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As I was born in a priestly family through the day I soaked in our age old traditions. On getting up, we were asked by our parents and elders to do Sakeste-Sakeste-Sehtan Nirang. Kusti prayers and farajiats were obligatory throughout the day, especially after coming out of the bathroom or cloakroom. No dinner was served to us unless we offered Deva-no-Namaskar prayer. Before retiring to bed, we had to pray Sarosh Yast ni Nirang. In the 1950s, almost every Parsi gentleman used to put on a black cap at home and outside and a Parsi lady wearing long sleeved blouses used to cover her head with the mathubanoo.

Every morning, after cleaning of the floors and sprinkling of water on the verandah, fresh chalk was put at the entrance of the house.  We were told by our elders that by doing loban, evil spirits are driven out from our home. So the incense ritual was a must in the house to spread the fragrance. Ladies at home, during their spare time, used to weave the kusti or stitch sudrehs for the members of their family.

A perennial fire burned in our home and only after taking a bath would lady members of the house go to the kitchen and touch the fire. About 50 years ago, each Parsi home was a castle of our age old tarikats.

From 1944-1952, I studied at the M. F. Cama Athornan Institute at Andheri, where our religious prayers and traditions were vigorously followed. As part of our priestly training a barber used to come to our Institute once a month and apply ‘0’ machine over our heads to make us completely bald. We had to wear a white dress called ‘sahya’ with white cap and white lenga, throughout the day, as we were taught that white is the emblem of our religion. While in bed we would cover our heads with white caps. On the hamkara days, we were taken to visit the local agiary for prayers. I humbly believe that my present position in life is due to my following our traditions in my younger days.

 I distinctly remember that our festivals such as Pateti, Navroz and Jamshedi Navroz were celebrated with gusto as there was great religious fervor in the hearts of the persons living at that time. Today’s celebrations are but a shadow of what we experienced. On auspicious or sad occasions, our elders always wore the dagli and pugree.

 I remember one incident, when a Parsi youth who was a frequent visitor to the race course wanted to get married to a Parsi girl from our family but his proposal was rejected on the ground that he was addicted to the races. Similarly, a Parsi youth who was addicted to smoking was not accepted by the community at large. Even under his will, a Parsi Zoroastrian would provide that if any of his children should marry outside the community, he or she would forfeit his/her right to claim a share in the family estate. I firmly believe that our forefathers survived and prospered because they scrupulously followed not only our religious principles but also our customs, usages and traditions.

With the advance of science, technology and materialism, some of our fellow Parsis are ignoring our past traditions, customs and usages. Because of their material wealth and power or position in life, unfortunately some Parsis have discarded our age old traditions and have stooped to the following: They have forsaken our religion and are going to babas, peers, darghas and churches. They are not wearing the sudreh and kusti. Instead of venerating fire, they have started smoking. They opt for marrying outside the community. They are denouncing publicly our age old religious rites like muktad, nirangdin and dakhmenashini.

It is a tragedy that such violators of our traditions are now claiming themselves as leaders of our community and want to have a say in the running of our punchayets/anjumans.

I firmly believe that if our community is to regain its past position, we will have to scrupulously follow our religious principles such as righteousness, hard work, industry and philanthropy and also our age old and time tested traditions, customs and usages.

In this context, I would like to quote what was admonished by Nobel Laureate Will Durant and his wife Ariel, in their famous treatise The Lessons of History: "Intellect is therefore a vital force in history, but it can also be a dissolvent and destructive power. Out of every hundred new ideas, 99 or more will probably be inferior to the traditional response which they propose to replace. No one man, however brilliant or well-informed, can come in one lifetime to such fullness of understanding as to safely judge and dismiss the customs or institutions of his society, for these are the wisdom of generations after centuries of experiment in the laboratory of history.”

I pray to Almighty God that this Navroz may bring new light, new vision and new thinking amongst our fellow Zoroastrians, for following our traditions, customs and usages so that our community may regain its past glory.

Burjor Antia is a trustee of three atash behrams and nearly half a dozen agiaries. He is a trustee of the Bombay Parsi Punchayet and a partner in the legal firm Mulla and Mulla and Craigie, Blunt and Caroe.