Why is zoroastrianism in decline today

Driving towards the newly established Yasna branch in Dohuk, Mehdi said he hoped to find a new community of like-minded converts. The head of the branch, Helan Chia, asked him whether he would abide by the core principles of respecting nature, its four elements of air, water, fire and earth and mankind before registering him officially as a member.

The focus on the environment and on peaceful coexistence are key elements attracting young people from conservative backgrounds to the ancient faith.

Similar to Christians and Jews, Zoroastrians were granted protective status under Islam on account of their holy scripture, the Avestsa, and are therefore safeguarded against discrimination on account of their religious beliefs.

This is also enshrined in Article 12 of the Iranian constitution. As non-Muslims, Zoroastrians are subject to numerous disadvantages in the workplace. It is almost impossible for them to get a job in the public sector and they are rarely admitted to university. Likewise, they are not permitted to hold high government positions, are excluded from serving in the police, and are not allowed to become teachers. Because of their dhimmi, or protected status under Islam, they have to pay a poll tax to the Islamic state.

With the limits which are placed on the practice of their religion, they find themselves second-class citizens in the Islamic republic. In modern Zoroastrianism, great significance is given to properly performed rituals and worship in the presence of fire — a symbol of the purity of their god Ahura Mazda — in the fire temple, the Ateshkadeh. The religious practice of fire worship, of which the majority Muslim population is suspicious, is not allowed to be conducted in public.

It therefore comes as no surprise that in Iran, not only religious activity, but also dialogue with other faiths only takes place within very narrow limits. Such dialogue is conducted only at the official level and is invariably initiated by the government side, reports Firouzgary.

Former President Mohammad Khatami, regarded as a liberal, set a positive example by constantly supporting interreligious dialogue as well as dialogue among various social groups. Yet, in the authoritarian climate of the Ahmadinejad era, even this restricted dialogue has long since been silenced. Recent anti-Semitic remarks made by President Ahmadinejad, however, have left them feeling uneasy. A few years ago, this newspaper reported on how community associations in small towns like Khambhat in Gujarat, that once had thriving Parsi localities, were struggling to protect religious shrines and cemeteries from encroachers.

According to the Federation of Parsi Zoroastrian Anjumans FPZA of India, in more than 50 of the 80 towns in the country where Parsis once lived, the anjumans, or associations are defunct. The number is estimated to be between 35, and 38, now. I remember the agiary on Lamington Road where, on some days, there used to be a queue to get in. As fire temples face closure, one concern is what to do with the holy fire — which is the focus of worship.

The fires are created in special ceremonies and cannot be extinguished. One solution has been to shift the fires to a shrine that still has visitors. When a fire temple in Bharuch in south Gujarat was planned to shut, there were talks of shifting its year-old fire to a new shrine in Navi Mumbai where more than Parsi-Zoroastrians now live.

Yet Tata seemed to have a pall of sadness over him, I thought, as he reflected on his own history as part of the community. When an earnest member of our group asked him to recount a time when his faith had positively influenced his life, he spoke instead of his escape from his overbearing Parsi family to the US, where he was able to study architecture and finally felt free and happy, before he was dragged back to India to be installed in the family business.

Mistry had built himself an ostentatious tower block in the suburb of Dadar, and had decorated its soaring exterior with oversized motifs of winged lions and bearded warriors, in homage to the grand ruins of Persepolis in Iran, the ceremonial capital of the Achaemenid empire, whose dominant religion was Zoroastrianism. As this was a private temple, the fire had not been consecrated and so it was a rare case when, as a non-Parsi, I was allowed to enter. But as I went to fix a head-covering, copying the others in the group, Sherry, our young priest companion, accosted me.

I sat alone in a wicker chair, listening to the lilting intonations of the priest waft from the temple without being able to see a thing. After the half-hour of prayer, we ascended in a lift and emerged into a dining room on the 19th floor, where a glass sculpture of a horse was suspended from the ceiling. A husky wearing a jewelled cravat padded across the chequered marble floor to greet us, and then came the host, wearing a tight black T-shirt and Louis Vuitton loafers.

We stepped on to a roof terrace just in time for the hazy sunset, and were then ushered up a floor to yet another terrace, where we chatted with Mistry and his family over canapes.

It was a disgrace, he said, that there were so many rich Parsi businessmen who were not following the Zoroastrian command to spread their wealth. I asked him how money could help reverse the decline in the Parsi population. What about taking a more inclusive line on who can be a Parsi? Our programme in Mumbai came to an end, and we left early in the morning for the hill station of Lonavala. Mistry had organised a team-building exercise for us at a retreat he owned, where corporate executives receive military-style counter-terrorism training.

After a bumpy hour in a jeep and then a short boat ride, we arrived at the luxury bootcamp, where the rooms had Kalashnikov lamp-stands and hand-grenade door handles, as well as Mistryisms engraved into various fixtures. As the sun set, we were told to stand to attention as the national anthem played, and then the staff handed out fatigues to change into for the exercises, which I decided to skip, feeling a little queasy at the militarism.

A billboard informed guests that the complex had been set up to help Indians take revenge for the Mumbai terror attacks , in which Pakistani gunmen killed more than people. The Parsis have long prided themselves on being able to get along with the rulers of the day, whoever they may be, and even the Parsi origin story reflects this knack for astute political messaging. When the refugees from Persia landed, so the tale goes, the Hindu king of Gujarat produced a full glass of milk, to signal that there was no space for new arrivals.

The Persians stirred a spoonful of sugar into the milk without spilling any, to show they would sweeten the kingdom without disturbing it. F or the second half of our tour, we journeyed north to Gujarat.

One of our first stops was Sanjan, the port where our ancestors arrived more than 1, years ago. A hot wind buffeted us as Sherry led a brief prayer on the sandy banks of the Varoli river, at the spot where the arriving Persians may or may not have produced that spoonful of sugar, and then we continued further north.

There was an energy and excitement inside our tour bus during the long journeys of the next few days, despite the unavoidable theme of ageing and decay that marked much of the trip. We played raucous games of Mafia and danced in the aisle to songs blasted through a bluetooth speaker. Sherry was a ringleader in both the card games and the dancing, rallying the troops and wiggling his hips to the music.

Born to Parsi parents from Gujarat who resettled in Zanzibar for business, Bulsara went to school near Mumbai, moved to Britain in and soon took the name Freddie Mercury. I started to ponder the idea of having a late-in-life navjote, egged on by many of the friendly co-participants in the tour, who thought it would be a fun excuse to all meet up again. I floated the idea with Sherry, but as we got chatting on the bus, I quickly realised I had been mistaken to infer from his bleached hair and carefree demeanour that he was a reformer and would approve of the idea.

In Zoroastrianism, there is no need to be ascetic or severe in order to be conservative. Sherry told me that if either parent was not a Parsi, he would not perform a navjote. He did not accept the century-old ruling allowing navjotes for those children who have just a Parsi father. I pointed out to him that there were many people on our tour who might end up marrying non-Parsis. Was it really necessary to kick them and their offspring out of the religion? Sherry combined a fervent commitment to religious dogma and ritual with a remarkably warm, laid-back attitude to just about every other aspect of life.

It was a curious combination, but one I came to recognise in many Parsis we met. W e arrived late one evening in Udvada, the small Gujarat town that houses the holiest fire in all Zoroastrianism, the Iranshah.

Laying eyes on the Iranshah was set to be the highlight of the tour for most of the group. If legend is to be believed, the fire was consecrated shortly after the arrival of the Parsis in India, and has been burning constantly for more than a millennium. The current temple that houses it dates from the s, and before priests are allowed to conduct prayer ceremonies there, they must undergo a nine-day purification ritual, during which they can have no human contact.

The narrow lanes that make up the centre of old Udvada are lined with once-spectacular Parsi mansions now mostly fallen into disrepair. Just a handful of Parsi families still live in the town, though there are a number of inns for the pilgrims who come regularly from Mumbai and across the world.

We checked into one of them, which had simple rooms that were bare save for a bed, a ceiling fan and a small representation of Zarathustra on the wall. He lived across from the temple, in a villa with windows open to the street, through which he was visible sitting at a desk, dressed in white.

Dastoor beckoned me into his home with a flick of the wrist.