Keeping alive their faith"

"While there is no overt persecution of Zoroastrians in Iran, I got the impression that they are just about tolerated in post-revolution Iran,” writes Sudha Mahalingam in an article "In the original home of Zoroastrians” in Frontline magazine (Volume 22, Issue 08, March 12-25, 2005) published from Madras.

"There is one member of the community represented in the Majlis. There are a few special schools where Zarthusht children learn their traditions and rituals. Zarthusht settlements are found in clusters in and around Yazd town, although there are a few of them scattered all over Iran. Inter-religious marriages are rare. There is a Zarthusht Anjuman Society, where the members gather to discuss issues of concern. Men and women enjoy equal status in Zarthusht society. Zarthusht women do not wear chadors, but only a headscarf. After a long chat with the priest and other members of the Zarthusht community in Yazd, I felt they were weighed down by the responsibility of having to keep their iden­tity, traditions and faith alive, even as their numbers are dwindling at an alarming rate.

"The next day, I made a detour to the Tower of Silence situ­ated on the outskirts of the town. There were two mounds — both were used 100 years ago, to leave the dead to vultures and the elements. Today, the Zar­thusht bury their dead in concrete crypts in a special cemetery. The Tower of Silence seems a misno­mer today. Young boys on motorbikes race up and down the mounds, kicking up a huge cloud of dust and making a racket. At the foot of the mounds are the ruins of an old caravanserai. Further away is the new Zarthusht cemetery.”

As the fire temples in Iran are open to all, Mahalingam visited two in Yazd: "Gradually, I wend my way to the fire temple — called atash kadeh in Farsi — the congregation point for all Zoroastrians in Yazd. The flame in this temple was brought from Ardakan in 1474 AD, and has been burning continuously since 470 AD in other locations. It is a Friday, and in a hall behind the temple, I find a heap of footwear. After a moment’s hesitation, I enter the premises and make my way across the row of women seated on the far side. A young priest is delivering a fiery speech in Farsi, peppered with animated gesturing. I do not understand a word of what he says, but am mesmerised by his body language. Everyone listens in rapt attention, at times nodding vigorously. There are framed paintings of Zoroaster and a huge bowl of fire in an adjacent chamber. Unlike Muslim women, Zarthusti women wear colorful headscarves and clothes. The men wear white skull­caps. The priest’s speech is followed by an elaborate Zarathusti prayer, with everyone standing and holding both palms out­stretched towards the sky. The men pull out a thread from around their waist — the belt of humility — and chant more prayers. It seems like eternity when the prayer finally ends.

"I befriend the priest, a banker by profession. I was very curious to know the content of his impassioned speech, but unfor­tunately he could not speak English. But he gestures for me to follow him. We get into his car and drive off to find an inter­preter. We find a young university student and all of us drive to another fire temple, where I am schooled in the rudiments of the Zoroastrian religion, Farsi traditions and history.”

The Yazd marketplace proved a disappointment compared to the ones in Shiraz and Isfahan. "At the entrance is a vendor selling just-hatched chickens dipped in lurid pink, green, red and blue colors. Inside the covered market there are rows and rows of plastic goods, pots, pans and electrical items. Not a single shop sold Yazd’s famed brocade or carpets.”

The writer also describes the traffic in Tehran enroute to the railway station "Driving through the streets of Tehran, the Iranian capital, during the evening peak hour is an excruciating experience, especially if you have a train to catch. ‘Have oil, will drive,’ seems to be the motto of Tehranians. There is an endless stretch of Paykans before, behind and beside my taxi — also a battered Paykan — inching their way down the swanky Vali-Asr avenue. We move at a snail’s pace and there is a good 30 km to go. My nerves are on edge, but the taxi driver seems unfazed as he weaves through the traffic lanes, past flyovers and under­passes, and manages to deposit me at the Tehran railway station just in the nick of time. Iranian trains are very clean and the stations virtually deserted — almost a culture shock for those of us from the subcontinent. I find myself in the women’s coach where all my fellow travellers are fully veiled in black chadors. Suddenly, I feel self-conscious in my token headscarf.”

History

Located 690 km south of Tehran, right in the heart of the vast Iranian desert, "Yazd is a town unlike any other. The recorded history of Yazd province goes back to 30 BC, when human settle­ments dotted the arid Persian countryside. Yazd is also the capital of the province bearing the same name. Yazd town is believed to be the second oldest, continuously inhabited town in the world, after Jerusalem. It is home to the descendants of the original Zoroastrians who refused to convert to Islam when the Arabs invaded Persia. When the Arab hordes descended on their town in the eighth century AD, most Yazdis fled to safe havens such as India, where today there is a distinguished and flouris­hing Parsi community. But some stayed back, defying their aggres­sors and keeping alive their faith, rituals and practices.

"I set out on a walking tour of the old town, savoring the leisurely pace of life in this part of the world. Adobe, bricks of sun-dried earth and straw, is the dominant building material and the houses look as though they were built eons ago. Every once in a while the monochrome of adobe is relieved by brilliant turquoise tiles embellishing the domes of mosques and minarets. Many houses are crumbling and look uninhabited, but Yazdis are very much there, behind those formidable doors. Like many ancient houses in Yazd, the front door sports two knockers — a slender one for women and a sturdy one for men. From the sound of the knocker, the inmates would know whether the visitor is a male or a female and accordingly decide who should open the door. This practice certainly predates the Islamic revolution. Now it is just a relic, with electric call bells supplementing door knock­ers. Behind that crumbling facade, most Yazdis live in modern comfort — with wall-to-wall carpeting and electronic gadgetry. Many even have computers with Internet connectivity.”

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Parsiana thanks photographer Kaveh Kazemi for the complimentary use of these photographs in this issue of the magazine. Though not a Zoroastrian, Kazemi "sees the roots of ancient Iran and Iranians” in the ages gone by. A student of photography at West Surrey College of Art & Design in England, Kazemi started his career at the height of the Islamic Revolution. He has worked as a freelance photographer and his photographs have appeared in Time, Newsweek, New York Times, Stern and so on. A resident of Iran, Kazemi’s photographs on Yazd were published in the French edition of Geo magazine in March 1997. His work can be seen on his website kavehkazemi.com