Astrological History of Iranian New Year

Every year, around this time, the Iranic people of West Asia, get ready to celebrate the birthday of life, as the beginning of their new year.

It is accurate to the second, and it connects the Earth to the Cosmos. 300 million people will stand absolutely still, for the Vernal Equinox. I call it Knowrooz, as it has more meaning, and I do not like the word “no” in the word Noruz.

In these trying times for the Iranian people, we sometimes need to get a bit of an Ego lift. Our calendar is the best in the world. Our mathematics is second to none. Here is why.

Humans actually noticed the seasons, and began measuring time, once they entered the Iranian Plateau, after leaving Africa 20,000 years ago.

So the first question I get from others is:

“Ali, why did the Iranians get to perfect the calendar?” “Why didn’t the Africans do it?”.

The answer is that, in Africa it is one season all the time. In the Iranian plateau, you get the four seasons. Anywhere else you get mostly either hot or cold.

The next question is:

“How do you know that humans came from Africa?”

The answer is found, by studying the history of chromosones in the Genome Project. The Europeans, wanted to know where they all came from, and ended up studying Haplogroups going back through Iran, before tracing them to East Africa. No I am not just saying this because I am an Iranian.

Remember Salman Parsi, an Iranian Apostate Prince, burnt all our libraries. What little is known of ancient Iran, has been written by our enemies. But we do have a couple of old books.

We are told that Iranians came from the North of Iran. That is true. But it is not the first migration. It is the second migration, just before the last ice-age.

Briefly the humans went from Africa to Iran, and then went further North East and West, some 20,000 years ago. The skin pigmentation changed to absorb more Vitamin D. So the blond haired fair skinned people are the oldest humans.

After literally thousands of years, we know from the Genome Project, that the stories in the oldest book in the world, The Zend-Avesta, are very true and very precious, but more specifically scientific. Iran has its own word and letter in cuneiform for God called Ahuramazda. It is then appropriate to say we Iranians are Ahuramazdans.

Ironically, the influence of the younger Abrahamic religions, meant that even the most faithful of Ahuramazdans, only read the bits of The Zend-Avesta, written by Zoroaster himself. It is called the Gathas. So Zoroastrians are different to Ahuramazdans.

Zoroastrians do not look at the dualist cosmology of ancient Iran. They do not look at the Astrology and exact meaning of the different constellations and the cosmos. The Zend-Avesta contains clear texts for respecting the different astrological energies as the Earth makes its journey in space. This is especially so for the spring Equinox.

Zoroastrians just look at the Gathas. They think other parts of the Zend-Avesta, to be fairy tales and irrelevant. As an Ahuramazdan, I can catagorically state that they aren’t irrelevant. It so happens, that parts of the Vendidad, relate to the coming of the Ice Age, as discovered by geologists and the migrations of the Iranians, as discovered by the Genome Project. But when Zoroastrians migrated to India in 900 AD they had no knowledge of genetics and could not understand the other parts of the Avesta and ignored it.

Back to the present. Here are some even more interesting facts. Iranians or Ahuramazdans, believe in a union of cosmos and nature on Earth. We represent the three forms of life: animals, plants and humans, and that everything is made of four elements of Fire, Earth, Air, and Water. That makes seven.

Each of the seven were seen to be everlasting and holy. In modern Persian we say “Hameesheh” or “Amesha”, means forever, and the word for “Holy” is “Sepanta”. Ahuramazdans write it as Amesha Sepanta. The word Haft Seen, comes from the seven Amesha Sepanta shortened to seven Sepanta or seven S’s.

Of course these days people most people are completely clueless about all this, and just think you put seven S sounding objects on the table.

The philosophy that was the backbone of three three hundred years Empires has been reduced to such trivia. The First Point of Aries was selected because the Empire stretched from China to Morocco. Astronomically the light from Sun, is evenly distributed as the Earth is not tilted towards or away from the Sun.

As an Iranian, I feel proud that some compatriot worked out the maths, and for thousands of years, we handed these stories orally without any mistakes, no matter who was ruling Iran friend or foe. For a great detailed video on all this watch this one done by Aryan Navabi, showing the sky at night from Tehran. It is long, and the bit about Knowrooz or Equinox is at 2:30 mins. You will see the figure 8 and when the exact moment for Knowrooz.

Below are the exact times of Knowrooz in the years to come, as the people in Iran are always off by 30 seconds or so too soon. As an astrologer we calculate the ingress of Planets and Moon all the time. I use the best and most accurate software called WinStar.

Wednesday 20 March 2019 09:59:01 PM GMT
Friday 20 March 2020 03:50:15 AM GMT
Saturday 20 March 2021 09:38:05 AM GMT
Sunday 20 March 2022 03:34:03 PM GMT
Monday 20 March 2023 09:25:06 PM GMT

Read this Zoroastrian Prayer, Ashem Vohu at the exact time.

Original Prayer

Ashem Vohu Vashistem asti
Ushtã asti, Ushtã ahmãi,
Hyat ashãi Vahishtãi ashem.

English Translation

Righteousness is the best good (and it) is happiness. Happiness (is) to him, who (is) righteous for the sake of the best righteousness.