PERSIA

By Stephen Knapp

The name Persia is actually a derivative of the Sanskrit name Parasu, which was the battle-ax of Parashurama. Lord Parashurama had led 21 expeditions around the world to chastise the Kshatriya warriors who had swayed from the Vedic principles and became cruel and unruly.

This was before the time of Lord Ramachandra. Persia was overrun by Lord Parashurama and his troops and succumbed to abide by his administration. According to E. Pococke on page 45 of his book, India in Greece, the land of Persia became known as Paarasika.

Pococke goes on the explain that the term “Chaldeans” comes from the Sanskrit term Kul-deva (often pronounced Kaldeo), which means “family gods” referring to a people who worshiped the gods of the Brahmanas. He also adds that the map of ancient Persia, Colchis, and Armenia provides distinct evidence that shows the colonization of people from India of a massive scale. It also shows the truth of several main descriptions of the area as found in the Ramayana and the Mahabharata.

A British author, R. G. Wallace, mentions on page seven of his book, Memoirs of India, that Hindus are numerous throughout Afghanistan, as well as Arabia and Persia. These are not recent migrants but remnants from the local populations who were converted to Islam by force.

Lt. Gen. Charles Vallancy, on page 465 of his book Collectania De Rebus Hibernicus, quotes Sir William Jones as saying: “It has been proved by clear evidence and plain reasoning that a powerful monarchy was established in Iran, long before the Assyrian or Pishdadi government; that it was in truth a Hindu monarchy… that it subsisted many centuries and that its history has been ingrafted on that of the Hindus, who founded the monarchies of Ayodhya and Indraprastha…”

E. Pococke, on page 178 of his book India in Greece, explains that “A system of Hinduism pervaded the whole Babylonian and Assyrian empires. Scripture furnishes abundant proofs, in the mention of the various types of the Sun-god, Bal-Nath, whose pillar adorned every mound and every grove.” Later, on page 182 of the same book, he explains that the term Syria is derived from the Indian tribes that under Sur or Surya, the sun, gave its name to the vast province of Surya, now Syria. This martial race is found in its greatest force in Palestine.

It is also explained that Babylonia is named after the Sanskrit Bahubalaneeya, meaning the realm of King Bahubali, a well-known king in the Vedic legends.

V. Gordon Childe points out more linguistic resemblances found in the Sanskrit of the Rig-veda and the Iranian of the Gathas of Zoroaster and Darius the Great. Both Indians and Iranians had called themselves Aryas and worshiped the same deities, such as Mitra, Aryaman, Indra, Varuna, Agni, and so on. They also once knew the same set of rivers, the Sarasvati and Hara ‘uvatis, as well as shared the Soma ritual. Thus, one can conclude that they were once of the same background. Even the word Iran or Ariana means “Land of the Aryans” as pointed out by Hermann Kulke in his book, A History of India. All this signifies that the early Iranians were a part of or at least affiliated with the Vedic Aryan civilization.

Many of the Vedic Aryan concepts of God were adopted by Zoroastrianism. In fact, its basic doctrines and conception of its god, Ahura Mazda, can be traced back to the Purusha-sukta, which is in the Rig-veda. Furthermore, Zoroastrianism had a great influence on the Judeo-Christian religion. Waddell points out that the Adam of the Adam and Eve story of the Hebrew Genesis came about from the traditional history in late Babylonia that described the oldest kings known to the ancient world of the Aryan dynasties. The Hebrew rabbis who composed the book of Genesis (said to be a book of Moses) heard these histories of the great supermen Aryan kings. Not understanding them, they distorted the historical facts about the great king Adda (the Babylonian name of an early Aryan king who was also called Addamu) and simply changed the name Addamu into “Adam,” the first created man said to have been formed by God in 3761 BCE. Thus, Waddell concludes that the story of the Hebrew genealogy of Adam, Cain, Enoch, Noah, and Japhet are variations of the names and distortions of the Babylonian history of the earliest recorded Aryan kings.

Waddell goes on to explain that the Hebrew Adam was the Sumerian Adar or Addamu and the Aryan Iksvaku. The name Cain is the English equivalent of the Hebrew Qain, who was called in Genesis by the title of Aysh, similar to Ayus of the Vedic epics. Cain is said to have built a city and named it after his son Enoch, which is the English version of the Hebrew name Hanuk. Biblical authorities say this city is identical to the old Sumerian seaport of Unuk in Lower Mesopotamia that Chaldeans later called Erek. And the name Enoch or Hanuck equates with Janak of the Vedic epics. Thus, the religion of the Jews and Christians is naturally similar in many respects to the Vedic tradition, though the Jewish people may have used distortions of neighboring histories to fabricate their own folklore. They also adopted various customs as well. For example, the baptism ritual that is practiced throughout Christianity originated in India in the form of immersion in the Ganges River for spiritual rebirth and purification.