Zoroaster

Zoroaster (c 630 BC — 553 BC), also Zarathustra or Zaradusht, was a prophet of the ancient Iranian religion of Zoroastrianism, which is known in India as Parsiism. There is also a belief that he could not have flourished later than 800 BC. He was a religious reformer, and the religion he founded is named after him. In spite of his being founder or reformer of a religion, though certainly a historical personage, nothing whatever is for certain known of him, except that his family name was Spitama, and that he was born in Bactria. He appears to have been a pure monotheist, and not to be responsible for the Manichean doctrine of dualism associated with his name, as Zoroastrianism, or the institution of fire-worship. Avesta is the sacred book of Zoroastrianism.

He taught that the world and history reflect the fight between Ormuzd (the creater, or good) and Ahriman (the devil, or bad). It resulted in banishment of evil and the victory of good.

Wisdom & Quotes

• In doubt, even if an action is just, abstain.
• Seek your happiness in the happiness of all.
• Happiness comes to them who bring happiness to others.
• Doing good to others is not a duty. It is a joy, for it increases your own health and happiness.
• One need not scale the heights of the heavens, nor travel along the highways of the world to find Ahura Mazda. With purity of mind and holiness of heart one can find Him in one’s own heart.
• He who sows the ground with care and diligence acquires a greater stock of religious merit than he could gain by the repetition of ten thousand prayers.
• Turn yourself not away from three best things: Good Thought, Good Word, and Good Deed.
• Taking the first footstep with a good thought, the second with a good word, and the third with a good deed, I entered paradise.
• One good deed is worth a thousand prayers.
• Beware of lust, it corrupteth both the body and the mind.”
• Your good thoughts, good words and good deeds alone will be your intercessors. Nothing more will be wanted. They alone will serve you as a safe pilot to the harbour of Heaven, as a safe guide to the gates of paradise.
• A reflective, contented mind is the best possession.
• With an open mind, seek and listen to all the highest ideals. Consider the most enlightened thoughts. Then choose your path, person by person, each for oneself.
• Ability in a man is knowledge which emanates from divine light.
• For a thinking man is where Wisdom is at home.
• A knife of the keenest steel requires the whetstone, and the wisest man needs advice.
• Excessive liberty and excessive servitude are equally dangerous, and produce nearly the same effect.
• Always meet petulance with gentleness and perverseness with kindness. A gentle hand can lead even en elephant by a hair. Reply to thine enemy with gentleness.
• Now the two primal Spirits, who reveal themselves in vision as Twins, are the Better and the Bad, in thought and word and action. Between these two the wise ones chose aright; the foolish not so.
• Do not to others what ye do not wish Done to yourself; and wish for others too. What ye desire and long for, for yourself. This is the whole of righteousness, heed it well.
• Be good, be kind, be humane, and charitable love your fellows console the afflicted pardon those who have done you wrong.
• He who sows the ground with care and diligence acquires a greater stock of religious merit than he could gain by the repetition of ten thousand prayers.
• One good deed is worth a thousand prayers.

Aesop

Nearby pages
Zosimus, Zou, Zou Rong, Zouaves, Zoutspansberg