“Serving a purpose”

Dr P. D. Sunavala’s letter ("Serving a purpose,” Readers’ Forum, Parsiana, August 7, 2005) is a harrowing tale of obscurantism and complacency concerning the Fasli calendar. Is this how our putative lay and priestly leaders deal with issues of socioreligious importance?

The so-called Fasli calendar which embraces both scientific reasoning and religious sanction — there is no divergence — is the only justifiable time-reckoner for all Zoroastrians in their home and diaspora lands. Earlier in these columns Sunavala dealt with its positive scientific aspects, arguably better than we had around the same time.

It might be useful here to summarize some aspects: The Fasli system is in full agreement with the seasons. It is in consonance with the solar reckonings of the gahanbars. It aligns well with the Gregorian calendar and the quadrennial intercalation of one day — the Awardad-sal gah (the sixth Gatha day observed by Faslis every leap year). It thereby sheds any confusion brought about by the "floating” Shahenshahi and Kadmi methods. It has a spring beginning. Our fourth month, Tir conforms well with the heliacal rising of Sirius around 30° north latitude in June-July. Pious Parsis always intone it as teshtar tir yazad without wondering why an asterism should have divided the inseparable twin Amshaspands of Khordad and Amardad in the sequence of our Zoroastrian months.

The religious aspects, however, have been largely ignored. There is, firstly, the point of our gahanbars being strictly seasonal, and therefore regulated by the periodicity in the earth’s orbit around the sun. Thus, one cannot have a northern mid-spring festival in September, nor a mid-winter one in June. Then we have the oddity of the Rapithwin observance when it should not be: Rapithwin comes in with the northing sun on March 21, and exits on October 16, not we emphasize, from late August to mid-March. The defective Rapithwin entails the gahs (with the liturgically crucial Srosh yasht hadhokht) being recited or omitted at the wrong times of the solar/seasonal year, the Afrin-i rapithwin likewise, as also the Khorshed Nyayish. The all-important Fravardegan/muktad 10 days’ ceremonies too are out of kilter. Furthermore, it is unambiguously stated in our Bundahishn, "The priests fulfil the regulations about a corpse (our funerary rites) and other things by this reckoning of summer and winter.” Since our unthinking dhongidox are very particular in invoking traditions and in observing the minutiae of rituals lest they become vitiated, it is surprising that they stubbornly continue to strain at gnats and swallow camels in the non-negotiable matter of timely observances! Refer, please, to the Afrin-i gahanbar.

To forestall the usual barrage of frivolous counter-arguments, we here reiterate that the quadrennial intercalation of one day is reliable by far over the quirkily intercalated month supposedly every 120 years. Claims of having exact records of such monthly intercalations are wholly spurious — when and why did they then stop? Denkard III’s scaling-up was most probably made as a continuing stalling tactic against Muslim insistence on our adoption of their new-fangled uncorrected Islamic lunar calendar.

In India, where the majority of Parsi Zoroastrians still thrive, it has even been claimed that there are no seasons, conveniently forgetting the six bimestrial seasons listed by Sanskritists. Note also that the remarkable editor of our Khordeh Avesta, Kangaji, has explained our spring-commenced gahanbars as bhar vasant (spring), pur garmino vakhat (summer): anaj tatha mevo utarvano vakhat (harvest time); the ayathrima as of "uncertain meaning” — it actually means "bringing-in of cattle;” pur sardi tatha varsadné lidhé (winter and rainfall); and lastly, sardi tatha garminu samtol thavu: i.e., the spring equinox of March 21.

The era of the Fasli calendar in Iran is a sagacious compromise between the Anno Hegirae (622 CE+) and the Anno Yazdgardi (=AY of 632 CE+): the Zardushtis call it the Khurshidi (solar) era. Mischievous linking with the Jalali era, etc is just that, for anyone can start up a new era — e.g. from the year within which the undersigned had cut his first tooth! Our exact guide in this solar/seasonal system is that trustworthy compendium, the Bundahishn whose chapters 1 and 25 carefully spell out the precise dates of such a calendar. To remove all doubt from the minds of seriously interested readers, this latter calendrical chapter is clearly labeled Abar sal-idenig — "Concerning the religious year.” It has no dealings with the sal-mar i tazigan.

FARROKH VAJIFDAR

London, UK