Persian Friend

Hello Guys: I came across this article which I found very disturbing: http://www.zerbaijan.com/azeri/genocide_article.txt Unfortunately the same people who create this kind of misinformation/disinformation are also fanning the flames of separation in our Azerbaijan province which originally was called Azarbaadeguaan, the original inhabitants being an Aryan nation who after many years of Turkish occupation lost their language. I further find amazing the Jewish hypocrisy on this issue as properly displayed in this text.

Hello Guys: With respect to the Persian language I remember a few years ago I was reading a linguistic book whereby the Persian language was described as being the Eastern equivalent of the English language in terms of its historical development. England was conquered by the Normans around 1000 years ago and the Normans were French-speaking people from Normandy in Northern France and they governed England for about 400 years afterwards. As a consequence a great many French words entered the English language and became anglicized. This major historical event had a great impact on the syntax and semantics of the English language. Furthermore the language of science and scientific communication in Europe was Latin which was a Roman language which caused an influx of Latin words into the English language. Similarly Persia was also conquered by the Arabs and the Arabs ruled the country for many centuries. The lingua franca in this Islamic Empire was of course Arabic and all the Persian scientists were composing their works in this language. They even wrote the most complete grammar of the Arabic language. There were many words that entered the Arabic language from Persian and then reentered the Persian language in their Arabicized form but were pronounced with a Persian accent. As an example the word 'Barg' meaning leaf in Persian became 'Varagh' and took on the meaning of 'peace of paper' or 'leaflet' in Persian. Sometimes the words are wrongly assumed to be of Arabic origin whereby they are evidently Persian such as the word 'Borj' meaning 'Tower' is the Arabicized word for 'Borg' of course related to 'Burg' in German and other languages. There are attempts to reduce the occurence of Arabic words in the Persian language or to eliminate them altogether. During the reign of Reza Shah the Farhangestan was assigned the task of creating sound words to replace some commonly used Arabic words and some European loan words and the efforts continue even nowadays. For example the word for an airplane used to be 'Tayareh' and now it became 'Havapeyma' or the word 'Automobile' was replaced with 'Khodro'. But it is not easy to undo and unroll many centuries of literary works and popular culture. The Arabic words have been persianized in the sense that they have in many cases acquired differnt meanings and have taken on Persian prefixes and suffixes and are pronounced with a Persian accent. One of the effects of these conquests on the native languages has been that they caused these languages to be simplified in terms of grammar and also had an impact on the melody of the language and also added more expressive power to these languages because they considerably expanded the vocabulary. This also made for a more fluid conversation in these languages. Maybe that is why the English language is so well-suited for pop music or has a nicer ring to it than for instance the German language. Maybe that is why Persian poetry and music has been quite rich. I have heard many Persian Armenians, particulary singers attest to the fact that Persian is a more beautiful language for writing songs and it rhymes better and has a better ring to it. At one time a Persian Armenian co-worker also once mentioned/confided in me that his Persian Armenian girlfriend always insisted that they speak Persian although they had emigrated for many years and as a proud Armenian he wanted to speak Armenian foremost. All the best. Persian Friend.

Hello Guys: I was wondering whether anyone of you could provide some insight as to the cultural characteristics of Armenians from Iran as compared to those from Lebanon. When I see Armenians from Iran I sense they are very similar to us but when I compare them to Armenians from Lebanon I feel there are some differences. I also hear that the Armenians in Lebanon were not wholeheartedly accepted by the Christian Maronites from Lebanon. I would appreciate it if somebody could elaborate in an objective manner. Also what are the statistics on Armenians in Lebanon? Did most of them emigrate during the Lebanese civil war? Are Armenians still a sizeable minority in Lebanon? Thanks. Persian Friend.

Hi Guys: I thought you might find the information interesting and useful: http://www.iranchamber.com/monuments/histo...urches_iran.php http://www.iranchamber.com/people/armenians_in_iran1.php All the best.

Hi guys: This is an interesting site about Armenian Iranians. http://www.arir.org/ Unfortunately it seems to be only in Persian. Maybe you could send an email to the webmaster and ask also for an English translation to be prepared for future.

Could you give some examples please. Thanks.

Hello Guys: You know I always come to you with questions? Are there any Armenian names that do not end in _ian? The only Armenian that I know whose name does not end in _ian is the famous Persian-Armenian Tennis Superstar Andre Agassi. His father used to box for Iran's olympic game several times. What is interesting about his last name is that is also a Persian last name. One of the famous Persian folklore singer's name is Aghassi: http://www.iranian.com/Music/Aqassi/index.html I would appreciate if you could elaborate. Thanks.

I am asking this question since we Persians usually place more weight on what the Armenians think on this matter. (And I am not insincere) The Arabic positions on this matter will certainly not be well-balanced because of their long-standing feud with the Jews because of Palestine. But the Armenians by the virtue of the fact that they are not directly involved in Middle-Eastern affairs/conflicts and also because of their smaller weight in the region might be able to offer a more balanced and also objective view on this matter. The Armenians in the region also don't share the same historical burden of Anti-semitism as other Christian European nations and that is why their position would offer valuable insight. Thanks again for granting me permission in order to participate.

A European commission opinion poll that claims 60% of Europeans see Israel as the greatest threat to world peace has drawn outraged denunciations of anti-semitism. The poll surveyed 7,500 people in 15 EU countries who said Israel was a bigger threat to world peace than Iran, North Korea and the US. Regarding the charge of anti-semitism that some have seen as implied by the poll results, the following passage from an article by Anatol Lieven in the May 2003 issue of "Prospect" is relevant: "Finally, the use of the charge of antisemitism as a means of intimidating critics of Israeli policies into silence—an approach all too common in the US—should be publicly rejected by all who regard themselves as liberals. Its overuse, whether from cynicism or hysterical conviction, runs the risk of producing a self-fulfilling prophecy. Sooner or later, what should be a charge of crushing seriousness and moral weight will become a mere marketplace insult, and will produce in its targets just a shrug of the shoulders. "Moreover, the widespread use of this charge deals a blow to civilised debate. Because by its nature it can be neither proved nor disproved in most cases, it leads discussion away from the clearly-lit arena of rational discussion and towards the dark corridors of paranoia and conspiracy, gloomy chambers of the mind in which even Blair's criticism of Israel can be attributed, as one American official recently remarked to me, to 'traditional British antisemitism.' " I would like to know how the Armenians would have voted on this issue. I would appreciate to see a sample of your views. All the best. Persian Friend.

Iran has lost his king of pop Vigen: http://www.vigenmusic.com/ May his soul rest in peace.

Please contact http://www.pbs.org and order the documentary "The Mystery of The Three Kings". It could shed some light as to the origin of The Holy Trinity. You should see this as a sort of indirect rendering of events. The remains of the three Persian magi were unearthed and moved and buried in a church in Cologne in Germany. It will answer many of your questions. Form a purely political standpoint (I mean don't mix religion into it) many Persians think that they were behind the creation of Christianity and they also subsequently accuse the Romans to be behind the creation of Islam. Sort of a tit for tat. I will maybe later go into details as to why later on. Thanks. Persian Friend.

I was expecting more specific answers or some elaboration. Hopefully America-Hye will provide that extra edge. I also thought that given the fact that Armenia was for a long time an integral part of Soviet Union that its number one trade partner would be Russia because of the Russian type of infrastructure and industry and also in terms of previous administrative structure of Armenia as part of Soviet Union. Thus you must have come a long way quite fast implementing an industrial and administrative conversion. But thanks anyway. Persian Friend.

Hi America-Hye: Thanks for the information. Are those Jews such as the wife of Levon Petrosyan originally from Armenia? I mean do you have Armenian Jews like we have Persian Jews? If yes since when have they been living in Armenia? For instance the Jewish community in Iran is amongst the oldest in the world. Tthe Jews were so impressed by the benevolence of Cyrus the Great that some of them decided to stay in Persia and even have some religious monuments such as the Tomb of Esther besides numerous synagogues. Is it possible to be Armenian and not Christian? There are many Iranians in the US notably in LA that have converted to Christianity. Do you know of any Armenians who may have converted to Judaism or Islam based on their independent study? I would like to know whether there exists a viable Armenian comunity in Israel like the ones in Lebanon, France, US and Iran. If yes how large is that community? I would also like to know the extent of trade between Israel and Armenia if it is okay to disclose. And just one last comment. I have Armenian friends from Lebanon whom I have seen sometimes complain about the Maronites of Lebanon that they discriminate against Armenians although the Maronites are themselves Christians. Could you tell me the nature, extent and intensity of those discriminations. I am sorry if the list got too long. Appreciate your time and effort. Thanks again. Persian Friend.

Thanks America-Hye for the information. Unfortunately I did not have this information but appreciate tremendously that you enlightened me. That is why I always ask in my posts and also insist that some of my statements are not absolute. As any other person my experiences are limited. We cannot know everything, everywhere all the time. Our experiences and education are limited by time, space and content. Thanks again. Persian Friend.

Hi Jewish Friend: The Persian Jews are fine. They love everything Persian particularly the food and the music and also the culture. Ther Persian Jewesses are also very nice and they don't mind to marry a Persian guy since according to your religion children take on their mother's religion automatically. But somehow all my Persian Jewish friends got into either medicine, law or dentistry and I was in engineering. They all hated engineering. I know the bond between us goes back a long time: Cyrus the Great, the three Magi lead by Caspar, Ester and Mordecai and many others. Actually it may come as a shock to our Armenian friends that Christianity was conceived and created by the only two monotheistic people of that time the Aryan Persian monotheists (Zoroastrianism) and the Semitic Israeli monotheists (Judaism). Thus it is believed by many that Christianity was brought about by combining elements of Judaism and Zoroastrianism. The aim of the new religion was simple: to infect the Romans by a new religion and thus to weaken them by preoccupying them with the spread of this new religion. The Romans were bugging the Jews too much since they had occupied Judea and the Roman Empire and the Persian Empire were also rivals and locked in frequent conflicts. The Holy Trinity actually refers to the three Persian Magi Caspar, Balthazar and Melchior who came to Jerusalem and took baby Jesus under their wings and protected and promoted him. Any input on this issue by our Armenian Friends? But hey we should not take up too much space on the Armenian forum. What I always wondered about is that how come there are no Armenians and Jews who have intermarried. I mean I know about so many Persians and Armenians married together and as you mentioned there are also many Jews and Persians intermarried but there are no Armenians and Jews that I know off. Anybody feel like contributing on this issue? Take care.