Mithra and the sun – Mithra as the Sun: The solarity question of the god Mithra in Iranian religious history from the point of view of comparative religious studies

The god Mithra/Mihr has played an important role in the religious history of Iran. Although the figure of Mithra is very complicated and has many different functions, one of his outstanding traits is his solarity. From as early as the 10th Yasht Mithra has been connected to the Sun, but researchers today continue to discuss how to understand his relationship with the Sun in this hymn. Some researchers equate Mithra with the Sun but the overwhelming majority of researchers see a difference between these two. The latter opinion is also supported by Greco-Roman authors such as Herodotus, Xenophon, Plutarchos, Arrianos and Curtius Rufus. However, from the Parthian period onwards these two gods have been more and more closely equated. This equation is confirmed by Strabo, inscriptions and reliefs from Asia Minor, and coins from the Kushan Empire. Mithra (Mihr) was also equated with the Sun in the Sasanian period. It has been suggested that this equation could have been influenced by Mesopotamian sources—Mithra was equated with son-god Shamash who was also the god of justice, like Mithra. In this lecture we look at the relationship between Mithra and the Sun through Iranian religious history and try to show how these two initially different deities became one and how the figure of Mithra changed as a consequence of being equated to the Sun.
Philippa Adrych, Robert Bracey, Dominic Dalglish, Stefanie Lenk, Rachel Wood. Images of Mithra. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017.
Michael Stausberg, Yuhan Sohrab-Dinshaw Vevaina (ed.) The Wiley Blackwell Companion to Zoroastrianism. Oxford: Wiley Blackwell, 2015.
Michael Stausberg. Die Religion Zarathustras: Geschichte, Gegenwart, Rituale. Bd. 1. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 2002.
Adrian David Hugh Bivar. The personalities of Mithra in archeology and literature. New York: Bibilotheca Persica Press, 1998.
Pierfrancesco Gallieri. “On the diffusion of the Mithra images in Sasanien Iran.” East and West, 40, 1990, 79-89.
Gherardo Gnoli. “Sol persice Mitra”. Ugo Bianchi (ed.). Mysteria Mithrae. Leiden: Brill 1979, 725-740.
Mary Boyce. A History of Zoroastrianism. Vol. Leiden: Brill 1975.
Ilya Gershevitsch. The Avestan hymn to Mithra. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1967.