Zend-Avesta III: Yasna, Visperad, Gāthās
- Language:
- English
- Translation:
- L. H. Mills
- Status:
- Selection or partial work
- Authorship:
- Anonymous or composite
- Condition of the text:
- No scanning noise detected (automatic measure over the whole text, not checked by hand)
- Extent:
- ~150,000 words · 718 passages
Cite this work
- APAAvesta. (n.d.). The Zend-Avesta, Part III: Yasna, Visparad, Gathas (SBE vol. XXXI) [Zend-Avesta III: Yasna, Visperad, Gāthās] (L. H. Mills, Trans.). Digital reproduction: SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/en/works/avesta/the-zend-avesta-part-iii-yasna-visparad-gathas-sbe-vol-xxxi
- MLAAvesta. The Zend-Avesta, Part III: Yasna, Visparad, Gathas (SBE vol. XXXI) [Zend-Avesta III: Yasna, Visperad, Gāthās]. Translated by L. H. Mills. Digital reproduction, SigPhi, https://sigphiai.com/en/works/avesta/the-zend-avesta-part-iii-yasna-visparad-gathas-sbe-vol-xxxi.
- ChicagoAvesta. The Zend-Avesta, Part III: Yasna, Visparad, Gathas (SBE vol. XXXI) [Zend-Avesta III: Yasna, Visperad, Gāthās]. Translated by L. H. Mills. Digital reproduction, SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/en/works/avesta/the-zend-avesta-part-iii-yasna-visparad-gathas-sbe-vol-xxxi.
Reference to the edition that SigPhi reproduces: SigPhi is its digital reproduction, not its publisher. The edition's year is not in the metadata (hence "n.d."), and the translator appears only when recorded.
What it is about
The third part of the Avesta in the 'Sacred Books of the East': the Yasna, the Visparad, and within them the Gathas, the only texts tradition ascribes directly to Zoroaster.
Context and history
This is the part that matters most. The Gathas are seventeen hymns in an archaic Iranian much older than the rest of the Avesta, and they are the oldest core of the Zoroastrian religion: a voice speaks there in the first person, addressing Ahura Mazda and posing the problem of evil in terms that would later reappear in the West. The Yasna is the liturgy within which they have been transmitted, and the Visparad is an expansion of it for certain feasts. Two things are worth knowing: the language of the Gathas is so difficult that translations diverge widely, and Mills's, of 1887, is one period's interpretation, not a settled reading.
Editorial context, not a citable source: unlike the passages of the work itself, these statements cannot be checked against the corpus.
the seductions of the Worst Mind, and unite with the Daevas in the capital sin of warfare from wanton cruelty, or for dishonest acquisition. The consequence of this latter alliance is soon apparent. The Kine, as the representative of the holy pedple, laments under the miseries which make Iranian life a load. The. efforts to' draw a livelihood from honest labour are opposed, but not frustrated, by the Daeva-worshipping tribes who still struggle with the • Zarathujtfians for the control of the territory. The Kine therefore lifts