Good Words, Good Thoughts and Good Deeds

Zoroastrianism is the religion of the former Persian Empire before the Arabs invaded the country in 600 A.D. and brought with them Islam. It is one of the oldest monotheistic (the worship of one god only) religions in the world. It was founded about 3,500 years ago by the prophet Zoroaster or Zarathusti in Persian.
His ethics are “Good Words, Good Thoughts and Good Deeds”. The religion's holy book is called Avesta.
Fire plays a specific role in Zoroastrianism as it represents God’s, or Ahura Mazda’s, light or wisdom. At prayer times people are facing the sun, fire or other light that represents Ahura Mazda’s energy. Fire is seen as pure. In keeping the mind, body and environment pure Zoroastrians believe they can defeat Angra Mainyu, evil. In Fire temples, or Agiaries, a sacred fire is always burning representing the light of God and is never extinguished.
It is not possible for people of other faiths to convert to Zoroastrianism as you have to be born into the religion. This causes the community to shrink as they need to marry within their community to preserve the religion.
It is estimated that today there are less than 200,000 Zoroastrians in the world. Most of them now live in India. The city of Yazd, in the centre of Iran, is also the centre of Zoroastrianism in the country. Only 3,000 to 4,000 worshippers can be found there today.

To find out more about Zoroastrianism see here.

Persian Pride

Persepolis the old capital of the former Persian Empire is situated in the South of Iran. The ruins of the palace and the symbolism sculpted in it represent the character of the Persian people today as it did then.
One symbol that you can see in Persepolis is a lion with the head of a man, wings of an eagle and surrounded by flowers. The flowers state that the Persians are living in peace with others. But attack them and they will fight back with the power and the courage of a lion, the intelligence of an eagle and the logic of a man. That is the pride of the Persian people.

For a picture of this see here.