RES OURCEStranslation, Die Gathas des Zarathustra (Heidelberg, 1959); S. Insler's
The Gathas ofZarathustra (Leiden, 1975); and I. Gershevitch's edition
with an English translation, The Avestan Hymn to Mithra (Cambridge,
1959; repr. 1967). The latest part of the Avesta, called the Videvdat,
concerns rules and rituals for personal purity. The Middle Persian
rendition of this text was published by D. Sanjana as The Zand f Javtt
sheda dad or the Pahlavi Version of the Avesta Vendidad (Bombay,
1895). Part of it is available with an English translation in D. Bishop's
"Form and Content in the Videvdad: A Study of Change and Con-
tinuity in the Zoroastrian Tradition" (Ph.D. diss., Columbia Univ.,
1974).
Virtually all surviving Middle Persian Magian texts appear to have
undergone a process of editing and reediting after the Muslim con-
quest. In spite of this, there are at least two such texts which appear
to have been composed under the Sasanians. One of them is the edi-
fying account of visits to heaven and hell by the Just Viraf called the
Arda-VirafNamak, which provokes the usual comparison with Dante.
It was probably composed in the sixth century, but the form in which
it survives seems to come from the ninth century. This Middle Persian
"text was edited with an English translation by M. Haug and E. W.
West as The Book of Arda Viraf (Bombay and London, 1872) and
reedited with Gujarati and Persian verse translations by J. Jamasp Asa
as Arda VirafNameh (Bombay, 1902). It was also edited with a French
translation by M. A. Barthelemy as Arta Wraf-Namak ou livre d' Arda
Wraf (Paris, 1887). For comparisons with Dante, see J. J. Modi, Dante
Papers: Viraf, Adamnan, and Dante and other Papers (Bombay, 1914).
The other text from the Sasanian period is a doctrinal work on fate,
time, Ohrmazd, and the problem of evil, the Datastan t Men6k t Xrat,
which seems to be of priestly origin but was designed for lay aristocrats.
This text, too, was probably composed in the sixth century. It was
edited with an English translation by E. W. West as The Book of
Mainy6-i Khard (Stuttgart and London, 1871), and was also published
in SBE 24 (Oxford, 1885): 1-113, and 12 (New York, 1901): 1-113.
There are later editions of this text by D. Sanjana, Dina i Mainu i
Khrat, or the Religious Decisions of the Spirit of Wisdom (Bombay,
1895), and by T. D. Anklesaria, Danak-u Mainyo-i Khard (Bombay,
1913).
The compilation of Magian myth and cosmology called the Bun-
dahishn was made sometime between the late Sasanian and early Is-
lamic periods in its surviving form, although some of its contents