Yazidi Black Book

The Black Book claims to originate when the Lord descended Black Mountain. It is not divided into chapters and is longer than the Book of Revelation. The first half of it contains a creation myth, beginning with the creation of a white pearl and Melek Taus, the Peacock Angel. There follows an account of the Fall (in which the forbidden comestible is wheat), and the creation of Eve after Adam has been driven from Paradise.

This is followed by the names of ancient kings who belonged to the Yazidi community. Next comes a statement of food taboos of the Yazidis, prohibitions connected with personal hygiene and verbal taboos.

The discussion then reverts to the subject of ancient Yazidi kings, and the Book concludes with another account of the Creation, which diverges quite considerably from the first.

The Black Book's story of creation is similar in that it involves the first male and first female, named Adam and Eve (in the English translation), who bear children. However, it differs significantly from other Abrahamic religions in that Adam has children of his own accord first - in a squabble with Eve over who is responsible for begetting the human race, they both emit their "seed" into jars. After a certain amount of time, they open the jars and find that Adam's jar has a male and female child in it, whereas Eve's jar only has worms. This is the only known Adam and Eve story that has the male, Adam, birthing offspring autonomously. However, the Yazidis, according to the Black Book, are descended from Adam and Eve's subsequent children, not Adam's autonomously conceived children.[2]

The Black Book also includes narratives of how the Yazidi people have been targeted by Jews, Christians, Persians, and Muslims, who have tried to "subdue" the Yazidi people, to no avail. This narrative is similar to the Jewish texts and Christian Old Testament narratives of attempts by other tribes and religions to exterminate God's "chosen people".[2] The Yazidis have a historical record of persecution as well: they have experienced up to 73 attempts of genocide (a number self-reported from the Yazidi community), and the community numbers just a few hundred thousand. They have faced centuries of discrimination and violence on the charge of being "devil worshippers", based on their belief in the Peacock Angel Melek Taus, who has become synonymous with 'Satan' in many outsiders' perceptions of Yazidism[3].

However, this narrative is relevant for the 2010s and modern day, given that ISIL,[4] an internationally recognized terrorist organization, has been killing thousands of Yazidis and kidnapping just as many girls and women for sexual slavery. Moreover, this is not the first time that large groups of Yazidis have been targeted or experienced forced conversion. Several hundreds of thousands of Yazidis have been killed in past centuries, and several thousand more forced to convert to other religions - mainly Islam, due to geographic proximity and the Yazidis most recent home in northern Iraq[5].

The Black Book is significantly shorter than the holy texts of other Abrahamic religions, but still contains an eclectic array of directives and mythology, to the point that when combined with the Book of Revelation, some scholars refer to it as "confusing":

The religion of the Yazidis seems to consist of a... medley of beliefs and legends overlaid with superstitions. Thus it includes old Pagan elements (including worship of the sun and the moon); Iranian elements (echoes of Persian dualism); Jewish elements (prohibition of certain foods); features from Christian sects, especially Nestorians (e.g. baptism, a kind of eucharist, breaking of bread, etc.); Muslim elements (circumcision, fasting, sacrifice, pilgrimage, Muslim inscriptions on tombs, etc.); Sabaean (transmigration of souls), etc.[6]

This may be in part, if not entirely, due to the Yazidi holy texts as known were written by non-Yazidi observers. Due to this, cultural significance or overall practical coherence may be more difficult to convey, given that the authors of the manuscripts were non-practitioners of Yazidism. As well as this, since Yazidism is a religion centered on oral tradition and its population is geographically dispersed, it would be difficult to expect Yazidism to remain consistent over several hundred years.

The original Black Book, said to be written in about 743 AD, is reputedly kept in a village near Tigris. However, it is not known if the text is actually housed in a specific location or only exists through oral retellings. If the book is in Tigris, it is unknown if the original Black Book is simply a Kurdish translation of the English and Arabic Black Books, or if it is a different text entirely.[7] However, the presence of a textual Black Book and Book of Revelation alone may be enough to alter the Yazidi religion to become more consistent and coherent across villages[8]. This is due in part to the rising literacy rate among Yazidis, such that those who can read or write hold a more esteemed position, and the written word is treated as more valid than the oral tradition[5]. Overall, one would expect that as literacy continues to rise in the Yazidi world, the Black Book and the Book of Revelation - whatever their translation - will become more solidified as the most valued resources for a true account of Yazidi beliefs.

• The Black Book of the Yezidis (edited with an introduction by J. Lange). ISBN 1547149566

• English text of The Black Book, from Devil Worship; The Sacred Books and Traditions of the Yezidiz by Isya Joseph (1919)
• Devil Worship; The Sacred Books and Traditions of the Yezidiz by Isya Joseph (1919) The entire original book.
• A Syriac version of The Black Book, published in 1896.
• Robins, F. C. "The Yazidis." Oxford University Press (OUP), 2017. Link Here
• Spät, Eszter. "Religious oral tradition and literacy among the Yezidis of Iraq." Anthropos (2008): 393-403. Link Here
• Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant. Encyclopedia Britannica. 28 October 2019. Web. Link Here.
• Ebied, Rifaat. "Devil Worshippers: The Yazidis." Sydney Studies in Religion (2008). Link Here.
• Yezidi Scriptures. Yezidi Truth. International Order of Gnostic Templars. United States. Web. Link Here.
• Isya, Joseph. "Sacred Books and Traditions of the Yezidis". 1919. Web. Link Here.
• Asher-Schapiro, Avi. "Who Are The Yazidis, the Ancient Persecuted Religious Minority Struggling to Survive in Iraq?". National Geographic Magazine. 11 August 2014. Web. Link Here.