Cyrus the Great conquers Babylon (Unknown Author / CC BY 4.0) Through this interaction, Zoroastrianism became a key source for the major Abrahamic religions: Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. The descendants of these exiled Jews would go on to compile the Torah, the first five books of the Hebrew Bible, and they carried the Zoroastrian influence into their religion. In conquering the city, Cyrus freed the Babylonian Jews who had been captured after the fall of Jerusalem over 60 years earlier. Possibly the most significant moment in this expansion came with the conquest of Babylon by the Persians in 539BC. Cyrus the Great, founder of the Achaemenid Persian Empire, was a devout follower and the under him the expansionist Persians spread of the religion through conquest and trade across Asia. Zoroaster was able to ask questions and received many answers from the vision, giving him his doctrinal foundation for the religion.ĭespite the religion’s obscure beginnings, Zoroastrianism grew to become the state religion of three major Persian dynasties, at a time when the Persian empire was the largest in the world. When Zoroaster was 30 he had a divine vision of the God Ahura Mazda and his Amesha Spentas, the seven Holy Immortals that emanate from Him. He opposed animal sacrifices and rejected the use of the Haoma plant, used in rituals to create hallucinogenic visions. Zoroaster rejected the polytheistic religion of the time, claiming that it was a tool of oppression and that the many gods were false. Apollonius of Tyana Similarities to Jesus Christ.Who Were The Nephilim? Biblical Demigods From Before The Flood.He married and had three sons and three daughters. A few details survive of his life: for example, we know he was born into the Spitama clan and worked as a priest. His name is a Greek rendering of the name Zarathustra, also called Zarathusti in Persian, or Zaratosht in Gujarati. He was born during the Bronze Age, a time when polytheistic religions were predominant.
Zoroaster was born somewhere in northeast Iran or southwest Afghanistan. Ahura Mazda as He is commonly depicted (A.Davey / CC BY 2.0)