Zahhak Becomes Ahzi-Dahaka
(The Devil’s Tantra)
Looking at different aspects within the story of Zahhak the Demon King, there are several lessons to be learned from several different angles that can enlighten us on the strengths and weaknesses that lead Zahhak to his own self-demise. This story was told in Persia to teach people what they considered evil, and what particular sins could lead one to the influence of the Devil. Through this we also see overt demonization of the Tantric Elements of Hinduism. From the stand point of a Traditional Ahrimanist, Zahhak was chosen by Ahriman to bring the Evil Religion except there was a fatal weakness in Zahhak’s Buddhi. Since the flaw in Ahzi-Dahaka is found in his mind, it shows flaws in his worship because he never took the time to corrupt his Buddhi and passively allowed Father Ahriman to do first Evil Action, which allowed that weakness to take over as time went on.
Obviously Zahhak’s arrogance and pride shined with his extravagant horse collection and the fact that he only invested his time in what he wanted to do without any concern of his kingdom. In the story it is alluded that there was incestual sex between Zahhak and his mother, thus bringing in the sin of unnatural sex and concupiscence. With this type of lifestyle, Zahhak caught the eye of the Devil, and Guru found his initiate. The looking into the fact that Zahhak was obviously a spoiled child that had power over his father because of the sex with his mother, and the fact it seems Zahhak was never disciplined, doesn’t him to have an evil nature just a perverted perception of life. Since Zahhak didn’t want to spill his father’s blood that means some of the societal morals was still in his heart and the local religion was still in his mind and that means his Buddhi remained attracted to Ahura Mazda.
“Zahhak heard him out and considered his words, but the thought of shedding his Father’s blood troubled his heart.” This is the fatal internal issue that will continue to be Zahhak’s ultimate downfall in the end. This is where one must be taught how to corrupt the Buddhi aspect of the mind. The mind can always override the heart, but must be taught when to override emotions and impulses. It is through the practice of the Evil Religion does corrupt this Buddhi and learns to control the heart with the Evil Mind.
When Ahriman saw how effective his words had been, he gave some new evil advice. He said to Zahhak, “If you do my will, I will give you all you could wish from the world. Follow my orders and you will be king of the earth; its animals, men, birds, and fish will all be yours.” Following the Devil’s will can be a task. If the Devil directs us through our subconscious, then we must become sensitive to our own thoughts, words, and actions. Along with the tools of cognitive behavioral therapy and dream interpretation can shed some light onto Ahriman’s great spiritual plan.
Next Ahriman disguised himself as an intelligent, talkative young man, and appeared humbly before Zahhak. He said, “If the king will accept my service, I am an excellent cook.” Here in lies the beginning of the physical and spiritual corruption by feeding Zahhak meat and Zahhak freeing giving Ahriman the “key” to the kitchen and pantries. By eating meat prepared by the very hands of the Devil, Zahhak is corrupted spiritually by absorbing the final emotions from the animals’ death throws. By absorbing this emotional distress and dead flesh, Zahhak is corrupting his Chakras and ultimately his mind.
“… when the king of the Arabs sat down to eat he gave his foolish head into Ahriman’s hands.” This resembles the guru touching the initiate on the forehead with his thumb to transfer all of his knowledge and wisdom over to the initiate. This is another step toward the great liberation.
When Zahhak stretched out his hand and ate, he was astonished at the man’s skill. He said to him, “You are a well-meaning man; consider what it is that you desire, and ask me for it.” The cook said, “May you live forever your majesty; my heart is filled with love for you, and my soul is nourished only by your glances. I have one request to ask of the victorious king, even though I am quite unworthy of it, and this is that he will command me to kiss his shoulders, and rub my eyes and face there.” When Zahhak heard his words he had no notion of what the man was plotting and said, “I grant you your request, and may your name be honored for it.” Then he said that the cook should kiss his shoulders, as if he were his bosom friend. The demon kissed the king’s shoulders, and disappeared forthwith; no man had ever seen such a wonder in all the world.
Taking into account that in Persian literature, the kiss symbolizes sexual intercourse. The fact that Ahriman is intermingling his eyes and mouth specifically on the shoulders of Zahhak, shows corruption through the Zoroastrian sin of homosexual intercourse between two men. Remembering back to the story of the first couple, the man and the woman were conjoined at the shoulder showing heterosexuality of man and woman. Through the corruption of dead flesh, the passing of knowledge and wisdom through the third eye, and now the corruption of gay sex the initiation is completed and the Kundalini is awakened. The serpents that grow after this coupling are the Ida and Pigala or Vasuki and Kaliya, which shows exterior signs of the Kundalini awakening and the Sushuma Channel opening and Shakti Serpent rising on the inside.
In a different account of this story, Zahhak still goes the physician with a small difference in the account. Ahriman as the physician, removes the serpents and tells Zakkah to sit on his throne while healing from the extraction, and if they grow back just feed them 2 young men’s minds a day. Zahhak did as requested, at the height of the midnight hour, Zahhak’s soul left through mouth and went high into the heavens where it exploded. This shows the completion of the Kundalini Rising, and Zahhak’s completion of the Great Liberation. Looking upon this in the eyes of a Traditional Ahrimanist, this was also Zahhak’s exorcism of his soul, the pedometer of his Karmic Debt was destroyed along with his “cosmic morality.”
Each night two young men, either peasants or of noble stock, were brought to Zahhak’s palace. There, in the hope of finding a cure for the king’s malady, they were killed and their brains made into a meal for the snakes. Let’s look at this from a less graphic and more metaphoric understanding while thinking about how the righteous attack a publicly evil person. They were trying to have good moral men talk Zahhak out of being “evil.” If we look back in the Bible of Corruption, Ahriman told Ahura Mazda that he make all of Ahura Mazda’s creatures love Him and attack Ahura Mazda, Zahhak is turning righteous men evil in the metaphor of the snakes eating the brains of these young men.
See what God did to Zahhak, when he still had forty years to live. Late one night he was sleeping with Arnavaz when he dreamed that three warriors suddenly appeared from an imperial palace. The youndest of the three was as tall as a cypress tree, the royal far radiated from him, and he strode forward between the other two like a prince, ready for battle and bearing an ox-headed mace. He attacked Zahhak and smote him on the head with his ox-headed mace. The young man flayed him from head to foot, tied his hands behind his back, and set a yoke on his shoulders, then he dragged him to Mount Damavand with a group of onlookers following. Zahhak writhed in his sleep, and felt that his liver would split with terror; he cried out, and his pillared chamber shook with the noise. His beautiful serving girls sprang up at their master’s scream, and Arnavaz said to him, “Tell me, my lord, what is troubling you; you are sleeping safely in your own house, it must be something in your soul that has terrified you. The seven climes are yours to rule, and animal, men, and demons watch over your safety.”
Just as Zurvan sacrificed for a 1,000 years to create both Ahura Mazda and Angra Mainyu, here we see the constant harassment and the fact that Zahhak never corrupted his Buddhi with Aka Manah. The theory here is, since the Nagas where constantly whispering in Zahhak’s ears, this should have provided the protection and overriding other’s speech toward Zahhak. Over time, it appears that Zahhak never separated himself from his religious upbringing and took all the spiritual and religious threats seriously. Since Zahhak’s Buddhi was still attracted to Zurvan (Fate), and in turn this created a Crisis of Conscience inside Zahhak. Through Zahhak’s Buddhi, the righteous won the battle of Zahhak’s mind, thus ending the internal spiritual and subconscious battle.
“You are God-fearing noble men, and if you’re of Feraydun’s party, free yourself from Zahhak’s chains; this king is Ahriman, and in his heart he is God’s enemy.” The righteous will also fight with the weapon of publicly exposing your religion and worship. This a double-sided sword, it designed to turn people away from you and isolate you, since most people require some form of group acceptance this does produce effects of those weak in constitution and fortitude. As a Traditional Ahrimanist, one should be prepared to have few positive connects till one acquires power within their community, and even those are tentative because of your power. You must become your power source, yes the Daeva can be as well, and on this path you will be lonely and should look to animals as friends to fulfill that need of acceptance. Look beyond the rumors and ill words and see them for what they are, your rise in power.
Jealousy of his rival’s success made Zahhak seek another remedy. Separating himself from his men, he dressed himself in iron armor so that he was unrecognizable, seized a lariat of sixty lengths, and made his way onto the roof of the palace. From there he could see the blackhaired sorceress Shahrnavaz, her cheeks as bright as day, her hair as dark as night, closeted with Feraydun and cursing Zahhak. He knew then that what happened was fated by God, and that he would not escape from the evil fate that was in store for him. The fire of jealousy flared up in his mind, and forgetting his throne and he risk to his life, he let himself down into the palace with his lariat. He did not announce himself, but drew a glittering dagger, intent on shedding his handmaidens’ blood. As Zahhak’s foot touched the ground, Feraydun leapt forward like the wind and brought his ox-headed mace crashing down on Zahhak’s head so that his helmet was shattered. At that moment the angel Sorush appeared and said, “Do not strike him again; his time has not yet come. Now that you have broken his power, bind him and take him to where you see a pass between the mountains. He will live imprisoned within the mountain, and his people will never be able to reach him.”
Here lays the defeat of Zahhak, and we should take serious note of this defeat because it is this same type of defeat that has happened in a repeating cycle throughout time. This is the precedence of all good triumphs over evil, and we as wiser proponents of evil should cut this law at its roots and become the evil which defeats good. Our first priority is to make the conscious decision to dedicate our lives to evil, do nightly religious and spiritual working to corrupt our Buddhi, maintain mindfulness of the stimulus we allow ourselves around, maintain mindfulness of our thoughts and subconscious reactions, limit contact with the enemy, and learn how to read your emotion so you can control them with logic. Through our nightly rituals we gain spiritual strength, senses, and fortitude which give us the tools required to defend ourselves from the enemy’s attack both mentally and spiritually. Devotion to the Devil and His Daeva will give us all we need spiritually to not only defend ourselves from the enemy, also attack the enemy with the Nagas of Ahzi-Dahaka which also gives us the power to control the Ahrimanic Impulse instead it controlling us.
The bound Zahhak was led out, ignominiously flung on a pack animal’s back, and taken to Shir-Kahn. When they reached the mountains, Feraydun wished to kill Zahhak, but again Sorush appeared and spoke persuasively in his ear, telling him to take this solitary wretched captive to Mount Damavand. Feraydun did this, as quickly as a courier travels, and imprisoned Zahhak in Mount Damavand, loading chains on him, and confining him to a narrow cave that seemed to have no end. Heavy nails were driven into his body, avoiding his vital organs, and pinning him to a rock so that he would suffer there for a long time. And so he was left, hanging in chains, with his heart’s blood staining the ground.
Again, this account is slightly different, because Ahzi-Dahaka is actually immortal and was nailed to the cave walls of Mount Damavand to keep evil imprisoned. Mount Damavand is an active volcano and the top of this volcano has vent that spew lava and these vents are considered Arezura aka the gates of Hell. At the bottom of Mount Damavand, there are caves that lead into the mountain and are accesses by boat. Through these watery caves is from where the Druj and Divs come from at night to spread their filth. This mountain, this volcano is our place of spiritual homage and is revered as such.
Looking through the Traditional Ahrimanist eyes’s, this final imprisoning of Zahhak in a cave that is located in the volcano that supports the gates of Hell, shows how mankind handles its shadow aspect. Nail down its animal impulses till the “volcano” either vents or erupts to express itself, and after this event occurs they just hide back in the cave. If the expression of the animal nature gets to wild, they either move the individual to a new place or put him through judicial processing to keep from repeating a violent over expression. Knowing that they are in the habit of suppressing their animal nature, and the expressing of this nature is brought on by the Ahrimanic Impulse, allows us to use the tools of the devil: vexation and doubt. Think of their evil expression as being equal to the crisis of conscience, and during or after this is event is the best time to attack the enemy because he needs to be alieved guilt.
