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Reform Transplanted: Parsi Agents of Change amongst Zoroastrians in Nineteenth-Century Iran

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Monica Ringer
Monica Ringer*
Affiliation:
Amherst College, Massachusetts
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Abstract

In the mid-nineteenth century, Parsis reestablished ties with Zoroastrians in Iran that had languished due to decades-long internal unrest in Iran. In 1854 reformists in India established the Society for the Amelioration of Conditions in Iran and sent a representative to Iran—Maneckji Hataria. Hataria was charged with eliminating the onerous non-Muslim tax owed by the Zoroastrians (the jaziyeh). Hataria also organized the Iranian Zoroastrian community, and funded a variety of community projects. He also brought Parsi reformist ideas to Iran, and attempted to reshape Iranian religious practice and belief along Parsi lines. This article explores the effects of Parsi reformist ideas on Iran, and Hataria's own writings concerning Zoroastrianism and its relationship to Iranian national identity.

Type
Research Article
Information
Iranian Studies , Volume 42 , Issue 4 , September 2009 , pp. 549 - 560
Copyright
Copyright © The International Society for Iranian Studies 2009

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Footnotes

This article is dedicated to the memory of Kasra Vafadari.

References

1 Dastur Vilayati trained Dastur Darab Kumana (later teacher of Anquetil du Perron), Dastur Jamasp Asa, and Dastur Fardunji. See Stiles Maneck, Susan, The Death of Ahriman: Culture, Identity and Theological Change Among the Parsis of India (Bombay, 1997): 130.Google Scholar The Nirangestan, at the time believed to be an authentic religious text, was later understood as a Sassanian text on ritual matters of uncertain, possibly even Muslim, authorship.

2 This last rivayat is called the Ittoter. For Mulla Kaus's travels, see the account written subsequently by his son, Mulla Firuz, and discussed in Maneck, Death of Ahriman: 142–144.

3 Mulla Kaus He collected ulama opinions concerning the Zoroastrian calendar in a manuscript published in 1828 as Risaleh-I Istishahad. Stiles Maneck, Susan, The Death of Ahriman: Culture, Identity and Technological Change among the Parsis of India (Bombay, 1997): 143–144.Google Scholar

4 Quotes from this issue of the Oriental Christian Spectator are from Maneck, Death of Ahriman: 147–148.

5 There is an oft-repeated story associated with this first fund, which tends to take precedence in the historiography of Parsi activities in Iran and obscures the novelty and larger context of the establishment of the SACI. Briefly, an Iranian Zoroastrian fled Iran with his daughter to prevent her from being abducted and married to a Muslim in 1796. The daughter in question subsequently married Framji Panday, a Zoroastrian merchant in Bombay, and together they helped other refugees from Iran. One of their sons established a fund to do so in 1834 and a second son was responsible for helping to found SACI. Amongst other sources, see Boyce, Mary, Zoroastrians: Their Religious Beliefs and Practices (London, 1979): 209–210.Google Scholar On the establishment of SACI, see Kestenburg Amighi, Janet, The Zoroastrians of Iran: Conversion, Assimilation, or Persistence (New York, 1990): 129–131.Google Scholar

6 In an article entitled “Explanation of the Imposition and End of Jazieh on Zoroastrians,” in the Zoroastrian journal Pandarha, 2, no. 8 (2499 Shahanshahi): 15–18, written by Mobed Firuz Azargoshasp, Iranians are recalled as requesting assistance from the Parsis. Whether this was the initial impetus or not is unclear.

7 Mobed Firuz Azargoshasp, “Explanation of Imposition and End of Jazieh on Zoroastrians,” Pandarha, 2, no. 8 (2499 Shahanshahi): 15–18. Azargoshasp cites the figure of 8,450 tomans as the official jazieh with local officials requiring payment of three times as much.

8 Maneckji Hataria's figures are cited in Ashidari, Jahangir, “A Corner of History,” Mahnameh-ye Zartoshtian (Tehran, 2535 Shahanshahi): 59.Google Scholar

9 For compelations of Maneckji's correspondence, see the selection of letters in the Ketabkhaneh-ye Meyhanparastan-e vagozari-ye Nasr al-Din Shah in Tehran. See also Amini, T. (ed.), Some Records on the Iranian Contemporary Zoroastrians (1879-1959) (Tehran, 2001): 1–90.Google Scholar

11 The translation is replicated in a letter from President of the Committee, Persian Zoroastrian Amelioration Fund, Dinshaw Manockji Petit to His Excellency Ronald F. Thomson, Esq., CIE dated Bombay, 4 December 1882.

10 Haji Zaher al-Dowlah was the son-in-law of Qajar prince Mirza Ali Khan Qajar.

12 See for example Petit's letter to Sir A.C. Lyall, KCB.

13 Amighi, Zoroastrians: 130.

14 Williams Jackson, A.V., Persia Past and Present (Elibron reprint of 1909 edition, 2003): 375.Google Scholar

15 Amighi, Zoroastrians: 104, 135.

16 Ashidari, “A Corner of History”: 40–41, 59.

17 Ibid: 64.

18 Fisher, Michael, “Zoroastrian Iran Between Myth and Praxis” (PhD diss. University of Chicago, 1973): 97.Google Scholar

19 Amighi, Zoroastrians: 134. Amighi claims that the Zoroastrian literacy rate was “high” compared to the Muslim population. See Zoroastrians: 136.

20 Maneckji Limji Hataria, Travels in Iran: A Parsi Mission to Iran (1865).

21 Ibid.

22 Ibid.

23 Ibid.

24 Shahmardan, Rashid, Farzanegan-e Zartoshti (Tehran, 1960)Google Scholar quoted in full in Fisher, “Zoroastrian Iran”: 100.

25 See Shahmardan, Farzanegan, as quoted in full in Fisher, “Zoroastrian Iran”: 100.

26 For Jackson's remarks comparing Iranian and Indian Zoroastrian practice, see Persia, Past and Present, pp. 337, 363, 372, 380–381, and 383–387.

27 For Jackson's remarks comparing Iranian and Indian Zoroastrian practice, see Jackson, , Persia Past and Present: 337, 363Google Scholar, 372, 380–381, 383–387.

28 Jackson, , Persia Past and Present: 356.Google Scholar

29 Ibid: 376.

30 Hataria, “Travels in Iran.”

31 Ibid.

32 Ibid.

33 Ibid.