Marriage

Author(s): Natubhai Shah
Publisher: UK Jain Academy

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inner and outer worlds, joy, and sweetness.
After the assembly is seated, first the bridegroom comes at the assembly hall. He is welcome there by the bride's mother. A fresh vertical mark with kumkum (vermillion powder) is made upon his forehead, and a little rice is stuck upon the moist kumkum mark and thrown over his head. Rice is considered to be the symbol of plenty and prosperity. Hence the showering of dry rice over a person is the usual Zoroastrian practise of ritually invoking blessings on all auspicious occasions. The officiating priests also, in performing the religious ceremony, and in invoking the blessings of God upon the couple, sprinkle rice over them. Before the recital of the marriage blessings, the bride and the bridegroom also throw upon one another a handful of
rice.
The mother of the bride takes an egg in her hand and passes it in a .clockwise manner seven times around the bridegroom's head and then thrown upon the ground and broken.. A coconut is then similarly passed round the head seven times and broken. A little water is then poured in a tray, which is passed round the head seven times, and then the water is thrown at the feet of the bridegroom. After the welcoming ceremonies on the threshold, the bridegroom is made to cross the threshold without placing his foot upon it. The bride also goes through the same welcoming ceremonies by bridegroom's mother and cross the threshold. The threshold is crossed with the right foot, which is always considered auspicious.
The Zoroastrian marriages are generally performed in the evening just a little after sunset. It is just the time when day and night unite. So, perhaps that hour is chosen to indicate, that just as day and night, light and darkness, unite together and melt into each other, so the marrying couple may unite together in prosperity and adversity, in happiness and grief, in danger and safety.
The bridegroom takes his seat first, and waits for the bride, who comes in, after a short time, to take her seat.
To make the bridegroom wait for the bride for some time, seems to be a custom prevalent among many people. Among the Zoroastrians of Iran, when, at the marriage time, the members of the bridegroom's family go to ask her to be present for the marriage, the bride does not go at once. Her relatives keep her away and say
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