ゾロアスター教ズルヴァーン主義研究5 : 1635年テヘラン写本Majles13522/4に所収の‘Ulamā-ye Islāmの文献学的評価

This paper is a study of a newly discovered manuscript of the New Persian text “‘Ulamā-ye Islam.” The newly discovered manuscript in this paper refers to the New Persian text “‘Ulamāye Islam” contained in the Majles 13522 /4 Codex at the National Library of the Islamic Republic of Iran. Based on the colophon, it can be determined that it was transcribed in 1635 by Bahrām Mehrabān Bahrām Goshtāsb, a Zoroastrian priest living in the village of Sūrak near Yazd. This codex was copied by me at the National Library of the Islamic Republic of Iran during my research in 2009-2010. The New Persian text “‘Ulamā-ye Islam” is the only surviving internal document on Zoroastrian Zurvanism, which was the state religion of the Sasanian Empire from the 3rd to 5th centuries. The original Pahlavi text was drafted in the first half of the 5th century by Mihr Narseh, the Grand Vizier of the Sasanian Empire, as an edict urging Armenians, who were converting to Christianity, to return to Zoroastrianism. However, there are three versions of this New Persian translation, and texts intertwine between them, making it difficult to reconstruct the original. If it is proven philologically that this “Bahrām Mehrabān’s version of ‘Ulamā-ye Islam” is the original Pahlavi edict - or that it precedes the other three versions - then its content will have a significant impact on our understanding of Zoroastrian Zurvanism from the 3rd to 5th centuries.