Muslims believe that God’s mercy and guidance are not only restricted to the Middle East area, but include all humanity, and they were not restricted to the known Abrahamic faiths — Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.

Muslims cannot say that because no prophet of Zoroastrianism, Buddhism, or Hinduism is mentioned in the Quran then these religions are free or void of any credibility or that they have nothing to do with the message of various prophets, because Allah says in the Quran what means:

{To every people (was sent) a messenger.} (10:47)

And He also says what means:

{And (We sent) messengers We have mentioned to you before and  messengers we have not mentioned to you.} (4:164)

This means that there were prophets who were not mentioned in the Quran, but that does not dismiss the reality that they were messengers from God.

Even though the form of religion present now in these scriptures may not appear as purely monotheistic as the Quran, it is quite possible that the original was pure.

But the problem is that by the passage of time, adulteration or change of the original teachings of the various prophets throughout the world happened because these scriptures, according to the Quran, show essentially the same basic fundamental truth: the oneness of God.

By the passage of time, it became rather difficult to discern which portions are indeed the authentic, pure teachings of those prophets and which sections were basically cultural adaptations or adoptions. However, the Quran indicates that all prophets spoke about the advent of Prophet Muhammad and gave descriptions of that last prophet to come, and till now there are some remaining prophecies in these scriptures that speak about the advent of Prophet Muhammad.

Prophecies of the Prophet Muhammad in Zoroastrianism 

The religion Zoroastrianism comes from the name of Zoroaster, who was a religious reformer in ancient Persia. Zoroastrianism is sometimes referred to also as Magianism, from Magian, or as the religion of fire worship. Zoroastrians are said to believe in two gods: one god for good or light, and one for evil or darkness.

“However Zoroastrians actually consider themselves to be monotheist, they believe that God is one, that there is none like God, that He is the Creator of all things and that one should not despair of God’s mercy. One statement in their teachings says, “Neither the eye can behold Him nor the power of thinking can conceive Him.” (Vidyarthi)

So the teachings in the ancient scriptures of Zoroastrians are somewhat consistent with both the Bible and the Quran.

Some people dismiss Zoroastrianism as paganism or fire worship, but it is said that originally the fire was a symbol of the covenant with God or the commitment to follow the divine light and to abide by the religious laws; the aberration happened when some people or followers later on started to worship the fire itself, so it developed from being a symbol to being an object of worship.

There are several clear prophecies about the advent of Prophet Muhammad in the Zoroastrian scriptures. The first one is mentioned in the Zend Avesta (first category of the Zoroastrian scriptures) which says that the burning fire that they used to have constantly burning in their temple will actually be extinguished, and historically speaking, it is reported that when Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) was born, for the first time that fire was extinguished in Persia.

Also the extinguishing of the fire could imply the disappearance of that form of religion as developed after Zoroaster, because when Islam came to Persia, very few Zoroastrians were left because the rest embraced Islam.

The other aspect of that prophecy is that when this fire is extinguished, it would be associated with the so-called powerful restoration of the world, and that may imply the correction of the adulteration or deviation that have taken place after Zoroaster.

The other prophecy is from the Dasatir (the second category of Zoroastrian scriptures) which says that while people are so much engaged in deviation from the path of truth, there shall arise a man among the Arabs, as interpreted from the original words, who is going to overthrow the oppressive government, and that was the kind of government that existed in Byzantine and Persia in the early days of Islam.

It also said that those who used to direct their prayers towards the temple of fire will direct their prayer now towards another house which will be stripped of its images. It is known that the Ka`bah, toward which the Persians now turn in prayer as they have become Muslims, was actually filled with idols by the Arabs; it was only through the advent of Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) that it was purified and stripped from all of these idols and that the purity and simplicity of the worship of One God was restored again.

The scriptures indicate that the person who will bring about that change is one who will be a law-giver, someone who received revelation in the form of law, and that applies to Prophet Muhammad.

It also describes him as eloquent, and that description really fits Prophet Muhammad as he was very eloquent in his sayings and speeches. Also the Quran that God revealed to him is unsurpassed in eloquence.

Works Cited

Vidyarthi, Abdul Haq. Muhammad in World Scriptures. New Delhi: Adam Publishers, 1990.