Kudos to Berjis Desai for foraying into antiquity as well as contemporary Parsi history in "The cult of a Zoroastrian goddess” (Parsiana, June 21-July 6, 2023). I am well aware of how complicated this topic is as I have studied it and even written a research article on it in the centennial issue of The K. R. Cama Oriental Institute Journal.
Goddess Anahita on a vase
Both Zoroastrians as well as non-Zoroastrians in Asia Minor were so greatly attracted to the Greek goddess of water and fertility that it posed a problem to the integrity of Persian rule in the region. There were so many Zoroastrians living in Asia Minor and Anatolia (modern Turkey) at that time that even half a millennium later when Shapur II re-conquered the region, he was surprised to find Zoroastrians had been captured, among others, and gladly returned to them any land of theirs he had confiscated. Strabo, the Greek philosopher and historian who lived long after the Persian influence had faded in the region, reports finding many fire temples and magis (mobeds) and portrays Cappadocia (the region of central Turkey) as "almost a living part of Persia.”
According to The Cambridge History of Iran (Vol 3, 341), in the fourth century BC "a satrap of (the ancient city of) Sardis worried not because non-Zoroastrians began following the religion of Iran, but that they did not do so in the right way.” It adds that the satrap took the very unusual step of building a temple and even erecting a statue of Ahura Mazda. Was he viewing idol worship as a lesser evil than worshipping alien gods?
As Zoroastrian scholar, the late Prof Mary Boyce observes, Zoroastrianism "came in like a spring tide and helped to change the world outlook of many peoples” (A History of Zoroastrianism, Vol II, 163). Even as it was a political move to promote Anahita worship by resorting to idols, which is tantamount to sacrilege, it evinces flexibility in order to survive in the long run because Anahita soon ceased to require idols for worship.
Ervad (Dr) KERSEY H. ANTIA
Chicago, Illinois, USA