As I write this, tens of thousands of Iranians (or let’s call them Persians) are demonstrating against the government of murderous black-turbaned mullahs who let the 1979 revolution and promptly immersed Iran in wars and supporting terrorism.
In many cases, this demand for a government is coupled with a desire to return to the Old Religion, which for them means Zoroastrianism.
Reza Pahlavi, son of the shah (king) who was deposed in 1979 and himself a US resident, has issued video statements supporting his revolution. I read that many protestors are chanting his name. He remains the crown prince, so if Iran becomes a constitutional monarchy, he would be shah.
His father, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi (1919–1980) was dying of cancer when he fled the country. He spent some time in a New York City hospital, where a member of his medical team was a nurse named Loretta Orion.
She, in turn, earned a PhD in anthropology, and became interested in the contemporary Pagan movement and in particular She wrote Never Again the Burning Times: Paganism Revived (1994) and It Were As Well to Please The Devil as Anger Him: Witchcraft in the Founding Days of East Hampton (2018), about a 17th-century witchcraft case on Long Island, New York.
I met her at the American Academy of Religion meeting in Philadelphia — 1995, I think, which would fit, since her book was just out then. There was no Pagan studies group yet, for we were just starting to find each other. She and I went out for a pizza slice or something, and she told me about attending to the shah, which all seemed kind of like ancient history by then.
And now the Pahlevi family is back in the news, and my feed on X is full of Persians saying how they can’t wait to get rid of the alien Semitic religion imposed on them by force (Islam) and go back to their Native Faith of Zoroastrianism, which has managed to cling on because it qualified as “heritage.”
Incidentally, “Iran” and “Aryan” (in its original sense) are at root the same word. So the Aryans want their old religion back.
So the (original) Aryans — some of them — want their Native Faith back, only in this case it is more or less monotheistic, but not always. If Iran/Persia is reinvented as a more secular republic, who knows what flowers might bloom?
The Persians I know hollow the old customs celebrating at the Equinoxes and Solstices. I think if the Islamic overlay were removed from their culture, it would not be a stretch to see their Old Religion (truly) return.
Fascinating, Chas. From what I have read, in the past, when it was the official religion of the ruler, it was not tolerant. But then neither was Christianity until immersed in democracies.
Interesting, Chas. The main trouble with Zoroastrianism is that it inverted the divine/anti-divine dichotomy and hence resonated with the Abrahamic religions. But this is what I posted a few days ago on FB’s monarchist page:
As a pagan, I am not particularly enamoured of Islam, or for that matter any of the Abrahamic religions, but I recognise the beauty of monarchy – perhaps today what might need to be a monarchial technocracy. I am not opposed to democracy, but it only works with an educated electorate. My feeling is that the beauty of monarchial pageantry can function as an inspiration for the educational effort that might make democracy work.
Iran has seemed always to have some kind of antithetical relationship with the rest of the West. If the people of Iran could now overthrow their country’s present regime of the past three decades or so, and Reza Pahlavi might play a catalytic role in the formenting process, Iran might be able to put herself at the vanguard of civilisation’s necessary & wished for positive advance.
Great message. Already in Shah times there were Iranians brought up as Muslims who tried to convert to Zoroastriansm, but the Zoroastrians in Iran did not accept conversions, one could be a zoroastrian only if one was born from zoriastrian parents. This was probably due to the fact wanted to avoid further islamic persecutions. Apparently Zoroastrians in Europe and America are not so strict but I am not sure.
Gus is right. Zoroastrianism in Sasanid period (ca. 250-650 CE) became the national religion of the Persian empire, and there were episodes of persecution of other religions, mainly various christian groups. This is what often happens when a religion becomes the official religion of the state, and it was also due to the continuous struggle against Roman and later the Byzantine empire, who after 350 CE were christian, so Christians in the Persian Empire were considered possible traitors.
There is just one thing I don’t agree with: “Iranians (or let’s call them Persians)”. Iran is a mosaic of peoples and languages, and the Persians are little more than 50% of the population. The other are Turks (Azeris, about 30%, Turkmens, Qashqai etc.), Kurds, Baluchis, Lurs, Arabs and others. So, saying Persians insteed of Iranians is like calling all the Americam “Yankees”.
But it is sure that, if the present revolution triumphs, it will be the end of Islam in Iran, possily with lots of people converting to Zoroastrianism.