Date: Jan 27, 2008 3:56 PM
Subject: Kersey Antia - hardly a "responsible" priest, says Mrs Pervin J Mistry
To: TZML <TraditionalZarathushtris@yahoogroups.com>
27 January 2008
Dear Zarathushti humdins,
cc: Vada Dasturjis,
cc: Ervad Sahebs,
cc: The Parsee Voice,
cc: Zoroastrian Studies,
cc: Parsi Pukar,
cc: Dini-Awaz,
cc: Prominent Zoroastrians,
cc: TZML
cc: TMYZ officials
Please find here enclosed a very informative article by Mrs. Pervin J Mistry.
Please forward this article too to our good Zarathushtis you know.
Sincerely
TZML Admins.
(please see below)
In 1983, Ervad Kersey Antia of Chicago performed the fake navjote of
Joseph Peterson! By so doing, he went against the Dasturi Formula he
prayed at the time of taking his bareshnoom when he became a navar.
All navars recite this Sacred Formula to pledge that they, as Ervads,
will uphold the unbroken succession of Dasturi handed down from Ahura
Mazda to the Ameshaspands, to Sarosh Yazad, to Asho Zarathushtra, to
Gushtasp Padshah and from him to Aderbad Mahrespand and then the
Dasturi that is passed on to the Dastur-e Zaman under whose domain the
new navar is initiated. The Dasturjis of all the Panthaks in India
under whose domain the Ervad is initiated unequivocally and
unanimously condemn conversion and intermarriage. The act of Ervad
Antia to perform the fake navjote of a juddin is therefore an act of
heresy!
When Ervad Kersey Antia committed this act of heresy in North America,
in 1983 with encouragement from like-minded heretics and religiously
illiterate folks, the Dasturjis of India, Dasturji Hormazdyar Mirza,
Dasturji Kaikhusroo JamaspAsa, Dasturji Firoze Kotwal, jointly
published books which were circulated among the Parsi community. These
scholarly books, Antia's ' Acceptance ': A Zoroastrian ' Ahrmoghi '
(Heresy); Conversion in Zoroastrianism _ A Myth Exploded; and
Conversion Caucus should be reprinted and freely circulated so that
the fallacy of the gullible who believe in Ervad Antia's personal
opinions and presumptions are put to rest. The three learned Dasturjis
who have studied the Avesta-Pahlavi and have spent their lifetime
studying the Avesta cautioned and educated the gullible as to what the
Avesta reveals regarding conversion, meaning proselytism. Their
learned word against Antia's carries heavy weight wherein erudite
scholarship refutes every single argument Antia extended to justify
his heresy.
Ervad Antia does not have a doctorate degree in Avesta and Pahlavi
languages. His degree is in psychiatry! He has no right to flout our
time-tested rituals, scriptures, customs and traditions. It should be
duly remembered by one and all that while our ancestors came to the
shores of India their only motive was to preserve and perpetuate the
ancestral Mazdayasni Zarathushti Religion which was under threat of
being extinguished by the Arabs when they conquered Iran and forced
many of our ancestors to give up our religion for Islam. Our ancestors
came to India to save, practice and follow the essential boonak
pasbani, the fundamental Pillar of our Religion without which we will
loose our religious and ethnic identity! Without this enjoined
discipline which is revealed in the Sacred Avesta, we would not have
survived for these past 1300 plus years in India. The groups that left
Iran and went to Europe and China and other parts soon got wiped out
through intermarriage and conversion. Today, only some archeological
evidences remain as mute testimony to these groups who left Iran after
the Arab conquest but failed to preserve their Zarathushti identity
and religion. They did not follow the mandate of boonak pasbani except
the group that landed on the shores of Diu. We are the descendants of
these wise ancestors who have passed on the baton of preserving our
religion, unaltered, to the succeeding generations.
The newer and recent migration to North America and other lucrative
parts of the world was only for the sake of greener pastures and not
for the sake of religion! These new immigrants were seeking to alter
our religion to suit their own convenience. In North America many fake
gurus and charlatans sprang up and were received by the spiritually
gullible community to hasten the process of the "melting pot" theory!
Many dime-a-dozen half-baked scholars sprang up and succeeded in
fooling the community to accept "change", "become progressively
modern" and to outdo the Westerners in all aspects of unbridled and
irresponsible "freedom". They first pronounced the Vendidad to be
"unZarathushtrian" because the Vendidad condemns intermarriage and
sets a strict moral code of conduct to be followed by all
Zarathushtis.
Today, as a result of Antia's conversion, more heretics have sprung up
and are subverting our religion. Ali Akbar Jafarey, a Muslim heretic
who has renounced his own Faith and become a 'kafir' has become a
self-styled 'ratu' and is converting other followers of other divinely
revealed religions to our religion! Think! If I sprinkle some water on
any individual, will I make that individual a Christian? Will
Christians accept such a fake convert as a Christian? No! But the
religiously illiterate and totally gullible Zarathushtis of North
America accept the converts these Muslim brings into our religion by
making them put on the sudreh-kusti in mass navjote ceremonies
performed by the aid of a loudspeaker! Many of these converts are the
unwanteds in their own communities; they follow alternate lifestyles,
meaning they are the gays and homosexuals. These are strictly
condemned in our scriptures, specially the Vendidad. To justify these
wrong immoral acts, the heterodox in North America first destroyed the
Vendidad as unauthentic and unZarathushtrian! Many of these morally
perverted juddin converts have become self-styled 'ratus' of our
religion! Oh Zarathushtis, do we have any self respect left? Did our
ancestors learn our religion from the heretics of other faiths? Should
we not listen and respect our Dasturjis when they unanimously condemn
conversion and intermarriages?
The learned Dasturs have pronounced with evidences from the Avesta
that the word "to convert" meaning to proselyte is absolutely
NON-EXISTENT in the entire corpus of the Holy Avesta!
Today, the Parsi-Irani Zarathushtis of India are trying to copy the
West! It should be duly noted and ingrained in every Parsi-Irani
Zarathushti's memory that not too long ago, at a FEZANA Meeting in LA,
in 2001, a Muslim convert, Arnan Ariane, challenged the Parsi-Irani
Zarathushtis that converts like him are now in majority and they will
dictate to us, the true followers, what our religion should be and how
it should be followed! In reality, we ARE a microscopic community and
the converts will swamp us in no time. Are we prepared to accept these
converts who will enter our religiously consecrated places of worship
and spit 'pan' on the floors? Are we prepared to welcome in our midst
gays and homosexuals? Are we prepared to do away with our sacred
ritual of Nirang-Din which is referred to as "bull-piss"? Without
nirang, no other rituals such as navjote, wedding, bareshnoom, etc.
will be performed! Are we going to do away with the Ijeshne ritual
because the converts are calling the sacred Hom as "bhang" or
mind-altering? What have we come to? Only the so-called 'educated',
'modern' Parsis community accepts these insults heaped on our
religion, scriptures, rituals, traditions. Look at the other
communities! They stand up for their right to practice and preserve
their religion the way they are used to! Will they keep quiet if a
Parsi insults their rituals, Prophet, mullahs, soma, the holy cross,
etc.
Any Parsi-Irani Zarathushti worth his/her salt will NOT GO to Ervad
Kersey Antia's lecture. All of you please spread the word to your
family and friends what sacrilege it is to hear heresy! Ervad Antia
will mention about Khurshedji R Cama that he was an orthodox who
accepted "change". But KRCama never propagated conversion! He was an
ardent appreciator/student of Ustad Behramshah Shroff! Behramshah
Shroff did not accept conversion and intermarriage as a Zarathushti
discipline but always stressed on the fundamental discipline of boonak
pasbani. Ervad Antia will quote from the scriptures to fool the
gullible. All his quotes and arguments have been appropriately and
scholarly refuted by the Dasturjis. Only the ignorant and the
heretics, as they are in every community, will believe in what Kersey
Antia says! These quotes and their interpretations are his own made-up
presumptions. He will quote from Dastur Dhalla but will not mention
that when asked by the Court in Bombay if Dastur Dhalla ever converted
anyone, the reply Dasturji gave was in the negative because, he
confessed, it went against the collective conscience of the community!
This was during the Vansda case when Ervad Bode lost the case!
So friends, be careful, please. We are enjoined to participate at
'SAT-Sang' where likeminded folks gather and generate spirituality.
This is anti-sat-sang! This is din-dushmani wherein angre-mainyu is
invited to subvert our age old, time-tested rituals, scriptures,
traditions and customs! Please do not go and pollute your soul! To
know the Truth please do read the 3 above-named books written by our
learned Dasturjis and also read Outlines of Parsi History as well as
Some Problems Facing the Parsi Community, both written by Dasturji
Hormazdyar Dastur Kayoji Mirza; also read Zoroastrianism _ Ancient and
Modern by Ervad Phiroze Masani. The key to our survival is religious
education.
The first generation of the Parsi-Irani Zarathushti community in North
America discarded their ancestral religious practices for "change" and
accepted intermarriage and conversion to mix with and be accepted by
the host majority followers of other missionary religions such as
Christianity and Islam. After 30 to 40 years of altering our
scriptures, rituals and traditions, the current second generation has
lost much that is today followed by the Parsi-Irani Zarathushti
community in India. They are mostly "Parsi-Irani Zarathushtis" in name
alone. Within the next 30 to 40 years our religion will be dead to the
Parsi-Irani Zarathushtis in North America and there will be those who,
like the Mazdayasnans of Europe, will call themselves "Mazdayasnans"
or "Zarathushtis" but they will be so in name alone. Already, some who
are honest, acknowledge that intermarriage and 'acceptance'/conversion
dwindles our community since the children of intermarrieds do not take
up the practices of our religion. They do not feel any affiliation to
our religion. The converts bring their own shade and hues of
"Zoroastrianism" but the real Mazdayasni Zarathushti Religion
practiced and handed down by our forefathers will not survive in North
America. It will not survive in India if India accepts the North
American model of our religion which is altered to suit personal
conveniences.
Both ARZ and AIMZ are renegade associations. By definition the AIMZ
group is the Association of Intermarried Mazdayasni Zoroastrians! The
ARZ is correctly dubbed as the Association for "Ruination" (instead of
Revival) of Zoroastrianism since they duplicate the renegades of AIMZ
and other such associations.
Do pass the word around! Thank You!
Sincerely,
Pervin J Mistry
21 Jan 2008
