Haurvatat

Haurvatat /ˈhəʊrvətət/ (Avestan: haurvatāt) is the Avestan language word for the Zoroastrian concept of "wholeness" or "perfection." In post-Gathic Zoroastrianism, Haurvatat was the Amesha Spenta associated with water (cf. apo), prosperity, and health. Etymologically, Avestan haurvatat derives from an Indo-Iranian root and is linguistically related to Vedic Sanskrit sarvatāt "intactness, perfection". The Indo-Iranian root has in turn Indo-European origins. In Common Era Zoroastrian tradition, Haurvatat appears as Middle Persian Hordad, continuing in New Persian as Khordad. The Iranian civil calendar of 1925, which adopted Zoroastrian calendar month names, has Khordad as the name of the 3rd month of the year. The Avestan language noun haurvatat is grammatically feminine and in scripture the divinity Haurvatat is a female entity. However, in tradition (K)Hordad was/is considered male; this development is attributed to the loss of grammatical gender in Middle Persian. In Isis and Osiris 46, Plutarch translates Haurvatat as Πλοῦτος ploutos "wealth, riches" and equates the divinity with "Plutus," the Greek god of riches. Like the other Amesha Spentas also, Haurvatat is already attested in the Gathas, the oldest texts of the Zoroastrianism and considered to have been composed by Zoroaster himself. And like most other principles, Haurvatat is not unambiguously an entity in those hymns. Unlike four of the other Amesha Spentas, Haurvatat does not have a standing epithet that in later Avesta texts becomes an element of her proper name. Already in the Gathas, Haurvatat is closely allied with Ameretat, the Amesha Spenta of "Immortality". Addressing Ahura Mazda in Yasna 34.11, the prophet Zoroaster exclaims that "both Wholeness and Immortality are for sustenance" in the Kingdom of God. In the same verse, as also in Yasna 45.10 and 51.7, parallels are drawn between Ameretat and Haurvatat on the one hand and "endurance and strength" on the other. The relationship between Ameretat and Haurvatat is carries forward into the Younger Avesta (Yasna 1.