Cambridge Ancient Hi.. - Index of

648 22a. the sasanid monarchy
Ardashir and of his immediate successors to this goddess can be considered
as part and parcel of a Zoroastrian orthodoxy, then this orthdoxy must
have been entirely different from the kind of orthodoxy assumed in his
glorification in the Denkard. 28
The absence of any clear reference to an organized clergy in the Res
Gestae Divi Saporis is at odds with the role ascribed by modern scholars to a
‘Zoroastrian church’, at least under the early Sasanid kings. This gap is not
filled by the far-reaching claims made in four inscriptions celebrating the
career of Kirder, the one priestly character who does figure on Shapur’s
monument. Kirder was promoted within the Zoroastrian priesthood from
a mere herbed under Shapur I to the rank of a mobed (mgwpt, i.e. chief magus)
under his immediate successors, Hormizd I, Bahram I and Bahram II.
Bahram II bestowed additional honours and supposedly authorized Kirder
to enforce Zoroastrianism and persecute heresies and other religions. This
only indicates that this king was attached to the kind of Zoroastrianism
preached by Kirder, which is more than can be said of Shapur I. 29
The extent of Shapur I’s Zoroastrian piety as it emerges from his own
Res Gestae is not entirely clear. He was indeed the founder of many firetemples
throughout his realm, according to his own testimony as well as to
Kirder. Yet fire-temples were sacred not only to Ahura Mazda but also to
Anahita, and Shapur’s favourable attitude to Zoroastrianism should be conceived
in the framework of a religious eclecticism that could also accommodate
Manichaeism. 30 Furthermore, the fact that he granted Kirder
sweeping powers to conduct the affairs of his religion, without matching
these powers with the appropriate titulature (herbed, whatever its meaning,
appears to be a rather modest title), suggests that Kirder was a court-priest,
not the designated head of a powerful church. Some tension between
Kirder in this function and some of his brethren cannot be ruled out.
Kirder’s statement, reiterated on his inscriptions as a refrain, that under his
leadership many of the magi (not all of them) were happy and prosperous,
implies an attempt to mute the voices of an opposition. The early Sasanid
monarchs, far from depending on an already powerful organization for
vital support, may rather have helped Zoroastrian clergy to improve their
position in a fluid and competitive religious milieu.
It is usually assumed that under Narseh (293–302) the influence of the
Zoroastrian priesthood declined, but that it regained much of the lost
ground under Shapur II (309–79). The figure of Aturpat, son of
Mahrspand, looms large in the post-Sasanid Zoroastrian literature, where
he is depicted as a model of Zoroastrian orthodoxy who submitted himself
28 Chaumont (1958); Duchesne-Guillemin in Yar-Shater (1983) 874–97.
29 Back (1978) 384–488; Duchesne-Guillemin in Yar-Shater (1983) 878–84.
30 Wikander (1946) 52–124; Chaumont (1958) 162–3; Lieu (1994) 24–5, 35–6 for Manichaeism in the
Sasanid empire.
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