The New Year Festival
Celebrated on March 21 at the approach of the vernal equinox and spring, the new year festival of the Parsis heralds hope and happiness for the year ahead. The revelry was popularised by King Jamshed.
Navroz literally means `new day`. Inherited from Zoroastrian Persia, it is celebrated as a new year feast by the Fasli Parsis of India.
Observed on the first day of Farvardin, which coincides with the spring equinox, the rituals of this long, colourful, happy event convey hope and new joys at the onset of another year.
Preparations for Navroz begin many days in advance. New clothes are specially made for the festival. Houses are cleaned and on Navroz, thresholds are decorated with chowk chandans. People visit fire temples and pray for the well being of the family. There may be some local variations but generally these practices are fairly widespread. In homes, a table covered with a white cloth is specially laid for Navroz. Placed on it is a copy of the Gathas, a lit lamp, an afrigan, a bowl of water containing live fish, a shallow earthenware plate with sprouted wheat or beans for prosperity, flowers for colour, a silver coin for wealth, painted eggs for productivity, and sweets and rosewater in bowls for sweetness and happiness. In addition, the table holds seven foods beginning with `sh` in Persian, sharab or wine, shakar or sugar, shir or milk, shirin berenjor sweet meat, shirin or sweet, shira orsyrup and shahad or honey. There are also seven things that start with `s` -sirka or vinegar, sumac or samanu, seb or apple, sir or garlic, senjed or sorb treeberry and sabzi or green vegetables - along with fresh fruit, dried fruit and nuts, pumpkin seeds, and vegetables of many kinds. These are meant to symbolise creation and to welcome spring.
A small bowl with a silver coin is also placed on the table. A pomegranate is arranged on the coin and surrounded with? flowers. A picture of Prophet Zarathustra is kept close to it. Then a mirror is positioned so that it can reflect the image of the pomegranate. It is believed that when the equinox takes place, the pomegranate shifts its position. This movement is visible in the mirror. By tradition this ritual is performed in Iran, from where Zoroastrians, across the globe, are informed of the onset of another year.
The `turn` of the year is awaited with excitement, particularly by the young. Bathed and dressed in new orclean clothes biding their time till the announcement of Navroz, members of the family exchange gifts and greetings.
They visit friends and relatives and wish each other by putting their right hand into the left hand of their friends, saying Hamazor hama usho bed, or` may you be with us at the ceremony and may you be righteous`. The lady of the house then leads her guests to the `Navroz table` and makes them smile into the mirror, so that they may smile throughout the year. She asks them to look at the silver coin, so that they may have wealth the whole year round, then sprinkles rosewater on their hands to keep them sweet smelling and healthy. After that, she invites them to partake of the food, which is laid on another table.
The origin of Navroz is not very well established. According to popular legend, the mythical Persian king Jamshed was the first to celebrate this festival. The Shah Namah states that the feast commemorates the ascent of King Jamshed into the skies, in achariot built by the demons he had subdued and forced into the service of??Jamshedi Navroz mortals. Named after the king, it appears to have been a pagan pastoral festival that marked the transition from winter to summer. The rites of fertility and procreation can be perceived insome of its customs.
Earlier on Navroz, prayers used to be offered to Rapithwan. It is believed that he withdrew underground during the winter to protect the roots of plants and springs of water from the demonic frost and reappeared only on Navroz to usher in the summer. The Parsis also celebrate the creation of fire and Arthravahisht on Navroz.