Imagining the End: Visions of

Zand 

of  genuine Avestan

texts which are no longer extant. On the other hand, the 

Zand 

system clearly

allowed the priesthood to incorporate new or foreign material into the Zoro-

astrian tradition.

The ‘metallic ages’ and the 

Zand-i Wahman Yasn

In the scholarly

discussion of  the past decades, the question of  the origins of  Iranian apoca-

lyptic ideas is closely connected with the status of  the myth of  the metallic

ages (see above), since the myth is most elaborately described in the 

Zand-i

Wahman Yasn

, and has been taken to provide a framework there for various

accounts of  an ‘apocalyptic’ nature. The details of  the academic discussion,

which is only tangentially relevant to the subject under discussion, are too

intricate to be examined in the present context. It may suffice, therefore, to

allude to some of  the main assumptions made there and to offer some

considerations.



. Most authors view the ZWY

 

essentially as one text – either as an ancient

composition consisting of  the 

Zand

 of  a lost 

Yasht 

to the Amesha Spenta Vohu

Manah (Phl. Wahman), or as a very late one reflecting the miseries of  the

Zoroastrian community in post-Sasanian times. The chief  proponent of  the

latter view, Ph. Gignoux, strongly argues that no Avestan 

Yasht 

to Vohu

Manah (Phl. 

Wahman Yasht

 or 

Yasn

), and consequently no 

Zand

 to such a

text, can have existed.



. Hultgård (



), who advances arguments in favour of  the existence of

an Avestan original of  the 

Wahman Yasht

, somewhat hesitantly seems to

suggest that the myth of  the metallic ages formed part of  this ancient hymn.

Gignoux

113

 argues that the story derives from the Biblical Daniel 



: 



–



.

114

Boyce, who assumes that an Avestan

 Wahman Yasht

 existed and that the core

of  the ZWY is based on its 

Zand

, nevertheless regards the concept of  the

metallic ages as a borrowing from Greek culture which entered the Zoroastrian

tradition in the period following the Macedonian conquest of  Iran.

Boyce’s views imply that at least one major element of  the ZWY did not

belong to the Avestan tradition. Hultgård

115

 admits the same thing for other