Worst enemy to the pashtoons

[Tjanaparh]

one word: Pashtunwali. This was what they had practiced along with Buddhism before the arrival of Islam. It is simple really, the Buddhas of Bamyan are the proof of this.

Dear brother, I am interested really to immagine how Pashtunwali did coexist with buddhism?

Could there have been Bon and Zartushti faith among Pashtuns too?

[Khostai]

Dear brother, I am interested really to immagine how Pashtunwali did coexist with buddhism?

Could there have been Bon and Zartushti faith among Pashtuns too?

Pashtunwali was difrent at that time, becuase we had a difrent religion the Pashtunwali of today is difrent becuase we are muslims.

You must replace Pashtunwali with the word culture, its the same, its not written in the stone, and if we Pashtuns become like more secular than the Pashtunwali will also change again. Peopel who think that in the Budhist era Pashtuns acted the same like now, are wrong.

I bet Armenians had also difrent culture before christianity, but still your Armenian indentity excisted before christianity.

[Tjanaparh]

Pashtunwali was difrent at that time, becuase we had a difrent religion the Pashtunwali of today is difrent becuase we are muslims.

You must replace Pashtunwali with the word culture, its the same, its not written in the stone, and if we Pashtuns become like more secular than the Pashtunwali will also change again. Peopel who think that in the Budhist era Pashtuns acted the same like now, are wrong.

I bet Armenians had also difrent culture before christianity, but still your Armenian indentity excisted before christianity.

Dear brother, that question iss difficult to answer. First of all not all armenians are christian, me i follow for example our traditional faith. Also there are many muslim armenians in turkey, they are called Hamshentsi or Hamshenahay.
to answer your question, our culture exists alsoamong christians but they mostly follow it only partly or even not at all. Christianity strongly opposed many armenian principles, so there have been many wars and conflicts between us and our christian brothers in history, due to various reasons it was christianity that took over and the fidel peole or migrated to north or hided their identity or got killed.


Our culture is also not written in stone, but our culture taught words to be much more important as writing was seen as weakness of mind. I thought that the main basis of Pashtunwali existed alreadybefore Islam?
Do you have more informations on that?

[Khostai]

Dear brother, that question iss difficult to answer. First of all not all armenians are christian, me i follow for example our traditional faith. Also there are many muslim armenians in turkey, they are called Hamshentsi or Hamshenahay.
to answer your question, our culture exists alsoamong christians but they mostly follow it only partly or even not at all. Christianity strongly opposed many armenian principles, so there have been many wars and conflicts between us and our christian brothers in history, due to various reasons it was christianity that took over and the fidel peole or migrated to north or hided their identity or got killed.


Our culture is also not written in stone, but our culture taught words to be much more important as writing was seen as weakness of mind. I thought that the main basis of Pashtunwali existed alreadybefore Islam?
Do you have more informations on that?

I think you answered your own question here, when Islam took over it rejected some aspects of the old Pashtun culture ( the same as christianity in Armenia) like women going outside without a veil was prohibited, and also thanx to Islam chadari had become mainstream in Pashtun culture and accepted, becuase Islam promotes covering for women.
The main basis of Pashtunwali existed before Islam, if we like to belive that Pashtuns are ancient peopel of 5000 years of history, but peopel have doubts that Pashtuns excisted for 5000 of years, becuase there are no old Pashtun writings or old Pashtun cultural artifacts, its all kind of vague.....And if you look at Pashtun DNA study its show us that we Pashtuns are really mixed. So some of our ancestors were living in Afghanistan for tousand of years but our other part of the ancestor came just recently and added and modiefied the culture of the peopel.
You can't belive that for 5000 years Pashtuns lived and acted the same way as what we do today, I bet our language was totaly difrent if we go a 1000 years back in history.
I can not really answer you question with hard evidence, becuase there is no hard evidence to back it up if its about the Pashtunwali.

Maybe some peopel here know more about it, I would also like to know more about how Pashtunwali came in to being and if it is really that old as peopel say it is.

[Tjanaparh]

I think you answered your own question here, when Islam took over it rejected some aspects of the old Pashtun culture ( the same as christianity in Armenia) like women going outside without a veil, and also thanx to Islam chadari had become mainstream in Pashtun culture and accepted, becuase Islam promotes covering for women.
The main basis of Pashtunwali existed before Islam, if we like to belive that Pashtuns are ancient peopel of 5000 years of history, but peopel have doubts that Pashtuns excisted for 5000 of years, becuase there are no old Pashtun writings or old Pashtun cultural artifacts, its all kind of vague.....
I can not really answer you question with hard evidence, becuase there is no hard evidence to back it up.

Maybe some peopel here know more about it, I would also like to know more about how Pashtunwali came in to being and if it is really that old as peopel say it is.

Well, as supposedly both us and You derive from indoeuropeans it is quiet logic that scriptures di not exist as writing system came from other peoples in indoeuropean culture. But this is the problem for todays mindset. People do not believe in words in todays culture, they believe only in what is on paper or material. If you consider that for example Pashtuns lived the same simple life as today, it is quiet evident that not much can be found of material, i suppose?!

[Badlun]

The difference between Christianity and Islam is that Christianity was presented to the world in its true form as a religion(faith+worship+morality) and except few decades of Church as a state , Church never mingled with state and thus the social effects of Christianity were few like names, presence of cathedrals in city centers etc but it did not have far reaching influence on culture and society.

On the other hand Arabs were very vile and intelligent who mixed religion with culture, society, politics, economy and thus had larger effect as on Pashtunwali. This definitely disfigured Islam as a religion and became a tool for Arab Imperialism and now for terrorism but many ethnicities and nations like Pashtuns, Barbers, Turks, Egyptians etc lost their original cultures and identities as totally submerged by Islam.

[RevolutionThroughReason]

Real Sufis don't care about things like culture; these are worldly concerns; they're focused Only on God.

Real Pashtun culture never existed in Ancient Times because Pashtuns are a mix of Turks, Sakas, Hepthalites and Kushans. If anything Pashto destroyed the cultures of people who eventually became Pashtun, like the Ghilzais who were originally Turkic speaking but adopted Pashto over time. So where could Pashto come out of all of this? That's just the reality of life. no big deal. Pashto evolved probably just a dialect of Soghdian and Khotanese whose speakers were originally Tajiks. If that's the case Pashtun cullture developed long after Islam came to the region.

[RevolutionThroughReason]

Dear brother, I am interested really to immagine how Pashtunwali did coexist with buddhism?

Could there have been Bon and Zartushti faith among Pashtuns too?

I don't think Pashtunwali co-existed with Buddhism because I believe at the time Buddhism was predominant, Pashtuns as an ethnic group probably did not exist. What happened is that the ANCESTORS OF Pashtuns came from a diverse range of Indo-Aryan peoples, SOME were Buddhist, SOME were Hindus, SOME were Zoroastrians, SOME were Manicheans. When the various invaders and conquerors uprooted these people they ended up melding and blending over time and Pashto probably evolved out of that gradual trend. There are studies which link Pashto to Soghdian, so Pashto probably evolved as a dialect of Soghdian and lesser known Indo-Iranian languages but this probably happened recently because there is NO records prior to maybe 1100 AD of anything related to Pashto. Except Puta Khizana , but that is said to be a possibly a forgery. Some allege it may have been forged by Dr. Abdul Hai Habibi, who was alleged to have miraculously found the manuscript.

[Kushan Prince]

Real Sufis don't care about things like culture; these are worldly concerns; they're focused Only on God.

Real Pashtun culture never existed in Ancient Times because Pashtuns are a mix of Turks, Sakas, Hepthalites and Kushans. If anything Pashto destroyed the cultures of people who eventually became Pashtun, like the Ghilzais who were originally Turkic speaking but adopted Pashto over time. So where could Pashto come out of all of this? That's just the reality of life. no big deal. Pashto evolved probably just a dialect of Soghdian and Khotanese whose speakers were originally Tajiks. If that's the case Pashtun cullture developed long after Islam came to the region.

RTR, The word pakhtun is derived from the word "Pakhta" and "Pactyans". These were the helenised words of pakhtun for Pashtun people. This was what Hedortus referred them as. As for Pashto,you have to understand that only its literature is 500 years old and Farley young. The language itself is 5000 thousand years old just as its people. The closest thing to Pashto was Bactrian, spoken by people who inhabited modern day Balkh and Avestan (old Pashto) this is probably a modern day dialect of Avestan.


As for sodighans, they lived further north of Afghanistan in present day tajikstan who came from the pamiri mountains. These are the modern day descendants of Tajiks but themselves were non exsistinct before Islam.

[Khostai]

RTR, The word pakhtun is derived from the word "Pakhta" and "Pactyans". These were the helenised words of pakhtun for Pashtun people. This was what Hedortus referred them as. As for Pashto,you have to understand that only its literature is 500 years old and Farley young. The language itself is 5000 thousand years old just as its people. The closest thing to Pashto was Bactrian, spoken by people who inhabited modern day Balkh and Avestan (old Pashto) this is probably a modern day dialect of Avestan.


As for sodighans, they lived further north of Afghanistan in present day tajikstan who came from the pamiri mountains. These are the modern day descendants of Tajiks but themselves were non exsistinct before Islam.

But how can a language excist for 4500 years without a writing system???

[RevolutionThroughReason]

RTR, The word pakhtun is derived from the word "Pakhta" and "Pactyans". These were the helenised words of pakhtun for Pashtun people. This was what Hedortus referred them as. As for Pashto,you have to understand that only its literature is 500 years old and Farley young. The language itself is 5000 thousand years old just as its people. The closest thing to Pashto was Bactrian, spoken by people who inhabited modern day Balkh and Avestan (old Pashto) this is probably a modern day dialect of Avestan.


As for sodighans, they lived further north of Afghanistan in present day tajikstan who came from the pamiri mountains. These are the modern day descendants of Tajiks but themselves were non exsistinct before Islam.

That's a very TENUOUS philological association at best. The word Pakhta is actually Bakhta referring to the Bactrians (which was where the reference in Greek texts alluded to). The Bactrians NEVER spoke Pashto, so how can they be Pashtun? Sure we can say perhaps some of their Population became the ancestors of certain segments of Pashtuns; BUT THEY THEMSELVES were not Pashtuns; if they were we'd find THOUSANDS of manuscripts of Pashto from their relics. We don't find a single one. And it makes sense because the Bactrians were HELENIZED , hence PAKHTA is referring to them, not us.....bingo! there's your clues.

RIght Soghdians live up North; Pashtuns and Tajiks have a common ancestors; some Pashtun clans like the Yusufzai are alleged to have Links with Tajiks. You do the Math.

[Tjanaparh]

The difference between Christianity and Islam is that Christianity was presented to the world in its true form as a religion(faith+worship+morality) and except few decades of Church as a state , Church never mingled with state and thus the social effects of Christianity were few like names, presence of cathedrals in city centers etc but it did not have far reaching influence on culture and society.

On the other hand Arabs were very vile and intelligent who mixed religion with culture, society, politics, economy and thus had larger effect as on Pashtunwali. This definitely disfigured Islam as a religion and became a tool for Arab Imperialism and now for terrorism but many ethnicities and nations like Pashtuns, Barbers, Turks, Egyptians etc lost their original cultures and identities as totally submerged by Islam.

Dear friend, You are wrong! When christianity came to me country it came in the most barbaric unmoral form. It won by intrigues and finding a substrate of already falling moral, that could easily be used. It mingled directly in state affairs (as however cathlic church did too).

Our main priest told to the main christian priest "lets avoid this bloody brother-brother war that will destroy our country", but the christian priest Grigor answered"No , we will exterminate You all with the name of Jesus".
You can find even all these descriptions in the history of armenian christian church written by a concinced christian, Agathageghos, he describes how the people who didn't want to convert were burned and calls them devils...
Still christianism, when it won the benevolence of the kings, had to fight for 400 years against the resistance of the people.
I do not want to say anything regarding the culture before, as our kings rule destroyed our culture even before christianism (that is due to our kings weren't armenians but to distance themselves from persia(where they belonged to) they embranced every kind of greek idolatry.

[Tjanaparh]

But how can a language excist for 4500 years without a writing system???

Look at Pamirian languages, many of them have no writing system till now. They differ from other iranic languages but still you can understand that they are iranic languages!

[Tjanaparh]

That's a very TENUOUS philological association at best. The word Pakhta is actually Bakhta referring to the Bactrians (which was where the reference in Greek texts alluded to). The Bactrians NEVER spoke Pashto, so how can they be Pashtun? Sure we can say perhaps some of their Population became the ancestors of certain segments of Pashtuns; BUT THEY THEMSELVES were not Pashtuns; if they were we'd find THOUSANDS of manuscripts of Pashto from their relics. We don't find a single one. And it makes sense because the Bactrians were HELENIZED , hence PAKHTA is referring to them, not us.....bingo! there's your clues.

RIght Soghdians live up North; Pashtuns and Tajiks have a common ancestors; some Pashtun clans like the Yusufzai are alleged to have Links with Tajiks. You do the Math.

May however the Bactrians have participated in the ethnonym PASHTUN?
Also won't it be difficult to draw i direct line between Pashtun in history and non Pashtun ?
Where to draw it? If I understood You right it should be in the begining of Islamic era? or after? or before?

[RevolutionThroughReason]

May however the Bactrians have participated in the ethnonym PASHTUN?
Also won't it be difficult to draw i direct line between Pashtun in history and non Pashtun ?
Where to draw it? If I understood You right it should be in the begining of Islamic era? or after? or before?

That's what I'm saying to ASSUME that the Pashtuns "were" these people is TENUOUS; it's a speculation. However the evidence points to them not being Pashtun at all.

I would say that Pashtuns as a distinct identifiable ethnicity probably between 1000-1100 AD because we only find a specific reference to Pashtuns "proper" around this time. That's my speculation but I'm basing this on the evidence we have available.