Pre-Christian Xmas in Aryan Iran (audio)

CC Liu, Ashley Wells (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly; Shuka Kalantari, The World (PRI)/GlobalNation

It's astrotheological: Mithra welcomes in the New Age displacing Taurus (wiki).

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Thousands of years ago, the Sun god Mithra was born on the longest night of the year, the Winter Solstice.

Mithra [from which Christianity borrows most of its origin story and lore] belonged to the ancient Zoroastrian faith [actually Mithra, as a space-god or akasha-deva, did not belong to any "religion" like Mithraism but served to found the most widespread tradition in ancient Rome, with many underground temples still being discovered in England, with an entire massive temple complex in Italy devoted to him, which was subsequently converted to what we call "the Vatican" or "Holy See" today, and just as Egypt had pharaohs and Rome had pope-kings, there were divine-rite-rulers called Mithridates], battled the god of darkness and won.

• Astrotheology: How major religions are co-opted to retell the same story in new guises to new generations

 

I'm here for sex from space, I mean heaven.

To celebrate, the Shabe Yalda Festival was created and is still celebrated throughout much of the Middle East [and Near East in other forms], including in Iran.

 

“It’s about the force of good versus evil, symbolized by light versus darkness,” says Wendy Warda, who has hosted Shabe Yalda parties at her home in El Sobrante, near San Francisco, for years.

Every year Anusheh Warda co-hosts Shabe Yalda parties with her mother in El Sobrante, California. She is seen here holding Akira, her friend’s baby (Shuka Kalantari/pri.org).

 

Nimrod's influence on world's religions like Mithra.

“The idea was, you had to stay up all night. You had to share with friends. You had to share poetry or some type of art and, of course, food.”

 

At Warda’s party this year, like the others, there was plenty of food, especially pomegranates, which represent the red light of dawn. Smokers huddled in front of the fire pit that burned all night.

 

Others sat in a circle in the living room and sang old Iranian songs, songs that made people like Sepideh Dianati feel a bit closer to home.

 

HGPS nativity? (Petrus Christus)

Dianati just moved from Iran to California for work and couldn't believe that Shabe Yalda is also celebrated in the United States. “I thought that all the traditions and customs from Iran finished,” Dianati says. “But now I’m so happy to see lots of people who want to celebrate [it], who like it!”

 

Warda first found out about Shabe Yalda through her husband, who is from Iran. And while the festival is closely identified with that country, her interpretation of it is to throw the doors open and invite people from all cultures together.

 

Int'l Jewish Anti-Zionist Network (IJSN.net)

“Some of our friends are Iranian and come from a Muslim background, and some of our friends are coming from a Christian background, but nobody’s particularly religious," she says. More