Xwēdōdah - Holy Incest in Zoroastrianism
This is a selection of excerpts from the following source:
https://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/marriage-next-of-kin/
A scientific article about incest in Zoroastrian/Mazdayasnian Persia. It's pretty fascinating, very well researched, and at times even titillating. Too bad it is sooo difficult to read. The original contains massive amounts of references to sources which break up the text so severely that it becomes almost unreadable. I'm talking endless strings of references, oftentimes longer than the sentences they accompany.
So what I did here is, I picked out the juiciest parts of the article and also removed most references, leaving only those that are part of a sentence's structure.
I hope you will find this both informative and entertaining/titillating.
MARRIAGE
ii. Next-Of -Kin Marriage In Zoroastrianism
In Zoroastrian Middle Persian (Pahlavi) texts, the term xwēdōdah is said to refer to marital unions of father and daughter, mother and son, or brother and sister (next-of-kin or close-kin marriage, nuclear family incest), and to be one of the most pious actions possible. The models for these unions were found in the Zoroastrian cosmogony. The meaning and function of the Avestan term is not clear from the contexts.
To what extent xwēdōdah was practiced in Sasanian Iran and before, especially outside the royal and noble families ("dynastic incest") and, perhaps, the clergy, and whether practices ascribed to them can be assumed to be characteristic of the general population is not clear. Evidence from Dura Europos, however, combined with that of the Jewish and Christian sources citing actual cases under the Sasanians, strengthen the evidence of the Zoroastrian texts. In the post-Sasanian Zoroastrian literature, xwēdōdah is said to refer to marriages between cousins, which have always been relatively common. When Anquetil Duperron visited the Parsis in the mid-18th century, he was told the term referred to marriage with cousins, and, according to James Darmesteter, it was rare for a Parsi to marry out of the family; marriage between cousins (a marriage made in heaven) was both practical and normal, while incestuous marriage was illegal.
Travelers' accounts provide little information. Adam Olearius (1603-71), for instance, who traveled in Persia in the years 1635-39, mentions the levirate, but was unable to confirm the claim of the Classical authors that sons would "meddle with" their mothers, or brothers with sisters. In the mid-19th century, Jakob Polak observed consanguineous marriages and noted that he observed no deleterious effects of such unions.
The mythical origin and function of xwēdōdah and the three proto-xwēdōdahs.
According to the Pahlavi texts, the xwēdōdah was initiated by Ohrmazd (alternative name of Ahura Mazdā, creator deity - editor's note) at the time of the creation and will connect and guide humanity through the period of the Mixture, when good and evil vie for supremacy, and on to the fraškerd when the world will again become the way Ohrmazd had originally made it. In Yasna, Spəṇtā Ārmaiti is said to be Ahura Mazdā's daughter, but details of how Ahura Mazdā sired her are found nowhere. In the Bundahišn for instance, all the heavenly beings are simply said to have been "fashioned" by Ohrmazd, including himself. On the other hand, Ohrmazd is also said to have been both father and mother of the creation; its mother, when he nurtured it in the world of thought, and its father, when he transferred it to the world of the living. In the Dādestān ī dēnīg about the first xwēdōdah of Mašī and Mašyānī (the first two humans, it is also said that the creator (= Ohrmazd) felt pleasure at the "action" from which all the creations were made, where "action" is a word that can refer to a sexual act, but is not unambiguous. The author of Dēnkard says people should perform it because it is well established that the creator did so when he made the creations.
According to the Pahlavi Rivāyat, three primordial xwēdōdah provide the mythical prototypes for the human ones. That of a father and daughter producing a son is like that of Ohrmazd and Spandarmad (alternative name of Spəṇtā Ārmaiti - editor's note) producing Gayōmard; that of a son and a mother producing a brother and sister is like that of Gayōmard and Spandarmad producing Mašī and Mašyānī; and that of a brother and sister producing further pairs of brothers and sisters is like that of Mašī and Mašyānī. These three were extolled by Ohrmazd as he explained to Zarathustra (aka Zoroaster, prophet of Zoroastrianism/Mazdayasna - editor's note) the advantages of xwēdōdah, calling it the greatest good deed of all. Accordingly, when Zarathustra came into the world, he exhorted mankind to praise the dēn (insight/conscience/religion - editor's note) and to practice xwēdōdah and was exhorted by Ohrmazd to practice it himself, thus setting an example for all to follow.
Somewhat differently, according to the Dādestān ī dēnīg, Ohrmazd made from the endless lights a form of fire, inside which he made the living thing called man (mardōm). It was injured by the Lie, and life became mortality, whence the name gayō-mard, which means "life prone to death". When Gayōmard died, his semen flowed into the earth, where it was protected by the gods and wherefrom a human son and daughter grew up, who, in due time, united and bore children.
Reading Yasna 53.4 in the context of the Zoroastrian tradition, without preconceptions about (a historical) Zarathustra's thoughts on the matter, one can only interpret "father and master/husband" as referring to the xᵛaētuuadaθa, probably encrypted in the text that follows. Moreover, Yasna 53.7 is commonly thought to refer to sexual activity, and the poem ends with a curse against the evil ones "of bad virility". Since Yasna 53 is the concluding poem of the Old Avesta and so, presumably, also of the Old Avestan cosmic regeneration ritual, it is likely to refer to the final actions: the (real or enacted) sexual coupling of the priest and his daughter. This act, being the re-performance in the world of the living of the primordial coupling of Ahura Mazdā and Spəṇtā Ārmaiti, heaven and earth, brings about their coupling in the world of thought, which, in turn, causes dawn to reappear and makes the existence (ahu) fraša (produces fraškerd), the purpose of the Old Avestan ritual. The name Pouru-cistā, meaning approximately "she who is noticed by many," but also implies brilliance (ciθra), may well be an epithet of dawn. If so, then Pouru-cistā may have been born from her father's "perfect sacrifice" or "best desire", and she unites with him now to make the new ahu, the new day and the new existence.
According to Dēnkard 3.80, the three kinds of "linkage" achieved in xwēdōdah are "father and daughter," "son and birth-mother" (burdār), and "brother and sister". Similarly, the Pahlavi Rivāyat gives the hierarchy of xwēdōdah as one's mother, daughter, sister, but the rules are complicated by the fact that one's sister may also be one's daughter. According to Dēnkard 3.80, the linkage will be the more efficient the closer the relationship between the two is: "of the same species" (ham-srādag), "closely connected" (nazd-paywand), and nabānazdišt, an Avestan term of uncertain meaning, but approximately "closest relatives". The best xwēdōdah is that by which a son sires a son-brother with his birth mother, because, having come from her body, he is nearer to his origin; thus offspring from siblings with the same parents is more valuable than when the parents are different. Examples of (apparent) xwēdōdah marriages include that of Ardā Wirāz with his seven sisters ("and those seven sisters were like wives to Wirāz") and that of Wištāsp with Hudōs.
The ethics of xwēdōdah.
Throughout the Pahlavi literature, there are scattered references to xwēdōdah focused on the benefit of performing and the evil consequences of not performing xwēdōdah.
The value of xwēdōdah. The relative value of xwēdōdah in the hierarchy of good deeds plays an important role in the Pahlavi texts. Kerdīr’s claims to behaving as a good Mazdayasnian also include generosity and truthfulness, as well as performance of the yasna (morning sacrifice - editor's note) at each gāh, which are precisely the four greatest good deeds listed in the Mēnōy xrad: namely, generosity; truthfulness and xwēdōdah; celebration of the gāhānbārs (seasonal festivals - editor' note); and the whole dēn. This is not the only list, however; in the Pahlavi Rivāyat, the following are said to be the four best things: the sacrifice to Ohrmazd; the gift to the fire of firewood, incense, and libations; making the righteous man favorable to oneself; and performing xwēdōdah with one's birth mother, daughter, or sister. Then it stresses that the greatest and best of them is the practice of xwēdōdah. Also, according to the Pahlavi Rivāyat, various means of striking down Ahriman (the Zoroastrian version of the devil - editor's note) include xwēdōdah, offering of myazd, and sacrifice to the gods.
In the list of advice ascribed to Zarathustra in Dēnkard 5.9.13-14, we are told that the foremost ways of thwarting the worst sins include belief in the good dēn (that of ērīh, Iranian-ness); performing sacrifices, xwēdōdah, the Avesta, and the gāhānbārs; and making the righteous favorable to oneself.
One of the arguments offered by the Sasanian priests for xwēdōdah is that good human qualities are more likely to remain and even improve the closer the offspring is to the parent. Dēnkard 3.80 gives numerous examples (that might fail to convince us) why this is true. In a list of advice ascribed to the high priest Ādurbād son of Mahrspand in Dēnkard 3.199, it is recommended to take a wife from one's own "seed" (tōhmag), in order that one's lineage (paywand) may go straighter (rāsttar rawād); the similar list ascribed to him in the Pahlavi Texts has paywand for tōhmag and dūrtar "farther" instead of rāsttar, commenting that most of the harm that came to Ohrmazd's creatures resulted from the fathers' giving their daughters away to others to marry and asked for the daughters of others to marry their sons. Zādspram, in a brief note, lists the three best things that Zarathustra taught mankind, the third of which was the xwēdōdah, which served to make the pure "seed" go forth and to ensure the good birth of children. According to the Pahlavi Rivāyat, all kinds of evils came about when foreigners came and contaminated the Iranian stock by marrying their daughters.
Performing xwēdōdah against the forces of evil. As the supreme good sexual act, the xwēdōdah is contrasted with the worst sexual act of all, the kūn-marz (anal intercourse; see HOMOSEXUALITY i). In the Pahlavi Rivāyat , Ahriman's intercourse with himself, which is said to be more grievous than those he committed with the demons, is thus contrasted with that of a son with his mother (as opposed to with someone not his closest relative). In fact, most evil in the world arose when mankind turned away from following the divine example and began imitating the anal intercourse practiced by Ahriman and the demons. Only when the Sōšāns comes at the end of the world will all mankind practice xwēdōdah, and evil will be banished forever.
In Dēnkard 3.80, it is told how every performance of xwēdōdah is a reminder to them of the first xwēdōdah, which produced humans, their adversaries, and inflicts such doubt and pain on them that they lose the urge to harm and destroy them. In the list of advice ascribed to Zarathustra in Dēnkard 3.195, 196, we are told that, by performing xwēdōdah, the demons are kept away from men's bodies and the Dahmān Āfrīn is given room in them. The story of how Jam (Jamšid) gave his sister Jamag to a demon and himself wedded the demon's sister is also in the Pahlavi Rivāyat. In other texts, Jamag refuses to have intercourse with Jam, but here, while Jam and the demon are drinking, Jamag switches places with the demon's sister and sleeps with her brother, whereby the demons are chased back to hell. According to the Pahlavi Rivāyat, the first time one performs xwēdōdah, 1,000 demons and 2,000 sorcerers and witches die, etc..
A bit surprisingly in view of the rest of the literature, the Pahlavi Rivāyat also tells us that Zarathustra expressed some doubt about the xwēdōdah, pointing out that it appeared to him, like to other people, as a bad and difficult thing, and, even more surprisingly, Ohrmazd answered that he would agree, were it not the best thing of all. In what is an elaboration on the Frauuarānē (Yasna 12) in Dēnkard 7.4.5-8, when Zarathustra recommends xwēdōdah, the Turanians were revealed to feel shame toward this practice. Zarathustra's objection is elaborated upon in Dēnkard 3.80, where the author proposes that beauty and ugliness are relative and differ from time to time and place to place. In some places, he says, it is considered beautiful to be naked, in others ugly. The ancestors thought it was beautiful to shave one's head, but that is no longer so. The discussion recalls that in the Dissoi logoi (ca. 400 BCE) about whether things can be good or bad by nature, where the author cites the Persian practice of having sex with (sunímen) one's mother, daughter, and sister.
Rewards and punishments. The rewards for performing xwēdōdah and so contributing to the progress of the world toward fraškerd and the punishments for refusing to do so are both considerable. The relative sinfulness of failure to perform xwedodah is said, in the Ardā Wirāz-nāmag, to be of the same order as failure to perform yasnas and recite the Gāθās. The souls of these sinners do therefore not reach paradise, but, if they have also not occupied any position of government, remain on the star-level, otherwise on the moon-level; this is also the place for the soul of a child who dies before the age of nine and who will proceed to paradise only if her (xwēdōdah?) father and/or mother is righteous. Those who have occupied positions of government remain on the sun-level. Those who have performed xwēdōdah, however, are said to radiate light as high as a mountain and are in the same place as the generous, the truthful, those who performed sacrifices, recited the Gāθās, and "believed in" the Mazdayasnian dēn.
Also, according to the Rivāyat of Ēmēd son of Ašwahišt, the punishment for the sin of someone who breaks up a xwēdōdah marriage by snatching the girl before the contract can be notarized is never to reach the Best Existence. In the Mēnōy xrad, the ruining of xwēdōdah is listed together with anal intercourse, active and passive, murder of a righteous man, and others as the most grievous of sins. Similarly, someone who prevents a xwēdōdah marriage will go to hell. The sin of breaking xwēdōdah is listed in the Patīt pašēmānīh. In the Persian Rivāyats, the sin of preventing someone from performing xwēdōdah ranks third among the worst sins, after pederasty and wife-swapping.
Xwēdōdah in Sasanian secular law.
The Mādayān ī hazār dādestān (MHD.) contains a few references to xwēdōdah relationships. The term itself is not used, perhaps because it was not precise enough, denoting a variety of relationships.
Following are the cases in the Mādayān ī hazār dādestān. MHD. 44.8-14: a discussion regarding the heritage of the older of two daughters of an intestate father, when the father has already given her share as daughter as absolute property; should she then also be entitled to a part of the remaining estate to maintain and reap benefit from as stūr (trustee). The case is compared with one in which the father has given his daughter her share as daughter, but then marries her. According to one authority, she would then also get her share as wife; according to another, she would not, only what she was entitled to as stūr; and a third says the older will be stūr, but the younger will inherit. MHD. 104.9-14: a man assigns a golden object to his wife and a silver one to his daughter. If he marries his daughter, the question arises whether she is entitled to both objects. MHD. 105.5-10: a man has left the two parts of his grounds, one to his son's first-born (if a boy?) and one to his daughter's first-born (irrespective of gender). The son and daughter get married and have a daughter, then a son, and the daughter inherits first, since they can have only one first-born child. MHD. 18.7-12: a father wills something he owns to be given (as stūr) to his son after ten years. If the son marries the father's daughter, it will be his property after ten years and his stÅ«r if he marries her before the ten years are up. Differently, if the father wills it saying it will be given to him after ten years and (also) if he marries the father's daughter, then it will be his property (from the time of the marriage). If he does not marry her, it will not be his absolutely. There is no case involving mother-son marriage.
Various legal issues also come up in the texts on religious law. For instance, in the second of its two references to xwēdōdah, the Hērbedestān states that, if a girl has reached sexual maturity before the age of nine, a man may have intercourse with her as a (regular) wife or a xwēdōdah (wife) in the usual way.
Xwēdōdah in the Classical sources.
A common feature of the non-Iranian sources is that they rarely, if ever, cite the opinions of Iranians themselves, other than, occasionally, the priests.
Several Classical and later authors refer to the practice of close next-of-kin marriages in the Achaemenid, Parthian, and Sasanian royal families. Some of the earliest Greek references to non-royal incest are those by Xanthus of Lydia in his Magica, quoted by Clement of Alexandria, that the Magi (singular Magus; Zoroastrian priests - editor's note) have sex with their mothers, daughters, and sisters (he also says the Magi shared their wives) and Ctesias of Cnidus about a brother-sister marriage. Herodotus (3.31) mentions that Cambyses lived with his sister, although the Persians had never lived with their sisters before that. Some of the earliest Roman references are found in Catullus (ca. 84-54 BCE; where he calls the offspring of someone who, allegedly, has intercourse with his mother, a magus). Ovid (43 BCE-17 CE), in his Metamorphoses, tells the story of Cinyras, king of Panchaia to the east of Arabia, whose daughter Myrrha was consumed by an illicit love for her father (their son was Adonis) and, pointing out that animals mate with their offspring, cites peoples among whom sons join with their mothers and daughters with their fathers so that their sense of duty/devotion (pietas) is increased by their double love, wishing she was born there. Ovid's story is also in (pseudo-)Plutarch's Parallela Graeca et Romana 22 and is related to one told by Panyasis, a 5th-century BCE epic poet cited by Apollodorus in his Bibliotheca. In this version, the father is Theias, king of the Assyrians. Only Ovid has the reference to other "peoples," however, which is therefore likely to have the same kind of sources as Catullus's poem and refer to the Persians. The assumption of increased duty/devotion by "double love" recalls the reasons given in the Pahlavi texts. Quintus Curtius Rufus, in his History of Alexander (mid-1st cent. CE), recounts the story of the Sogdian governor Sisimithres, who married his mother and had two sons with her, remarking that parents there were allowed to have indecent intercourse with their children.
https://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/marriage-next-of-kin/
A scientific article about incest in Zoroastrian/Mazdayasnian Persia. It's pretty fascinating, very well researched, and at times even titillating. Too bad it is sooo difficult to read. The original contains massive amounts of references to sources which break up the text so severely that it becomes almost unreadable. I'm talking endless strings of references, oftentimes longer than the sentences they accompany.
So what I did here is, I picked out the juiciest parts of the article and also removed most references, leaving only those that are part of a sentence's structure.
I hope you will find this both informative and entertaining/titillating.
MARRIAGE
ii. Next-Of -Kin Marriage In Zoroastrianism
In Zoroastrian Middle Persian (Pahlavi) texts, the term xwēdōdah is said to refer to marital unions of father and daughter, mother and son, or brother and sister (next-of-kin or close-kin marriage, nuclear family incest), and to be one of the most pious actions possible. The models for these unions were found in the Zoroastrian cosmogony. The meaning and function of the Avestan term is not clear from the contexts.
To what extent xwēdōdah was practiced in Sasanian Iran and before, especially outside the royal and noble families ("dynastic incest") and, perhaps, the clergy, and whether practices ascribed to them can be assumed to be characteristic of the general population is not clear. Evidence from Dura Europos, however, combined with that of the Jewish and Christian sources citing actual cases under the Sasanians, strengthen the evidence of the Zoroastrian texts. In the post-Sasanian Zoroastrian literature, xwēdōdah is said to refer to marriages between cousins, which have always been relatively common. When Anquetil Duperron visited the Parsis in the mid-18th century, he was told the term referred to marriage with cousins, and, according to James Darmesteter, it was rare for a Parsi to marry out of the family; marriage between cousins (a marriage made in heaven) was both practical and normal, while incestuous marriage was illegal.
Travelers' accounts provide little information. Adam Olearius (1603-71), for instance, who traveled in Persia in the years 1635-39, mentions the levirate, but was unable to confirm the claim of the Classical authors that sons would "meddle with" their mothers, or brothers with sisters. In the mid-19th century, Jakob Polak observed consanguineous marriages and noted that he observed no deleterious effects of such unions.
The mythical origin and function of xwēdōdah and the three proto-xwēdōdahs.
According to the Pahlavi texts, the xwēdōdah was initiated by Ohrmazd (alternative name of Ahura Mazdā, creator deity - editor's note) at the time of the creation and will connect and guide humanity through the period of the Mixture, when good and evil vie for supremacy, and on to the fraškerd when the world will again become the way Ohrmazd had originally made it. In Yasna, Spəṇtā Ārmaiti is said to be Ahura Mazdā's daughter, but details of how Ahura Mazdā sired her are found nowhere. In the Bundahišn for instance, all the heavenly beings are simply said to have been "fashioned" by Ohrmazd, including himself. On the other hand, Ohrmazd is also said to have been both father and mother of the creation; its mother, when he nurtured it in the world of thought, and its father, when he transferred it to the world of the living. In the Dādestān ī dēnīg about the first xwēdōdah of Mašī and Mašyānī (the first two humans, it is also said that the creator (= Ohrmazd) felt pleasure at the "action" from which all the creations were made, where "action" is a word that can refer to a sexual act, but is not unambiguous. The author of Dēnkard says people should perform it because it is well established that the creator did so when he made the creations.
According to the Pahlavi Rivāyat, three primordial xwēdōdah provide the mythical prototypes for the human ones. That of a father and daughter producing a son is like that of Ohrmazd and Spandarmad (alternative name of Spəṇtā Ārmaiti - editor's note) producing Gayōmard; that of a son and a mother producing a brother and sister is like that of Gayōmard and Spandarmad producing Mašī and Mašyānī; and that of a brother and sister producing further pairs of brothers and sisters is like that of Mašī and Mašyānī. These three were extolled by Ohrmazd as he explained to Zarathustra (aka Zoroaster, prophet of Zoroastrianism/Mazdayasna - editor's note) the advantages of xwēdōdah, calling it the greatest good deed of all. Accordingly, when Zarathustra came into the world, he exhorted mankind to praise the dēn (insight/conscience/religion - editor's note) and to practice xwēdōdah and was exhorted by Ohrmazd to practice it himself, thus setting an example for all to follow.
Somewhat differently, according to the Dādestān ī dēnīg, Ohrmazd made from the endless lights a form of fire, inside which he made the living thing called man (mardōm). It was injured by the Lie, and life became mortality, whence the name gayō-mard, which means "life prone to death". When Gayōmard died, his semen flowed into the earth, where it was protected by the gods and wherefrom a human son and daughter grew up, who, in due time, united and bore children.
Reading Yasna 53.4 in the context of the Zoroastrian tradition, without preconceptions about (a historical) Zarathustra's thoughts on the matter, one can only interpret "father and master/husband" as referring to the xᵛaētuuadaθa, probably encrypted in the text that follows. Moreover, Yasna 53.7 is commonly thought to refer to sexual activity, and the poem ends with a curse against the evil ones "of bad virility". Since Yasna 53 is the concluding poem of the Old Avesta and so, presumably, also of the Old Avestan cosmic regeneration ritual, it is likely to refer to the final actions: the (real or enacted) sexual coupling of the priest and his daughter. This act, being the re-performance in the world of the living of the primordial coupling of Ahura Mazdā and Spəṇtā Ārmaiti, heaven and earth, brings about their coupling in the world of thought, which, in turn, causes dawn to reappear and makes the existence (ahu) fraša (produces fraškerd), the purpose of the Old Avestan ritual. The name Pouru-cistā, meaning approximately "she who is noticed by many," but also implies brilliance (ciθra), may well be an epithet of dawn. If so, then Pouru-cistā may have been born from her father's "perfect sacrifice" or "best desire", and she unites with him now to make the new ahu, the new day and the new existence.
According to Dēnkard 3.80, the three kinds of "linkage" achieved in xwēdōdah are "father and daughter," "son and birth-mother" (burdār), and "brother and sister". Similarly, the Pahlavi Rivāyat gives the hierarchy of xwēdōdah as one's mother, daughter, sister, but the rules are complicated by the fact that one's sister may also be one's daughter. According to Dēnkard 3.80, the linkage will be the more efficient the closer the relationship between the two is: "of the same species" (ham-srādag), "closely connected" (nazd-paywand), and nabānazdišt, an Avestan term of uncertain meaning, but approximately "closest relatives". The best xwēdōdah is that by which a son sires a son-brother with his birth mother, because, having come from her body, he is nearer to his origin; thus offspring from siblings with the same parents is more valuable than when the parents are different. Examples of (apparent) xwēdōdah marriages include that of Ardā Wirāz with his seven sisters ("and those seven sisters were like wives to Wirāz") and that of Wištāsp with Hudōs.
The ethics of xwēdōdah.
Throughout the Pahlavi literature, there are scattered references to xwēdōdah focused on the benefit of performing and the evil consequences of not performing xwēdōdah.
The value of xwēdōdah. The relative value of xwēdōdah in the hierarchy of good deeds plays an important role in the Pahlavi texts. Kerdīr’s claims to behaving as a good Mazdayasnian also include generosity and truthfulness, as well as performance of the yasna (morning sacrifice - editor's note) at each gāh, which are precisely the four greatest good deeds listed in the Mēnōy xrad: namely, generosity; truthfulness and xwēdōdah; celebration of the gāhānbārs (seasonal festivals - editor' note); and the whole dēn. This is not the only list, however; in the Pahlavi Rivāyat, the following are said to be the four best things: the sacrifice to Ohrmazd; the gift to the fire of firewood, incense, and libations; making the righteous man favorable to oneself; and performing xwēdōdah with one's birth mother, daughter, or sister. Then it stresses that the greatest and best of them is the practice of xwēdōdah. Also, according to the Pahlavi Rivāyat, various means of striking down Ahriman (the Zoroastrian version of the devil - editor's note) include xwēdōdah, offering of myazd, and sacrifice to the gods.
In the list of advice ascribed to Zarathustra in Dēnkard 5.9.13-14, we are told that the foremost ways of thwarting the worst sins include belief in the good dēn (that of ērīh, Iranian-ness); performing sacrifices, xwēdōdah, the Avesta, and the gāhānbārs; and making the righteous favorable to oneself.
One of the arguments offered by the Sasanian priests for xwēdōdah is that good human qualities are more likely to remain and even improve the closer the offspring is to the parent. Dēnkard 3.80 gives numerous examples (that might fail to convince us) why this is true. In a list of advice ascribed to the high priest Ādurbād son of Mahrspand in Dēnkard 3.199, it is recommended to take a wife from one's own "seed" (tōhmag), in order that one's lineage (paywand) may go straighter (rāsttar rawād); the similar list ascribed to him in the Pahlavi Texts has paywand for tōhmag and dūrtar "farther" instead of rāsttar, commenting that most of the harm that came to Ohrmazd's creatures resulted from the fathers' giving their daughters away to others to marry and asked for the daughters of others to marry their sons. Zādspram, in a brief note, lists the three best things that Zarathustra taught mankind, the third of which was the xwēdōdah, which served to make the pure "seed" go forth and to ensure the good birth of children. According to the Pahlavi Rivāyat, all kinds of evils came about when foreigners came and contaminated the Iranian stock by marrying their daughters.
Performing xwēdōdah against the forces of evil. As the supreme good sexual act, the xwēdōdah is contrasted with the worst sexual act of all, the kūn-marz (anal intercourse; see HOMOSEXUALITY i). In the Pahlavi Rivāyat , Ahriman's intercourse with himself, which is said to be more grievous than those he committed with the demons, is thus contrasted with that of a son with his mother (as opposed to with someone not his closest relative). In fact, most evil in the world arose when mankind turned away from following the divine example and began imitating the anal intercourse practiced by Ahriman and the demons. Only when the Sōšāns comes at the end of the world will all mankind practice xwēdōdah, and evil will be banished forever.
In Dēnkard 3.80, it is told how every performance of xwēdōdah is a reminder to them of the first xwēdōdah, which produced humans, their adversaries, and inflicts such doubt and pain on them that they lose the urge to harm and destroy them. In the list of advice ascribed to Zarathustra in Dēnkard 3.195, 196, we are told that, by performing xwēdōdah, the demons are kept away from men's bodies and the Dahmān Āfrīn is given room in them. The story of how Jam (Jamšid) gave his sister Jamag to a demon and himself wedded the demon's sister is also in the Pahlavi Rivāyat. In other texts, Jamag refuses to have intercourse with Jam, but here, while Jam and the demon are drinking, Jamag switches places with the demon's sister and sleeps with her brother, whereby the demons are chased back to hell. According to the Pahlavi Rivāyat, the first time one performs xwēdōdah, 1,000 demons and 2,000 sorcerers and witches die, etc..
A bit surprisingly in view of the rest of the literature, the Pahlavi Rivāyat also tells us that Zarathustra expressed some doubt about the xwēdōdah, pointing out that it appeared to him, like to other people, as a bad and difficult thing, and, even more surprisingly, Ohrmazd answered that he would agree, were it not the best thing of all. In what is an elaboration on the Frauuarānē (Yasna 12) in Dēnkard 7.4.5-8, when Zarathustra recommends xwēdōdah, the Turanians were revealed to feel shame toward this practice. Zarathustra's objection is elaborated upon in Dēnkard 3.80, where the author proposes that beauty and ugliness are relative and differ from time to time and place to place. In some places, he says, it is considered beautiful to be naked, in others ugly. The ancestors thought it was beautiful to shave one's head, but that is no longer so. The discussion recalls that in the Dissoi logoi (ca. 400 BCE) about whether things can be good or bad by nature, where the author cites the Persian practice of having sex with (sunímen) one's mother, daughter, and sister.
Rewards and punishments. The rewards for performing xwēdōdah and so contributing to the progress of the world toward fraškerd and the punishments for refusing to do so are both considerable. The relative sinfulness of failure to perform xwedodah is said, in the Ardā Wirāz-nāmag, to be of the same order as failure to perform yasnas and recite the Gāθās. The souls of these sinners do therefore not reach paradise, but, if they have also not occupied any position of government, remain on the star-level, otherwise on the moon-level; this is also the place for the soul of a child who dies before the age of nine and who will proceed to paradise only if her (xwēdōdah?) father and/or mother is righteous. Those who have occupied positions of government remain on the sun-level. Those who have performed xwēdōdah, however, are said to radiate light as high as a mountain and are in the same place as the generous, the truthful, those who performed sacrifices, recited the Gāθās, and "believed in" the Mazdayasnian dēn.
Also, according to the Rivāyat of Ēmēd son of Ašwahišt, the punishment for the sin of someone who breaks up a xwēdōdah marriage by snatching the girl before the contract can be notarized is never to reach the Best Existence. In the Mēnōy xrad, the ruining of xwēdōdah is listed together with anal intercourse, active and passive, murder of a righteous man, and others as the most grievous of sins. Similarly, someone who prevents a xwēdōdah marriage will go to hell. The sin of breaking xwēdōdah is listed in the Patīt pašēmānīh. In the Persian Rivāyats, the sin of preventing someone from performing xwēdōdah ranks third among the worst sins, after pederasty and wife-swapping.
Xwēdōdah in Sasanian secular law.
The Mādayān ī hazār dādestān (MHD.) contains a few references to xwēdōdah relationships. The term itself is not used, perhaps because it was not precise enough, denoting a variety of relationships.
Following are the cases in the Mādayān ī hazār dādestān. MHD. 44.8-14: a discussion regarding the heritage of the older of two daughters of an intestate father, when the father has already given her share as daughter as absolute property; should she then also be entitled to a part of the remaining estate to maintain and reap benefit from as stūr (trustee). The case is compared with one in which the father has given his daughter her share as daughter, but then marries her. According to one authority, she would then also get her share as wife; according to another, she would not, only what she was entitled to as stūr; and a third says the older will be stūr, but the younger will inherit. MHD. 104.9-14: a man assigns a golden object to his wife and a silver one to his daughter. If he marries his daughter, the question arises whether she is entitled to both objects. MHD. 105.5-10: a man has left the two parts of his grounds, one to his son's first-born (if a boy?) and one to his daughter's first-born (irrespective of gender). The son and daughter get married and have a daughter, then a son, and the daughter inherits first, since they can have only one first-born child. MHD. 18.7-12: a father wills something he owns to be given (as stūr) to his son after ten years. If the son marries the father's daughter, it will be his property after ten years and his stÅ«r if he marries her before the ten years are up. Differently, if the father wills it saying it will be given to him after ten years and (also) if he marries the father's daughter, then it will be his property (from the time of the marriage). If he does not marry her, it will not be his absolutely. There is no case involving mother-son marriage.
Various legal issues also come up in the texts on religious law. For instance, in the second of its two references to xwēdōdah, the Hērbedestān states that, if a girl has reached sexual maturity before the age of nine, a man may have intercourse with her as a (regular) wife or a xwēdōdah (wife) in the usual way.
Xwēdōdah in the Classical sources.
A common feature of the non-Iranian sources is that they rarely, if ever, cite the opinions of Iranians themselves, other than, occasionally, the priests.
Several Classical and later authors refer to the practice of close next-of-kin marriages in the Achaemenid, Parthian, and Sasanian royal families. Some of the earliest Greek references to non-royal incest are those by Xanthus of Lydia in his Magica, quoted by Clement of Alexandria, that the Magi (singular Magus; Zoroastrian priests - editor's note) have sex with their mothers, daughters, and sisters (he also says the Magi shared their wives) and Ctesias of Cnidus about a brother-sister marriage. Herodotus (3.31) mentions that Cambyses lived with his sister, although the Persians had never lived with their sisters before that. Some of the earliest Roman references are found in Catullus (ca. 84-54 BCE; where he calls the offspring of someone who, allegedly, has intercourse with his mother, a magus). Ovid (43 BCE-17 CE), in his Metamorphoses, tells the story of Cinyras, king of Panchaia to the east of Arabia, whose daughter Myrrha was consumed by an illicit love for her father (their son was Adonis) and, pointing out that animals mate with their offspring, cites peoples among whom sons join with their mothers and daughters with their fathers so that their sense of duty/devotion (pietas) is increased by their double love, wishing she was born there. Ovid's story is also in (pseudo-)Plutarch's Parallela Graeca et Romana 22 and is related to one told by Panyasis, a 5th-century BCE epic poet cited by Apollodorus in his Bibliotheca. In this version, the father is Theias, king of the Assyrians. Only Ovid has the reference to other "peoples," however, which is therefore likely to have the same kind of sources as Catullus's poem and refer to the Persians. The assumption of increased duty/devotion by "double love" recalls the reasons given in the Pahlavi texts. Quintus Curtius Rufus, in his History of Alexander (mid-1st cent. CE), recounts the story of the Sogdian governor Sisimithres, who married his mother and had two sons with her, remarking that parents there were allowed to have indecent intercourse with their children.
36-40, M