A Zoroas Liturgy: The Worship in Seven Chapters (Yasna 35-41).

• Author: Jamison, Stephanie W.
• Position: Book review

A Zoroas Liturgy: The Worship in Seven Chapters (Yasna 35-41). By ALMUT HINTZE. Iranica, vol. 12. Wiesbaden: HAKRASSOWITZ, 2007. Pp. xiv + 397.

Ever since Johanna Narten's truly groundbreaking edition of and commentary on the Yasna Haptanhaiti (Der Yasna Haptar[eta]haiti, Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1986), this liturgy (hereafter YH), nestled in the very middle of the Yasna in the midst of the Gathas, has taken its rightful place in the corpus of Old Avestan on the merits of the antiquity of its language and the high literary value of its style. Though Humbach treated only the Gathas in his first edition of the Old Avestan corpus (Helmut Humbach, Die Gathas des Zarsthustra. Heidel-berg: Winter, 1959), his 1991 re-edition includes the YH, as the title suggests (The Gathas of Zarathushtra and the Other Old Avestan texts, Heidelberg: Winter, 1991), and the three volumes of Jean Kellens and Erie Pirart's Les text vieil-avestiques (Wiesbaden: Reichert, 1988, 1990, 1991) also treat it along with the Gathas. And the text, translation, and commentary now appear in an English edition, the volume under review, dedicated to Narten.

The book is something of a hybrid. The author herself tells us (p. xiii) that she intended only to produce an English translation with short notes, but feeling that Narten's discussions "have not had the impact which they deserve" and noting that subsequent scholars (particularly Humbach and Kellens-Pirart) have not always accepted Marten's views, she decided to summarize some of Narten's arguments and contrast them with subsequent scholarly reaction. Thus, the book is neither a translation of Narten nor not a translation. It advances very few arguments of the author's own, but usefully paraphrases, in often nearly verbatim translation, both Narten and critical reaction to Narten, as well as adding references to other relevant secondary literature that has appeared since Narten's edition.

The structure of the book follows Narten's closely in many ways, but deviates in others. She first gives the unadorned text and translation (pp. 29-46). then follows with a treatment of the whole text section by section (pp. 47-326), in each case repeating the text and translation of the section in question (unlike Narten), followed by a list of textual variants (conveniently placed under the text, unlike Narten's edition, where all the variants are listed in a separate chapter). She then, like Narten, chooses certain words and phrases in...