There is an image in the ancient Persian culture, which is not so easy to find in other contemporary cultures to it, is the image of a man, richly dressed, with a nice beard and headdress treated aristocrat. A man who appears to our eyes with their wings.
It 's the Fravashi mazdaica Persian culture, a culture that is still dated with great accuracy, but definitely before the seventh century. BC
What do these Fravashi we explained it a great Orientalist, Alessandro Bausani, in an essay of 1951, religious Persia. I have dwelt on only seven pages of this central text for the study of Persian religion, because it seemed to sense an ancient history, but of considerable importance for a modern reflection on the human being.
The author writes: "Recent studies (...) seem to have accepted that the idea of \u200b\u200bFravashi is associated with the" heroic defensive force "and would have originally indicated protective and defensive strength that emanates from a head, even in death ... "(1).
Later the concept that sees the real capacity in the Cape, even posthumously, to protect communities and individuals, undergoes a transformation: " This originally aristocratic notion that it then as" democratized "means any man then took his Fravashi exercising its protective power not only for him but for the benefit of all those who invoke .
There was therefore a concept of prezaratustrico Fravashi in character we may almost be described as animistic, but subsequent developments, the 'democratization' of Fravashi , focus instead on the ethics of choice, typical of the thought of Zarathustra, which leads to a definition closer to the modern mind: "The Fravashi (...) are a real" Dual "transcending of the men, past, present and future. Even the living have their Fravashi, which in this case is even closer - in order to continue the comparisons always dangerous - to the concept of our "guardian angel .
The idea of \u200b\u200b"force protection issued by a Head" is transformed over time in the "double" - not visible - of every man. We are still in the field of possible mental representation of 'other' self, arising from the thought that the human being is not only visible, material reality. It can also be 'dream', ie the image of living beings, stories of real events as much as the living material, but that suddenly disappear with the opening of the physical eyes upon awakening. Think of this world (and themselves in this other world) as a double of himself does not appear as a purely religious idea. Not even the so-called "guardian angel" is interpreted mechanically as the religious element, the name of 'angel' at the bottom means 'messenger' or 'intermediary' between the world of matter and the immaterial world and, therefore, while a prelude to a religious view, does not belong fully - again - to the transcendent world.
But then we read: "Ahura Mazda Fravashi put the men (not yet in the flesh) in the presence of a free choice that will determine their fate: that is to remain in the celestial world in order to protect the assault of Ahriman (the God of Evil) or down and incarnate in physical bodies to fight Ahriman in the terrestrial world. The Fravashi the proposal to come down to earth answered "yes." Occurs as a split, and now, in this earthly world, the true man Fravashi is his, his ego is both angelic his destiny and his true double transcendent ... "
We should start talking about 'immortal soul' that goes down to incarnate in physical bodies (and deadly ) and " the real man is his Fravashi . The 'real' man, the human truth, it is now (only?) In size is not material, the material body seems to be defined solely as temporary storage of human truth. Is conceptualized what looks like a split similar to (almost) contemporary Greek cultural proposal.
There is another term which explains the subsequent development of the initial entity Fravashi warrior-knights: the idea of \u200b\u200b Daena, which is related with the very complex Fravashi . " It 's very likely that the Fravashi warrior has been recruited as an angel in Zoroastrianism sceglitrice as emblematic of the soul between good and evil, while the Daena concept is very similar to' religious works (well) selected ' (... ) result is (in the religious history mazdaica) the unusual figure of the soul-angel-Valkyrie-religion, which is one of the most original products of Zoroastrianism .
The Fravashi , entities in protecting tribal nature, had made an initial transformation that seems to symbolize the human free will, and now lies beside another entity whose 'essence' is all to play.
A summary pahlavico (II chap. Mênokê of Khrat, the step is a summary dell'Hadôkht Nask, a text Avesta) speaks of the soul after death with Daena . The soul of the righteous Civat cross the bridge, the bridge that connects the earth to heaven on which they had to pass the souls of the dead, and at that time "the good he has made advances toward him in the form of a maiden, more beautiful and better than any girl in the world. The soul of the just then said: 'Who are you that I have never seen a girl in the world more good and more beautiful than you?' In response to that kind of girl so he adds: 'I'm not a girl, but I'm your righteous act, young man from right thought, the right speech, right action by, from the right religion! (...) I'm your righteous thoughts, your words straight, your righteous actions that you thought, said and done. Because if I was already estimated to me you should render even more respected and honored if I was you I should render and even more honored if I was already beautiful, I should render you even more beautiful '. "
Although "... in texts even later (Vendidad 10.18 and 5.21) and Daena urvan (spirit, soul) are almost synonymous " yet the process of flattening does not seem done, " Daena not ... means 'soul' as 'religion' in an abstract sense, even if the sense of duality of Daena is Off Amesha like entities that are both personal virtues and divine aspects "more" s and is expected to ease with which the Zoroastrian language embodies 'angels' the Good Thought and docile. "
Both Daena that Amesha Off Zoroastrianism indicate entities that are both 'personal virtue' and 'divine aspects'. It is therefore hypostasis of human qualities, a way of describing the characteristics of ethical and moral man, yet have few tools available to conceptualize or, conversely, have enough imagination to create ' images ' rich in human content, it follows immediately transposition in "divine aspects", ie belonging to another dimension, but maintaining a close relationship with human characteristics.
Daena The fact is clear: " I'm your righteous thoughts, your words straight, your righteous actions that you thought, said, done . Goes beyond the material received, but not beyond, perhaps, more clearly shows the real intent hidden in the words and actions. And in this 'beyond' maybe we come to better understand the secret of this mysterious entity. The term Daena connects it root den means that 'religion', but ... den (which is always too uniquely translated with 'religion' has the value much more active and personal 'revelation' (...) so good and bad deeds are Daena ie 'revelation of the soul' Human .
But "most commonly the etymology back to the root of 'see' (...) and insist explaining naturalistically (...) and as a 'right to see' both as 'the subject of vision' .
Daena The problem lies in the double meaning of item along with psychological and religious element, a problem that scholars have found it very difficult to determine. "... is quite unusual for a mentality that the twentieth century the same word can mean 'religion', 'double the soul' and a 'girl' that is more or less both .
We try to orient ourselves. There are three proposed terms to think about: ' religion ',' double soul 'and' girl 'that is either one or the other.
den We have seen that has a value of 'revelation', more than religion in modern terms. Value that is revealing, to unveil what is hidden, because the etymology back to the 'right to see'. We think we can rule out that the physical meaning adheres to a vision, so we speak of an ability to see something that is latent to the visible behavior, something that is also 'the subject of vision'. The Daena then you 'see' and 'be seen' in the more intimate and profound human soul.
The soul of a righteous man when he meets the Daena , relates to its own latent dimension that says "I'm your straight works ...." Perhaps we come to understand the difference: 'soul of the just' seems to follow an ethical dimension. In fact, the Fravashi Zarathustra era is characterized as the ability to 'choice' between good and evil, as something close to free will and therefore seems to connect the conscious sphere, seems to be the core sense of ethics, the will to choose.
The Daena appears instead as closest to the latent content of the conscious will itself. It reveals the hidden intent.
The soul of a righteous man when he meets the Daena , relates to its own latent dimension that says "I'm your straight works ...." Perhaps we come to understand the difference: 'soul of the just' seems to follow an ethical dimension. In fact, the Fravashi Zarathustra era is characterized as the ability to 'choice' between good and evil, as something close to free will and therefore seems to connect the conscious sphere, seems to be the core sense of ethics, the will to choose.
The Daena appears instead as closest to the latent content of the conscious will itself. It reveals the hidden intent.
If Fravashi is the soul, the Daena appears as the soul of the soul, the contents of the content here is the 'double soul'.
Finally, there is the 'girl ' that "more or less " represents them both. Why a 'girl' ? Why is the 'most beautiful and most good between girls'? If we speak of an unconscious dimension that speaks of the 'right to think, speak, act', because all these characterizations are positive, when we read on that "good and (but also) the bad deeds that are Daena 'revelation soul 'of man ?
Why does a beautiful and good girl should also represent the ' bad deeds' of the soul of a man? It is suspected that the 'pretty girl' represents only the internal dimension, the image of the 'right' that they find their explanation of your right to think and act in itself in having a priori, latent image of a beautiful young woman. The right then is not that the "right action" is not 'right' because it is able to choose the good by an act of conscious will, but that is because it has a 'pretty girl' as its own internal image . Being 'right' is in itself a consequence of having an internal image of a beautiful girl.
"This is Daena, personified abstraction attested in the thought of Zarathustra has changed in the sense that the most warlike Zoroastrian Fravashi "the protective idea, full of belligerence, old soul would be amended in the ethical sense when Zarathustra himself has developed the concept of Daena . That is, when he imagined this, beside or hidden behind the conscious will, an internal image. The fear and the need for protection, delegated the power emanating from a character of great depth, even after his death, he left the field to the individual's ability to act ethically. The fear of the unknown vanishes by showing a human being no more crouching and trembling, but erect and aware. It would seem a turn towards a more rational relationship with the world, but the female image is present, has not disappeared and that she does the right, not the conscious and rational act. E 'self-image that determines the ethical choice.
It conforms female human action and forces him, apparently there are no obligations to him outside, to act justly.
Finally, there is the 'girl ' that "more or less " represents them both. Why a 'girl' ? Why is the 'most beautiful and most good between girls'? If we speak of an unconscious dimension that speaks of the 'right to think, speak, act', because all these characterizations are positive, when we read on that "good and (but also) the bad deeds that are Daena 'revelation soul 'of man ?
Why does a beautiful and good girl should also represent the ' bad deeds' of the soul of a man? It is suspected that the 'pretty girl' represents only the internal dimension, the image of the 'right' that they find their explanation of your right to think and act in itself in having a priori, latent image of a beautiful young woman. The right then is not that the "right action" is not 'right' because it is able to choose the good by an act of conscious will, but that is because it has a 'pretty girl' as its own internal image . Being 'right' is in itself a consequence of having an internal image of a beautiful girl.
"This is Daena, personified abstraction attested in the thought of Zarathustra has changed in the sense that the most warlike Zoroastrian Fravashi "the protective idea, full of belligerence, old soul would be amended in the ethical sense when Zarathustra himself has developed the concept of Daena . That is, when he imagined this, beside or hidden behind the conscious will, an internal image. The fear and the need for protection, delegated the power emanating from a character of great depth, even after his death, he left the field to the individual's ability to act ethically. The fear of the unknown vanishes by showing a human being no more crouching and trembling, but erect and aware. It would seem a turn towards a more rational relationship with the world, but the female image is present, has not disappeared and that she does the right, not the conscious and rational act. E 'self-image that determines the ethical choice.
It conforms female human action and forces him, apparently there are no obligations to him outside, to act justly.
From Persepolis to Jerusalem
... but the religiosity inherent in Persian thought, not 'view', not clarified, let alone denied, concealed the fraud.
So, do not know when, however, "... in texts even later, we find that " Daena and urvan (spirit, soul) are almost synonymous. " The date is a problem to determine the possible ideological effects in and out of the Persian culture. Here is the procedure for a case, but it is clear, however, that the female figure at some point it is flattened on the idea of \u200b\u200bspiritual soul , it was detached and disembodied, hovering, now far from the bodies of men and women. The Daena now became urvan .
The female image loses the concreteness of man's relationship with its interior, with its own irrational, that is detached from him and you lose the abstract infinity of heaven. What looks like a terrific insight on the human truth of Zarathustra undergoes a dramatic and epoch-making division and the pre-Islamic Persia, is not known when, he loses his 'girl' ...
Great King of Persia, Achaemenid dynasty, had already thought, perhaps, when moved in arms to the beautiful plains of the Fertile Crescent, or carried with them, again, the female image?
History tells us that only conquered all the ancient Near East and moving forward with the unstoppable force of a hurricane and annexing the proud Babylonian empire, in the land of Babylon found representatives of a small nation almost insignificant next to come out now and for ever from history without having left any evidence worthy of note: the Jews.
found in the capital of their royal court in exile and many miles further south on the Euphrates also found the priests, the aristocracy of that people. They were there for almost seventy years, a couple of generations, after Jerusalem was conquered, the walls torn down, the Temple destroyed, the people dispersed. According to the customs of the Assyrians and Babylonians, the people defeated were not exterminated, but destroyed, reduced to 'nothing', mixed with other peoples, cultures, religions, ethnic groups to make them disappear and immediate benefit in the interest of the conquerors. That is the layers 'high' of subject peoples were deported and kept under control, because they could not act against the policy of assimilation of imperial logic.
do not think that the great King of Persia, according to which every nation should instead be free in culture, customs and religion tolerated in the name of peace (and a greedy taxation) which was not to disturb the reign of great dream of crossing the sea and conquer the Greek cities, continuing the journey westward began years earlier when as Persepolis, the ancient capital of the kingdom, Cyrus the Great, arrived in the Iranian plateau edges, for the first time he had lowered the gaze to the immense valley lying between the Tigris and Euphrates, the two big rivers where the story was born.
do not think and so, therefore, agreed to leave from Jerusalem to the king and his court, department officials and scribes, priests, nobles, the educated, artisans and soldiers and their families and their servants. Two long caravans brought back the Jewish leaders, in their ancient capital. The Babylonian exile was over.
In the biblical texts speak of the King and High Priest and of their differences and their different thinking, developed during the long years Babylonians. The priest joins the King, then bows, then opposed it and, at some point, there's no trace of the King. The house of David leaves the scene suddenly and forever, the Priests take the reins of power and state-building. Perhaps even riots, maybe even a devastating civil war (symbolically represented the episode of the golden calf and the destruction of idolatry) the great king of Persia decided to send two senior officials at different times of the Jewish people as its officials to restore order and establish that peace which was to be maintained in every corner of the empire. Ezra and Nehemiah were their names in Jerusalem and imposed their will and ideology of the priestly caste now settled in the halls of power.
The law was imposed and the cult of the gods foreigners was forbidden and prohibited their idolatrous representations that God was one and had to be one, and mixed marriages were forbidden and contamination between peoples. The Babylonian destruction was almost successful, but, before the threat of disappearance, the Jewish culture had rebelled and had affirmed its existence ... we are, we exist, and God has a special relationship with us that we are the people from He chose to show by our behavior the way of salvation for all humanity. We were almost canceled for having given to contamination with other, but this does not happen again.
The new ideology was to Ezekiel, the last of the major prophets and priests, he articulated the political fallout, social and religious in a set of standards 'of purity' so punctilious as pedantic. The great mystical dream of Ezekiel, his cosmic vision that has been extended up to see the infinite, reduced to a series of prohibitions and precepts that governed the food, medical care, sex, the relationship between men and between men and animals and men and between priests and priests and rituals and clothing and do the dishes broken ... because he, Ezekiel, had said that it was necessary to distinguish between the pure and the impure, between the sacred and the profane. A madman, a visionary, a violent psychopath or a large of human thought?
against the priestly aristocracy who had already had a hand in drafting the Torah, the Pentateuch of Moses, collecting ancient works and more recent calculations, the ideology of early Jewish and contemporary thought, with the birth and creates a current of thought that opposition was cultural, religious, ideological, and finally also political.
Responsible of this opposition to the priestly tradition was a new religious movement inside the Jewish world that probably developed between IV and V BC " whose thinking was clearly different from the rest production of his time Jewish "(2).
Judaism, which had never been more monolithic since the time of King David and Solomon, went to meet a split in the currents of thought that were and were parallel (but conflicting) until their final gap radical.
Many things characterized the difference between the new movement, called Enoch because Enoch was the patriarch of reference was not Moses, Priests and the current in power. One of these was the belief in the existence of an immortal soul, an idea that priests abhorred and rejected a radical.
" current in Judaism enoch brought a whole new way of understanding and living the relationship between man and God, or religion. The basic change is the new anthropology: the man does not end his life with death, but may continue in a different dimension and better (...) The interest in things of this world is balanced and perhaps exceeded that for the afterlife, where everything is fear, suffering and death will no longer exist. The Enochian founded the modern religion, especially visible in the derivation Christian "(3).
disembodied soul had taken the place of the female image that each human carries within it, linked to its human and male as well as every woman carries in itself the idea and hope to meet one day a 'right' from 'right action, talk, think'. The soul had destroyed the image of the tearing itself to the body of men and women. And without it, men and women became flesh, capable of moving, but no longer have that real life that comes from a fantasy images that are closely linked, one, with the concreteness of their corporeality.
The existence of the soul is disembodied human beings of pure spirit and the flesh of women to use. This is based on the first texts of the current enoch when they report as the Angels Watchers, spiritual and immortal beings, they saw human females and decided to join them: "And they took , for them, their wives and each one if they chose one and began to go to them. It joined with them and taught them charms and spells, and showed them the cutting of trees and roots. And they became pregnant and begot giants whose stature, for everyone, was three thousand cubits " (4).
But why, asks God ... " because you left the sky high and holy, and you're lying down with the daughters of men? (...) You , spiritual beings, saints, living the eternal life, you have committed impurities on women ... did you like men, who are flesh and blood, who are mortal and destructible. This is why I gave them women ... "(5).
The real men are spiritual beings, immortals who never should behave as non-spiritual men, those of flesh and blood, who have joined the women because women are mortal and serve them, for reproduction. Meat to be used to ensure the continuity of the species.
"They said to their Lord (...) see then what Azazel has done, as he taught all the depravity on earth and made manifest the secrets of the world that perform in the heavens and (see how) Semeyaza (...) taught spells and (see how) went by the daughters of men, together with their lay with those women, they became unclean and made posters, to them, these sins, and (see how) women and begat the giants, therefore, the whole earth was filled with blood and depravity "(6).
For as men of flesh and blood spiritual beings, Angels Watchers, Azazel, Semeyaza and many others like them, had declined to join with women and had taught them, in exchange for their ability to procreate, their wisdom, the secrets of the world, spells and magic, cutting plants and roots for this exchange of 'know' versus 'creating', the evil spread throughout the Earth.
enoch ideology stipulates that bad, the children of the marriage comes from carnal intercourse between men spiritualized and women who are just breeding animals. After the disembodied female image and endorsed the idea of \u200b\u200b'soul' as you discover the horror of the relationship between men and women ' sinful'. The evil is spreading throughout the world like a plague. But the plague is not the sexual union between a man and a woman, claimed as the Jews thought of Enoch (and how to think and Christians), African soul is separated from the body, the fever is to have the disembodied image inside.
and disembodied immortal soul had entered Jerusalem, coming from outside of Judaism, new and foreign ideas. As more and foreigners were the Persians. Perhaps they were to bring the contamination of a violent thought in the Near East, if we accept a dating (V-IV century BC.) Of the Book of Watchers, but if we consider the reliability of the dating later (in IV-III sec. BC), then the greek world that we must look to the world that swept all resistance when Alexander of Macedonia came to Asia in 334 BC (7).
E 'known'. .. Iranian culture which was actually in contact with the Jewish world of Babylon is unknown ... " (8) for the problems datings of Persian thought, so any guess is difficult and can not be anything other than research hypotheses.
In any case, the 'most beautiful of the beautiful ' in Jewish apocalyptic thought there's no trace ... and the new myth, the matrix of an 'ideology that will be developed five centuries later in Christianity, is based on a' particular idea: Evil spreads when the Angels join the women. When the angel makes love with Donna. Devastation is not the original image of Cupid and Psyche?
November 2010
Notes
1) Alessandro Bausani, religious Persia, pp. 65-72.
2) Paolo Sacchi, Jewish Apocalyptic The and its history. The proposed dating is Sacchi.
3) P. Sacchi, The problem "apocalyptic" , published in "Credereoggi 'XIV, LXXX, 1994.
4) Book of Watchers, 7.
5) Book of Watchers, XV-3, 4.
6) Book of Watchers, IX-4, 10.
7) For an early dating to the V-IV sec. BC corresponds to the Persian period in the Near East, favored by the Italian school (Sacks Bocaccini), the low, the IV-III sec. BC Graecised phase now, is instead proposed by Collins and Nickelsburg (See P. Sacchi, The history of the Second Temple and the Christian origins ).
8) P. Sacchi, Between Judaism and Christianity. Reflections on early Judaism and medium , p. 120.
Bibliography
cf. Also in this blog: The girl Persian
; Love, Psyche and the Angels Watchers
are virgin or young woman?
; Love, Psyche and the Angels Watchers
are virgin or young woman?
Bausani A., religious Persia, Basic Books, 1951.
Gnoli G. , The Zoroastrian religion in History of Religions, Vol I, The ancient religions edited by G. Filoramo, Ed Laterza, 1994.
Sacchi P., sacred / profane, impure / pure in the Bible and its , Morcelliana, 2007.
Sacchi P. (Ed.), Old Testament Apocrypha , UTET, 2006.
Sacchi P., The Jewish apocalyptic and its history , Paideia, 1990.
Sacchi P., History the Second Temple and the Christian origins in http://www.christianismus.it, 2010.
Sacchi P., sacred / profane, impure / pure in the Bible and its , Morcelliana, 2007.
Sacchi P. (Ed.), Old Testament Apocrypha , UTET, 2006.
Sacchi P., The Jewish apocalyptic and its history , Paideia, 1990.
Sacchi P., History the Second Temple and the Christian origins in http://www.christianismus.it, 2010.
Sacchi P., Between Judaism and Christianity. Reflections on early Judaism and medium , Morcelliana, 2010.
