Avestanii
Avestanii is a is a monotheistic religion and philosophy based on the teachings of prophet Ahura Mazda formulated c. 1750 BCE. The Avestanii religious faith has been the subject of religious persecution in the form of pogroms, religious inquisitions, and political persecution.
Some of the basic tenets of the faith are:
- In God there are contained hosts of glorious Hierarchies and lesser beings of every grade of intelligence and stage of consciousness, from omniscience to an unconsciousness deeper than that of the deepest trance condition. During the current period of manifestation these various grades of beings are working to acquire more experience than they possessed at the beginning of this period of existence. Those who, in previous manifestations, have attained the highest degree of development work on those who have not yet evolved any consciousness.The period of time devoted to the attainment of self-consciousness and to the building of the vehicles through which the spirit in man manifests, is called "Involution". The succeeding period of existence, during which the individual human being develops self-consciousness into divine omniscience, is called "Evolution". Every evolving being has within him a "force" which makes evolution not to be a mere enfoldment of latent germinal possibilities but a process where each individual differ from that of every other. This force, called "Epigenesis", provides the element of originality and gives scope to the creative ability which the evolving being is to cultivate that he may become a God.
- As expressions and aspects of Creation, God emanated the Amesha Spentas ("Bounteous Immortals"), that are each the hypostasis and representative of one aspect of that Creation. These Amesha Spenta are in turn assisted by a league of lesser principles, the Yazatas, each "Worthy of Worship" and each again a hypostasis of a moral or physical aspect of creation.
- God's creations—evident as truth and order—is the antithesis of chaos, evident as lies, falsehood and disorder. The resulting conflict involves the entire universe, including humanity, which has an active role to play in the conflict.
- God had originally placed the means of subsistence on earth so that people should divide them among themselves equally, but the strong had wronged the weak, seeking domination and causing the contemporary inequality. This in turn empowered the Five Demons that turned men from Righteousness - these were Envy, Wrath, Vengeance, Need and Greed. To prevail over these evils, justice had to be restored and everybody should share excess possessions with his fellowmen.
- Ahura Mazda allegedly planned to achieve this by making all wealth and women common or by re-distributing them
Avestanii serves as the root religious basis for most of the known religions throught the known world. Although it is a minority faith, many of its followers have served as scholars, scientists, businessmen, bankers, and doctors, often with little or no legal protection of their status.
page revision: 7, last edited: 23 Jan 2010 23:27