Ancient Relationship Between Iran and Israel: Iran was called Persia in ancient times. Then the Rajdharma here was Parsi religion. Parsis are called Julastrian. When the Arabs attacked and captured Iran in the 7th century, the people here had to become Muslims who did not want to be migrated to India or other countries. But before Islam, Iran had a close relationship with the Jewish country of Israel. Ancient relationships between the two have been very deep and important from historical, religious, cultural and business point of view. Their history is from thousands of years ago.
1. The oldest Persian civilization: The roots of Persian civilization are more than 5,000 years old. The oldest settlements appeared in Elam, which is a region located in today’s southwest Iran. By 1000 BC, Indo-European tribes, especially Meds and Persian, moved to the Iranian plateau. These two groups soon decided the direction of the region. Meds founded a short -term empire in the 7th century BC, but eventually a visionary leader: Persian people led by Cyrus the Great left him behind.
2. Cyrus saved Jews: After the second exile of the Jews, when the forces of King Nabukdnesar II of Babylona attacked Jewish and destroyed the Jewish temple in 586 BC, most Jews were taken as slaves to Babylon (an important city of Iraq) as slaves. While there were still some Jews left in Judea, there were some who moved to Egypt, Elphantine Islands and other northern African places. The Jews who were not deported were living in poverty. His life deprived of his temple and religious leaders was decaying.
In the 6th century BC, Persian Emperor Cyrus Great conquered Babylon, when Cyrus gave freedom to the Jews and allowed them to return to Jerusalem and re -build their temple. Jewish texts, Hebrew Bible books Ezra and Ezra and Isaiah have been called “sent by God”. This is the only non-Jewish that received this title.
Cyrus also gave the Jews the option to either stay or go back to Jerusalem. Although he promised the reconstruction of the temple, unfortunately, he died before this dream realized. Later, between 521–516 BCE Persian king Derius paid from the Persian Empire’s treasure to rebuild another temple and sent items taken from the temple back.
3. Jews lived in Iran earlier: The Jewish settled on the Persian land on four different occasions:-609–611 BC, after the first exile of 722 BC, which was caused by Asirian. In 538 BC, 586 BC after the second exile, which was caused by Babylonia. Then after the destruction of the second temple by the Romans in 70 AD and in the 17th century, Spanish Inquisition and the Jews’ Ottoman Empire and later as a result of disintegration in Iran.
The Jewish community continued to flourish for thousands of years in Persia. Earlier thousands of Jews lived here and similarly Parsis lived in Jerusalem. In Persia, the Jews attained religious freedom, business and social reputation. One of the oldest continuous population of Jews was in Iran, especially in Susa, Hamdan and Isfahan. Relationships between ancient Persia and Jewish people are usually positive and helpful. Giving mercy and freedom to the Jews by the Persian emperors became an important part of the history of the Jews.
Some scholars believe that during the Persian Empire, Jews were under the Persian rule and some Jews served as officials of the Persian Empire. In addition, there are some predictions in the Bible that refer to the Persian kings, especially Cyrus the Great, who are seen as a liberator for the Jewish people.
4. Religious and cultural relations: The ancient Persia had a strong religion and coincides with the Judaism, such as: in a God, faith in God, the fight of good vs. evil, day of justice, prayer and many other things that make both religions equal. These similarities increased the cultural coordination between the Jews and the Persians.
