UULA Adult RE: Zoroastrianism, Part 1

This month's adult RE class will be this coming Friday, April 20th at 6:30 at the UULA Church building.

The topic will be Zoroastrianism, an important religious tradition in ancient Persia, with many modern day followers, and one of the world's first monotheist religions. The Zoroastrian tradition stands at an important crossroads in human history, and the Jews came into close contact with the Zoroastrians just as their own tradition was morphing from their polytheistic or henotheistic past into their own form of monotheism.

Zoroastrians believe in:

Prophets
God and a devil
Heaven and a fiery Hell
Angels and demons
Monotheism (arguably...)
Individual judgment at death, and a cosmic last judgment at the end of the world
Armageddon battle, followed by a millennium period
Resurrection of the body and life everlasting
Creation in 6 periods of time
An individual named Yima, who at the request of Ahura Mazda (God), built a fortified enclosure to preserve all living creatures from an approaching severe winger (compare to Noah)

Zoroastrianism is difficult to study, since there are very few good resources describing the Zoroastrian faith available in English. Worse, many of the original writings were destroyed, first by Alexander the Great, and then by the Islamic invasion. So it is difficult to be certain about the direction of transmission, but the similarities between Zoroastrianism and Judaism, Christianity, and Islam are too numerous to be due to chance. It seems likely that the Zoroastrian religion is the origin of modern ideas like Satan, Hell, and a fiery Judgment. As such, it is well worth our time to learn about and to understand.

I hope to see you there.

Zoroastrianism Part 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j6YMAwMygK4

Last month's class was our final lecture on ancient Mesopotamian religion, and a recording is available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GEAOJSW-G2Y&list=PLC9Hp5vpDjaY5H_sGzlzVwYnWtDPKIJtW

During this lecture, I mentioned my earlier lecture on the Amarna revolution in Egypt, the first recorded experiment with monotheism. That lecture can be found here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F4SxB86fEHg&list=PLC9Hp5vpDjaY5H_sGzlzVwYnWtDPKIJtW&t=1s&index=8

Видео UULA Adult RE: Zoroastrianism, Part 1 канала Religious Scholarship & Literacy