Of the Vind'yuan assault.
1. SUDGA, the false, sent by De'yus to overturn the Great Spirit's dominion in Vind'yu, and to establish the highest heavenly place, Urvatooz, was wiser than Osiris or Te-in in his wicked work. For he permitted not his army, his thousand millions, to rush on for the places of worship and for the oracle-houses. But most deliberately halted his forces in Haroyu, the lowest heavenly place over the mountains of Vivrat, in Vind'yu, three miles high and broad as the earth, and a commanding situation.
2. Whence, in a sure way, he sent his measurers on ahead down to the earth, to measure mortals, as to their weakness and strength in faith in Jehovih (Ormazd), and other rulers, heavenly; to map them and mark them, and to number them.
3. Great was the peace and beauty and glory of Vind'yu in that day. Her rivers and canals coursed the country over, and her industrious sons and daughters, two hundred millions, were, in the eyes of the angels, the pride and glory of the earth. Hundreds of thousands of her people were prophets and seers. And so abundant was spiritual light amongst the people, that even those who had learned but one language could understand and speak other languages with people from remote parts; words and sentences they had never heard; even when first meeting strangers. Like the inhabitants of Jaffeth, as to government and industry, mostly by the exchange of goods, and not by buying and selling, lived the Vind'yuans. This was their weakest point, as to an assault.
4. Sudga said to his generals and captains: Only by confounding the languages of these people can they be broken up and subdued. Behold, they are becoming as Gods; knowing and understanding in advance of the words spoken. What, then, is their greatest liable shortness, save we confound them suddenly in the meaning of words? Fall ye upon them, and possess them, and obsess them, all who are easily captured. Get ye a foothold here and there in the first place; and in their commerce cripple them.
5. Sudga said: It is a strong city that maketh all kinds of goods; it is a weak place indeed that dependeth on another, which is far off. Such people are easily tripped up. Behold, I will teach these people that I am the militant before whom every knee shall bow; or, in failing to win them thus, I p. 405 will set city against city, and country place against country place; all against one another, for which their superabundant languages will furnish excellent material.
6. Sudga opened the door at night for his hosts to fall on the weakest of mortals, as to faith in Ormazd, Who had become as a stale story to hundreds of thousands of men and women. In Vind'yu had woman risen in knowledge, higher than the highest of women in other parts of the world. In the HOUSES OF PHILOSOPHY and HOUSES OF SCIENCE women were foremost, as to men, and skeptical as to the Ormazdian power.
7. On rushed Sudga's legions; and even as Osiris and Te-in won in the third assault, so now Sudga in the first. And, he too, sent word to De'yus, and exaggerated beyond all bounds of truth, as to his victories. Nevertheless, his hosts were sufficiently anchored on the earth to claim an everlasting victory for De'yus and to establish his name.
8. And here, also, after a few years, the questions came from mortals, asking thus: Behold, ye cut off the heavens of the ancients, the Nirvanian regions beyond Chinvat. Ye teach us that De'yus is the ALL HIGH RULER. What, then, is the all highest for man? How came the worlds? Whence came man? How was the creation created?
9. To answer which Sudga sent to De'yus for instructions. And De'yus sent to Sudga, even as to the other Gods, an invitation to meet in Hored, to hear the words of the Lord God, to learn his commands.
10. Thus invited, thus went the five great warrior Gods before De'yus, taking with them each his ten thousand attendants, besides thousands of trumpeters. De'yus had a good feast prepared for them; he had sent receivers forth to meet them and conduct them to Sanc-tu in great splendor.