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{{Short description|Zoroastrian term conventionally interpreted as heretic}}
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'''Zandik''' (Middle Persian: 𐭦𐭭𐭣𐭩𐭪) is a [[Zoroastrianism|Zoroastrian]] term conventionally interpreted as [[heretic]] in a narrow sense, or, in a wider sense, for a person with any belief or practice that ran contrary to [[Sassanid Empire|Sassanid]]-mediated Zoroastrian [[orthodoxy]].

The [[Middle Persian]] term engendered the better-attested Arabic زنديق ''[[zindiq]]'', with the same semantic field but related to Islam rather than Zoroastrianism. In the Islamic world, including Islamic-era Iran, the term was also variously assigned to [[Manichaean]]s, [[Mandaeans|Mandaean]]s, [[Mazdakite]]s, Zoroastrians, Buddhists, Christians, and free-thinkers in general, including Muslims.<ref name="Schaeder">{{citation|last=Schaeder|first=Hans Heinrich|chapter=Zandik-Zindiq|title=Iranische Beiträge, I|series=Schriften der Königsberger Gelehrten Gesellschaft 6, K5|location=Halle|publisher=KGG|year=1930|pages=274–291}}.</ref>{{rp|276}} Whether ''zandik'' was also used in any of these ways in Zoroastrian times is unknown; in that context, the term is only attested in three texts (two from the same author), and in all three appears as a [[hapax legomenon]] used in a pejorative way, but with no additional hints from which to infer a meaning.

In several now-obsolete studies related to Zoroastrianism, the word was also speculated to be the proper name of a particular (but hypothetical) priestly tradition that embraced [[Zurvanite]] doctrine.<!-- The now-obsolete 'Swedish school' of Iranian Studies considered 'zandik' to be a Parthian word. -->

==Lexicology==
The conventional translation as 'heretic' was already common in the 19th century when Christian Bartholomae (1885),<ref>{{citation|last=Bartholomae|first=Christian|title=Altiranisches Wörterbuch|year=1855|location=Strassburg|publisher=Trübner|at=col. 1662}}.</ref> derived ''zandik'' from [[Avestan language|Avestan]] ''zanda'', which he treated as a name of certain heretics.<ref name="Schaeder" />{{rp|276}}

Zindīq (زنديق) or Zandik (𐭦𐭭𐭣𐭩𐭪) was initially used to negatively denote the followers of the [[Manichaeism]] religion in the [[Sasanian Empire]].<ref>{{Cite book|title=Taheri-Iraqi, Ahmad. Zandaqa In The Early Abbasid Period With Special Reference To Poetry. University of Edinburgh. p. 3. [...] the word zindiq/zandik was initially applied in the Sassanid Empire to the Manichaeans as a pejorative epithet [...]}}</ref> By the time of the 8th-century [[Abbasid|Abbasid Caliphate]], however, the meaning of the word zindīq and the adjectival ''zandaqa'' had broadened and could loosely denote many things: [[Gnosticism|Gnostic]] Dualists as well as followers of Manichaeism, [[Agnosticism|Agnostics]] & [[Atheism|Atheists]].<ref>{{Cite book|title=Taheri-Iraqi, Ahmad. Zandaqa In The Early Abbasid Period With Special Reference To Poetry. University of Edinburgh. p. 3. "Although the word zindīq/zandik was initially, in the Sassanid Empire, applied to Manichaeans as a pejorative epithet, by the time of the Islamic Epoch its usage had broadened and was loosely applied to Gnostic Dualists, Agnostics, Atheists and even free-thinkers and libertines. Eventually in the later period, even up to the present time, 'zindīq' came to be synonymous with 'irreligious'."}}</ref> Early examples of Arabic ''zindiq'' denoting Manichaeans, and this possibly being the meaning of the term in the early attested use in Middle Persian (see [[#waldo|below]]), led A. A. Bevan<sup>[[wikt:apud|''apud'']] </sup><ref name="Schaeder" />{{rp|274}} to derive Middle Persian ''zandik'' from Syriac ''zaddiq'' 'righteous' as a Manichaean technical term for 'listeners' (i.e. lay persons, as contradistinguished from the Manichaean elite). Bevan's derivation was widely accepted until the 1930s, especially amongst scholars of Semitic languages, but was discredited following a comprehensive review of both Arabic and Iranian usage by H. H. Schaeder (1930). Schaeder pointed out that the substantive was ''zand'', not ''zandik'' (an etymology would thus have to explain ''zand'', not ''zandik''), as ''-ik'' was merely a regular [[Middle Iranian languages|Middle Iranian]] adjectivizing suffix.<ref name="Schaeder"/>{{rp|277}}

An alternative interpretation that explains both 'Manichaean' and 'heretic' derives the substantive in ''zandik'' from [[Avestan language|Avestan]] {{Script/Avestan|𐬰𐬀𐬥}} ''zan'' 'to know, to explain',<ref name="Schaeder" />{{rp|276–277}} which is also the origin of Middle Persian '[[zend|zand]]' (a class of exegetical commentaries) and '[[Pazand]]' (a writing system). In this explanation, the term ''zandik'' came to be applied to anyone who gave greater weight to human interpretation than to scripture (perceived to be divinely transmitted). Prior to Schaeder's review, the term was commonly assumed to first explain 'Manichaean', and to then have developed a meaning of 'heretic' as a secondary development.<ref name="Schaeder" />{{rp|277}} In that model, the term referred to Manichaeans because of their disposition to interpret and explain the scriptures of other religions in accordance with their own ideas.

==In inscriptions==
Under the Sassanids (224-651 CE), the previously informal indigenous Iranian religious tradition now known as 'Zoroastrianism' was mediated and formalized into the systemized configuration with which it survives today.<ref>{{citation|last=Boyce|first=Mary|title=On the Orthodoxy of Sasanian Zoroastrianism|journal=Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies|volume=59|issue=1|year=1996|pages=11–28|doi=10.1017/s0041977x00028536|s2cid=162913368 }}.</ref> The ''[[Denkard]]'', a 9th-11th century work of Zoroastrian tradition, attributes this systemization of doctrine—in which certain beliefs and traditions were seen as definite while others were considered unacceptable—to an initiative by Tansar, high priest under [[Ardashir I]], the founder of the dynasty. The development of a particular orthodoxy is also indicated by other sources, such as the ''[[Letter of Tansar]]'', which additionally suggests that the systemization of the Zoroastrian church was part of a greater state-sponsored "revival" of Iranian values, apparently as a Sassanian reaction to the perceived cultural "corruptions" of the preceding (likewise Iranian, but Hellenistic) [[Arsacid empire|Arsacid Parthian]] dynasts.<ref name="LoT">{{citation|last1=Boyce|first1=Mary, ed.|last2=Minovi|first2=Mojtaba, trans.|year=1968|title=The Letter of Tansar|location=Rome|publisher=Istituto Italiano per il Medio ed Estremo Oriente}}.</ref>

The Arsacids were probably not as culturally "[[Aniran|un-Iranian]]" as Tansar's/Ardashir's propagandistic justification to overthrow them indicates,<ref name="LoT" /> and it isn't even clear whether the systemization had any effect on the general populace in Sassanid times itself (or whether this first occurred in the post-Sassanian period).<ref>{{citation|last=Shaked|first=Shaul|year=1994|title=Dualism in transformation: varieties of religion in Sasanian Iran|series=Jordan Lectures on Comparative Religion, vol. XVI|location=London|publisher=SOAS}}.</ref> However, literary and epigraphic evidence from the third century onwards indicates that Sassanid-era priests in positions of authority persecuted individuals who held beliefs that were in not in accord with their (Sassanid-mediated) brand of Zoroastrianism. Among this epigraphic evidence are the 3rd/4th-century inscriptions of [[Kartir]], Tansar's successor and high priest under three of Ardashir I's successors. In his own inscription on the [[Ka'ba-ye Zartosht]], Kartir states (''KKZ'' 8–9) that he persecuted <!-- Caution: LITERAL QUOTATION, do not change substantially, the inscription is subject to interpretation -->"Jews, Buddhists, Brahmins, [[Nasorean]]s (Judeo-Christians), Christians, 'Maktaks' (Mandaeans, Manichaeans?) and ''zandiks''."<ref name="JDG">{{citation|last=Duchesne-Guillemin|first=Jacques|chapter=Zoroastrian religion in the Sasanian period|title=Cambridge History of Iran, vol. 3(2)|year=1983|publisher=Cambridge UP|pages=866–908}}.</ref> Kartir's inscription is the earliest epigraphic evidence of the word ''zandik''.

Although the precise meaning of ''zandik'' is not evident from Kartir's use of the term, it is commonly assumed to mean 'heretic', or 'unorthodox' in relation to Kartir's ideology.<sup>cf. </sup><ref name="JDG" /> However, none of Kartir's inscriptions actually define the contents of his orthodoxy.<ref name="JDG" /> From this inscription and another at Sar Mashad, it appears that the only doctrine that Kartir was concerned with was the belief in a hereafter, a heaven and a hell, with one or the other as the final destination of the soul as reward or punishment for deeds in this life.<ref name="JDG" /> Nonetheless, in 1920s-1960s scholarship, Kartir's silence on the subject precipitated an ''[[Argument from silence|ex silencio]]'' view that the 'heresy' in question must have been [[Zurvanism]], a now-extinct branch of Zoroastrianism influenced by Hellenistic and/or Babylonian notions of the hereafter. The word ''zandik'' was even speculated to be the proper name of a particular (unattested) priestly school that embraced Zurvanite doctrine, to which a number of unappealing aspects of Zoroastrian religious praxis were then attributed.<!-- all the ex-silencio stuff is bad science, and actually doesn't deserve mention. However, leaving it out will attract uninformed additions (very likely based on copyright-expired stuff), so I've mentioned it with the following caveat.--> Modern Iranian scholarship is much less inclined to wild speculation, and these hypothetical constructs are no longer followed today.

{{anchor|waldo}}
Noticeably absent from Kartir's list is any immediately identifiable mention of Manichaeans, who were intermittently persecuted by the Sassanid establishment, also by Kartir, who is explicitly named as one of Mani's persecutor's in Manichaean sources.<ref>{{citation|last=Henning|first=Walter Bruno|title=Mani's Last Journey|journal=Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies|volume=X|issue=4|year=1942|pages=948–949|doi=10.1017/s0041977x00090133|s2cid=161286597 }}.</ref> There are three suggested reasons to explain this anomaly: a) The conventional view is that Kartir includes them under the term 'Maktak';<ref name="JDG" /> b) an alternate position is that Kartir's text dates from the early period of Bahram I's rule when Mani still had Shapur I's and Hormizd I's protection; c) the third view is that Manichaeans are included in 'zandik'.<ref name="Schaeder" />

==In tradition==
The term ''zandik'' appears once in the 9th/10th-century texts of Zoroastrian tradition (the so-called [[Pahlavi books]]). In this one instance, in ''[[Menog-i Khrad|Daedestan i Menog-i Khrad]]'' 36.16, the term appears as an abstract noun ('zandikih') and is explained to be the thirteenth most heinous crime.

==References==
{{Reflist}}

[[Category:Zoroastrian terminology]]
[[Category:Heresy]]

[[ar:زندقة]]