“I was born,” the Prophet Muḥammad is reported to have said, “in the reign of the Just King,” meaning thereby Character of Núshírwán. Khusraw Anûshak-rûbân (“of Immortal Spirit”), who is still spoken of by the Persians as “Núshír-wán the Just” and regarded as the perfect type of kingly virtue. We have already seen that this verdict cannot be accepted without reserve, and that Núshírwán's vigorous measures against heretics rather than his justice (in our sense of the term) won him the applause and approval of the Magian priests by whose hands the national chronicles were shaped; just as the slur which rests on the name of the first Yazdigird (called Baza-gar, “the Sinner”) is to be ascribed rather to his tolerance of other religions and his indifference to the Zoroastrian clergy than to any special wickedness of life. Yet Núshírwán, though severe on heretics whose activity threatened the welfare of the State, was by no means a fanatic, but on the contrary interested himself greatly in foreign religions and philosophies. In this respect he reminds us of the Caliph at Ma'mún and the Emperor Akbar, both of whom took the same delight in religious and philosophical controversies and speculations. Nöldeke (Gesch d. Sasaniden, p. 150, n. 3 ad calc.), who is by no means disposed to look favourably on the Persians, gives, on the whole, a very favourable summary of his character, which he concludes in the following words: “On the whole Khusraw (Núshírwán) is certainly one of the greatest and best kings whom the Persians ever possessed, which, however, did not prevent him from being capable of reckless cruelty, nor from having little more regard for the truth than the Persians, even the best, are wont to have.” His suppression of the Mazdakites, his successful campaigns against the “Romans” (Byzantines), his wise laws, his care for the national defences, and the prosperity enjoyed by the Persian Empire during his reign (A.D. 531-578) all conduced to the high reputation which he enjoys in the East as an Neo-Platonist philosophers at the Court of Núshírwán. ideal monarch; while his reception of the seven Greek philosophers, expelled from their native land by the intolerance of the Emperor Justinian, and his insertion of a special clause in their favour (whereby they were guaranteed toleration and freedom from interference on their return thither) in a treaty which he concluded with the Byzantines at the close of a successful war, as well as his love of knowledge, exemplified not only by his patronage of learned men, but by the establishment of a great medical school at Jundê-Shâpûr, and by the numerous translations from Greek and Sanskrit into Pahlawí executed by his orders, caused it to be believed, even in the West, “that a disciple of Plato was stated on the Persian throne.”

*

The importance of the visit to the Persian Court of the Neo-Platonist philosophers mentioned above has, I think, Introduction of Neo-Platonist ideas into Persia at this epoch. hardly been sufficiently emphasised. How much the later mysticism of the Persians, the doctrine of the Ṣúfí?? which will be fully discussed in a later chapter owes to Neo-Platonism, is beginning to be recognised, and has been admirably illustrated by my friend and former pupil Mr. R. A. Nicholson, late Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, in his Selected Poems from the Díván of Shams-i-Tabr'z (Cambridge, 1898); nor, if Darmesteter's views be correct, did Zoroastrianism disdain to draw materials from the same source. The great historical introduction of Greek phiosophical and scientific ideas into the East took place, as is well known, during the early 'Abbásid period, especially during the reign of Hárunu'r-Rashíd's son al-Ma'mún (A.D. 813-833), but it is exceedingly probable (though, owing to the loss of the great bulk of Pahlawí literature, especially the non-religious portion, it cannot be proved) that already in the sixth century, during the reign of Núshírwán, this importation had begun, and that the beginnings of the Ṣúfí doctrines, as of so many others, may in reality go back beyond the Muhammadan to the Sásánian times. As regards the Christians, Núshírwán's contempt for their pacific doctrines and vexation at the rebellious behaviour of his son Anúsha-zádh (see p. 136 supra) did not prevent him from according certain privileges to the dangerous and often disloyal Monophysites,* or from accepting in one of his treaties with the Byzantine Emperor certain stipulations in favour of the Catholics;* nay, it was even asserted by Euagrius and Sebêos* that he was privately baptized before his death, which statement, though certainly false, shows that he was generally regarded as favourably disposed towards the Christians, who, as Nöldeke remarks, gave a touching proof of their gratitude for his favours a century later when they would not suffer the remains of his unfortunate descendant Yazdigird III, the last ruler of the House of Sásán, to lie unbaried. Such toleration, however, was always subject to considerations of the safety of the State and the order of social life, both of which were threatened by the doctrines of the communist Mazdak, of whom we shall now speak.

The evidence which has come down to us concerning this remarkable man has been carefully collected by Nöldeke* in the fourth Excursus (Ueber Mazdak und die Mazdakiten, pp. 455-467) appended to his admirable History of the Sásánians, Mazdak the Communist. which we have already had occasion to cite so fre­quently. It must naturally be borne in mind that this rests entirely on the statements of persons (whether Zoroastrian or Christian) who were bitterly opposed to his teaching, and that if the case for the defence had been preserved we might find favourable features, or at least extenu­ating circumstances, of which we now know nothing. What, for example, to take an analogous case from modern times, would be our judgment of the Bábís if we depended solely on the highly-coloured and malicious presentations of their doctrines and practices contained in such official chronicles as the Násikhu 't-Tawáríkh of the court-historian Lisánu'l-Mulk, or of the talented Riẓá-qulí Khán's supplement to the Rawẓatu'ṣ-Ṣafá, or even of presumably unprejudiced Europeans who were dependent for their information on the accouuts current in court circles? In this connection it is worthy of remark that the charges of communism and antinomianism, especially in what concerns the relation of the sexes, were those most frequently brought alike against the Mazdakites of the sixth and the Bábís of the nineteenth century by their opponents; and since we now know that the alleged com­munism of the early Bábís, so far as it existed at all, was merely incidental, as in the similar case of the early Christians, and cannot be regarded as in any sense a characteristic of their doctrines, we cannot avoid a suspicion that the same thing holds true in some degree of Mazdak and his followers.

Whether Mazdak himself originated the doctrines associated with his name is doubtful, a certain Zarádusht the son of Doctrines of Mazdak. Khurragán, of Fasá in the province of Fárs, being mentioned in some of the sources as their real author. Of the theoretical basis of this doctrine we know much less than of its practical outcome, but Nöldeke well remarks that “what sharply distinguishes it from modern Communism and Socialism (so far as these show themselves, not in the dreams of individuals, but in actual parties), is its religious character.” All evils, in Mazdak's view, were to be attributed to the demons of Envy, Wrath, and Greed, who had destroyed the equality of mankind decreed and desired by God, which equality it was his aim to restore. The ascetic element which has been already noticed (p. 161 supra) as one of the features of Manichæanism to which the Zoroastrians so strongly objected also appears in the religion of Mazdak in the prohibition of shedding blood and eating meat. Indeed, as we have already seen (p. 169 n. 1 ad calc.), to the Zoroas­trian theologians Mazdak was par excellence “the ungodly Ashemaogha who does not eat.”

For political reasons, of which, according to Nöldeke's view, the chief was a desire to curb the excessive power of the priests Rise and fall of the Mazdakites. and nobles, King Kawádh (or Qubád) favoured the new doctrine; an action which led to his temporary deposition in favour of his brother Jámásp. This untoward event probably produced a considerable alteration in his feelings towards the new sect, and the balance of testimony Massacre of the Mazdakites (A.D. 528-9). places in the last years of his reign that wholesale slaughter of the Mazdakites with which, in the popular legend, Khusraw the First is credited, and by which he is said to have earned his title of Núshírwán (Anúshak-rúbán, “Of Immortal Spirit”). According to the current account (given in its fullest form in the Siyásat-náma of the Nidhámu'l-Mulk (ed. Schefer, pp. 166-181; transl. pp. 245-266), Prince Núshírwán, after exposing the evil designs and juggler's tricks of Mazdak to his father King Kawádh, deceived the heresiarch by a feigned submission, and fixed a day when, in presence of all the Mazdakites, he would make formal and public profession of the new doctrine. Invitations were issued to the Mazdakites to a great banquet which the prince would provide in one of the royal gardens; but as each group entered the garden they were seized by soldiers who lay in wait for them, slain, and buried head downwards in the earth with their feet protruding. When all had been thus disposed of, Núshírwán invited Mazdak, whom he had himself received in private audience, to take a walk with him through the garden before the banquet, and to inspect the produce thereof. On entering the garden, “Behold,” said the prince, pointing to the upturned feet of the dead heretics, “the crop which your evil doctrines have brought forth!” Therewith he made a sign, and Mazdak was at once seized, bound and buried alive head downwards in the midst of a large mound of earth specially prepared for him Contemporary testimony. in the middle of the garden. A contemporary account of the massacre by an eyewitness, Timotheus the Persian, has been preserved to us by Theophanes and John Malalas. The presence at this horrible scene of the Christian bishop Bazanes, who was also the King's physician, finds a curious parallel in recent times, for Dr. Polak, court-physician to the late Náṣiru'd-Dín Sháh, was present at the cruel execution of the beautiful Bábí heroine Qurratu'l-'Ayn in 1852.

However great the number of Mazdakites who perished in this massacre (which took place at the end of A.D. 528, or Subsequent his­tory of the Mazdakites. the beginning of 529) may have been, the sect can hardly have been exterminated in a day, and there are reasons for believing that a fresh perse­cution took place soon after Nushírwán's accession to the throne (A.D. 531). After that, even, the sect,though no longer manifest, propably continued to exist in secret; nor is it unlikely that, as is suggested by some Muhammadan writers, its doctrines, like those of the Manichæans, passed over into Muhammadan times, and were reproduced more or less faith­fully by some of those strange antinomian sects of later days which will demand our attention in future chapters. This view is most strongly advanced by the celebrated Nizámu'l-Mulk, who, in his Treatise on Government (Siyásat-náma) endeavours at great length to show that the Isma'ílís and Assassins towards whom he entertained so violent an antipathy (amply justified in the event by his assassination at their hands on October 14, 1092) were the direct descendants of the Mazdakites.