FIRE WORSHIPPERS.

Oamaru Mail, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 10604, 5 November 1910, Page 3 (Supplement)

FI RE WORSHIPPERS.

frank Carpenter.) 1 ' ... the most powerful, the , . . im ] most charitable * t j le J>arsee, which lias bew at Bombay. _ I UW s ~,« in comparing it with religions asto the " um ~ *Ti» than 100,000 Parsees. * a , r f. but their hanks and other »' cr - cHtutions are scattered, rfl ! Far East and their posrd*n ntold millions. They, liave -= 2f , ',l in every business movein "India, for they kings of the country f° r their.integrity and >£ n " , a nd just now. when In-. * mi l'v the popuiistic Hin : :or ?,that they stand:in favor.] e niinent is of value tcT Great. io nifp of their biggest, capital-: Hv caid at a Parsee mass, +'his people denounced the ' nfl inarch} advocated by the other sects, and re?;%ie British rule as an unhipwing to India. '«■ /inns are illiterate. Isot one read of write. The Pars c *!fnivcrsallv educated. Many f ; f' graduates of colleges and K and tl ie y liave lar 8? b ° ys i crirls' schools at Bombay places in Hindustan for fhe •'t their children. r f no more charitable be-j P. ti, e world than the Parsees. *® a Wavs giving to/ public ens" ,d tlioii- institutions, foundpeople, have cost many dollars. During the past A taiuests of the late Naoroji l,ove been largely distributed ■ vl : tion there have been other " Pirsees here at Bombay agThe Wadia bet" more than five million '? r - All this was for the ame-

f' the condition of the poor 1 promotion of education among the Janisetjee Jeejeeb- ?•"■., te which was founded 60 L'arsee of that name. !*? i'if e ' a poor boy and died A great part of his f-'w'to charity. He gave t „ hospitals, colleges, and :U ul about £20,000 to this '"r],'e Government of- India took ■' 'the tiii't and agreed to pay upon it as a loan. Since j£r'piir?eos have added to the i-'i the capital of the infourfold as large as when i The l'arsees of Bombay are " -injtarv houses for the poor i'mni'miniities. Their scheme is 'i, same as that of the George fund, and they expect to •-r per cent, on their money. iAirities are not confined to the '-:-; V are pushed and aided by ™ ;,s well. They have ricli compare in their gifts with Ql S:i<re and girls who might |,v side with Helen Gould. Titer character is Miss HainaUii Petit, who has just given -lierv. valued at 240,000 rupees, —.l : n« r ' a l'arsee girls orphanage, i: proposed to teach the vaand industries, so that the is upon leaving, may earn their; Miss Petit has given this "-"rer to trustees, and a commitParsee gentlemen are ;?• out the plans for the insti-

;,i'iiiß Parsee givers of the past :r f ifii2lit compare with certain jEillionaire widows, was Mrs i;i;biiAV:uliii, of the same family waaii who has just left iilijold dollars. She was the Millionaire Parsee of this city, ■i e outlived more than 30 years. ,1k time she gave away one iEd a-half dollars m public * sri almost two millions in ''fas. She gave Bombay its *siial for native women at a j ill this, left a big fortune to

skits. •~" '" ! aorrest the wealth of the Parsl'etits might be called the lis of the country, save that bv far more generous. One aof the Petit family, to which s& girl who has just donated j&ora girls' orphanage, foundikitplianage to perpetuate'the -j'ais son, who was cut off jJE These Petits have made •lis in cotton. One of them a s first spinning and weaving if Mia. This was over fifty a It was a great success, and sir added others, so thafhe bets cotton king of the country. stilt of the proceeds are deiii charitable fund for the bene:is cf their faith. I want to tell ;h; the Punchayat or. religious i& manages it. This controls p.tertv than Trinity Church in f:ri. It has charge of all the ibk. amounting to more than ii and other holdings m real ittitli are of great value. The tat lias recently figured in some bre at Bombay which have i treat excitement throughout tee world. The Parsee' church b corporation. Its members are :;o a fault, and give more, tori than anv sect I know. At a time they arc conservative, •■■a to control what they give KJioiit of the fold converts who sci pure Parsee blood. :1-st: ago one of the Tatas, a s:e member of the community, aa himself a French wife: She scsuvertod to her husband's re--poiessed the faith of Zoroaster ft taken into the church. Thcras feits of the faith objected, s trustees of the Punchayat cieii; iliev could not allow any sis iiie church money to go 5-:e converts, nor would they ; «ii converts to warm their i: the holv tires or upon death : ~ their ilesh torn from their ! -?the vultures on the Towers a 'l'lie French lady has insist-'-iicr Hunts and she has now -Miit to enforce them before *at Bombay. The Judges •::dod in her l'a'vor, and converts M have the right to come into :ih under certain restrictions. '.there was :i minority decision. :i-e justices suggested that the '■■ i- have separate temples and "'■"ors. and another has protest- "• the verdict might open the : :«i!!!(l,-sii-:il)lc aliens and ruin -ferity ,if the Parsee commu-

:& me to the faitli .of '**• You have often heard ■~*l worshippers of fire. In a. «y are ,-o. They have fire alin their temples, but they H as one of them told me, ?.!» omlih-iii of the sun and as visiMf tvpe of the Creator. ,: '?'j all religions supposed to be r'Auroiiy. Upon investigation,! - 1; that tin- idols are '•"'ls rojtiv-ontative of-the deity ; !;; « and rules, and not as sticks : s: * I'luumvd with supernatural '■ There is no religion upon .. j'wt does not contain some truths. Otherwise it could V*' ; ieve<l by reasoning man nor - Ss followers from generation to '-en. ■■.-•. ....- -.

; p "seo3 believe in one God and ; purrectinn and equality of all pfire C.cid. Thev believe that. .-} created two spirits; one of '■'■". the other of good; one of other of darkness. These fichting for man's s ! -'i according as he favors one ~, K her lie ascends to heaven or £? w hell. His conduct on earth i l "^ s his life after death. look upon fire and water "won. and stars as the crea- ! tse spirit light, They especial- * are. and that used in the t te F« at Bombs v is said to hay© for hundreds of years. -.-Tom Persia, where it was first Eany centuries ago, before the Redans conquered the country , v J ' e uip people out. It was carf., ll ;em to the town of Ornruz, on t'f 3 . Gulf, and brought with :^ sn 3an. in India, when the first L'? 1 ca me to Hindustan. • Later ,3 "fonght it with them.to BomiC:, ahvavs kept blazing in !T«3 here. ' s ??? ee 5 do not permit strangers atnnl^ 6 - The >' Te^ar& f"f T t' ,°? h °h- to have it viewed by wS t ! ley mako no -■ disDla y of Wh'- 1 ?>' gorgeous churches and 4"v 1 ous ceremonies. lam told ■t>U; 00k "PO" fire as-;the> purest C, ea rth. In some' of their bt i le , S the - v have sta rted tlie l Wv v m a tree or DU ' ,din '= • "ginning, and have fed them

with, chips and dust of sandalwood. I understand that they will not spit in the fire nor blow out a light. For a time many of them would not smoke tobacco, and • some of them have refused to serve in the lire department hero at Bombay, not wishing to sin ".in putting fire out. This worship of fire is by no means original with' the Parso.es. Our own ancestors of the long ago, the early Aryans, were worshippers of fire as ,xe-presenting-'the lightning and the sun. The Hindoos had a fire god called Agm, and bowed down to it-sis a means of purification. They use sacred "fire in their domestic rites to-day, and at-their weddings a fire is lighted and the bride and'groom walk around it. Akbar, the great. 'Mohammedan Emperor of Northern India, 1 made his ' own sacred fire by lighting a piece of cotton through a crystal lens with the rays of the sun. He used this burning glass several times every year, and jail the fires of his household were started that way. The Parsees are often called disciples of Zoroaster. * This man belonged to the Magi;"" he-held the same faith as the wise men who followed the star to the stable when' Christ was born at Bethlehem. It is one of the oldest of religions and was worshipped by Cyrus the Great. "Zoroaster was a" boy of twelve at the time Jerusalem was taken by Nebuchadnezzar. He had lived in Northern Persia, and the old Persian writings chronicle many miracles as to his birth and life. He went through a period of religious preparation, and at thirty received a revelation arid came forth-to reform the old creed of the Magi. He had many visions. He saw the one God, and was tempted again and again by the spirit of darkness, but always came off triumphant. During his life he converted Vish'taspa, - one of the great kings of that time, and his religion spread. Ml over Persia. It was'the chief religion there for many years, but is now believed in alone by the Parsees. A white-haired, silver-boarded old follower of this faith tells me that one of the chief elements of the religion is a belief that the/soul is immortal, and that all human beings are free moral agents, and therefore responsible. They believe in rewards and punishments, and that in this life-we settle our future existence. As to the Parsee God, he is called the Doer, the Creator, and the Governor of the World. He is the emblem of glory and light, and for .this reason the Parsee when he worships stands before the fire or turns his face to the sun as the symbol of the Almighty. It seems strange to think of a beautiful, well-bred, intelligent woman, the wif6 of a millionaire, fighting in the courts of India, for her right to Parsee burial. This means that at death sne will he laid naked upon one of the Towers of Silence and have the flesh. picked from her hones by a flock of vultures which have always fed upon human flesh. This is the universal Parsee disposition of the dead. They do not bury the body in the earth nor burn it. Fire is too holy and sacred to he_ defiled with a corpse, and the work of the worms is too slow and too vile. Instead they lay their bodies, out in the open in an iron grating under the sky and the birds pick the bones. The place where the towers of the dead stand is a beautiful one. It is on Malabar Hill, an elevation rising almost straight up from the sea, and washed by the winds from the ocean The hill is covered with a beautmu garden. You walk up to it over welt- : paved roads shaded by tropical trees : and bordered with flowers and shrubs. Winding your way through this luxuriant vegetation yon at last reach a. point from whence you can see far out over the Indian Ocean, and, turning landward, view the whole of Bombay. Here, among the trees at one side, shut • off bv an iron railing so that none but the priests may enter, stand five greau circular towers as white as the bones which lie on their top. : Each tower is about twenty-five feet in height and ninety feet in diameter. It is crowned with a grating or great circular gridiron which slopes towaros the centre, where a well five feet in width runs down to the sea. The gridiron grating is cast. m sec- : tions and so formed that there are : footpaths here and there through it. • In each tower there are certain divi- , sions for the classes of the dead. One ; section is devoted to the bodies of men, another to those of women, and a third to the children, the last part nearest : the well. The bodies are stripped naked before they are placed upon the towers, and after the flesh has been devoured by the vultures are left to bleach and d'rv in the sun. The bodies are taken into the towers by two bearded men dressed all m white. These are the carriers of the dead. At every funeral they take the corpse and, entering the tower through an opening about eight feet.irom the o-round, walk up a flight of, steps and place it upon its proper location. Alter it has been stripped by the birds .and has become perfectly dry, they take tongs and throw the bones nuo the well, where they are left to crumble °These towers are well drained. The heavy rains of the tropics fall upon them, but the water goes off sea, and there are filters below them filled with charcoal, so that all is kept clean. Indeed, the bone dust accumulates so slowly that it has taken forty rears to make it rise five feet. . " I shall never forget my visit to these towers of silence. None but can no close to them, and it was through a Parsee of JWgh rank fliat .1 rained admittance. Climbmg the hill with- one of the sextons," 1 made my w-iv about through the paths of a garden comprising perhaps sixty acres ot trees and flowers. I .was shown the Parsee Temple and. then taken to a place where I could overlook the gicat towers. '- '• ' ' !,,,„„ \t first each seemed to me a huge cvlinder of white with a frieze or copin<>- of mighty black birds. As I continued to look the birds-sprang into life Thcv raised their heads and craned their nooks", and I "tuought they imagined us corpse bearers. A moment latnrs a funeral made its way up the hill, and I saw that thev were gazing at it Jn front came tlie earners of the dead, and upon their shoulders lav the corpse of a baby, which. -whs clad in white. The camers.had then faces covered, and behind thorn mourners on' foot, in white -clouhine.All Parsees walk to - funerals, and thev dress much the same. !here are no " differences of conditions at the Towers of Silence. . . ■■ , "Naked we came into the world and naked we must depart from ,t, said mv old Parsee guide. ;. "The bones of us" all go into these reservoirs, and tlie flesli of the rich and the poor-feed the same vultures." '■ :"' . . As the procession drew near the birds grew excited; They flapped their wings and flew from side of the tower to the other- t .The slope, of the crratiug is such that I could-not see the Tittle body as it was stripped and laid in its place. ' Such sgW are, yisiUe only to the carriers, but I could ,ell the time of the exposure by the flock of vultures which came flying from the variouslowers to that part closure, and by the flapping of the wings and the noise. a.hornbk. one, hut when I-thought that, those birds in two hours would accomplish what millions of insects q and '.slimy worms might or youths in nerforming, I doubted after .-ail jfcjbt better %m ours. ','. ~ -.".'•■'"' -V- 7 -. - " ' : ' ;.■:-.

A writer in the Army and iSayy Chronicle gives the cost of the chief parts of a modern British battleship. The two 12in. turret guns, he states, with their mountine: and protection, cost £IOO,OOO. and £l5O is the price <u firing each shell.' The torpedo tubes cost £3OOO each, and the weapons themselves £6OO each. Air C E. Newton, addressing the shareholders of the Milford Docks Companv describes how London lost <l<iverpool 'shipping revenue. "There was - W he said "when the Qity <* l London advanced to the Crown f36'.By' 2s and in discharge of the debt tiie fee simple of some 300 manors and estates was conveyed to jthe - Corporatiou Amongst them was the 'lordsnrp of Liverpool, "with all customs, anchorage, and tolls of the waters* or-the Mersey, and with all the manorial, seismorial. and regal rights of the town-. ship and * lordship 'of Liverpool -then existing/ And this lordship "and'those rights,""from .which an' annual incpajehn millions is now .derived, f the shortsighted "corporation of' the-.'pe- « riod to Lord of £450." ""-■'. ■--;-".-, •