Book Notice: New trends in Avestan studies

[George Thompson]

For List members who may be interested in new trends in Avestan studies:

A new book has recently appeared which gathers together a number of recent
essays by Jean Kellens, a pre-eminent student of Avestan.  In collaboration
with Eric Pirart, Kellens published a path-breaking edition of Old Avestan
Texts:

*Les textes vieil-avestiques*, in three volumes, Wiesbaden, 1988-1991.

The new book is:

*Essays on Zarathustra and Zoroastrianism*, translated and edited by Prods
Oktor Skjaervo, published by Mazda Publishers, Costa Mesa, California, 2000.

In this volume several recent articles, otherwise somewhat inaccessible to
List members because published originally in French or in journals not easily
available in India, are translated for the first time into English.  This
volume is important because it tracks the recent development of Kellens's
views on many important issues in Avestan studies.

I call the List's attention to just a few brief points which relate to Vedic
studies:

Perhaps the following remark will make list members appreciate how intimate
Old Avestan texts and Old Vedic texts are: "It is hardly an exaggeration to
say the Old Avesta is the eleventh maNDala of the Rigveda, only written in a
slightly different dialect" [p. 46].

The Old Avestan text, the Yasna Haptanhaiti, composed in a rhythmic, strophic
prose which is as old as the Avestan Gathas attributed to Zarathustra and
probably as old even as the Rgveda itself, is characterized by Kellens as
"analogous to the BrAhmaNas," and its syntactic techniques and style
"force[s] one to postulate the existence of Indo-Iranian prose" that is
analagous to Indo-Iranian poetry [p.40].  In other words, neither Vedic
poetry nor Vedic prose is an innovation: each is a genre inherited from the
common Indo-Iranian period.

As for Avestan haoma [= Vedic soma], Kellens speculates that there must have
been either substitution or addition to the divine drink at an early date
[pp. 72f.].  Kellens detects traces of shamanistic practices in Old Avestan
texts [p.74].  There are traces of such in the RV as well.  This is a very
complicated problem that I myself am pursuing at the moment.

Well, there there are many other observations, such as about the preference
in Avestan for day-time rituals, as opposed to Vedic rituals which were
performed at night [cf.atirAtra].  On the Vedic devas vs. the Avestan
daEuuas.  On the term manthra in Avestan vs. the term mantra in Vedic.  etc
etc etc.

Other important points which are raised in this collection which Kellens
initiated in his earler work are, briefly:

The question of the historicity of the figure of Zarathustra himself: is he a
prophet like the prophets of the Bible, or is he a quasi-mythological figure
like the many RSis of the Rgveda?  Is Zarathustra's notorious dualism a
product of the imagination of later scholars, under the influence of later
dualisms?  Is Zarathustra really the author of the Gathas which are
attributed to him, or is this attribution merely mythological fantasy, or a
matter of mis-understood ritual performance?

Finally, as to the date of the Old Avestan texts, relevant for a discussion
of the dating of the RV, Kellens is inclined to go along with the new
consensus among Iranists to date them to about 1000 BCE, but he qualifies
this with a passing remark that this date is "is still, probably, too timid"
[p.100].

Kellens is a controversial figure who has frequently challenged received
opinion.  His Cartesian scepticism, which in my mind is the hallmark of his
and Pirart's edition and commentaries on the Old Avestan texts, has aroused
the wrath of many other Iranists because of the profound scepticism which he
has expressed concerning modern Avestan studies as a whole.  He has argued
that Avestan studies is far more tenuous and uncertain than Vedic studies [if
that can be believed!], both because of the relative size of Old Avestan
texts [very small], but also because if the serious disruption which the
Avestan tradition suffered as a result of various historical circumstances.

In any case, it is no longer acceptable for Indologists to rely on out of
date translations from Avestan such as those of Darmesteter and Mills, et al.
 Besides the recent French translation and commentaries of Kellens and
Pirart, we are also fortunate to have the translation of Old Avestan texts,
with commentary, in English in the1991 edition, of H. Humbach [with the
assistance Skjaervo and Elfenbein].  Insler's translation of and commentary
on the Gathas, of 1975, must also continue to be consulted.

The 1986 work of J. Narten on the Yasna Haptanhaiti, in German, should also
be acknowledged as the path-breaking work that it is.  Though it has not been
translated into English, its insights have been incorporated into later work.
 Behind all of this is the important influence of Karl Hoffmann..

With apologies to specialists for whom all of the above is self-evident, and
to Dominik also, if the post exceeds acceptable length.  However, there are
many non-specialists on this list who might find this notice of use.  It is
cordially offered to them.

best wishes,

George Thompson