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Liber XXXVI · Zoroastrianism

Liber XXXVI · Zoroastrianism · Chapter VI: Parsis & Modern Zoroastrianism

Ilm-e Khshnoom: Parsi Esotericism and Zoroastrian Mysticism

Ilm-e Khshnoom, the Parsi esoteric movement of Behramshah Shroff: hidden masters of Mount Damavand, teachings on sacred sound, soul and ritual, and critics.

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Ilm-e Khshnoom is an esoteric movement within the Parsi Zoroastrian community of India, founded in the early twentieth century by Behramshah Nowroji Shroff (1858–1927), who said that as a young man he had been taught the hidden meaning of the religion by a secret community of Zoroastrian masters living on Mount Damavand in Iran. Its name means roughly "the science of spiritual satisfaction", and its followers, called Khshnoomists, combine a mystical reading of the Avesta with a strict defence of traditional ritual and purity.

Esoteric Currents in Modern Zoroastrianism§

Zoroastrianism had known mystical and philosophical interpretations long before Khshnoom. In Mughal India, the Iranian sage Azar Kayvan (died around 1618) gathered a circle that blended Zoroastrian motifs with the Illuminationist philosophy of Suhrawardi, whose "philosophy of light" had drawn on ancient Persian wisdom (see Suhrawardi and the philosophy of illumination). The school's writings, including the Dasatir, a book in an invented language presented as ancient Persian revelation, were published in Bombay in 1818 and for a time accepted by some Parsis as genuine scripture before scholars showed them to be modern.

In the late nineteenth century two forces shaped Parsi religious life, as described in Parsis and modern Zoroastrianism. Reformers, influenced by Western scholarship and above all by Martin Haug, taught that only the Gathas were the authentic words of Zarathustra and that much later ritual and law could be set aside. At the same time the Theosophical Society, whose founders settled in Bombay in 1879 and later at Adyar, offered a different modernity: it praised Zoroastrianism as a vessel of ancient occult wisdom, and Henry Steel Olcott lectured on the spirit of the religion to enthusiastic Parsi audiences (see Theosophy in India). Many Parsis joined the Society. Ilm-e Khshnoom grew in this setting, but it claimed a source that was wholly Zoroastrian.

Behramshah Shroff and the Masters of Mount Damavand§

According to the accounts preserved by his followers, Behramshah Shroff was born in Surat in 1858 into a modest Parsi family. As a teenager he set out for the north-west of India and, in the company of a group of travellers who proved to be Zoroastrian adepts, was taken into Iran to a hidden settlement in the region of Mount Damavand, the great volcano north-east of Tehran that holds a prominent place in Iranian legend. There, it is said, he spent about three years among a small community of righteous Zoroastrians called the Saheb-e Dilan, "masters of the heart", who had preserved the full knowledge of the religion in secret since the fall of the Sasanian empire. They taught him the inner meaning of the Avesta, the science of the sacred word and the nature of the soul, and sent him back to India with instructions to wait until the time was right to share part of what he had learned.

Shroff returned to India and for many years lived quietly. From around 1902, encouraged by a few listeners, he began to lecture in Bombay, speaking in Gujarati. He wrote little himself; his teachings were recorded, expanded and organised by disciples, notably Jehangir Chiniwalla and Phiroz Masani, whose books and periodicals gave the movement its doctrinal shape. Khshnoomist associations formed in Bombay and Surat, and the movement acquired its own publications and places of worship.

There is no independent evidence for the hidden community on Damavand, and historians treat the story as a foundation narrative of a kind familiar from other esoteric movements, comparable to the Theosophical Masters of Tibet. For Khshnoomists, by contrast, the masters are real guardians of the faith, and Shroff's journey is the guarantee that their teaching is not a modern invention but the restoration of a lost ancient knowledge.

The Teachings of Ilm-e Khshnoom§

The name comes from the Persian ilm, "knowledge", and khshnoom, derived from the Avestan khshnaothra, "satisfaction" or "propitiation", a word that recurs in the liturgical formula by which divine beings are honoured. Khshnoom is thus understood as the knowledge that leads to the satisfaction or bliss of the soul and of the divine.

Central to the system is the power of sacred sound. Khshnoom teaches that the Avestan words of the prayers, the manthras, act through vibrations, called staota, which have effects on the subtle and material worlds, and that they work only when recited in the original language with correct pronunciation and in a state of ritual purity. Translation is therefore not merely a loss of meaning but a loss of power. This gives a metaphysical foundation to the traditional Parsi practice of praying in Avestan, discussed in the Ahuna Vairya and Ashem Vohu.

Khshnoom also offers an elaborate cosmology of spiritual planes, divine emanations and cosmic cycles, and an account of the soul's long journey through successive existences towards its final liberation and return to its source. This teaching of the soul's evolution through several lives distinguishes Khshnoom sharply from mainstream Zoroastrianism, which teaches a single earthly life followed by judgment. Another key notion is chithra, a kind of spiritual seed or heredity carried by each person, which Khshnoomists use to explain why religion is bound to birth. Khshnoom writers also date Zarathustra many thousands of years before the dates proposed by historians, and they regard the Avesta, including texts that scholars consider late, as an encoded body of revealed knowledge whose literal meaning is only its outer layer. The movement encourages a vegetarian diet as conducive to spiritual purity.

Ritual, Purity and the Defence of Tradition§

Unlike many esoteric movements, Ilm-e Khshnoom is not a path away from ritual but a passionate defence of it. Where reformers saw the Videvdad's purity rules as priestly accretions, Khshnoomists interpret them as precise spiritual science: corpse pollution, menstrual seclusion, the Barashnom purification and the consecration of fires are all explained in terms of invisible forces and their effects on the soul and the world (see the Videvdad). The disposal of the dead in the towers of silence is defended as the only method that protects the elements and assists the soul.

Khshnoomists place great emphasis on the regular performance of the kusti prayers, on the purity of priests and on the integrity of the higher rituals, and they have supported the most traditional positions on hereditary priesthood and the sacred fires. They have also been among the most determined opponents of conversion and of the initiation of children of mixed marriages, arguing on the basis of chithra that Zoroastrian identity is a matter of spiritual heredity rather than personal choice. In this respect the movement allied esotericism with orthodoxy and became an important voice of Parsi traditionalism in the twentieth century.

Khshnoom, Theosophy and Mazdaznan§

Historians of religion, including scholars such as John Hinnells and Michael Stausberg, have noted how much Khshnoom shares with Theosophy: hidden masters in remote mountains, a language of vibrations, planes and evolution, a claim to an ancient wisdom concealed behind the letter of scripture, and the teaching of successive lives. Yet Khshnoom presents itself as purely Zoroastrian, and it rejected the Theosophical claim that all religions express one universal wisdom open to all. Where Theosophy was universalist and open to converts, Khshnoom was particularist and closed. Some scholars interpret it precisely as a way for Parsis to adopt the attractive ideas of the esoteric revival without leaving their own tradition.

A very different modern esotericism using Zoroastrian names was Mazdaznan, founded in the United States around 1900 by Otoman Zar-Adusht Ha'nish, which taught breathing exercises, diet and a "Mazdaznan" philosophy of life. It had no connection with the Parsi community and found followers mostly in Europe and America, including the Bauhaus teacher Johannes Itten. The contrast illustrates how the prestige of Zarathustra could attach both to an inward-looking Parsi traditionalism and to a Western movement of self-cultivation; on the wider story of the Western image of Zoroaster see Zarathustra and the Gathas.

Ilm-e Khshnoom Today and Its Critics§

Ilm-e Khshnoom remains a minority current among Parsis, concentrated in Mumbai and Gujarat, with followers in the diaspora. Its influence has been greater than its numbers, because its arguments are widely used by traditionalists in debates about conversion, intermarriage, the towers of silence and the training of priests. Some Khshnoomist families maintain their own prayer halls and observe especially strict purity.

Critics within the community make several objections. Reformists regard its doctrines as unhistorical and its claims about hidden masters as unverifiable. Many orthodox priests, though sharing its ritual conservatism, reject its teaching of multiple lives as contrary to the Zoroastrian doctrine of a single life followed by judgment, described in Zoroastrian eschatology. Academic scholars note that its interpretations of Avestan words often have no basis in philology. Khshnoomists reply that the inner knowledge of the religion cannot be reached by grammar alone. Whatever one's view, the movement is a significant example of how a small, ancient community responded to modernity by turning inward to an esoteric reading of its own scripture.

Frequently asked questions§

What does Ilm-e Khshnoom mean?§

It means roughly "the science of spiritual satisfaction". Ilm is the Persian word for knowledge, and khshnoom comes from the Avestan khshnaothra, satisfaction or propitiation, a term used in Zoroastrian liturgy.

Who founded Ilm-e Khshnoom?§

It was founded by Behramshah Nowroji Shroff (1858–1927), a Parsi from Surat who said he had been taught by hidden Zoroastrian masters near Mount Damavand in Iran. He began teaching in Bombay in the early twentieth century.

Do Khshnoomists believe in reincarnation?§

Khshnoom teaches that the soul passes through successive existences on its way to final liberation. This sets it apart from mainstream Zoroastrian teaching, which holds that each person lives one earthly life and is then judged.

Is Ilm-e Khshnoom the same as Theosophy?§

No. It shares several ideas with Theosophy, such as hidden masters and spiritual evolution, but it presents itself as an exclusively Zoroastrian teaching and strongly opposes conversion and religious mixing.

Sources and further reading§