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Comment by Alex3917 | Hacker News Reader

> Who is upvoting these articles about my mostly forgotten culture and why?

I feel like Zoroastrianism is pretty mainstream, at least in the U.S. Even Obama celebrated Nowruz.

I doubt most Americans have even ever heard of Zoroastrianism.

If you read about the Ancient Greeks, you will necessarily read about Ancient Persia. If you read about Ancient Persia, you will hear of Zoroastrianism.

But that's not necessarily to say that you're wrong.

The average person's knowledge of ancient Greece and Persia doesn't extend far beyond 300 and other sword and sandal type epics. They think of Greek deities as ancient history. Worship of the Greek pantheon isn't a mainstream thing. They probably don't give any thought to the ancient Persians' religion. Certainly I don't imagine most people know it's still around.

EDIT: Were the Achaemenid Persians (the "bad" guys in 300) even Zoroastrian? Or did Zoroastrianism come later?

The story of 300 depicts the Persians in a very negative way lol. They don’t seem at all Zoroastrian in the movie (multiple idols, and weird rituals, no likeness of anything Zoroastrian shows up). It’s a great movie tho!

In reality those Persians were Zoroastrian, at least in name. I say “in name” because the Battle of Thermopylae (i.e. 300) would have been 500-2000 years after the creation of the Zoroastrian religion[0], I’m sure more than a little was altered/forgotten.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Achaemenid_Empire

[0] We don’t have much recorded history that dates back that far and it’s a matter of academic debate when exactly the religion started.

> The story of 300 depicts the Persians in a very negative way lol

For sure. The movie's framing device is a Spartan soldier recounting a glorified version of the Battle of Thermopylae, and building up Leonidas as a heroic figure, as a way to fire up the troops for the next battle against the Persians. That's why I put "bad" in quotes - it's Spartan propaganda.

Most Christians would at least be familiar with a few Zoroastrian figures--the Magi (aka Wisemen) who bring gifts for the baby Jesus. Magi, or at least a mythology of them, had been considered peculiarly knowledgeable and wise since at least Aristotle.

It's niche for me. I heard about it in class a few times and every time it's mentioned learned slightly more about it. Definitely stood out amongst world religions for me, though

I am American and for me it was a mandatory religion to learn along with hinduism, islam, christianity, judaism, jainism, sikhism, buddhism, taoism, and confucianism.

Though I think many would argue that confucianism is not a religion but a philosophy and my education might have been different than others.

> Even Obama celebrated Nowruz.

Nowruz isn't an exclusively Zoroastrianism festival. It's also the New Year's Day celebrated as a secular holiday by many ethnic groups.

Nowruz is basically a cultural holiday (with roots in Zoroastranism) celebrated by all of Iranians and some surrounding countries regardless of their religion.

Nowruz is celebrated by many Iranian-speaking peoples, even ones who had little historical connection to Zoroaster's reforms. It is best seen as a general ethnic Iranian holiday, not a specifically religious Zoroastrian one.

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