taking place in Iran, they also contributed to the broader change in attitudes towards Zoroastrians in that country.

    Description

    Buhler’s book will be launched at an event in SOAS. For more information, see this link.

  • TISS-Parzor Academic Programme

    ‘Parzor is delighted to announce its long awaited TISS-Parzor Online Academic Programme on Culture & Heritage Studies’. As part of this programme, you can ‘learn, gain credits, explore exciting issues of environment and sociology, craft, art, literature, theatre, cuisine as well as business and philanthropy’.

    Dr. Shernaz Cama announces the start of the TISS Parzor Online Academic Programme on Culture & Heritage Studies.

    For admissions and programme details, visit the TISS Website. Admissions are open till 31st August and open to all! Apply now!

  • Beyond the theosophical paradigm

    Errichiello, Mariano. 2024. Beyond the theosophical paradigm: Ilme kṣnum and the entangled history of modern Parsis. Journal of Persianate Studies. Brill 1–25.

    In the early twentieth century, an esoteric interpretation of Zoroastrianism known as Ilme kṣnum became popular among the Parsis of India. Although research on the subject is scant, most scholars suggest that Ilme kṣnum draws largely upon the ideas promoted by the Theosophical Society in India. By examining primary sources in Gujarati, the present article illustrates the interpretation of the Zoroastrian cosmology proposed by Ilme kṣnum. Through a comparative analysis of its main concepts and terms, Ilme kṣnum is historicized in the context of the relations of the Parsi community with the Persianate and Western worlds. By framing Ilme kṣnum as a reconciliation between Persianate and Western forms of knowledge, the present article looks at historical entanglements as resources for the Parsi quest for religious authenticity, placing Zoroastrianism in global religious history.

    The Abstract

    This is an open access publication ahead of the print.

  • Trust Matters

    Vevaina, Leilah. 2023. Trust matters: Parsi endowments in Mumbai and the horoscope of a city. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.

    Although numbering fewer than 60,000 in a city of more than 12 million people, Mumbai’s Parsi community is one of the largest private landowners in the city due to its network of public charitable trusts. In Trust Matters Leilah Vevaina explores the dynamics and consequences of this conjunction of religion and capital as well as the activities of giving, disputing, living, and dying it enables. As she shows, communal trusts are the legal infrastructure behind formal religious giving and ritual in urban India that influence communal life. Vevaina proposes the trusts as a horoscope of the city—a constellation of housing, temples, and other spaces providing possible futures. She explores the charitable trust as a technology of time, originating in the nineteenth century, one that structures intergenerational obligations for Mumbai’s Parsis, connecting past and present, the worldly and the sacred. By approaching Mumbai through the legal mechanism of the trust and the people who live within its bounds as well as those who challenge or support it, Vevaina offers a new pathway into exploring property, religion, and kinship in the urban global South.

  • Zoroastrianism Special

    Journal of Himalayan and Central Asian Studies, Vol 25 (1-2), 2021. Guest Editor Shernaz Cama.

    The newest issue of the Journal of the Himalayan and Central Asian Studies, Vol 25 (1-2), 2021, guest-edited by Shernaz Cama is dedicated to the Zoroastrisn Studies.

    Recent discoveries by international teams from varying backgrounds of academic study have found rich artistic and linguistic material along the Silk Route. So far, these discoveries remain in volumes on Zoroastrian studies. This edition of the Journal of Himalayan and Central Asian Studies brings some of these findings to a wider audience. This will help make links between multicultural concepts, oral traditions as well as iconography. These multicultural links will be taken forward to a much later colonial and post-colonial period of history when adaptation and absorbing new influences once again becomes vital to the creation of a Parsi Zoroastrian culture. It is this multiculturalism, the ability to straddle different geographies and adapt to historical circumstances, while maintaining a core essence, which has been a feature of the Zoroastrian identity throughout its long history.

    (more…)

  • The Parsi community of India and the making of modern Iran

    Marashi, Afshin. 2020. Exile and the nation: the Parsi community of India and the making of modern Iran. Austin: University of Texas Press.

    In the aftermath of the seventh-century Islamic conquest of Iran, Zoroastrians departed for India. Known as the Parsis, they slowly lost contact with their ancestral land until the nineteenth century, when steam-powered sea travel, the increased circulation of Zoroastrian-themed books, and the philanthropic efforts of Parsi benefactors sparked a new era of interaction between the two groups.

    Tracing the cultural and intellectual exchange between Iranian nationalists and the Parsi community during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Exile and the Nation shows how this interchange led to the collective reimagining of Parsi and Iranian national identity—and the influence of antiquity on modern Iranian nationalism, which previously rested solely on European forms of thought. Iranian nationalism, Afshin Marashi argues, was also the byproduct of the complex history resulting from the demise of the early modern Persianate cultural system, as well as one of the many cultural heterodoxies produced within the Indian Ocean world. Crossing the boundaries of numerous fields of study, this book reframes Iranian nationalism within the context of the connected, transnational, and global history of the modern era.

    Contents:

    • Note on Transliteration and Dates
    • Acknowledgments
    • Introduction
    • Chapter 1. To Bombay and Back: Arbab Kaykhosrow Shahrokh and the Reinvention of Iranian Zoroastrianism
    • Chapter 2. Patron and Patriot: Dinshah J. Irani, Parsi Philanthropy, and the Revival of Indo-Iranian Culture
    • Chapter 3. Imagining Hafez: Rabindranath Tagore in Iran, 1932
    • Chapter 4. Ebrahim Purdavud and His Interlocutors: Parsi Patronage and the Making of the Vernacular Avesta
    • Chapter 5. Sword of Freedom: Abdulrahman Saif Azad and Interwar Iranian Nationalism
    • Conclusion
    • Notes
    • Bibliography
    • Index

  • Dadabhai Naoroji and Indian nationalism

    Patel, Dinyar. 2020. Naoroji: Pioneer of Indian Nationalism. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

    The definitive biography of Dadabhai Naoroji, the nineteenth-century activist who founded the Indian National Congress, was the first British MP of Indian origin, and inspired Gandhi and Nehru.
    Mahatma Gandhi called Dadabhai Naoroji the “father of the nation,” a title that today is reserved for Gandhi himself. Dinyar Patel examines the extraordinary life of this foundational figure in India’s modern political history, a devastating critic of British colonialism who served in Parliament as the first-ever Indian MP, forged ties with anti-imperialists around the world, and established self-rule or swaraj as India’s objective.
    Naoroji’s political career evolved in three distinct phases. He began as the activist who formulated the “drain of wealth” theory, which held the British Raj responsible for India’s crippling poverty and devastating famines. His ideas upended conventional wisdom holding that colonialism was beneficial for Indian subjects and put a generation of imperial officials on the defensive. Next, he attempted to influence the British Parliament to institute political reforms. He immersed himself in British politics, forging links with socialists, Irish home rulers, suffragists, and critics of empire. With these allies, Naoroji clinched his landmark election to the House of Commons in 1892, an event noticed by colonial subjects around the world. Finally, in his twilight years he grew disillusioned with parliamentary politics and became more radical. He strengthened his ties with British and European socialists, reached out to American anti-imperialists and Progressives, and fully enunciated his demand for swaraj. Only self-rule, he declared, could remedy the economic ills brought about by British control in India.
    Naoroji is the first comprehensive study of the most significant Indian nationalist leader before Gandhi.

    Naoroji | HUP

    Dinyar Patel is an assistant professor in the Department of History at the University of South Carolina.

  • Between Boston and Bombay

    Rose, Jenny. 2019. Between Boston and Bombay: Cultural and Commercial encounters of Yankees and Parsis, 1771–1865. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan.

    A few years after the American declaration of independence, the first American ships set sail to India. The commercial links that American merchant mariners established with the Parsis of Bombay contributed significantly to the material and intellectual culture of the early Republic in ways that have not been explored until now. This book maps the circulation of goods, capital and ideas between Bombay Parsis and their contemporaries in the northeastern United States, uncovering a surprising range of cultural interaction. Just as goods and gifts from the Zoroastrians of India quickly became an integral part of popular culture along the eastern seaboard of the U.S., so their newly translated religious texts had a considerable impact on American thought. Using a wealth of previously unpublished primary sources, this work presents the narrative of American-Parsi encounters within the broader context of developing global trade and knowledge.

    Table of Contents

    • Arrivals: Parsis, Pilgrims and Puritans
    • “A Nice Morality” (1771–1798)
    • A Shawl Handkerchief and a Cabinet of Curiosities (1799–1806)
    • Merchant Princes, Missionaries and a Man-of-War (1807–1815)
    • A Passage to and from India (1816–1835)

  • Islam, Judaism and Zoroastrianism

    Kassam, Zayn R., Yudit Kornberg Greenberg & Jehan Bagli (eds.). 2018. Islam, Judaism and Zoroastrianism (Encyclopedia of Indian Religions 15157). New York, NY: Springer.

    The earlier volume in this series dealt with two religions of Indian origin, namely, Buddhism and Jainism. The Indian religious scene, however, is characterized by not only religions which originated in India but also by religions which entered India from outside India and made their home here. Thus religious life in India has been enlivened throughout its history by the presence of religions of foreign origin on its soil almost from the very time they came into existence. This volume covers three such religions—Zoraoastrianism, Judaism, and Islam . In the case of Zoraostianism, even its very  beginnings  are intertwined with India, as Zoroastrianism reformed a preexisting religion which had strong links to the Vedic heritage of India. This relationship took on a new dimension when a Zoroastrian community, fearing persecution in Persia after its Arab conquest, sought shelter in western India and ultimately went on to produce India’s pioneering nationalist in the figure of Dadabhai Naoroji ( 1825-1917), also known as the Grand Old Man of India. Jews found refuge in south India after the destruction of the Temple by the Romans in 70 C.E. and have remained a part of the Indian religious scene since then, some even returning to Israel after it was founded in 1948. Islam arrived in Kerala as soon as it was founded and one of the earliest mosques in the history of Islam is found in India. Islam differs from the previously mentioned religions inasmuch as it went on to gain political hegemony over parts of the country for considerable periods of time, which meant that its impact on the religious life of the subcontinent has been greater compared to the other religions. It has also meant that Islam has existed in a religiously plural environment in India for a longer period than elsewhere in the world so that not only has Islam left a mark on India, India has also left its mark on it. Indeed all the three religions covered in this volume share this dual feature, that they have profoundly influenced Indian religious life and have also in turn been profoundly influenced by their presence in India.