A History of Religious Ideas, Volume 1: From the Stone Age to the Eleusinian Mysteries

by Mircea Eliade

In the gāthās Ahura Mazdā holds the first place. He is good and holy (spenta). He created the world by thought (Yasna 31. 7. 11), which is equivalent to a creatio ex nihilo. Zarathustra declares that he “recognized” Ahura Mazdā “by thought,” “as the first and the last” (31. 8), that is, as the beginning and the end. The Lord is accompanied by an escort of divine beings (the Amesha Spentas): Asha (Justice), Vohu Manah (Good Thought), Ārmaiti (Devotion), Xshathra (Kingdom, Power), Haurvatāt and Ameretāt (Integrity [health] and Immortality).13 Zarathustra invokes and praises these Entities together with Ahura Mazdā, as in this gāthā: “Wise Lord most powerful, Devotion, Justice making the living prosper, Good Thought, Kingdom, hear me: Have pity on me when retribution comes to each” (33. 11; see also the following strophes).