North American Zoroastrian Religious Tele – Class  –

Sunday January 22 11 AM (SST)      Ervad Soli P. Dastur
A Zoroastrian Religion Class was held by Telephone on January 22nd by Ervad Soli P. Dastur from his home, Hira Villa, in Sarasota, Florida. About 40+ people joined in by calling a Tele-meeting phone number. The people were from both Canada and USA, from NY to Dallas and even LA, Montreal to Miami. The class material was a PowerPoint Presentation on The Zoroastrian Ceremonies. We followed Dr. J. J. Modi’s famous book:

  The Religious Ceremonies and Customs of the Parsees which is now available on Internet at: http://www.avesta.org/ritual/rcc.htm

Thanks to my very good friend Joseph Peterson. We also introduced the two Gujarati Pav Mahel books used by all Mobeds all over the world.

The Greek historian Herodotus famous book: Histories was also introduces as a rich source of the belief and social customs of the Persian during the Hakhaminian Dynasty of Darius, Xerxes, etc. The two NAMC books on Jashan and Obsequies by our own Mobeds Jehan Bagli and Adi Unwalla were also introduced.

A very broad brush summary of all 30+ ceremonies were given with actual photos of the ceremonies. The ceremonies cover Socio-Religious, Purification, Initiation, Consecration and Inner andOuter Liturgical Ceremonies. It also put special emphasis to those ceremonies that are possible to perform in North American context. Finally, as it is becoming our custom, the permanent question: “We do not understand what we are praying in our daily prayers” was answered by suggesting some alternatives. The final prayer in English, from Dr. Dhalla’s book: Homage Unto Ahura Mazda: “Orthodoxy, courts puerilities (immaturities, childishness, foolishness) of dogmatic theology, casuistry (deceptive, fallacious, dishonest) and irrational formalism”,was recited by all together ending with our signature Zoroastrian greeting of: “Hamaa Zor, Hamaa Asho Bade” (May we be united in righteousness) performed by all attending the Class, a cyber Hamaa Zor all over North America!

Before the Cyber Hum Bandagi, we showed a part of the Bui Ceremony video performed by our own Mobed Kobad Jamshed in the beautiful San Jose Dar-e-Meher in his beautiful sonorous voice! The peals of the bell brought a magic environment to all listeners!

The PowerPoint Presentation slides and 1 explanatory file for the daily prayers were sent out to all participants ahead of time. In most homes, families gathered in front of their computers following slides of this presentation as I spoke about them from my home. These files are attached to this message.

We also request all of you to suggest what topics we should cover in the next Tele Classes.

Many of the interested Humdins all over the Hafta Keshwar Zamin wanted us to place this one hour class as an Internet video. So, we have uploaded the whole Tele Class on YouTube in 10 segments so as to be within 10 minute restriction in YouTube.