Ahura Mazda/Ahriman

Ahura Mazda is the Zoroastrian high god of light. According to tradition, he is using humankind to defeat Ahriman, or Angra Mainyu, the devil figure of darkness, who has come to Earth to tempt humans away from the light. A battle of light and darkness, good and evil, is being waged that will end at the last judgment, when light will triumph and a new, purified Earth will enter into its prophesied eternal age of destiny.

(See also Apocalypse; Babylonian Captivity; Zoroastrianism)

Sources: Campbell, Joseph. The Inner Reaches of Outer Space: Metaphor As Myth and As Religion. New York: Harper & Row, 1986. Ellwood, Robert S., and Barbara A. McGraw. Many Peoples, Many Faiths. 6th ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1999.