All things, created by Ahura-Mazda pronouncing the creating, pre-existing word "Honover," were pure, perfect, and beautiful as himself until spoiled by the evil influence of Ahriman. And though Ahriman, like Ahura-Mazda, has been eternal and self-existing in the past, Zoroaster declares that a day will come when three great prophets will arise, Ukhsyad-eremah, "the increasing Light," Ukhsyad-eretah, "the increasing Truth," Açtvad-ereta, "self-existent Truth," who will convert all mankind; everything created will become as pure as on the first day when it issued from the breath of the "Wisest of all Intelligence," and Ahriman will be destroyed and disappear for ever.
Such is the real doctrine of Zoroaster, while the hymns of the Zend-Avesta glow and burn with the assurance of the mystic and essential life of the soul with the spiritual essence of all pure thought. The pure heavens are like light; thought is likened to a drop of pure light, and the departing spirit has a sunbeam for its guide to conduct it to immortal light.
In the Gâthas, or Songs, he says: "God appears in the best thought, the truest speech, and the sincerest action. He gives through his pure spirit health, prosperity, devotion" (which, more properly translated, ought to be "love"), "and eternity to this universe. He is the Father of all truth and the Mother of all tenderness."
It is very remarkable that the early Aryans looked upon disease, deformity, and weakness in the same light that we are apt to regard the depraved and vicious. Health was the first and greatest boon, the gift they supplicated most earnestly from heaven. Health first, then immortality. They seemed to loathe consumption and scrofula, and many of their most energetic prayers are supplications to the Deity to be preserved "from this hateful indwelling sin," as they termed it. Their laws for the happy treatment of women, especially in certain conditions of health, of which I shall treat in the chapter on their domestic life, is full of that reverence for her health and happiness, as well as those of her offspring, which is seen to penetrate the whole life of the Fire-worshipper, passing as it did in the course of time into a rigid etiquette. Stern as it is, it is infinitely better than the careless indifference with which the mother, "the transmitter of human life," is so often regarded among us.
In the Zend-Avesta we find a moral code almost as perfect as our own, with rather a singular account of the creation. In one of the books, called "Desater," it would seem all animals being created except man, the dog was dreadfully lonely, and that man was created only out of compassion for him; and no sooner was man formed than all the animals, save the dog, broke out into open rebellion against the Great Spirit for having favored man with speech, reason, and immortality.
As in Genesis, so in the Desater, the Great Spirit brought the animals to Gelshadèng and made them subject to him, and he it was who divided them into seven classes. There is a curious dialogue that passed between the seven great sages of Persia and the seven different animals, and the reasons given why some are made fierce, others harmless, and yet others beneficent. In some passages great veneration is expressed for the cow, and great aversion to some animals, and to the human corpse; this is not permitted either to find a resting-place in the earth or in the fire, because of the sacredness of both these elements; and it is commanded that it be abandoned to birds of prey or to absorption by the air in enclosures set apart for the purpose.
However, in spite of many things that seem childish and absurd in their books (the unprejudiced student is not always certain that the right meaning of the text has been rendered, for the language is full of difficulties), yet so much is clear: that the "Gâthas" are very beautiful hymns and full of true religious feeling. They are addressed to the household fire, to the sun, moon, and stars, to the spirit of the hills, mountains, trees, birds, and flowers, to the earth, air, and sea. The earth is often called the "infinite, the all-nourishing cow," and the sun is consequently, by the same figure, designated "the fiery-winged one, the immortal bull."
Then there are prayers and songs to the spirits of the righteous dead, to the seven high angels around the throne, the planets then known. The most spiritual are those addressed to Ahura-Mazda, "the Everlasting Light," who is described as an ineffable Being, full of brightness and glory. Zoroaster discovers God in the eternal invisible Fire. His wonder and joy over the first kindling of the flame arose from the spiritual symbolism that interpreted all nature to him. In it he recognizes the type of the immortal Light and the spiritual resurrection of the soul. Thrilling with religious fervor, he bows before the radiant light as the most subtle and all-dissolving element, and in feeling its mystery acknowledges the mystery of God, its Supreme Creator.