Cambridge Ancient Hi.. - Index of

650 22a. the sasanid monarchy
divine personification (such names seem to have been common among the
Iranian nobles under the Sasanids). The role of this divinity in the
Zoroastrian pantheon is much disputed, but represents a trend in
Zoroastrian religion which attempted to provide a unifying monistic framework
for its fundamentally dualistic theology: Ohurmazd, the good principle,
and Ahriman, the evil principle, were depicted as the twin sons of
Infinite Time. There is, however, little reliable information: the Pahlavi
Zoroastrian literature of the post-Sasanid period is virtually silent, whereas
contemporary non-Sasanid and non-Zoroastrian sources suggest that this
doctrine was the orthodoxy endorsed by the Sasanid kings. 33
Various attempts have been made to overcome the discrepancy. It has
been postulated that the orthdoxy reflected in the extant Zoroastrian literature
triumphed only after the collapse of the Sasanid monarchy, in the
context of rivalry between supporters of the old national religion and the
new Islamic monotheism, so that the former monistic orthodoxy was
deliberately suppressed. 34 According to another view, the story of
Zurvanism is one of intermittent success: whereas under some kings it was
indeed the accepted orthodoxy, under others the pendulum swung in the
opposite direction and the dualistic trend became dominant. Dualism was
finally triumphant under Khusro I (531–79), whose reign also constitutes a
decisive stage in the canonization of the surviving Avestan Nasks and in
the development of Zoroastrian theological literature. Attempts have also
been made to play down the significance of Zurvanism, either as a fad
entertained by the upper classes or as a popular version of Zoroastrianism,
and, at any rate, as nothing tantamount to a heresy in its familiar Christian
sense. 35
Perhaps the best way of approaching a solution is to get rid of the notion
of a Sasanid Zoroastrian church analogous in its position to that of the
Christian church in the late Roman empire, intent upon using secular
support to impose a uniform doctrine within its ranks. The truth may well
have been that although the early Sasanid kings had found Zoroastrianism,
as represented and propounded by the estate of the magi, the most potent
religious factor in many of their domains, they were not always prepared to
allow it to become the sole officially dominant state religion. Thus, for
example, Anahita, who seemingly fades out after the reign of Narseh,
springs again into prominence under the last Sasanids, from Khusro II to
Yazdgard III (633–51). 36
Furthermore, the fact that some Sasanid kings, like Shapur I, were prepared
to unleash the Zoroastrian priesthood against the Christians in the
33 Christensen (1944) 149–54; Boyce (1979) 112–13, 160–1.
34 Boyce (1979) 160–1; cf. Boyce (1984) 96–9.
35 Zaehner (1955); reaction in Boyce (1957), (1990); Frye (1959), (1984) 321 with n. 27; Shaked (1979)
xxxiv.6. 36 Wikander (1946) 55–6; Duchesne-Guillemin in Yar-Shater (1983) 897.
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