The lecture on Zoroastrian Hermeneutics in Late Antiquity, part of the Pourdavoud Institute Lecture Series, will take place on April 2, 2025, from 16:00 to 18:00 at Royce Hall 306, Dickson Plaza, Los Angeles. In this session, Yuhan Sohrab-Dinshaw Vevaina, Bahari Associate Professor of Sasanian Studies at the University of Oxford, will examine the exegesis of the Sūdgar Nask from the ninth book of the Dēnkard.

The Sūdgar Nask is one of the key commentaries on ancient Avestan texts, composed in Middle Persian (Pahlavi) during the Sasanian period (224–651 CE) and the early Islamic centuries. This valuable text, rich in hermeneutical and exegetical discussions, reflects the long-standing tradition of allegorical interpretation among Zoroastrian priests and their response to profound social changes in Iran at the time. Despite its significance in understanding the intellectual history of Zoroastrianism, linguistic complexities and the lack of a reliable translation have resulted in limited scholarly attention.

In this lecture, Vevaina will present the first critical edition, translation, and commentary of this work in two volumes, which will make a substantial contribution to linguistic, theological, and historiographical studies of Zoroastrianism. He argues that reading the Sūdgar Nask is a hermeneutic process in which Avestan and Pahlavi texts are intricately interwoven, generating new meanings.

Yuhan Sohrab-Dinshaw Vevaina, Associate Professor of Sasanian Studies and a Fellow at Wolfson College, University of Oxford, received his PhD in Iranian and Persian Studies from Harvard University. Before joining Oxford in 2017, he taught at Harvard University, Stanford University, and the University of Toronto. In 2023 and 2024, he published a two-volume critical edition and commentary on the ninth book of the Dēnkard, which was awarded the Association for Iranian Studies Book Prize for Best Book in Ancient Iranian Studies in 2024.

He is currently working on a book titled Topographies of Rhetoric and Moral Reasoning in Sasanian and Post-Sasanian Zoroastrianism, based on his four lectures at the École Pratique des Hautes Études in Paris in Spring 2024. Additionally, he is collaborating with Arash Zeini on a critical edition of the Epistles of Manuščihr, which will be published by Edinburgh University Press.

This lecture will be a valuable opportunity for scholars and enthusiasts of Zoroastrian studies, Sasanian history, and Pahlavi texts.

Time: April 2, 16:00–18:00
Location: Royce Hall 306, 10745 Dickson Plaza, Los Angeles, CA 90095, United States
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