Books without Ritual. Ritual without Books. The Mazdean Approach to the Divine Liturgy and Orality. A Reversed History of Avestan and Sasanian Scholarship.

The article deals with the history of the written and oral transimission of texts in Pre-Islamic Persia. It shows that various forms of textual supports were known and adopted, expecially according to the diffusion of books in different languages, which followed the main local traditions. Another problem here analyzed concerns the difference between the Mazdean liturgy in which the text is only oral (in fact. it is properly a mantra), while in the Christian framework the sacred book was given a special priority. This substancial difference produced a number of strong incomprehensions, visible for instance in the false starement that the Zoroastrian priets did not possess written version of the Avestan liturgy, as sometimes declared in contemporary Christian Syriac sources