Literature and history

history come.

Hello and welcome to literature and history.

Episode 82, Zorroastrianism.

This episode will cover the basic tenets and ancient history of Zoroastrianism.

An ancient Persian religion still practiced in Western India, Iran, and scattered communities

predominantly situated in North America and Europe.

Zoroastrianism has been one of the most consequential and far-reaching theologies on Earth, notwithstanding the fact that so few of us know anything about it.

To start our story for the day, then, let's picture the city of Jerusalem.

The dome of the rock, the heart of the old city of Jerusalem, sits atop Temple Mount, a place with a nearly 3,000 year-long recorded history.

Temple Mount is the site of Judaism's first and second temples, where in apocryphal writings Adam was created and in canonical

writings Abraham was told to sacrifice his son.

It is the site where the prophet Muhammad is said to have ascended to the afterlife from the rock at the temple's heart.

A quarter mile to the west of the dome of the rock is the Church of the Holy Sepulch, where, also according to tradition, Christ was crucified, buried, and resurrected.

These two sites form one of Earth's most popular places for tourism and pilgrimages, ground zero for some

of our most sacred narratives.

A ways away from Jerusalem, 1, 530 miles to the east, almost exactly due east as the crow flies.

There is another religious site, one known to locals of that part of Iran, as a nice place for a picnic or day

trip, but broadly forgotten by the world at large.

A squat, basalt outcrop rises out from the beige-colored earth, home to

weathered stone structures that have been eroded by thousands of years of exposure to the

elements. During part of the year, seasonal rains make the rugged promontory an island surrounded by shallow, muddy water that in ancient times was a lake.

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