Zoroastrianism's role in Christianity's Development: Christianity is one of the most popular religions of the early 21st century. Through the course of Christianity's first millennia it was able to rise from its original twelve followers to become the state religion of Rome and the mighty empire which it held. However, unbeknownst to many, the concepts that exist in Christianity and Judaism (the religion from which Christianity spawned) were initially conceived by the nearly dead religion of Zoroaster. Christianity is closely modeled after the Zoroastrain's beliefs in the afterlife, redemption, judgment, duality of deities, apocalypse and messiahs. Whether Christianity adopted or coincidentally shared the beliefs of the Zoroastrians is up for debate. Regardless, the similarities are staggering.Both Christians and Zoroastrians believe that there will be an apocalypse. When this apocalypse occurs it is believed that the world will be cleansed of non-believers and evil. This apocalypse will occur after a Messiah has arrived on earth. The Christians believe that Messiah will be Jesus, whereas the Zoroastrians believe that the messiah to spur the apocalypse will be the third Saoshyant.Both religions also share a critical component of their individual apocalyptic views. Zoroastrians and Christians both initially believed that the apocalypse would come quickly after the death of their founders. Obviously, that apocalypse never came and strangely enough, both religions adapted to this issue in the same way. They both took up a belief in millennialism. The Christians claimed that 1000A.D. would be the end. Of course that never happened, so they moved on to believe that 2000A.D. would be the date of the apocalypse, now they are somewhat undecided as to when the apocalypse will occur. The same plight occurred within the Zoroastrian faith. When Zoroaster died they waited patiently for the apocalypse to come. After a few years had...
