Major religions believe in asceticism as a road to salvation. Zoroastrianism believes in strict principles of piety, truth, service, self-abnegation, simplicity and in a few more virtues, which an ascetic may believe in and practice.
Zoroastrianism abjures both begging and asceticism and disbelieves in abandoning life and its pious pleasures. Nor does it believe in sanyas and grahstha ashram or in fasting. It believes that we can attain saintliness and salvation by being His true followers without giving up the substance for the shadow. We do not believe in privation as a road to salvation. Be straight as a ramrod, without necessarily being an ascetic, and enter heaven. BEHRAM T. DASTUR
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