New age: Details about 'Mithra'
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Mitra or Mithra was an important deity of Indic (Sanskrit mitra) and Iranian (Avestan miθra) culture. His first appearance is in the inscribed peace treaty between Hittites and Mitanni, ca. 1400 BCE. There Mitra appears as one of five Vedic deities invoked as witnesses and keepers of the pact, with Varuna, Indra and the twin horsemen, the Nasatya (Campbell, 1964 p 256). Vedic Mitra is attested from the Rigveda onwards as one of the Adityas, a solar deity and the god of honesty, friendship, contracts and meetings. Iranian Mithra came into increased prominence as a major deity of Zoroastrianism; Mithra is missing from the Gathas of Zoroaster but appears in the Yashts of the 6th century Avestas. (Campbell p 257). The Iranian and Indo-Aryan deities are descended from a Proto-Indo-Iranian deity whose name can be reconstructed as *Mitra. In both cultures, he is distinguished by his close relationship with the god who rules over the asuras (Iranian ahuras) and protects rta (Avestan asha): Varuna in India and Ahura Mazda in Iran. Mithra was believed to have been the son of God (Ahura Mazda)"I created him" Ahura Mazda declared to Zoroaster, "to be as worthy of sacrifice and as worthy of prayer as myself" (Campbell, loc. cit.). According to Persian tradition, Ahura Mazda sent his son Mithra to defend humanity from evil and from the Adversary, Ahriman. Some believe that the mythology and lore surrounding Mithra is very similar to that surrounding Jesus and other aspects of Christianity. They claim, for example, that Mithra was believed to be born on the 25th of December, was conceived by Ahura Mazda and his virgin mother Anahita. (See Mithraism's Parallels to Christianity for a detailed comparison.) In Graeco-Roman culture, Persian Mithra was adopted as Mithras. His cult, Mithraism, entered Europe after the conquests of Alexander the Great and spread rapidly throughout the Roman Empire in later years. The Hellenistic and Roman god Mithras, worshipped by male initiates from the 1st century BC to the 5th century AD, combined the Persian Mithra with other Iranian and perhaps Anatolian deities in a syncretic cult.
Etymology and OriginsThe Indo-Iranian word *mitra- could mean either "covenant, contract, oath, or treaty", or "friend". A general meaning of "alliance" might adequately explain both alternatives. The second sense tends to be emphasized in Indic sources, the first sense in Iranian. The word is from a root mi- "to bind", with the "tool suffix" -tra- (compare man-tra-), a contract is thus described as a "means of binding" (compare Ishara). The earliest known occurrence of the name Mitra is in a treaty inscription, ca. 1400 BCE, established between the Hittites and the Hurrian kingdom of the Mitanni in the area southeast of Lake Van. The treaty is guaranteed by five Indo-Iranian gods: Indra, Mitra, Varuna and the Nasatyas. The Hurrians, it appears, were being led by an aristocratic warrior caste worshipping these gods. Mitra in the VedasIn the Vedic hymns, Mitra is always invoked together with Varuna, so that the two are combined in a dvandva as Mitravaruna. Varuna is lord of the cosmic rhythm of the celestial spheres, while Mitra brings forth the light at dawn, which was covered by Varuna. In the Shatapatha Brahmana, Mitravaruna is analyzed as "the Counsel and the Power" — Mitra being the priesthood, Varuna the royal power. As Joseph Campbell remarked, "Both are said to have a thousand eyes. Both are active foreground aspects of the light or solar force at play in time. Both renew the world by their deed." Mithra in the Iranian WorldThe reform of Zarathushtra (Zoroaster) retained the multitudes of Persian deities, reducing them, in a complex hierarchy, to "Immortals" and "Adored Ones" who were now conceived either under the rule of Ahura Mazda or of Ahriman, as all of the cosmos was now part of Good or part of Evil. In the later parts of the Avesta, Mithra comes to the fore among the created beings. He gained the title of "Judge of Souls". As the protector of truth and the enemy of error, Mithra occupied an intermediate position in the Zoroastrian pantheon as the greatest of the yazatas, the beings created by Ahura Mazda to aid in the destruction of evil and the administration of the world. He became the divine representative of Ahura-Mazda on earth, and was directed to protect the righteous from the demonic forces of Ahriman. He was thus a deity of truth and loyalty, and, by transfer to the physical realm, a god of air and light. As the enemy of darkness and evil spirits, he protected souls, a psychopomp accompanying them to paradise. Because light is accompanied by heat, he was the god of vegetation and increase; he rewarded the good with prosperity and annihilated the bad. Mithras was called omniscient, undeceivable, infallible, eternally watchful, and never-resting. By at least the Hellenistic era, Mithra was identified as the son of Anahita, a goddess with extensive parallels to Near Eastern mother-deities who is not mentioned in the early Avesta. The largest temple with a Mithraic connection is the Seleucid temple at Kangavar in western Iran (c. 200 BC), which is dedicated to "Anahita, the Immaculate Virgin Mother of the Lord Mithras". The birth of Mithra is celebrated at the eve of the winter solstice, called Shab-e Yalda in Persian, as befits a god of light. As a god who gave victory, Mithra was prominent in the official cult of the first Persian empire, Achaemenid dynasty, where the seventh month and the sixteenth day of other months were consecrated to him. Mithra, the "Great King" was especially suited as a tutelary god for a ruler: Royal names incorporating the god's name (e.g. "Mithradates") appear in royal names of Parthia, Armenia, and in Anatolia, in Pontus and Cappadocia. His worship spread first with the empire of the Persians throughout Asia Minor, then throughout the empire of Alexander and his successors. In Mesopotamia, Mithra was easily identified with Shamash, god of the sun and justice. The Parthian princes of Armenia were hereditary priests of Mithra, and an entire district of this land was dedicated to Anahita. Many temples were erected to Mithra in Armenia, which remained one of the last strongholds of the Zoroastrian cult of Mithra until it became the first officially Christian kingdom. Temples to Mithra in Greater Ancient IranOther Mithraic temples mentioned by David Fingrut, 1993 (link): at Khuzestan; in central Iran near present-day Mahallat, (a few columns still standing at the temple of Khorheh); at excavated Nisa in Turkmenistan, later renamed Mithradatkirt (Mithraic mausoleums and shrines); at Hatra in upper Mesopotamia (Mithraic sanctuaries and mausoleums). Mithra in the Greco/Roman world
In the Hellenistic culture, Mithra could be identified with Apollo - Helios. During the 2nd century BC, probably at Pergamon, Hellenistic sculptors transformed the figure of Mitra/Helios into an iconic Mithras, the central god of a new syncretic religion, Mithraism. Although this new cult never caught on in the Greek homeland, it was taken to Rome around the 1st century BC by, and was dispersed throughout the Roman Empire and embraced by emperors as an official religion.
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Mithra Mitra (dios) ميترا מיתרה Mitra ミスラ Mithra Mitra (mitologia) Mitra (divindade) Mitra Mithra
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