The Fractious Eye: on the Evil Eye of Menstruants in Zoroastrian Tradition*
NUMEN 61 (2014) 83-108 NVMEN BRILL brill.com/nu The Fractious Eye: On the Evil Eye of Menstruants in Zoroastrian Tradition* Shai Secunda Martin Buber Society of Fellows, Hehrew University of Jerusalem, Mt. Scopus, Jerusalem, 91905, Israel shaLsecunda@gmaiLcom Abstract Like all religions, Zoroastrianism evolved, and its rich textual record provides us with the material to trace some of its developments across the centuries. This article attempts to reconstruct an ancient Iranian myth preserved in Zoroastrian tradition ahout the dangerous powers of the gaze of menstruating women, and traces its development as it grows out of the Avesta and interacts v«th Western philosophical traditions in the Middle Persian writings of late antiquity and the early middle ages. Keywords Zoroastrianism, evil eye, menstruation, Videvdad, Avestan, Pahlavi, Zand, Iranian mythology, Babylonian Talmud This article received much input from many colleagues and mentors, especially from Yaakov Elman, Dan Sheffield, Prods Oktor Skjserv0, and Yuhan Vevaina. For their advice and for invit- ing me into a most unique scholarly community, 1 am grateful. 'Cj KONINKLIJKE BRILL NV, LEIDEN, 2014 | DOI 10.1 l(iS/l.'ifiS.'-,27h-12S4Ki(l2 84 SECUNDA Menstrual Impurity in Zoroastrianism In classical Zoroastrianism,' as in many religions, menstruation and menstru- ating women are deemed ritually impure.^ In Zoroastrianism, as in many cul- tures and religions, there is a belief in the power of the human eye to inflict damage on people and property.^ And in Zoroastrianism, as in a number of societies across time and space, the gaze of menstruating women is thought to be especially harmfijl.
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