The Bundahishn (lit. On Creation) is a ninth century work written in Middle Person.  It is actually a commentary (Zand) on a lost Avestan book.  The Bundahishn deals not only with creation, but with the nature of God and the devil, the holy immortals and the demons opposed to them, the structure of the world, and the end of time.  Though it is not a philosophical work in the sense of containing arguments, the categories used show the influence of Greek philosophical and scientific thought on the Zoroastrians of the Sassanian Dynasty (cir. 200-600 A.D.).

    The Bundahishn teaches a radical Dualism according to which both God and the Devil have eternally existed and neither is the cause of the other.  God is declared to be omniscient, perfectly good and infinite in duration.  The devil, though he has existed from all eternity, is said to be limited in time since there will come a time when he is not.  The devil's nature is destruction, and he is not omniscient like God.  In fact, the devil was not always aware of God's existence, thought God was eternally aware of the Devil's existence.  Physically, God is associated with light, while the Devil is associated with darkness.  Though the Zoroastrian Dualists did conceive of the Devil as, in some sense, real, they did not think of him as being as fully real as God or God's creation.  Being a purely destructive force, many of his attributes are mere negations of the positive attributes of God.  Other Zoroastrian texts declare that the Devil has no physical form (darkness being a lack of light rather than a positive property), and exists in this world only parasitically in the bodies and souls of the good creatures of God.  At any rate, it is significant that the Zoroastrians held the devil has only a menog (i.e. spiritual) and not a getig (i.e. physical) form.  The idea seems to be that only an evil will is essentially evil.  Matter is not so--in fact it is essentially good as completing the essence of the human being, which essence is good.  Matter can, of course, be used for evil purposes, but then the true evil resides in the will of the being who makes use of matter in such a way.  Again, over attachment to physical things is bad (being greedy, or addicted to physical pleasures, etc.), but that over attachment is itself a mental property, a kind of vice, and is not a property of a material thing as such.

    At any rate, the fundamental point of the opening of the Bundahishn is that, although the two spirits are equal in the sense of being uncreated and always existing, they are not equal in the sense of having the same essence--they are essentially distinct.  And God's essence is pure goodness and wisdom and every other desirable property to the highest degree, whereas the devil is the opposite of God.  He is not so much, however, the mere lack of light, or lack of goodness, or lack of wisdom, but the contrary opposite of these.  Thus he does not simply lack moral goodness, as a stone might be thought to, he is positively evil and his evil consists in destructiveness, or in the desire to destroy.  He does not simply lack knowledge, he is stupid--i.e. he is in error about the nature of God and about what is really desirable.  And error is not simply a lack of knowledge (it is not mere ignorance) it is a positive mistaking, I suppose, of one thing for another.  If you have an erroneous judgment you take it that that which is, is not, and that which is not, is.  This is highly paradoxical, and the Indians spent a great deal of time coming up with theories of error.  Their theories are so complex they make my head hurt.  But basically the theories boil down to only two types, I think, though the first type breaks down to a number of distinct sub-species.  One sort of theory supposes that error consists in mistaking one thing for another thing (e.g. taking a rope for a snake because of the resemblance of the two).  This theory, then, does not suppose that one is thinking exactly of what is not, but of mixing up two things that are.  The other sort of theory supposes that the object of error neither exists nor does not.  It cannot exist, because if it did, the belief in its existence would not be false.  It cannot not exist, because no one can think of what does not exist!!  So the object of error is indescribable--it cannot be talked about either in terms of being or non-being.

    Now, it does seem to me that the Zoroastrians thought of the Devil as being an entity which neither is nor is not. He is not mere nothingness, because nothingness cannot act and is neither good nor evil.  He is not anything truly real, however, else he would be a positive force, like God himself.  So he is a sort of anti-God, anti-Life, anti-matter, etc.  I don't know if this is ultimately coherent, but I think it is interesting.  There are sorts of evil which don't seem to be merely the lack of some good--in that sense they are positive (i.e. they are not mere negations); but they are not positive insofar as they vitiate, destroy and corrupt.  Well, I wish I could make this clearer, but I can't, so I will leave this topic and move on.  I should note, however, that Karl Barth, a great Christian Theologian, taught that evil is not merely a lack of goodness, but a force of destruction opposed to God.  It would be interesting to compare his view of evil with that of the Zoroastrians (that is a paper hint).

    God knew that the Devil existed and that he could only be defeated by luring him out of eternity into the world of space and time--the world of matter and change, in other words, so God, long before the Devil was aware of His existence, began to create the world in menog or unseen form.  Basically this means he created all things first in potency. He created the matter of the world out of His own infinite light and infused it with the essence of all creatures.  This matter immediately begins to change and starts to form itself into the world.  It is explicitly compared to an embryo in the Bundahishn.  One interesting aspect of all this is that the Zoroastrians seemed to suppose that matter was necessary for the differentiation or distinction of things of the same sort.  I say this because the creation is held to need matter to be made complete, and the process of creation is one of greater and greater determination and distinction until the final state of creation is reached when everything is completely made and is a distinct individual from other created things.  On this view then the menog (i.e. spiritual) forms of things can be seen to be their species essence which is the same in every individual of a species (e.g. every cat is the same insofar as it is a cat), while getig  (matter) adds to that form concrete existence in the world and allows for a plurality of things in the same species. The menogness of things thus binds them together, makes them all one in their essence, but the getigness of things gives them their unique individuality. So, getig was necessary to complete God's creation, and the devil, as a pure spirit of evil cannot produce matter--he can only corrupt what God has produced.

    The Bundahishn seems to teach that God created in order to destroy the devil, or, rather, render him powerless.  In the eternal, motionless, menog realm, it would have been impossible to destroy or in any way affect the devil.  Therefore, the material world was necessary for God to defeat the devil.  But one might wonder why God needed to defeat the devil, unless it was supposed that the devil had the power to destroy or hurt God.  Supposing that would very severely limit the power of God, and it seems inconsistent with the notion that God is an uncreated spirit.  But perhaps we could suppose that God wanted to create a material world simply to bestow good on His creatures and to reflect His own perfection, but that He knew that if He did that the devil would attack it.  The Bundahishn, in fact, says that creation perfects God Himself.  God does not, of course, become intrinsically better or wiser by creation (i.e. His character or essence does not change), but in creating others he acquires the good quality of being their creator and loving father and, in that sense, makes Himself better.  This is opposed to the traditional Christian view which says that God is impassive--i.e. He is utterly unaffected by anything outside of Himself. Such a view, however, is hard to reconcile with the idea that God loves us, and it seems to make it difficult to understand why God would have chosen to create the world to begin with.

    At some point during the creation of the World the Devil becomes aware of God and His creation.  Perhaps the Devil never would have if God had not created, but in creating God brought about some sort of change that the Devil was able to perceive.  The Bundahishn says that the Devil recognized the superiority and beauty of God's creation and that is why he wanted to destroy it.  This again emphasizes the destructive nature of evil but seems also to recognize that evil must be aware of the difference between good and evil.  Were it not, it would not be evil but simply blind destructive force (like a storm). This might raise problems with the notion of an essentially evil being.  If to be evil, a being must know the difference between good and evil, it might seem that it at least could act in a way that is good.  But, I suppose one could argue that an essentially evil being just is a being which is determined to act in a way that it knows to be bad.

    According to the Bundahishn, after the devil perceived God's creation he fashioned a counter-creation of demons, which, like the holy immortals, are aspects of his own infinite wickedness.  When God sees the "creation" of the devil he does not revere it, but finds it repulsive.  However, God being good offers to make the devil happy and immortal (the God of the Zoroastrians wishes to save even the devil), but, says the Greater Bundahishn, the devil "ever judging others by himself, deemed that God's offer of peace could only be made from a position of weakness, so he rejcted it."  This seems to me an insightful passage.  The wicked are self-centered and so cannot understand the generous desires of the good.  But this could also undermine Zoroastrian Dualism.  One might thing that if good can understand evil but the converse is not the case then it must be because evil is a sort of exaggeration or deficiency of desires that are good. But if evil is wholly of another nature than goodness it would seem that neither the good nor the wicked could understand each other.  But if God cannot understand the devil, it does not seem He would be omniscient.  However, understanding that the devil has such and such desires might be different from understanding those desires.  A person who has no desire to rape children might understand that other people do without understanding those desires in the way we understand the desires of other people because we also have those sorts of desires.  If God is perfectly good perhaps he cannot understand our evil desires "from the inside" so to speak.  This is a very interesting question to me, but a very difficult one.  I think it would make a good paper topic.

    After the devil rejects God's offer of salvation God reveals to him how history will unfold if the devil attempts to destroy God's good creation--he shows the devil clearly that he will ultimately be defeated.  At this revelation the devil falls into a swoon and God completes the act of creation.

    God is said in the Bundahishn to make the matter of the material world out of His own substance, which is light.  His creation of the moral order of the world is represented by his creation of the Holy Immortals, each of which represents an aspects of God's own perfect nature.  The creation of the world according to the Bundahishn takes 3,000 years.  Not exactly the period modern science tells us, but considerably longer than the Genesis account!! In other ways the creation of the world is similar to the Genesis account insofar as the material and inanimate world are created first, next the world of plants, then animals, and finally man.  According to the Bundahishn each of the species of things was originally created in, so to speak, only one individual.  Thus there was originally one plant (a tree), one animal (a cow) and one human (a man).  The human though, being the proto-type of all humans did not look like present day humans.  He is described as being round in shape and much taller than present day humans.  It might not even be right to call him a male, since he was the proto-type of all later human beings rather than a particular human being.

    After the creation is complete the demoness Az (lust) wakes the devil up and inspires in him a frenzy for destruction.  The devil's passion then overwhelms his reason, and forgetting that he cannot win, he attacks creation by boring into the earth from below.  He pollutes the water, mixes fire with smoke (this seems to mean he turns fire into a destructive force rather than a creative and sustaining one), kills the first plant, the first animal, and finally the first human.  Thus, on the Zoroastrian account, death is not a natural occurrence willed by God; it was brought into the world by the devil and, to this day, all death is ultimately to be traced to the activity of the demons.  The early Christian Fathers had the same view, and it has recently been defended by some prominent Christian thinkers.
 

1. With lucky dispensation and good-omen, I will write, in the second fortunate constellation, during, the primacy of Anosha-ruban Spend-yat Mah-vindat Rustom Shatriyar, the friend of God, of entire wisdom, practicer of piety, friend of righteousness, recogniser of God, spiritual seer, loved by the good, the primate of the good Mazdyasnian Religion, and writer of the Bundahishn.

2. Owing to the coming of the Arabs to Iran-shahr, and their promulgation of heterodoxy and ill-will, orthodoxy has vanished and fled from the magnates, and respectability from the upholders of religion; deep wonderful utterances, and the proper reasoning of things, meditation for action, and word of true reason, have faded from the memory and knowledge of the populace.

3. On account of evil times, even he of the family of nobles, and the magnates upholding the religion, have joined the faith and path of those heretics; and for the sake of prestige, they have defiled, with blemishes, the word, dress, worship and usages of the faithful. 4. He too, who had the desire to learn this science and secret, could not possibly appropriate them, from place to place, even with pain, trouble and difficulty.]

[5]

CHAPTER I

2. The Light is the place and location of Ohrmazd; there is some one who calls it 'Endless Light'; and the omniscience and goodness are, forever, of Ohrmazd; there is someone who calls them 'Revelation'; Revelation has the interpretation of both these; one, that of the eternal, of Infinite Time; just as were Ohrmazd, Space, Revelation, and Time of Ohrmazd; .................. --.

3. Ahriman was, at the abysmal station, in darkness, owing to after wit and destructive desire.

4. His destructive desire is raw; and that darkness is his location; there is someone who calls it 'Endless Darkness'.-

5. Betwixt them was Void,- there are some who call it 'Ether'-, wherein was their joining.

6. They both have finiteness and infinity. 7. For, the utmost height is that which one calls 'Endless Light,'- [that is, it is 'not limited'-;] and the abysmal station is the 'Endless Darkness', [and that is infinity. 8. And owing to boundary, both are finite,] -- that is, betwixt them is a Void, and they are not connected with each other. 

[7] 9. And again, both the Spirits are finite in themselves. 10. And again, on account of the omniscience of Ohrmazd, everything in the creation of Ohrmazd is finite; for, they know the covenant of both the Spirits. 11. And again, there will be the complete predominance of the creatures of Ohrmazd, at the final material life, upto eternity and eternal progress; [and that is] infinity. 12. And may the creatures of Ahriman perish at the time when the final material life shall take place; that, too, is finiteness.

13. Ohrmazd knew, through omniscience: "The Evil Spirit exists, who will defeat and seize, and even intermingle, with envious desire, the eminent supporters, with several eminent agents, to the end;" He created, spiritually, those creatures which were requisite as those agents.

14. For three thousand years, the creatures remained in the spiritual state, that is, they were unthinking, unmoving, and intangible.

15. The Evil Spirit, on account of after-wit, was unaware of the existence of Ohrmazd; then, arising from that abyss, he came to [the precinct of] the luminous [stars]. 16. When he saw Ohrmazd, that Light, and the unseizable Lustre, he made an attack, for destruction, on account of his destructive desire and malicious nature. 17. He, [then,] saw valour and fortitude, which were greater than his own, returned to darkness, and miscreated many Devs, destroyers of the creatures, and rose for battle.

18. When Ohrmazd saw the creatures of the Evil Spirit, they appeared to Him formidable, defiled and bad creatures, [full of wickednese;] they did not delight Him.

19. Then, the Evil Spirit saw the creatures of Ohrmazd; they appeared to him very [acute] creatures, [ever] worthy of inquiry; the creatures and creation of Ohrmazd delighted him.

20. Then, in whatever manner, Ohrmazd knew the end of the affair, He proffered peace unto the Evil Spirit, and said: "Evil Spirit! bring thou help, and offer praise, unto My creatures, so that, at that dispensation, thou mayest [9] become deathless, without decrepitude, hungerless, and thirstless."

[21. Its meaning is this: "If thou wilt not head the contest, thou wilt not render thyself useless, and it will be profitable to us both."]

22. Thereupon, the Evil Spirit spoke: "I shall not bring help unto Thy creatures, nor shall I offer praise; I will, [rather,] destroy [Thee] and Thy creatures too, upto eternity and eternal progress; [I will convert] all Thy creatures to unfriendliness unto Thee and friendship unto me."

23. Its explanation is this: he imagined: "Ohrmazd is helpless owing to him, and therefore He proffers peace;" he does not accept it, and even leads an attack.

24. Thereupon, Ohrmazd spoke: "Thou art not omnific, O Evil Spirit!" that is, thou canst not destroy Me, "thou canst not so do unto My creatures too, that they may not return to My relationship."

25. Then, Ohrmazd knew, by means of omniscience: "If I do not fix a period for [his] contest too, he can do so unto My creatures, [as he will lead the onset and everlasting dispute and confusion; and during the confusion, he] can seduce [the creatures], and make them over to himself;" just as, even now, there are many men in the mingled state, who practise impiety more than piety, [that is, they are mostly performing the will of the Evil Spirit].

28. Thereupon, Ohrmazd spoke to the Evil Spirit: "[I project] the time fixed for the contest in the mingled state, to nine thousand years;" for, He knew that He would render the Evil Spirit useless, by this fixation of time.

27. Then, the Evil Spirit agreed to that covenant, on account of inability to foresee the end; just as, two men, fighting together, fix up a period, saying: "Let [us] fight such and such a day up till [night]."

28. Ohrmazd knew this too, by means of omniscience: Within these nine thousand years, three thousand years will pass all according to the will of Ohrmazd; three thousand years [will pass] in the mingled state, according to the [11] will of [both] Ohrmazd and Ahriman; and, in the final contest [He ought to render] the Evil Spirit useless, and He will withhold adversity from the creatures.

29. Then, Ohrmazd chanted forth the 'Ahunwar', that is, He uttered a 'Yatha ahu-vairyo' of twenty-one words; He showed to the Evil Spirit His own final victory, the inability of the Evil Spirit, the perishing of the Devs, the rising of the dead, the final material life, and the unopposed condition of the creatures, upto eternity and eternal progress.

30. When the Evil Spirit saw his own inability, and the perishing of all the Devs, he fell back into darkness, having become stupefied [and unconscious].

31. Just as, one says in the Scripture: "When a one-third of it was uttered, the Evil Spirit died within his body, through fear; when two parts of it were uttered, the Evil Spirit fell on his knees; and when it was uttered complete, [the Evil Spirit] became stupefied and disabled [from] rendering the creatures of Ohrmazd [unfit for work]."

32. [He remained] for three thousand years in stupefaction.

[33. First, I will mention the spiritual creation of the creatures, and then the material.

34. Ohrmazd was the Lord, before the creatures, owing to creativity, and after the creation of the creatures, He was the Lord, Wisher of benefit, Prescient, Opposed to pain, Publicly governing everything, Beneficent, and All-observant.

35. He, first, created the essence of the Yazads, Good-progress, that Spirit whereby He can make good His own material body when He may contemplate the creation of the creatures; for, He had Lordship through the creation of the creatures.

36. He, Ohrmazd, saw, with clear vision: "The Evil Spirit will never turn away from opposition; that opposition will not be rendered ineffective, except by the creation of the creatures; there will be no progress of the creatures, except by Time; and that when He will create Time, even the creatures of Ahriman will progress."

[13] 37. Being helpless, He created forth Time, in order to disable the Antagonist.

38. Its meaning is this: "The Evil Spirit cannot be expelled, except by 'kâr-i-châr'; the explanation of 'kâr-i-châr' is this: "One ought to perform an 'action' by 'stratagem' and 'with efficacy.'"

39. Then, out of Infinite Time, He produced forth Time which is the Lord of duration -- there is someone who calls it Finite Time -- out of Time which is the Lord of duration, Impassability arose, that is, the substance of Ohrmazd will not pass away; out of Impassability, the Progress of prosperity became manifest, -- that is, the, unhappiness owing to the Devs may not come; out of the Progress of prosperity, spiritual Intransformability became manifest, the Spirit owing to whom the substance of Ohrmazd will not alter from that which was produced, at the original creation; out of spiritual Intransformability, the complete Will of the creatures of material existence became manifest, the righteous creation of the creatures and conformability.

40. Ahriman's was unconformability, owing to the unrighteous creation of the creatures and ignorance.

41. Its meaning and explanation are these that Ahriman will fight with Ohrmazd the Lord; and the sagacity, eternity, excellence, and impassability of Ohrmazd, and the inefficiency, perverseness, lack of excellence and after wit of the Evil Spirit, came into manifestation, when He created the creatures.

42. For, verily, Time, which is the Lord of duration, is the first creature that He created forth; for, before the mingling, it was infinite, the Eternity, which Ohrmazd created as finite; on account of that is it infinite that, from the original creation, when He created the creatures, upto the end, when the Evil Spirit will be inactive, is a cycle of twelve thousand years, that is finite, which will finally mingle with and be transformed to infinity, so that even the creatures of Ohrmazd will be everlasting, with Ohrmazd, owing to purity.

43. As one says, in the Scripture: "Time is more [15] powerful than both the creations, the creation of Ohrmazd and even that of the Evil Spirit; Time is accessible for work and regulation; of accessible beings, Time is the most accessible; of beings worth inquiry, Time is the most worthy of inquiry," -- that is, determination can be made by Time--; "It is by Time that a temporal dwelling is erected; by Time, the ornamented is dilapidated; and of mortal men, none can escape from it, neither when he flies above, nor when he digs a well in the depth below and sits within it, nor when he goes down underneath the spring of cold waters."

44. Out of His own Self, out of the Essence of Light, Ohrmazd created forth the astral body of His own creatures, in the astral form of luminous and white Fire, whose circumference is conspicuous; and out of the Essence of those Spirits, which remove the opponent that is in both the creations: that which is Power and that which is Time.

45. He created forth the astral body of the good Wind, as the Wind was necessary; -- there is someone who calls it the Wind which is the Lord of duration.

46. He created forth the creatures, with the help of the Wind which is the Lord of duration; for, when He created even the creatures, the Wind, verily, was an agent which was- necessary in His work.

47. The Evil Spirit miscreated his creatures; out of his own Essence of Darkness, in the astral form of the blackness of charcoal, of the wicked worthy of darkness, like noxious creatures of very sinful blemish.

48. Out of the Essence of Self-willedness, he miscreated the vile 'Varûn' having no astral form, as 'Varûn' was necessary.

49. He, first, produced the Essence of the 'Devs', Evil progress, that Spirit wherefrom the harmfulness of the creatures of Ohrmazd arose; for, out of the Essence of Darkness, he produced the Infinite Darkness; and out of Infinite Darkness, there forthwith arose Untruthful Utterance, which became manifest, owing to the vileness of him the Evil Spirit; -- for, he created such creatures, whereby he would make himself [17] worse, that is, he might become ineffective; for, he miscreated that astral form, out of Infinite Darkness, he produced his own creatures in that astral form, and became useless owing to his own creation of the creatures.

50. Out of the Essence of Light, Ohrmazd produced Truthful Utterance; and the Beneficence of the Creator, -- the creation of the creatures, -- became manifest out of Truthful Utterance; for, He created forth the 'Athro' astral form, out of 'Infinite Light'; He produced all the creatures, too, in the 'Athro' astral form; the 'Athro' astral form and temporal Time became separated; out of the 'Athro' astral form, arose 'Ahunwar', the Spirit of the 'Yatha ahu vairyo', through whom, the original creation and the end of the creatures became manifest, that is 'Din': as 'Din' was produced along with the creation of the creatures; from the 'Ahunwar' arose the spiritual Year, which, in the mingled state, is now half shining and half dark, of three hundred and sixty-five days, which is a part of Time which is the Lord of duration.

51. Owing to it, both the creations progressed, in the contest.

52. As is said: "The creation of Ohrmazd remained in comfort, on account of His sovereignty, leadership, organisation, and supreme position; the creation of the Evil Spirit remained in discomfort, on account of his preponderance, violence, sinfulness and the abysmal station."

53. Ohrmazd came to the temporal Beneficent Immortals, when they were produced by Him; -- note that He had to reproduce them here, in material life; He has to remove injury from it, once again, at the final material existence--; He preserves the spiritual creation, spiritually; having produced the material creation spiritually, He produced it again in material life; He, first, produced the seven fundamental Beneficent Immortals, then the others; the seventh, Ohrmazd Himself; of the material creations, created in the spirit, the first are six; He Himself was the seventh; for, both, spirit first, and then matter, are of Ohrmazd; after the Wind which is the Lord of duration, of the Beneficent [19] Immortals], He, first, created forth Vohuman, through whom arose the progress of the creatures of Ohrmazd; He, first, created forth Vohuman, out of Good-Progress, the Essence of Light, with whom there was the good Mazdayasnian Religion; He knew this that it will reach the creatures, [up to] the renovation; and then, [He created] Ardwahisht, then Sahrewar, then Spendarmad, then Hordad and Amurdad; [the seventh, Ohrmazd himself; eighth, Truthful-Utterance; ninth, Srosh pertaining to holiness; tenth, Manthra Spenta; eleventh, Neryosang; twelfth, the eminent Rad 'Rathwo Berezato'; thirteenth, the just Rashnu; fourteenth, Mihr of wide pasture lands; fifteenth, the good Ashiswang; sixteenth, Parend; seventeenth, Sleep; eighteenth, Vat; nineteenth, Lawfulness; twentieth, Beneficence of Peacefulness in dispute, accusation, and defence.]

54. Of the material creations: first, the Sky, second, the Water, third, the Earth, fourth, the Tree, fifth, Beneficent Animal, sixth, the Man, [and seventh, Ohrmazd Himself; were His creations, which He created forth, with the help of the Wind which is the Lord of duration; for, when He had created forth the Wind which is the Lord of duration, it, too, became an agent that was requisite, for the creation of the creatures.]

55. [For opposition to these,] the Evil Spirit [miscreated] Akoman, [first of the arch Devs, then] Indra, then Sauru, then Naon-haithya, then Taromat, then Tairich and Zairich, [and then the other Divs; seventh, the Evil Spirit himself.

56. The Evil Spirit never contemplates, never utters, and never does any righteous thing; the happiness of the creatures of Ohrmazd was not requisite for him; the creatures of Ohrmazd did not need the happiness of the creatures of Ahriman.

57. Ohrmazd does not contemplate that thing which He cannot execute; and the Evil Spirit contemplates what he cannot perform, and also leads for quarrel.

58. The creation of Ohrmazd was so nourished, in the [21] spiritual state, that it was moisture, unthinking, unseizable, and immovent, resembling the sperm; then, out of moisture; there was intermixture, resembling sperm and blood; then, out of intermixture there was collision, resembling a knot; then, out of collision there was the breakage, into life, hands, and feet; then, out of breakage there was recession of the eyes, ears, and mouth; then, out of recession there was propulsion, when the creation was in motion; even now, in material life, the parts are collected in the womb of the mothers, in that manner, and they beget and nourish the newborn.

59. By means of the creation of the creatures, Ohrmazd has the motherhood and fatherhood of the creation; for, when He nourished the creatures, in the spiritual state, that was His motherhood; when He produced them in material life, that was His fatherhood.