Date: Feb 1, 2008 1:52 PM
Subject: Dastur Dr. Peshotan Dastur Hormazdyar Mirza on Kersey Antia
and conversion
To: Hushang Vakil
As a result of Kersey Antia's lecture and the showing of the film on
Saturday evening, our learned and rightful Dasturji Sahebs are
cautioning the community regarding the scriptural truth and the
dangers of conversion, indirectly called 'Acceptance'! Please be aware
and do pass this on to all your friends, relatives and neighbours. The
religiously ignorant and the gullible will accept deceitful lies
propagated by Kersey Antia and his likes. Let the Dasturjis and the
Scholar Priests spread the Truth regarding conversion and
'acceptance'!
Please circulate through e-mails and also by printing out this
circular which will be distributed today in baugs and colonies. Every
one of you can do your share by circulating this mail/leaflet. Thank
you.
The Board of TMYZ.
.........................................................................................
Antia's ahrmoghi (heresy) of 1983 raises its ugly head again on
February 2, 2008.
Parsis Beware!
Ervad Kersey Antia of Chicago is trying to mislead the gullible of the
Parsi-Irani Zarathushti community in India with help from the two
associations named ARZ and AIMZ.
Ervad Antia was condemned by the Dasturjis and the athornans of India
in 1983 when he so-called converted Mr. Joseph Peterson in New York,
U.S.A. He was also publicly disowned by his Alma Mater, the M. F. Cama
Athornan Institute. On February 2, 2008, a quarter century later, he
is stepping on Indian soil to promote his ill-conceived heretical
concept of conversion.
Ervad Antia should realize that the Christian Missionaries are
murdered in India for their proselyting zeal. When Pope John Paul II
visited India he had to retract his statement regarding conversion. He
clarified that he referred to the moral conversion only! The Hindus do
not accept conversion which is forbidden in their religious scriptures
such as the Bhagvad Gita. The Parsi-Irani Zarathushti community is
respected in India and throughout the world because we respect all
religions and practice the true brotherhood by not accepting
proselytes. When we first landed at Sanjan in the 7th century A.C.E.
we were accepted by Jadi Rana because we, like the Hindus, did not
practice conversion as per our religious mandate. Till today, we have
not practiced conversion in India and the Hindus accept us as good
citizens of India!
Ervad Kersey Antia is jeopardizing the lives of our brethren in Iran
and worldwide by coming to India and propagating conversion in a
public forum. The mullahs in Iran are not at all in favor of Muslims
being converted to other religions. Recently, a Muslim was given
public hanging in Tehran because he admitted that he had converted to
Zarathushtrianism. The Muslims in Iran will come to know of Kersey
Antia's so-called 'acceptance' propagation and who will save
Zarathushti lives in Iran and elsewhere if Muslims begin to convert
themselves here in India? If he is sincere and sure of his scriptural,
historical and other references that promote conversion, he should
first go to Iran, deliver his speech there, convert some Muslims in
Iran and then target the gullible Parsis of India who may blindly
accept his conversion-mania! We hope the Parsi-Irani Zarathushti
community will realize how precariously dangerous any conversion
activity will prove for the community in India and Iran, especially
since we are such a small community with no defense mechanism and no
country of our own!
Please read carefully and acquaint yourselves with what the Holy
Avesta reveals regarding conversion/acceptance of juddins (followers
of other revealed religions) as 'Zarathushtis'!
•Conversion means to convert, to change. Customarily, one converts to
something better. If "to convert" means to change one's religion of
birth then there is no such word existing in the entire sacred Avesta
to indicate changing or giving up one's religion of birth to 'accept'
another religion.
•The only conversion the sacred Avesta mentions, specifically in the
Ahunavad Gatha, Y. Ha 30, is to convert Angre-Mainyu to Spenta-Mainyu!
Y. Ha 30.2 mentions only the two moral choices which are further
defined in Y. Ha 30.3 as the choice between good and bad only.
Emphasis is laid on the moral choice without which spiritual progress
would be stagnant. The freedom to choose comes with grave moral
responsibility. Irrefutably, only the two specific moral paths are
revealed and the inevitable consequences of the choice between the two
paths is repeatedly mentioned as Divine Justice or the immutable law
of reward and punishment, i.e. good to the good and suffering to those
who choose the wrong path. There is absolutely NO mention of the word
'religion(s)'.
•Different religions are different prescriptive medicines for the
soul. It is not the name of the religion that makes an individual
spiritually progressive. It is in following the path laid down by the
prophet of a specific religion the individual is born into that makes
the individual spiritually enlightened. The learned, e.g. Swami
Vivekananda, Mahatma Gandhi and others have maintained that
proselytism hinders spiritual progress.
•Proselytism/acceptance leads to hatred and wars. Religious riots,
genocide, holocausts, jihads, crusades and human misery and strife are
the cause of religious rivalry stemming from the act of proselytism.
Proselytism advances the belief that one particular religion is
superior to the others and therefore those who promote conversion
insist that mankind must adopt only one particular religion. This is
against the Divine Plan as revealed in the Zarathushtrian scriptures.
•Religion is bestowed at birth by Lord Almighty. Y. Ha 19 reveals the
sacred Ahunavar manthra in detail. It reveals that as soon as Ahura
Mazda uttered the Divine Word, Ahunavar, the Universe became manifest.
Y. Ha 19.14 clearly states that: "There are five faiths or religions,
pancha tkaesha, which enlighten." In Y. Ha 19.16 the words pancha
ratu, meaning the five leaders appears. This proves that the Divine
Will has manifested the five main religions and prophets for the
spiritual benefit of the varied needs of humanity. We are taught that
an individual is born in a certain family, in a specific religion
according to the Divine Plan. Conversion from religion to religion,
therefore, goes against the Divine Will, against the soul's spiritual
progress and creates disorder in the basic Law of Nature. For this
reason the Bagvad Gita also admonishes, "para dharma maha bhay",
meaning, adopting a different religion is spiritually perilous.
•Asho Zarathushtra did not convert individuals from religion to
religion. He lived and preached Ahura Mazda's Revelation during the
Kiyani Dynasty. There were no conversions during the Peshdad and
Kiyani dynasties. Both are considered to be pre-historic dynasties
when only the Mazdayasni Din existed. There were no other established
religions to convert from! Asho Zarathushtra put back on the right
path those Mazdayasnis who had deviated from the Path of Asha and were
led into following some Devayasni practices. King Vishtasp was a
Mazdayasni who accepted Asho Zarathushtra's teaching. Asho
Zarathushtra renovated and restored the Mazdayasni Din to its pristine
form and thus our religion came to be known as the Mazdayasni
Zarathushti Din. At a tender age of 7 or 9, at navjote, a Parsi-Irani
Zarathushti child confesses: "Mazdayasno ahmi mazdayasno
Zarathushtrish", meaning, "I am a Mazdayasni (by birth) and a
Mazdayasni follower of Zarathushtra".
•During the Achaemenian Dynasty also, the Parsi Kings did not convert
the followers of other revealed religions. Cyrus the Great liberated
the Jews from the Babylonian captivity and granted them complete
religious freedom and even rebuilt the Temple of Solomon from his own
treasury. For this, Cyrus is remembered in the Old Testament as a
'Messiah'. Cyrus could have converted all the conquered people but
according to the religious tenets, he did not! Darius also did not
convert the subjects of the 28 Nations he ruled. Adhering to the
fundamental tenet of boonak pasbani or preservation of the 'gene',
tokham, he has carved his genealogy in the famous inscription at
Naqsh-i Rustom: "Parsa parsahya puthra arya ariyachithra", meaning (I
am) a Parsi, the son of a Parsi, an Irani, of Irani lineage! To even
remotely think that our ancestors practiced proselytism is to defame
their names!
•The Sassanians did not convert other followers but stray instances
happened among the nobility in later times when the Empire became
decadent. This resulted in the weakening of the Empire from within due
to religious rivalry, treason, religious riots, patricide, fratricide
and the end of the Empire came swiftly. In the last four years of the
Empire, before Yazdgard III ascended the throne, ten monarchs ruled
over Iran!
•History records that the only group of Parsi-Irani Zarathushtis to
survive outside of Iran is the one which came to Sanjan with the sole
purpose of protecting and preserving the religion as was practiced
since time immemorial in Iran. The Parsi-Irani Zarathushti community
flourished in India only because it preserved its religion and
religious identity.
•Groups who left Iran for Europe, China and other parts of Eurasia
did not preserve the religion. They converted, intermarried and got
wiped out. Today, the memory of their existence survives through some
archeological evidences that stand as mute testimony to the groups of
Zarathushtis who left Iran during and after the Arab conquest. They
left Iran to escape the inhuman persecutions and oppression they
suffered at the hands of the Arab conquerors but got assimilated into
other host religions and cultures due to the open-door policy of
conversion and intermarriage.
•In 1983, Ervad Kersey Antia of Chicago so-called converted Mr.
Joseph Peterson. Ervad Antia, in his attempt to introduce and promote
proselytism, states in his treatise "The Argument for Acceptance" that
"it is contrary to present Parsi practice or politics." He forgets
that the Avesta does not mention proselytism but only the ethical
conversion of converting vices to virtues; that Asho Zarathushtra did
not convert any followers of any other religions; that the practice is
alien to our religion which is a non-missionary religion; that during
the worst times the Zarathushtis faced in Iran immediately after the
Arab conquest, the Din-Dasturs of Iran have described us in the
Pahlavi Dinkard as "tokhmak paspaan", preservers of the genetic seed!
It is not only after coming to India that we do not convert but
throughout the interminable millennia long history of our religion,
we, as a religious community, have not converted the followers of
other revealed religions.
•For our small community to open its doors to conversion/acceptance
is to inevitably toll our own death knell. The converts will outnumber
the true Parsi-Irani Zarathushtis and they will dictate to us based
upon what they will add from their own religions, customs and
traditions. Our survival does not depend upon numbers. It depends upon
unity within the community and in continuing to practice the
time-tested rituals, customs and traditions as we have inherited these
since countless generations and upon which our survival depended till
today. No community survives that has moved away from its doctrinal
and traditional usages. Today, we have no enemies threatening our
survival from outside but the destruction comes from within. This is
the greatest threat we have faced so far in our long history of
survival, despite all odds.
•In order to justify conversion/acceptance of juddins, Ervad Antia's
ilk discard the Vendidad with its moral and hygienic code and declare
it to be "unZarathushtrian"; "written by the Babylonians"; they call
the sacred Nirang, "bull-piss"; the sacred health-giving Hom is
mentioned by them as "mind-altering", "intoxicating", and "bhang"; the
gays and the homosexuals who are not wanted in their religions are
accepted by them into ours! O Parsis! Is this the altered, mutilated
religion you wish to pass down to the future generations? Our
ancestors sealed their fate in blood and some left their beloved
homeland, Iran, to protect, preserve, to hand down to us our great
religion. We are the preservers of our religion, of our ancient Kiyani
tokham! Let us not open the flood gates to converts who will
inevitably alter our traditions, customs, rituals and scriptures.
Conversion is anti-Zarathushtrian. It is not propagated in the sacred
Avesta.
•Acclaimed, distinguished European scholars who studied the Avestan
and Pahlavi languages and dedicated their life to the study of the
sacred Avesta never converted themselves to our religion. They
recognize that the Avesta does not mention proselytism but only the
ethical conversion, and they also know how dangerous the outcome will
be to the small Parsi-Irani Zarathushti community if we accept the
so-called 'converts'.
•For a better understanding of our scriptures and the problem of
conversion, please read: 1) "Conversion Caucus", by Dasturji Dr.
Hormazdyar Dastur Kayoji Mirza, 2) "Conversion in Zoroastrianism _ A
Myth Exploded" and 3) "Antia's 'Acceptance': A Zoroastrian Ahrmoghi
(Heresy)", jointly written by Dasturji Dr. Hormazdyar Dastur Kayoji
Mirza, Dasturji Dr. Kaikhushroo Minocher JamaspAsa and Dasturji Dr.
Firoze Meherji Kotwal. In addition, we urge you to read "Outlines of
Parsi History" and "Some Problems facing the Parsi Community" by
Dasturji Dr. Hormazdyar Dastur Kayoji Mirza; "Zoroastrianism _ Ancient
& Modern" by Ervad Phiroze S. Masani and the booklet "Acceptance _
Never Ever!" published by Rustom A. Irani.
Education is our best weapon against din-dushmani!
Dastur Dr. Peshotan Dastur Hormazdyar Mirza for and on behalf of all
other Dasturs and Scholar Priests of India.
