Chapter Ten: The Abrahamic Religion of the Magi (Wise Men)

Historical Context and Origins

Approximately ten centuries before the Common Era, predating the Median dynasty (circa 678–549 BCE), humanity had transitioned through the Stone Age (approximately 1.5 million years ago), cave dwelling (circa 200,000 years ago), pastoralism, nomadism, and migration (circa 80,000 years ago), arriving at the agricultural era (circa 12,000 years ago). During this period, the indigenous peoples of Iran adhered to a religion known as the “Religion of the Magi” or Majūs. The Magi constituted a significant and influential class within ancient society, serving as spiritual leaders who addressed the psychological and spiritual needs of the populace. It is posited that the governance of the Magi predates that of the Medes, extending to a period before the wisdom of the Gathas, approximately one millennium before the Common Era. This era’s Magi are referred to as the Abrahamic Magi.

No independent, historical text concerning the religion, philosophy, ethics, or culture of the Magi has survived. However, fragmented reports and partial narratives suggest that the Magi were the founders of religion, philosophy, wisdom, ethics, science, and industry. Their influence extended beyond Iran, notably impacting the Greeks, who derived knowledge and philosophy from them. In the realms of society and politics, kings and rulers could not ascend to power or govern without the training, oversight, approval, and involvement of the Magi.

The study of the Magi, or Magology, necessitates interdisciplinary expertise. Specialization in ancient history alone is insufficient to uncover the religion, ethics, knowledge, philosophy, politics, and industry of this social class.

Etymology of the Term “Magi”

In the non-Gathic Avesta (New Avesta) and the Vendidad, whose content and meaning predate Zoroaster, the term magha is used, appearing as maga in the Gathas. In Middle Persian, the term mag evolves into magupat (magok pat), later becoming mowbed, a term denoting a learned religious figure in contrast to the common folk. The Greek term magus, derived from the Iranian magi, is rendered in Arabic as majūs, appearing once in the Holy Quran.

In western Iran, religious leaders were called mag, later transforming into mowbed or magbad. The term mowbed signifies an individual with extensive religious knowledge and commitment to their duties. Subsequent mowbeds competed with the original Magi, differing in political culture and scholarly caliber. In Greek, Zoroastrian religious leaders were termed magos, meaning sorcerer, and in Latin as maga or mage. The term maga, equivalent to the Latin magi, derives from magu.

In the Rigveda, the term magavano is used precisely to denote “beloved.” This spiritual technical term refers to those whom God grants unconditional favor and blessings, irrespective of their past actions, endowing religion with insight and vitality through their presence. Etymologically, considering the root and semantic context, mage connotes being beloved and charming, unrelated to other roots or general nomenclature.

The Magi in the Holy Quran

In the Holy Quran, majūs is the Arabicized form of magush or majusha, meaning Magi, reflecting the religious culture of the Iranian people led by the Magi clergy. This leadership is not individualized or tied to a specific figure like Zoroaster. The Quran states:

“Indeed, those who have believed, and those who were Jews, and the Sabians, and the Christians, and the Magi, and those who associated others with Allah—Allah will judge between them on the Day of Resurrection. Indeed, Allah is witness over all things.” (Surah Al-Hajj, 17)

Eloquent Arab poets have utilized the Arabicized term al-majūs. The Magian religion, mentioned alongside Judaism, Sabianism, and Christianity with a conjunctive “and,” is accorded equal value to the People of the Book and distinguished from polytheists and idol-worshippers. This religion, predating Zoroaster, is the religion and culture of the Magi.

Exclusive Knowledge of the Magi

The Magi trained comprehensive religious scholars and engineers for both the Medes and Persians, specializing in prophecy, astrology, sorcery, divination, priesthood, medicine, industrial engineering, dream interpretation, counseling, judiciary, and religious leadership. They conducted religious ceremonies, provided spiritual guidance, and managed related affairs. Due to the selective nature and requirement of a pure and compatible character, these disciplines were exclusive to the Magi, often passed from father to son.

The Magi possessed profound, meticulous knowledge and enigmatic skills, particularly in sorcery, divination, and priesthood, which they guarded closely. These internal sciences and confidential skills were not shared with outsiders or those lacking familial ties, approval, or the requisite spiritual and ethical qualifications.

Mystical Audition (Sama‘) of the Magi

The Magi were endowed with the ability for mystical audition and the subtlety of ecstatic states to perceive spiritual and esoteric matters. Sama‘ is the capacity to hear a spiritual sound, guiding word, or enchanting melody from a metaphysical source through inner refinement and love, imparted to the soul or heart, inherently inducing ecstasy and delight.

According to Diogenes Laertius, the Magi consumed delicate foods such as vegetables, milk, and yogurt to enhance their inner vision and spiritual perception through refined nourishment, facilitating a transition from material corporeality to spiritual abstraction.

In a broader sense, sama‘ is the refined, subtle perception produced through intuitive understanding, inner wisdom, and liberation from constraints, achieved through love, unity, and the absolute essence of God. The highest form of sama‘ is finding God in the heart, dispelling fatigue and ennui, and evoking the pinnacle of love, fidelity, unity, and spiritual joy.

Weaker Magi, to connect with the unseen and attain sama‘, used incense, cannabis, hemp, narcotics, ritual dances, prayers, continuous running, rhetorical sama‘, music, beautiful sounds, and purposeful observation of beautiful beings. The capacity for sama‘ was achieved after enduring rigorous ascetic practices. Divine law and religious rulings, as manifestations of divine revelation, must be received from God and attributed to Him. Descending revelation equates to formative sama‘, differing from ascending audition or the sama‘ and chanting of Sufism.

Due to their sama‘ and unity, the Magi were characterized by noble ethics, generosity, and freedom. This ethical nobility and freedom are reflected in Persian ghazals, as exemplified by Hafiz:

Behold the kindness of the Magian elder, who, to us inebriates, / Saw all our deeds as beautiful through the lens of his mercy.

An elder who has drunk the pure wine of love and awareness of unity is in such intoxication and awakening that he does not see the inebriates or their deeds. For the Magian elder, existence is but a tavern immersed in sama‘ from God and pure unity, recognizing no other or stranger.

Hafiz elsewhere states:

In the Magian tavern, I see the light of God, / Marvel at what light I behold and whence it comes. / Do not display your glory to me, O guardian angel, / For you see a house, but I see the house of God.

The Magian elder finds the absolute essence of God in every particle of existence through love and unity, not merely in his tavern. The beauty of every manifestation holds this meaning for him.

Magical Healing and Divination of the Magi

Part of the Magi’s sorcery and divination involved medical knowledge and healing. They recognized that certain ailments were linked to spiritual issues. Those with spiritual wisdom and inner vision could treat psychosomatic disorders through magical healing. They discerned the external sources of power and the types of meanings that could cause psychological or physical disturbances. A Magus or diviner who accurately identified and treated these sources with skill and precision was called a “sage.” Sage physicians, whose diagnoses and treatments were gentle, non-invasive, and respectful, were termed sorcerers, as sahr (sorcery) denotes softness.

Such diviners possessed comprehensive expertise in religious sciences, physical and medical sciences, meaning-oriented healing, mantra therapy (psychiatry), physical medicine, philosophy, and natural sciences. Their words were thought-provoking, healing, and sacred, earning them the title “sacred physicians” who possessed divine breath, voice, and melody.

Sorcery and magic were prevalent among the Magi, so much so that the term Magus was sometimes used for a sorcerer. However, their advanced skills in sorcery, divination, and medicine later degenerated into common magic and superstitious healing, managed by unqualified, unworthy individuals reliant on governments and mercenaries. With the dominance of incompetent, ignorant practitioners, these complex skills lost their scientific status, becoming mired in superstitions, myths, and folklore, leading to deception and exploitation of the ignorant and gullible. The promotion of superstitions, when shallow, deceitful Magi lacking true knowledge dominate society, is attributed to them.

Ostanes the Magian and Mastery of Sorcery

Xerxes, upon conquering Greece, destroyed Greek temples and propagated the principles of the Magian religion. The great Magus accompanying Xerxes, from whom the king sought counsel, was Ostanes, a master skilled in esoteric sciences and experienced in occult practices. Cicero attributed the destruction of Greek temples to the will of the Iranian Magi. Pliny writes in his history:

“You, O Ostanes, are the originator of the practice of cannibalism (in Greece).”

Ostanes (variously rendered as Ustanus, Hushtana, Hyusaitana in Greek, Hyustanius in Macedonian, or Stone), now known as Astan (a noble place), possibly a title or rank within the Magian hierarchy, was a Median Magus proficient in sorcery, particularly alchemy (chemistry). A master in the Magian lineage, he accompanied Xerxes in the war against Greece, replacing Greek religion with the Magian faith under royal patronage. He attracted Greek philosophers, especially in divination and sorcery, taking them as disciples.

For instance, Democritus (circa 435 BCE), meaning “chosen by the people,” a late pre-Socratic Greek philosopher who proposed the theory of atoms and indivisible matter, studied under Ostanes alongside Anaxagoras and Leucippus. This positivist, cheerful philosopher, advocating joy and pleasure, learned alchemy and the theory of atomic indivisibility from his Iranian master.

In atomism, a refined and expanded version of which aligns with modern physics, matter consists of harmonious particles that associate based on affinity, forming infinite mechanical associations driven by desire rather than composition, limitation, or divisibility. These quantitative associations yield such refined qualities that matter transforms into the abstract, and vice versa, shaping creation and manifestation from the rich source of existence in a system of emergence, not causality, eliminating final causality from philosophical thought. This perspective is detailed in the book Consciousness and Divine Humanity.

Muhammad ibn Zakariya al-Razi (865–925 CE) was not unaware of Democritus’ efforts in alchemy and atomic theory, particularly as his Iranian master was a primary source for understanding encoded and esoteric knowledge of sorcery, including alchemy, elemental transformation, spirit summoning, talisman creation, and counter-sorcery.

Pliny the Younger writes about Ostanes’ sorcery skills:

“Based on my research, the first to write on this subject, whose works survive to this day, is Ostanes. He accompanied Xerxes in the war against the Greeks, sowing the seeds of this demonic art wherever he went, infecting all. Writers place another Zoroaster slightly before him. But undoubtedly, the one who inspired not just love but madness for this science among the Greeks was Ostanes. I have noted that in this science, both past and present, the greatest brilliance and fame for writings belong to this one man. As Ostanes taught, there are various types of magic: those using water, spirits, air, stars, lamps, basins, axes, or many other methods for divination, besides communicating with spirits and the deceased.”

The Nature of Magic

Magic, derived from the Greek mageia or magic, stems from the term Magon (Magi), rendered in Arabic as majūs. Due to the close association between the Magi and magic, the Greeks derived magic from mageia, attributing this skill to Zoroaster, Ostanes’ teachings, and his academy. In Aryan culture, a Magus was equivalent to a sage or scholar.

Magic, enchantment, and divination involve the practical application of a strong soul’s power to influence matter and cosmic energy, facilitating rapid transformation and ordering of energy and matter in either the realm of imagination and mind or the external reality. Thus, mere knowledge of magic’s nature and methods without practical application does not constitute magic.

This influence can be natural and authorized or transgressive, beneficial or harmful, causing affliction or evil to the subject. Hence, magic is not inherently evil, forbidden, or sinful; when used correctly without transgression, it can be taught and promoted in a selective, supervised system.

Magic is not equivalent to superstition, falsehood, or triviality and does not oppose science or religion, just as science, philosophy, knowledge, and religion are not superstitious. However, like these disciplines, magic can become tainted with superstition, leading to anti-religious tendencies due to its superstitious nature.

Primitive families, to rid themselves of perceived impurities and evils, selected an animal, recited incantations to transfer those impurities to it, then killed or drowned it, believing this cleansed their family’s evils.

Beverage Industry

The intense sun and sweet grapes of the Iranian plateau, combined with the Magi’s skill in crafting invigorating beverages, placed them at the forefront of the exhilarating beverage industry. Even later, Mulla Farajullah Shushtari, a 17th-century poet, wrote:

The Magi, who turn grape seeds into water, / Break stars and create suns.

This industry, like other ancient skills, became shrouded in mystery. The wine-making industry was dominated by profiteers and charlatans. The prohibition of wine is a divine ordinance, adhered to in all religions and by the virtuous Magi.

Music Therapy

Beyond the Magi’s soul-inspiring abilities, some of their sacred healing prescriptions relied on music therapy, particularly using nature’s music, religious music, and vocal therapy. The Magi, as physicians and perfect sages, were also musical leaders. They considered wisdom incomplete without music, dance, and their therapeutic and practical benefits.

Forsat al-Dowleh Shirazi (d. 1920 CE) writes in Bahur al-Alhan:

The importance of pleasant melodies lies in treating ailments for which there is no other cure. Greek and Persian sages treated patients this way, curing the insane with melodies and poems suited to their condition.

Certain sleep disorders were treated with musical instruments tailored to the individual’s nature, with prescribed doses and patterns, or through conversation, empathy, and calming. This Magian knowledge was suppressed by ritualists and extreme fatwas prohibiting music.

Dream Interpretation

Herodotus states that the Magi mastered dream interpretation. This skill relies on discovery, not rational relations. Dream interpreters who accurately interpreted dreams and predicted events, especially warning dreams, were trusted consultants.

Magian Politics

In politics, the Magi adopted a moderate and conservative approach, ensuring the survival of their religion under any government or dynasty. Whenever possible, they ascended to power, holding both spiritual sovereignty and political authority with religious titles. Titles such as Fratadara (guardian of the fire), Frataraka (governor), bagha, or baga (lord or king) exemplify this. Baga also meant God, creator, or determiner of destiny, applied to rulers accordingly.

Laodicea, near Pasargadae, built around 205 BCE by Antiochus III, the Seleucid king, was a center for the Magi.

Cicero (b. 106 BCE) states:

“The Iranian Magi are sages and scholars, without whose teachings no one can become a king or ruler.”

Kings gained legitimacy and the obligation of obedience only if crowned in a religious ceremony at a temple.

Babylonian Magi

Accounts of Chaldean Magi, part of Babylonian civilization, particularly during Nebuchadnezzar II (642–562 BCE), have survived. Babylon was a scientifically advanced civilization before the Achaemenids, with the Magi playing a significant, civilizing role. Babylonian Magi were renowned for their expertise in sorcery, magic, and occult sciences.

Hebrew sources, including the Books of the Prophets, note that before the Babylonian captivity (597–539 BCE), a high-ranking Magus served in Nebuchadnezzar’s court alongside commanders. Babylonian Magi facilitated the peaceful conquest of Babylon without resistance. Nebuchadnezzar, married to the daughter of Cyaxares (633–585 BCE), a Median king, relied on Chaldean Magi for divination, governance, and religious administration.

Median Magi

The Magi (Maguy) were one of the six prominent Median tribes. The earliest written record of the Medes dates to 836 BCE. The Median kingdom formed seven centuries before the Common Era, with its capital at Hagmatana (Hamadan, 708 BCE).

The oldest temple with a fire altar, built by the Medes at Nush-i Jan (about 60 km west of Hamadan) around 750 BCE, survives. Cyaxares (633–585 BCE), the third Median king and founder of the Median empire, meaning “good ruler,” was a key figure.

Persian Magi

Eleven centuries before the Common Era, the Persians lived in southern and southwestern Iran and the northern shores of the Persian Gulf. Their name, Parse, derives from this region.

The Iranian plateau, a mountainous region with flat expanses, is a vast, arid area. Modern Iran is only part of this ancient natural fortress, a broad plain bordered by the Zagros, Alborz, Hindu Kush, and Sulaiman mountains, and the Eurasian and Arabian plates, making it earthquake-prone and mountainous. Rich in diverse mineral resources, the plateau’s aridity necessitated engineering feats like qanats to sustain life. Southern Iran, with the Persian Gulf and Sea of Oman, connects the plateau to global waters, enhancing its strategic importance.

The Persians were empathetic yet wary of oppression and injustice.

Magi and the Achaemenids

The Medes and Persians maintained friendly relations, though Median and Persian Magi differed. Astyages, the last Median king, a debauched tyrant, turned this friendship into aggression, seeking to conquer Persian lands. Led by Cyrus the Great, the Persians rebelled, overthrowing the Median dynasty and establishing the Achaemenid dynasty, named after Cyrus’ ancestor, Hachamanish, a Persian king. The Persians shaped Achaemenid rule and Persian civilization. After Islam’s rise and Arab conquest of the Sasanians, Pars became Fars.

The Magi, as a Median tribe or at least a robust association, gained prominence, their teachings spreading widely under Median royal support, as a shared religion deterred separatism. With their knowledge, wisdom, divination, medicine, and occult sciences, the Magi were embraced by the steadfast, knowledge-loving Persians and the Achaemenid court, particularly under the Samanids, expanding their influence.

Herodotus notes that the Magian sect, or Magush, had followers before the Aryan invasion of Iran, during the Median reign until the Persian (Achaemenid) era. However, under Persian rule, the influence and authority of Median Magi waned.

Nevertheless, Persian Magi played a fundamental role in the Achaemenid and Sasanian courts, governance, and politics as clergy. They conducted religious ceremonies, selected heirs, crowned kings, trained successors, and managed royal tombs.

Magian Rebellions

A significant document about the Magi is Darius the Great’s Bisotun inscription near Kermanshah. Bisotun, meaning “place of gods,” records that Gaumata, a Magus, rebelled against Darius, attempting to seize the throne. Darius quelled the rebellion, preserving his rule. It is plausible that Darius’ propaganda portrayed him as a national hero and legitimate leader, despite lacking divine favor and the approval of the virtuous Magi.

Gaumata rebelled eight years after Cyrus’ death. It is said that after rising against Cambyses, he exempted people from military service and taxes for three years, restored herds and lands to farmers and the poor, freed slaves to combat aristocratic oppression, and promoted welfare and freedom for the disadvantaged. These actions contributed to his instability. Darius’ inscription confirms that he reclaimed lands, herds, slaves, and houses Gaumata had taken from the people (likely meaning soldiers).

Though Darius claimed to follow Ahura Mazda and possess divine favor, leading Greek sources to consider him Zoroastrian, analysts knew he lacked faith in Mazda and was not a true Zoroastrian, having usurped the throne of the virtuous illegitimately.

The Bisotun inscription also mentions another Magian rebellion by Fravartish (distinct from the Median king), a Median who seized Hamadan but was killed about eighteen months later. Darius states he cut off Fravartish’s nose, ears, and tongue, gouged out an eye, and chained him as a lesson. This record attests to Darius’ lack of chivalry, divine favor, and justice, despite his resolute will and general favor.

Parthian Magi

With Alexander’s invasion and the fall of the Achaemenids, virtuous Magi were marginalized during the Seleucid and Hellenistic era (312–63 BCE), while court Magi supported by Alexander’s successors managed religion. The Parthians (247 BCE–224 CE) followed. During their rule, Magi sought a divinely favored figure in Bethlehem, finding Jesus Christ as the newborn prophet and supreme Magus, the beloved and charming divine.

Three Iranian Magi, during the Parthian decline, coordinated with the court to seek the divinely favored infant, awaiting his divine teachings and enlightened guidance. Jesus’ birth is dated to 4 BCE, coinciding with Phraates IV’s reign (Ashk XIV). Real power lay with Queen Musa, a Roman who poisoned her husband, Phraates IV, to rule alongside her son. Josephus mentions her with confused details.

Christian artists depicted the Iranian Magi’s presence in Bethlehem, a key proof of Jesus’ divine selection, in paintings titled Adoration of the Magi, emphasizing this historical evidence. It is said the Magi tracked Mary’s virgin birth and Jesus’ birth using exclusive documents, passed from Cyrus the Favored to Parthian Magi as a religious-governmental record.

On the night of Jesus’ birth, three discerning Magi visited him. The choice of three Magi with three gifts may reflect John’s construction to suggest the Christian Trinity. Their guiding star might be the inner light of divine favor, misrepresented as a star. According to John’s Gospel, the Magi located Jesus through astrology and a remarkable star visible even by day, or a unique cosmic phenomenon signaling his birth.

Later, the Magi’s foresight is emphasized in John’s account as a warning dream, not astrological data:

“And being warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they departed to their country by another way.”

Some Christian sociologists, like Max Weber (1864–1920), viewed Jesus of Nazareth as a charismatic, sacred religious leader. Jesus was not only charismatic but a sacred sage and inherently perfect beloved, surpassing sages: “When the hundred comes, ninety is already with us.”

As discussed in the final chapter, Christianity struggled to preserve its original divine form, swiftly falling under Jewish influence, creating a Judaized Christianity.

During the Seleucid and Parthian eras, a distorted Zoroastrianism, managed by superficial Magi, prevailed. True favored ones are found among Israel’s prophets, as narrated in the Quran. During the Seleucid (Hellenistic) era, Jews rebelled multiple times but maintained good relations with the Parthians, even achieving aristocratic status.

Virtuous Iranian Magi were severely marginalized by shallow, short-sighted Magi.

During the Parthian era, Iranians encountered the Christianity of the apostles. Christians in the Iranian empire enjoyed freedom to propagate, establish bishoprics, and manage religious legal domains peacefully, while in the Roman empire, they faced political persecution and bans.

In 70 CE, Jews, who held Canaan and Jerusalem for 601 years under Cyrus’ liberation decree, lost their land to the Roman empire’s first attack, destroying Solomon’s Temple. Iran was the best destination for their migration.

In 130 CE, Hadrian, visiting Jerusalem, ordered a Roman temple built on the ruins of the sacred temple. Enraged Jews rebelled, but the emperor ordered their massacre, decreeing Jerusalem for non-Jews.

Jews in Europe endured 1,878 years of exile until 1948, when the Zionist regime restored their independence. For those years, Jews were permitted only once annually, on the 25th of Av, to visit Jerusalem, gaze at the ruined temple from afar, and weep. The crumbling wall where they wept is called the Wailing Wall.

Jews in Europe were forced to live in designated “ghettos” in humiliation. It was rumored they sacrificed Christian boys during Passover.

After the Renaissance, managed by Jews, Mendelssohn, a German Jew, translated the Old Testament into German, dispelling false accusations against Jews, granting them full freedom.

In the late 19th century, many Russian Jews were expelled. Russian and European Jews rose for independence and dignity, founding Zionism, a nationalist movement to preserve Jews through state and law.

Zion, a hill in Jerusalem, was a military center during Israel’s glory under David and Solomon, symbolizing their power, frequently mentioned in later prophetic books.

After Zionism’s establishment, Jewish migration to Palestine began. Ultimately, the British Prime Minister divided Palestine into Israel and Hashemite Jordan.

Two points are noteworthy: Jewish exile, if historically true and not a Jewish construct, is superficial. In reality, this religious minority always held significant wealth and influence, operating a shadow government ensuring protection, immunity, security, and prosperity for their racial followers, controlling other religions’ destinies. They seek Palestine for continued dominance, preserving it at any cost due to its strategic regional superiority.

Secondly, Jewish conquest of Canaan does not grant eternal racial inheritance or historical right to the land, excluding other races from lawful ownership. Jews tie statehood and land ownership to their inherent ethnicity.

Sasanian Magi

Some Magi, unable to tolerate Parthian governance, exploited its weaknesses, strongly supporting Ardashir Babakan, a virtuous, chivalrous leader advocating Mazdaic revival. In 224 CE, they elevated him to power. Ardashir, in his Naqsh-e Rostam inscription, states…

[Note: The original text is truncated here, omitting details about Ardashir’s inscription and further Sasanian developments. Assuming continuity, the translation resumes with the provided content.]

Zindiks, heretics, lacked existential security. They outwardly converted to Islam, ultimately eradicated by the Islamic caliphate.

Iranian Christian Church

During Shapur II’s reign, with Constantine’s declaration of Christian freedom, Christians in western border regions abstained from fighting Rome. Consequently, they were seen as allies of the Caesar, enemies of the Iranian empire, and Roman agents. Shapur II ordered the persecution of Christian missionaries and teachers. Under Bahram IV, whose power was held by his Roman wife, Musa, tolerance for Christians peaked, and mowbeds could not pursue Christian missionaries.

In the tenth year of Yazdegerd I’s reign (399–420 CE), Iranian bishops formed the Council of Ctesiphon, establishing forty episcopal districts under the supreme patriarch of Iranian Christians. Under this freedom, some Zoroastrian fire temples were destroyed or converted into churches. Yazdegerd cracked down, imprisoning or executing Christian leaders. In 424 CE, the Iranian church declared independence from Roman oversight, endorsing the Nestorian church, deemed heretical by Rome. Iran became a major center for Nestorian Christianity’s propagation. The Iranian court was influenced by Christianity, with Christian courtiers, merchants, royal wives, and the medical system under Christian control. Christianity, like Zoroastrianism, became a pillar of Iranian kingship.

Anushzad, Anushiravan’s son with a Christian mother, rebelled with Christian support but died from wounds, buried Christian-style.

Khosrow Parviz quelled Bahram Chobin’s rebellion with Roman and Christian support, allowing non-Zoroastrians to convert to Christianity. Influenced by his Christian wives, his support for Jacobite Christians, a minority compared to Nestorians, caused Nestorian discontent, contributing to his deposition.

After him, Purandokht (630–631 CE) appointed the Ctesiphon patriarch as her envoy in peace talks with Rome. With the Arab caliphs’ invasion, the semi-Christian Sasanian army, lacking martyrdom zeal, suffered a crushing defeat.

Mary Boyce summarizes in A History of Zoroastrianism:

“With Islam’s rise, Zoroastrian mowbeds deliberately destroyed rare Pahlavi and Avestan manuscripts to show their permanent conversion to Islam. They were already weakened by Iran’s organized church.”

Iranians’ acquaintance with the teachings and affection of the Prophet’s Household revitalized virtuous religiosity in Iran. However, Iranians never accepted Arab racial superiority, the caliphs’ Islam, or their interpretation, preserving Iranian identity and cultural-scientific independence to rebuild their power. A prime example is Salman Muhammadi, who became Ctesiphon’s governor post-Islam. The usurping caliphs, opposing Alid culture, had to appoint an Iranian scholar as Iran’s first governor, submitting to a ruler from Iran’s virtuous, Alid-loving, Quran-knowledgeable lineage.

Salman Muhammadi

Among renowned, worldly Iranian Magi, Salman Muhammadi, born in Pars from a Mazdaic favored family, possessed vast knowledge and insight. Following Jesus’ testament, he joined Eastern Christianity’s imams, awaiting the divine savior and eternal salvation, inherently drawn to the noblest of God’s messengers.

Salman stated:

“The land does not rest on deeds alone; one’s lineage is their faith and living in God’s light and will.”

Called a refreshing waterfall bestowing wisdom, the Prophet said:

“Salsal, who grants wisdom.”

This enlightened, favored scholar, versed in invocation, semiotics, hidden esoteric knowledge, and religious studies, amassed past priests’ knowledge. A former mowbed, he understood his era’s volatile society. Like the three Magi who visited Jerusalem at Jesus’ birth to confirm it, Salman sought truth and the divine savior—the true divine religion and its final prophet, the continuation of Hanif Islam. In Medina, he found the Prophet as the seal of messengers, bearing prophecy’s signs.

Recognizing the Prophet, Salman became one of his closest insightful companions, privy to secrets, earning the honorable title “Salman is from us, the Household,” reflecting his profound Magian mystique. Through scientific coexistence, faithful following, and spiritual affinity, he embodied human excellence and intimacy with the Household of Purity, with the angel of revelation conveying divine greetings to him.

Salman accepted Ctesiphon’s governorship under Umar, conditional on receiving his mandate from Imam Ali with his permission. Ctesiphon, the Parthian and Sasanian capital, shows Iranian culture never submitted to caliphal rule, with Magian culture rooted in divine will in Salman. Umar criticized his governance, but Salman rejected these, ruling by virtuous chivalry. He told Umar:

“I am not one to forsake divine will and prioritize your command over God’s.”

Salman, Iran’s first Muslim governor, received his mandate from Imam Ali, ruling by Ali’s insightful culture, not the caliph’s expansionist, colonial ambitions.

With vast knowledge and command of decisive proofs, Salman was a sacred teacher and divine educator inviting to Islam. He will be discussed further in the Islam chapter.

Centralization and Suppression of Virtuous Magi

In the Sasanian era, the Magian institution and Zoroastrian religion became centralized and monolithic. The state, supporting this institution, became a sword in the hands of superficial Zoroastrian mowbeds lacking wisdom and sagacity. Tansar (Tosar), a 3rd-century CE high priest known for compiling the Avesta at the Sasanian onset, wrote to Gushnasp, king of Tabaristan, describing Iran’s kings as pursuers of heretics and innovators to glorify the official religion, as the nation was prone to heresy. He deemed various tortures necessary to purge sorcerers and heretics.

Generally, chosen sages with inner wisdom and knowledge remained obscure, while famous ones were often weak, pretentious, government-supported mowbeds, not true researchers, sages, or sacred figures with inner authority.

Magi: Complete, Virtuous, Hanif Clergy

Ali ibn Husayn Mas‘udi (896–957 CE), a renowned historian dubbed the Arab Herodotus and a supporter of Imam Ali’s Household, considered Persian kings Hanifs and star-guided, with “star” symbolizing divine inner light.

Sahah al-Furs, the oldest Persian-to-Persian dictionary (728 AH) by Shams Munshi, an 8th-century notable, calls Zoroaster a Magus, an imam of Abraham’s nation, following the tolerant, Hanif, monotheistic religion.

Abraham the Hanif

Leonard Woolley’s archaeological research uncovered Ur of the Chaldeans, part of Abraham’s environment and historical context (circa 1900 BCE), a prophet of love and advanced culture.

Jewish sources state Abraham (Abram), son of Terah, was among the first to proclaim monotheism among Hebrews. Born in the Hivite tribe during Amraphel’s (Hammurabi’s) reign in Babylon, his birthplace was Ur in Mesopotamia. He rose to tribal leadership. Due to eastern tribes’ attacks, the tribe migrated to Harran in northern Arabia. There, Yahweh chose Abraham as His “friend.” Water and fodder shortages forced migration to Canaan on the Mediterranean coast, where Abraham lived until his death. His sons, Ishmael and Isaac, gave rise to Arabs and Jews.

The Quran uses “Hanif”—voluntary inclination to truth—for Abraham’s religion in eight instances. Hanaf means stepping inward.

Hanif denotes balanced, upright faith, free inclination to truth, avoiding idolatry, demon-worship, or astrology, free from non-divine intentions, and naturally aligned with truth.

Hanif’s hallmark is free, uncoerced monotheism, untainted by compulsion or impurity. Abraham’s greatness lies in his voluntary monotheism, love for God, harmony with creation, and purity from defilement.

Abraham predates Iranian Magi, living around 4000 BCE per some accounts, 1900 BCE per others, or 200 years before Zoroaster per Zoroastrian reckoning. Neither Abraham nor Zoroaster are historical figures amenable to historical analysis.

No historical sources or artifacts about Abraham, the divine Hanif prophet, have been found except Ur’s discoveries. For his events, the Quran is authoritative, its validity in religious and historical matters endorsed by the Infallible Imams. The Quran states about Abraham’s imamate:

“And [mention] when Abraham was tried by his Lord with commands and he fulfilled them. [Allah] said, ‘Indeed, I will make you a leader for the people.’ [Abraham] said, ‘And of my descendants?’ [Allah] said, ‘My covenant does not include the wrongdoers.’” (Surah Al-Baqarah, 124)

Hanif Magian Imams

Iranian Magi, with divine favor and sacred wisdom, held religious perfection, institutional leadership, political legitimacy, and kingship. They viewed all their actions as worship and praise for Ahura Mazda.

The Magi possessed noble character, divine teachings, and truthfulness. No independent prophet with a distinct scripture or divine book is recorded among them; they authored their own texts, lacking a specific scripture or religion. These Magian clergy followed a divine prophet of their era with Hanif characteristics, though no evidence clarifies their adherence to Abraham. Their history is speculative and obscure, with Abraham predating them. Jews, through repeated historical distortions, have claimed Abraham and Israel as the sole origin of divine religions, denying Iranian spirituality and wisdom, even erasing historical records, to exclusively claim Abraham’s legacy.

The oldest textual reference to Israel dates to 1207 BCE, during Merneptah’s reign (1224–1214 BCE). Israel, a name of God, means God’s sovereignty, equivalent to Arabic malik.

Hanif Islam

Islam was initially called Hanif (inclined to truth), later officially termed Islam. Islam, like salam, means peace, security, and harmony. One who freely and harmoniously coexists with God and His creation is Muslim. This peaceful coexistence with creation’s flow, resilience, and freedom from conflict, violence, or coercion requires knowledge, authority, faith, love, and passion. As such coexistence is only possible through love, Islam equates to love in content and meaning.

Monotheism, unity, love, and oneness are sagacity’s hallmarks, with Hanif perfection tied to sagacity, proximity to God, divine favor, and receiving divine rulings in a revelatory system.

Invitation to the Monotheistic Magian Religion

In the Gathas, Yasna 53, verse 7, people are called to the Magian religion thus:

“Your reward will be this Magian religion, as long as your devoted effort is rooted in your essence, where the deceitful soul will be cast aside and destroyed. If you reject this Magian religion, your lament will be your final word… ruin befits the wicked. Those who seek to debase the honorable, those vile despisers of the religion, will face retribution.”

The Magi, as guiding, enlightened teachers who attained divine proximity through heartfelt illumination, promoted monotheism. They worshipped Ahura Mazda, the wise, life-giving, singular God, and were monotheists. In their teachings, evil, savagery, and vice were created entities, not equal to Ahura Mazda.

The Magi practiced a religiosity imbued with divine favor, enabling them to purify religion from heresies and superstitions and society from oppression and injustice through divine light. Similarly, governance could lead politically and manage state-nation relations only if divinely favored and commissioned by God. Thus, the Magi cannot be considered disciples of Greek schools but of the divine favored ones’ ethos and Kianid wisdom.

Divine Favor of the Magi

At Naqsh-e Rostam, a beautiful relief depicts Narseh, the seventh Sasanian king (293–302 CE), receiving the ribboned ring, symbolizing kingship.

Divine favor, a special divine gift, grants humans the ability to connect with God and rely on Him through divine intuitive wisdom and monotheistic knowledge. The symbol of inner favor in the Magi was the turban or headband. In reliefs, the favored, legitimate Khosrow adorns his crown with a turban or receives it from Ahura Mazda. In Shia culture, the turban, even after death in other realms, signifies special divine favor. People, sultans, and rulers in those realms recognize such figures by their turban as divine crowning. In antiquity, they were called Khosrows, divine rulers, and sages.

A sage, from far and zank, means profoundly intuitive and divine, equivalent to a wise scholar, with sacred, intuitive knowledge based on heart perception, living God’s rulings beyond mere intellect or genius.

Divine favor, a unique, perfect life, should not be confused with fravahar (forward-driving force), the Zoroastrian symbol of Ahura Mazda’s essence and life’s origin. Fravahar or farvashi is a divine force accompanying every human or phenomenon’s soul, protecting against deceit and interpreted as a gallant guardian. Fordain derives from this.

Fravahar and soul are two of five inner human forces, alongside ahu (life force ending at death), daena (religion, conscience, discerning good from evil), and baod (perception and understanding). The soul, eternal post-death, is responsible for good and evil deeds, while fravahar (creation’s radiance) rejoins the life-giver after death, as it was created before entering this world.

In the original Mazdaic symbol, fravahar, with bird wings like the homa, falcon, or eagle, and a central circle, represents inner favor and heart. In Achaemenid depictions, fravahar is altered. Humans have innate wisdom, a ray of Ahura Mazda’s wisdom, and acquired wisdom. Innate wisdom without acquired wisdom lacks efficacy. Religion and conscience are innate, guided by prophets to enhance truth and right choices.

Fravahar is not favor but a cultural symbol. Culture, from far and human aspiration, means harmonizer.

All particles and phenomena have fravahar; all material, plant, animal, and human entities, with humans possessing a superior, complex form, have religion and wisdom. What makes humans human, granting proximity to God, is religion, wisdom, conscience, and emotion alongside thought, centered on divine favor. Finding God brings salvation, with monotheism paramount, though unity with guardianship achieves perfection.

Fravahar resembles the belief in mana, a common element in primal religions—a force beyond natural habit, present in all entities with varying intensity. For instance, a lion’s mana exceeds other animals due to its superior strength and noble traits. A tribal leader’s mana surpasses followers’. When one tribe defeats another, the victor absorbs the vanquished’s mana. Magi and mowbeds, for a fee, transferred one’s mana to another or a deceased’s to a living person through incantations. All phenomena draw from universal guardianship. Those with greater presence or dominance possess specific guardianship and divine favor. Guardianship is a religious term for each phenomenon’s existential rank. Inherently favored ones manifest a degree of inner grace and divine rule, with their identity, awareness, will, and love defined by this grace.

Divine favor is a gift to select humans, with divine prerequisites in God’s realm, granting noble phenomena like sages and favored rulers unique, exalted existence, returning to Him. They view God as the great orchestrator with radiant manifestation. Through God’s effective orchestration and revelatory judgment, humans find a secure refuge no demon can harm.

The Sanskrit deva means god (self-existent, uncreated), inherently autonomous. Deva and demon denote intangible, potent entities causing harm.

Early Magi, due to their inner divine connection, were divinely favored, blessed with special divine light and truth, granting legitimacy, wisdom, health, beauty, prosperity, divine power, and cosmic force. Through this proximity and divine inspiration, they knew truths surpassing others, becoming chosen, sacred, and sage. A king, to be just, worthy, successful, and complete, required this divine radiance.

Semantic Distortion of Divine Favor

Though Kianid wisdom holds sagacity as non-hereditary, kings distorted divine management and Kianid favor into hereditary rule, autocracy, and despotism. They reduced the continuous inner light and radiance to disconnected fire temples, making them central to Zoroastrianism. Fire temples did not exist in Zoroaster’s time, gaining prominence later. Kianid wisdom and Iranian philosophy waned, with peripatetic philosophy and Greek beliefs dominating philosophical schools for centuries, limiting universal reason to ten intellects and stripping unity from philosophy. Zoroaster, in Yasna 49, verse 11, speaks of the fate of tyrannical, illegitimate followers and religious deceit:

“So be it, those under evil rulers, who are evil-doers, evil-speakers, evil-seers, evil-minded, their deceitful souls will be met with foul nourishment, dwelling in the abode of lies among known companions.”

Favored Heroes

Besides sages and rulers, heroes and chivalrous figures possessed inherent noble zeal, justice, truth-seeking, and granted freedom. These, lesser than favored sages and rulers, bore divine confirmation in their nature. A prominent sacred hero, embodying chivalry and inherent nobility, is Purya-ye Vali (1255–1322 CE), born Mahmoud Khwarazmi, buried in Khoy.

Ferdowsi’s Favored Chronicle

Ferdowsi (940–1025 CE) dedicated his Shahnameh, or Favored Chronicle, to commemorating noble men favored in rulership, heroism, chivalry, priesthood, or prophecy. In the Shahnameh, favor denotes this, with glory its semantic requisite, not its equivalent. The title Shahnameh was later applied by people, not chosen by Ferdowsi.

Examples include the favored, free-spirited Rostam Dastan. Ferdowsi contrasts unfavored, unchivalrous, deceitful, or falsely favored figures, like Shaghad, plagued by inferiority, who kills the legendary Rostam not in combat but through a trap with a spiked pit. The Shahnameh deems greed and ambition the root of all dishonor.

Favored and heroic culture manifests in luti (humility) or detachment and dervishism. Luti differs from thuggish violence, opposing divine favor. A hero with divine favor inherently possesses chivalry, nobility, and dervishism; without it, even a victorious champion lacks favor.

Favored rulers served divine mediators and sages of their era, while favored heroes served divinely ordained rulers. Thus, divine favor and protection served God’s servitude and divine will correctly, fostering religion. Favored ones, or Kian-favored, were in God’s proximity, under His special protection, executing His divine will.

Technical Term: Favored

In the Magian school, God is the Favored, the most favored of His names and attributes. In this book, favor and favored are defined by their original establishment, historical ruling, and sagacity’s culture and technical term, not common usage, often tainted by superficial, pseudoscientific writings or prior books’ myths and distorted meanings. Some misinterpret sagacious favor, especially in the Shahnameh.

Favor is inherent, unattainable, divinely granted, unmediated, and non-acquired. It does not necessitate determinism or fate. In the material world’s freedom, favor can manifest through will, effort, and submission or remain latent due to poor upbringing, unfit mentors, or adverse circumstances.

Divine confirmation and grace guide and protect favored ones from adversaries, evildoers, and demons.

Assaults on Favored Wisdom

Alexander’s invasion and cultural plunder, alongside Sunni caliphs’ attacks on Iran, destroyed favored wisdom’s sources. Jewish adversaries and Christian clergy, through organized governance and the church, violently targeted Kianid wisdom. The powerful church across Iran propagated its faith, controlling knowledge centers like Jundishapur with Roman Christianity and theology, nearly making Christianity Iran’s dominant religion without Islam’s advent.

Besides these assaults, sacred wisdom depends on its saints’ lives, tied to sages and wise figures.

Official Narrative of Illuminative Reason

A superficial layer of favored wisdom was narrated by Saint Augustine (354–430 CE) in Christianity and Shahab al-Din Suhrawardi (1155–1191 CE) in Islam, discussing the Light of Lights, illuminative reason, and Iranian Magian wisdom, reviving a faint representation. Their books and other illuminative sages align with a prophet’s teachings, followed by favored Iranian Magi. One must be a saintly sage or a disciple of a knowledgeable saint to grasp illuminative wisdom’s depth and express its sacred reason. Suhrawardi states in Kalimat al-Tasawwuf:

“Among Persians was a group guided by truth… we revived their noble, radiant wisdom in the book Hikmat al-Ishraq, unmatched by any before.”

This wisdom is Kianid, belonging to divine inner rulers and profound, chivalrous heroes, with an unbroken, continuous lineage.

Pahlavi or hero here does not refer to entertaining literature like Baba Taher’s 5th-century quatrains but to the Iranian plateau before the Sasanians, especially during Kartir’s upheaval, when ritualist mowbeds and the state merged, enforcing a monolithic, superficial, distorted religion, marginalizing true sages.

Signs of Divine Favor

In Kianid wisdom, divine favor’s radiant light adorns one in spiritual and physical perfection, health, and beauty, appointed by God to guide and aid people, fulfilling His will, attaining prophethood or imamate, worthy of divine revelation or inspiration. In the Gathas, Yasna 31, verse 3:

“O Mazda! With Your words and tongue, enlighten us of the will that sages hold.”

This clearly speaks of God’s will and ruling, reaching the favored sage’s heart through illuminative revelation.

A ruler, as long as divinely favored and authorized, commands with success and glory. If favor departs, they face disgrace and curse, ruling illegitimately in God’s place, leading the true state and Iran to chaos, ruin, autocracy, deceit, and loss of its inherent nature.

Iranian Magi, in this sacred culture and Kianid educative structure, deemed sovereignty God’s right, believing He appoints the ruler. Only God’s chosen holds Kianid spiritual and ruling authority.

The symbol of revelatory mediation’s truth, spiritual sagacity, and divine favor is this. In ancient Iran, kingship required spiritual Magi’s confirmation. Favor, interpreted as fire, symbolizes purity and truth. In Magian religious texts, fire, as atar or athar, with shin indicating agency or likeness, as in Cyrus, becomes athravan or asravan, meaning favored, radiant with fire, and religious leader. Magi call official religious leaders athravan, azrban, or atarban.

Khosrow Meaning, Inspiration, and Imamate

Khosrow denotes possessing inner divine guidance in two structures: divine revelation and intuitive wisdom. Intuitive wisdom makes one self-reliant in producing true, radiant knowledge without specific illuminative revelation, though its greater truth depends on proximity, love’s intensity, unity, detachment from manifestations, and connection to the source of emergence.

Per the Quran, imamate, with inspirational and guardianship power beyond intuitive wisdom, sagacity, and general revelation, was granted to Abraham after great struggles in old age, excluding wrongdoers.

Inspiration surpasses general revelation, directly drawing sanctity, grace, and power from God.

A prophet’s righteousness and truth rely on divine revelation; without it, they are ordinary. However, favored truth and intuitive wisdom are self-reliant, inseparable from truth, dependent on inner wisdom’s intensity.

Zoroaster: Sushyans and Manthran Magus

Per the Gathas, a historical Magus, Zoroaster, called himself Sushyans. In Pahlavi, Sushyus, in Gathic Saoshyant, Sushyans is a sage not bringing a new religion but tasked with establishing justice, truth, and divine order, reviving religion and religiosity.

Zoroaster called himself manthran, a messenger of wisdom and thought, one who, with inner religion and conscience, awakens wisdom and inspires character through truth. Magi, until attaining inner religion, conscience, truth, and favor, cannot properly teach or awaken.

Examples of Favored Rulers

History’s favored rulers include Cyrus the Great as emperor, Khwaja Nasir al-Din Tusi (1201–1274 CE) as minister and advisor to Hulagu Khan (1217–1265 CE), and Sheikh Baha’i (1547–1621 CE), Sheikh al-Islam of the most powerful Safavid king, Shah Abbas the Great (1571–1629 CE), for 35 years. This favor led Iranian scholars to Shia Islam, building a sagacious Iranian base for Shia wisdom. Islam’s civilization, if any, is that of these radiant sages who knew freedom, awareness, harmony, and coexistence, not the Arab caliphs’ sword-driven, Arab-centric pride.