Gabr (also gabrak, gawr, gaur, gyaur, gabre) is a New Persian term originally used to denote a Zoroastrian. Persian (Local names: فارسی Fârsi or پارسی Pârsi)* is an Indo-European language spoken in Iran, Afghanistan and Tajikistan as well as by minorities in Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, India, Pakistan, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Southern Russia, neighboring countries, and elsewhere. ... Zoroastrianism is the religion and philosophy based on the teachings ascribed to the prophet Zoroaster (Zarathustra, Zartosht). ...

Historically, gabr was a technical term synonymous with mōg, "magus", denoting a follower of Zoroastrianism, and it is with this meaning that the term is attested in very early New Persian texts such as the Shahnameh. In time, gabr came to have a pejorative implication and was superceeded in literature by the respectable Zardoshti, "Zoroastrian". The Three Wise Men are given the names Gaspar, Melchior, and Balthasar in this Romanesque mosaic from the Basilica of St Apollinarius in Ravenna, Italy. ... Zoroastrianism is the religion and philosophy based on the teachings ascribed to the prophet Zoroaster (Zarathustra, Zartosht). ... Shâhnameh Shāhnāmé, or Shāhnāma (Persian: )(alternative spellings are Shahnama, Shahnameh, Shahname, Shah-Nama, etc. ...

By the 13th century the word had come to be applied to a follower of any religion other than Islam, and it has "also been used by the Muslim Kurds, Turks, and some other ethnic groups in modified forms to denote various religious communities other than Zoroastians, sometimes even in the sense of unbeliever."^[1] As a consequence of the curtailment of social rights, non-Muslims were compelled to live in restricted areas, which the Muslim populace referred to as Gabristans.^[2] Islam (Arabic:  ) is a monotheistic religion based upon the teachings of Muhammad, a 7th century Arab religious and political figure. ... Languages Kurdish Religions Predominantly Sunni Muslim also some Shia, Yazidism, Yarsan, Judaism, Christianity Related ethnic groups other Iranian peoples (Talysh Baluch Gilak Bakhtiari Persians) The Kurds are an ethnic group who consider themselves to be indigenous to a region often referred to as Kurdistan, an area which includes adjacent parts... An infidel (literally, one without faith) is one who doubts or rejects central tenets of a religion, especially those regarding its deities. ...

The etymology of the term is uncertain. "In all likelyhood,"^[1] gabr derives from the Aramaic GBR, which – in written Middle Iranian languages – serves as an ideogram that would be read as an Iranian language word meaning "man." (for the use of ideograms in Middle Iranian languages, see Pahlavi) During the Sassanid era (226-651), the ideogram signified a free (i.e. non-slave) peasant of Mesopotamia. Following the collapse of the empire and the subsequent rise of Islam, it "seems likely that gabr used already in Sasanian times in reference to a section of Zoroastrian community in Mesopotamia, had been employed by the converted Persians in the Islamic period to indicate their Zoroastrian compatriots, a practice that later spread throughout the country."^[1] Aramaic is a Semitic language with a four-thousand year history. ... The Pahlavi script was used broadly in the Sasanid Persian Empire to write down Middle Persian for secular, as well as religious purposes. ... Sassanid Empire at its greatest extent The Sassanid dynasty (also Sassanian) was the name given to the kings of Persia during the era of the second Persian Empire, from 224 until 651, when the last Sassanid shah, Yazdegerd III, lost a 14-year struggle to drive out the Umayyad Caliphate... Mesopotamia refers to the region now occupied by modern Iraq, and parts of eastern Syria, southeastern Turkey, and southwest Iran. ... // Introduction Fars is one of the 30 provinces of Iran. ...

See also

• Majus

Majūs (Arabic and Persian: مجوس, pl. ...

Bibliography