There are two fundamental spirits, twins which in waking hours are heard, but in thought are not seen. They are the better and the bad. Of these two, the wise have chosen rightly, not so the foolish.
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"Hear with your ears the best things; behold with a clear vision the two choices, deciding each man for himself, before the great consummation."
"The path of Good Thought leads to the Best Existence."
"May we attain to the state of perfection, O Ahura Mazda."
"He who takes delight in the cattle and in the pasture, he is the one who serves Mazda."
"May we be among those who shall make this world perfect, O Mazda Ahura, and may we be workers for the renovation of the world."
Iranian prophet who founded Zoroastrianism, the first major religion of cosmic dualism between good (Ahura Mazda) and evil (Angra Mainyu). Closely associated with The Buddha (near-contemporary Eastern moral-cosmological revolutionary). For an intellectual contrast, see Friedrich Nietzsche, German philosopher of 'beyond good and evil' — Nietzsche appropriated Zarathustra's name for Thus Spoke Zarathustra (1883) precisely to invert the original's moral cosmology — the historical Zoroaster founded the good-versus-evil framework Nietzsche's character announces the end of.
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Two opposing forces exist in every moment of life—one that builds and one that destroys, one honest and one deceitful. You can hear them speaking through people's words and actions, but you cannot see them directly in the mind. Every person faces a choice between them. Wise people recognize the difference and pick the constructive path; foolish people either cannot tell them apart or knowingly choose harm.
Zoroaster built his entire religious system around this cosmic dualism between Spenta Mainyu (beneficent spirit) and Angra Mainyu (destructive spirit). As a priest-reformer who rejected the polytheistic Indo-Iranian traditions of his time, he taught that salvation hinged on personal moral choice—good thoughts, good words, good deeds. This verse from the Gathas, the hymns he composed himself, captures the ethical free-will doctrine that distinguished his teaching from the ritualistic religions surrounding him.
Zoroaster lived in ancient Bronze Age Persia, likely between 1500 and 1000 BCE, among pastoral Indo-Iranian tribes who worshipped many nature deities through animal sacrifice and haoma rituals. Tribal raiding, cattle theft, and priestly corruption defined daily life. Into this world of arbitrary divine favor, Zoroaster introduced a revolutionary ethical framework demanding individual accountability—an idea that would later influence Judaism, Christianity, Islam, and Greek philosophy through Persian imperial contact.
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