Ervad K.N. Dastoor

From: HM Mistry
Sent: Tuesday, February 01, 2000 3:51 PM To: 'davier'; 'dastoor'; 'dolly'
Cc: 'Birdy'

Subject: Protest against honour to Ali Jafarey 

ATTENTION ! CLOSE YOUR EYES 

Religion is a matter of intense physical, mental and spiritual discipline. It prescribes does and dents of life as determined by God and proclaimed by the 'Saoshyants', Prophets,'Avatars', 'Ashavans', Saints, Rishis, Fakirs and Sufis of all Religions. 

The exercises for the soul (Ruvan), the mind and the body prescribed by our Religion are arduous and strenuous. They require rigorous efforts; for instance it is very difficult to observe the Law of "Pa sey Gavashni" i.e. to speak the truth from the tongue (Zabaan) as exactly and precisely as coming out of the heart (Dill and mind (Daymaagh). This is the foundation of all the moral and spiritual teachings. Similarly, it requires a strong will to keep Sudreh-Kusti on the body for 24 hours and to chant the compulsory Farajiyat Manthra prayer - Khorshed and Meher Niyaish every day; to pray Atash Niyash before Atash Behram, Aderan or Dadgah or'Divo'; to have the 'Kriyas' performed for our dear departed ones; and to preserve the racial gene (Boonak Pasbaani). 

There is a group of some Iranis and Parsis in America who desire some excuse to come out of these strenuos spiritual exercises. Someone should talk to them that all this is humbug, nonsense, not genuine and not only avoidable but should be shunned and abandoned. There, then, arrived the heroes to say this with a highbrow air tinged with scholastic theatricals. One of them is Ali Jafarey. 

Jafarey's theory is short and simple - too short and too simple not to be thoroughly wrong. Gatha is the only genuine Zoroastrianism; the rest of the Parsi life is humbug although there are so violently varing translations and nobody knows what was the real and genuine message of the Gathas. Further, all that the Parsis did for thousands of years in Iran and India was wrong and un-Zoroastrian. Zoroaster was a"bonny boy" born 3768 years ago. He discovered 'Mazda Ahura "the super intellect being"' - "Spenta Mainyu" who granted man freedom of thought, will, word, action, and 'good' mind i.e (do what you like - like, say, Hitler). So, arrive at the truth through your (alleged) good mind. Jafarey's own "good mind"  leads him to blaspheme all the spiritual and mystical practices of the Parsis. His good thoughts should lead the Parsis to think that Yezdezard Shahreyar was a fool to be doing Barsam-Baaj before eating his food and thereupon get killed; those ancestors who arrived at Sanjan to preserve and protect the spiritual institutions were fools. They could have preserved their good thoughts, words, deeds there. Their consecrating paak Iranshah Fire was an act of foolishness. Those who then built seven Atash Behrams and 100 Agiaries in India were fools. (We believe in one God - no other worship please.) Those who pray Manthras are fools (Manthras are the conspiracy of later priests). Those who get Kriya performed for the dead are fools. Those who strive to preserve the racial genes are fools. 6000 Parsis of Bombay walking behind a Holy Fire at 3 a.m. on January 20, 2000 were (love fools). It seems there is only one "Wise man of the West" and that too a non-Parsi who having been born in the great Religion of Islam says he is converting people including Mohmedans to Zoroastrianism. How can one who is faithless to his own great Prophet boast of training the followers of another Prophet and even alleging to convert ? It is clear that he must be ignorant of both. Why does he not use his talents, if any, to do something which the Sufis like Hazrat Inayat Khan or his son Vilayat Khan do in the West ? 

But that is not so smooth and cozy. It is easier to thrive on the ignorance of the easy-going Parsis than to be out in the world and proclaim one's own philosophy of ignorance. 

And it is in fact ignorance. The undercurrent of Jafarey doctrine is the materialistic thought of the 19th century which arose from the Newtonian-Darwinian Godlessness. Today, as the 20th century is ending, that science is shattered. It knocks on the door of mysticism. It has come to an end after miserably failing in its quest for truth, all technological advances notwithstanding. Technology is not truth. It assumes something to be workable, wellknowing, that the truth by itself is receding further away. That is why technology is the father of destruction. 

The concept of God propagated by Jafarey is also an immature and childish piece of thinking, meant only to boost the ego and endure the Parsis to do what is ordained not to be done and not to do what is ordaine~ to be done. It is not far from atheism, if you take it to its logical end. 

There is ample evidence in the writings of Jafarey which clearly indicates that he is twisting and torturing the meanings of Avesta words just to support his own pet doctrines. A hundred examples can be given for this. Due to lack of space, I give only one. The words "Daenyai" in "Kemna Mazda" prayer (last line of Gatha Ha 46-7) is translated not, as the word clearly indicates, "for the Daena", i.e. Din, but as "this doctrine". (Spenta 1993-94). He means the Jafarey doctrine and not Asho Zarathustra's Daena. His explanation of the passage says that Fire is warm and mind is cool. ("Athrashchaa Mananghaschaa"). It is really hot and cold at the same time. 

Look at the audacity of authentically prescribing "the bonny boy" Zoroaster's exact birth Year 3761 years ago !as in ·1993) (Reads like a Times of India birth column). This, when the scholars have found the subject extremely perplexing ! Duperon gives Zoroaster's time at 589-512 BC; West and Jackson: 600-583 BC; Bartholomae and Meyer: 1000-900 BC; Boyce:1700 to 1500 BC; K R Cama has mentioned 13, Greek Roman and Latin writers giving 13 different datas - that too spread over probable periods - in his Gujarati Zarathustra Nameh ! And here is a wise man who is so sure !

And Zoroaster which Jafarey has depicted is not worth remembering even for 300 years. He is described as "Good-conscience", "thought-provoker", "human being" and the alleged philosophy attributed to him by Jafarey is too childish to be called a philosophy at all. It is in violent contrast with all-that is said about Asho Zarathushtra and His divine Message scattered throughout in Avesta (including the Gatha). It is too immature to get a place in the subject of philosophy, ancient and modern. The whole idea is to provide materials to those Parsis who want to find a scholarly looking excuse to avoid the Zarthosti ways and "tarikats" of life, for the preservation and protection of which our ancestors left their country, where they ruled, and came to India. 

To "honour" him is a huge exercise in ignorance. It is not a case of blind leading the blind but the blind leading those who deliberately close their eyes and do not want to see. 

* * * * * *

LINKS:

To Return to the Relevant Reply, CLICK
Ridicule by K.N. Dastoor

TABLE OF CONTENTS  and Their Links 

Foreword  

Introduction & the Gist of "The Plain Reality Behind The Intricate Falsity"

  Analysis of the 26-page "Global Protest"