Daēvas
DAĒVAS
A term applied to certain Persian divinities. The Iranian opposition between ahuras and daēvas is ancient since it is paralleled in India, although with different values for the asuras and the devas. The asuras, as opposed to the gods who were mere gods (devas, "celestial beings"), had a more moral, abstract quality. This contrast developed in India and in Iran but in two different directions. In India, the moral quality became occult, evil, and the asuras, in the classical period, became demons, leaving the devas as the only gods. In Iran the opposite took place; the ahuras monopolized divinity at the expense of the daēvas who sank to the level of demons. Thus Indra is a god in India, but a demon in Iran. Zoroaster opposed the cult of the daēvas, as did Xerxes, according to a recently discovered inscription.
Mazdaean propaganda never was able to stamp out the cult of Ahriman and the other daēvas, which is still attested, e.g., in the Latin Mithraic inscriptions Deo Arimanio (e.g., Corpus inscriptionum latinarum (Berlin 1863–) 3.3415).
For bibliography, see amesha spenta; persian religion, ancient.
[j. duchesne-guillemin]