Prof. Dr. Kianoosh Rezania

Chair for History of Western Asian Religions

Director of the Käte Hamburger Kolleg Dynamics in the History of Religions
Professor of History of West Asian Religions
KHK Visiting Research Fellow 2014/15

Kianoosh Rezania holds a M.Sc. in Computer Science from Sharif University of Technology (Tehran 1998), a M.A. in Iranian Studies from the University of Tehran (2002) and a Ph.D. in Old Iranian Studies from the Georg-August University Göttingen (2008). Until 2003, he worked as a software-developer in Tehran. In 2004, he joined in the Department of Iranian Studies at the Georg-August University of Göttingen and commenced his Ph.D.-project on the Zoroastrian image of time, sponsored by the DAAD. Since 2011 he is a research associate (“Wissenschaftlicher Mitarbeiter”) in the Iranian Studies Department of the G.-A.-University of Göttingen and started at the same time his current habilitation-project on the conception of space in the early Zoroastrianism.

Kianoosh Rezania specialized in Old Iranian Studies, especially Zoroastrianism, but he is also interested in Indian Studies, Iranian religions, the history of religions and old Iranian languages. He is the author of Die zoroastrische Zeitvorstellung: eine Untersuchung über Zeit- und Ewigkeitskonzepte und die Frage des Zurvanismus (2010) and editor of Teachers and Teachings in the Good Religion: Opera Minora of Philip G. Kreyenbroek on Zoroastrianism (2013) and Raumkonzeptionen in antiken Religionen. Beiträge des internationalen Symposiums in Göttingen, 28. und 29. Juni 2012 (2014). During his fellowship with us, he will be working on a project entitled The Pahlavi-Literature in Its Context. The interreligious contacts of Islamic and Zoroastrian scholars in the 9th and 10th centuries and the genesis of the Pahlavi-literature.

Education

Ph.D., Old Iranian Studies, Georg-August University, Göttingen, Germany, 2008
M.A., Old Iranian Culture and Languages, University of Tehran, Tehran, Iran, 2002
M.Sc., Computer Science, Sharif University of Technology, 1998
B.Sc., Computer Science, Sharif University of Technology, 1996

KHK-Fellowship

Duration: October 2014 to March 2016

Publications

2025

Freudenberg, Maren, and Kianoosh Rezania. 2025. ‘Systematisierung der Zugänge’. In Handbuch Wirtschaft und Religion, edited by Maren Freudenberg, Moritz Hinsch, and Martin Lutz. Berlin: de Gruyter, Oldenbourg.

2024

Rezania, Kianoosh. 2024. ‘Eschatologia Iranica I: From Zoroastrian Cosmos to Abbasid Madīnat al-Salām’. Religions 15 (10). https://doi.org/10.3390/rel15101170.

2023

Freudenberg, Maren, and Kianoosh Rezania. 2023. Religionsökonomie: Einführung für Studierende der Religionswissenschaft und Wirtschaftswissenschaften (version Publisher’s Version). 1st ed. Trier: UTB. https://doi.org/10.36198/9783838559124.

Pourjavady, Reza, Kianoosh Rezania, and Kianoosh Rezania. 2023. ‘Safavid and Mughal Empires in Contact: Intellectual and Religious Exchanges between Iran and India in the Early Modern Era’. Entangled Religions, October. https://doi.org/10.46586/er.13.2023.11206.

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Rezania, Kianoosh, and Kianoosh Rezania. 2023a. ‘On the Concept of Leadership and the Office of Leader of the Zoroastrians (Hu-Dēnān Pēšōbāy) in Abbasid Zoroastrianism’. Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, March. https://doi.org/10.1017/s0041977x22000829.

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———. 2023b. ‘Review of Iranische Religion: Zoroastrismus, Yezidentum, Bahāʾītum’. Journal of the American Oriental Society [ISSN: 2169-2289] 143 (1). https://doi.org/10.7817/jaos.143.1.2023.r0018.

2022

Rezania, Kianoosh, and Kianoosh Rezania. 2022. ‘Did the Āẕar Kaivānīs Know Zoroastrian Middle Persian Sources?’ Entangled Religions [ISSN: 2363-6696] 13 (5). https://doi.org/10.46586/er.11.2020.8895.

Veisi Hasar, Rahman, and Kianoosh Rezania. 2022. ‘Transcendence between Expression and Secrecy : A Critical Cognitive Perspective on the Metaphorical Discourse of Yārsān Religion’. Iranian Studies 2022 (March). https://doi.org/10.1017/irn.2021.12.

2021

Rezania, Kianoosh. 2021a. ‘Manuščihr and the Epistles of Manuščihr’. Encyclopædia Iranica. https://referenceworks.brillonline.com/entries/encyclopaedia-iranica-online/manuscihr-COM_336458.

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———. 2021b. ‘Wie die Kuh auf den Mond kam: eine Schöpfungsgeschichte aus dem alten Iran’. In Wie die Sterne an den Himmel kamen, edited by Kianoosh Rezania, Judith Stander-Dulisch, and Franziska Burstyn, 51–58. Leipzig: Edition Hamouda.

Rezania, Kianoosh, Judith Stander-Dulisch, and Franziska Burstyn, eds. 2021. Wie die Sterne an den Himmel kamen: elf Geschichten aus der Zeit unserer Vorfahren (version Publisher’s Version). Leipzig: Edition Hamouda.

2020

Dehghani Farsani, Yoones, and Kianoosh Rezania. 2020. ‘Ibn Al-Malāḥimī on Zoroastrianism’. Iranian Studies 53 (5–6): 703–39. https://doi.org/10.1080/00210862.2020.1713058.

Rezania, Kianoosh. 2020a. ‘A Suggestion for the Transliteration of Middle Persian Texts in Zoroastrian Middle Persian: Digital Corpus and Dictionary (MPCD): A Three Layered Transliteration System’. Estudios Iranios y Turanios.

———. 2020b. ‘Tracing Zoroastrian Deities in Central and East Asia: The Case of Goddess Dēn’. In ゾロアストリアニズムと奈良・飛鳥文化を探る。. Vol. 4. Nara: 奈良県立大学ユーラシア研究センター.

———. 2020c. ‘“Religion” in Late Antique Zoroastrianism and Manichaeism: Developing a Term in Counterpoint’. Entangled Religions 11 (2). https://doi.org/10.46586/er.11.2020.8556.

Rezania, Kianoosh, and Eduard-Nicolaus Iricinschi, eds. 2020. Formative Exchanges between the Sasanid Empire and Late Antique Rome: Zoroastrianism, Manichaeism and Christianity in Contact (version Publisher’s Version). Entangled Religions 11. https://er.ceres.rub.de/index.php/ER/issue/view/170.

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Rezania, Kianoosh, and Kianoosh Rezania. 2020a. ‘Götz König. Studien Zur Rationalitätsgeschichte Im Älteren Iran. Ein Beitrag Zur Achsenzeitdiskussion’. Abstracta Iranica [ISSN: 0240-8910], no. Volume 40-41 (September). https://doi.org/10.4000/abstractairanica.50568.

———. 2020b. ‘Richard E. Payne: A State of Mixture. Christians, Zoroastrians, and Iranian Political Culture in Late Antiquity’. Entangled Religions [ISSN: 2363-6696] 3 (November): CXLVICLIII. https://doi.org/10.46586/er.v3.2016.cxlvi-cliii.

2019

Rezania, Kianoosh. 2019a. ‘The Place of Future: On the Correspondence between Temporal and Spatial Anterior/Posterior Markers in Avestan’. In Studi Iranici Ravennati III, edited by Antonio Panaino and Andrea Piras. Vol. 18. Milano: Mimesis.

———. 2019b. ‘The Place of Future: On the Correspondence between Temporal and Spatial Anterior/Posterior Markers in Avestan’. In Studi Iranici Ravennati III.

2018

Rezania, Kianoosh. 2018. ‘Zoroastrian Middle Persian: Digital Corpus and Dictionary (MPCD)’. Presented at the Digital Humanities Day, Bochum, July 6.

2017

Rezania, Kianoosh. 2017a. ‘Iran and Islam: Early Encounters’. Der Islam 94 (2): 319–21. https://doi.org/10.1515/islam-2017-0021.

———. 2017b. Raumkonzeptionen im früheren Zoroastrismus: kosmische, kultische und soziale Räume (version Publisher’s Version). Göttinger Orientforschungen, N.F. 14. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz.

———. 2017c. ‘The Dēnkard against Its Islamic Discourse’. Der Islam 94 (2): 336–62. https://doi.org/10.1515/islam-2017-0023.

———. 2017d. ‘The Sassanid Empire and the Rise of Islam, AD 300–800’. In Crossroads, 48–55. Zwolle: WBOOKS.

———. 2017e. ‘Zoroastrianism and Special Divine Action’.

———. 2017f. ‘Der Zurwān-Mythos: ein rituelles kosmogonisches Konzept zur Verzeitlichung der Ewigkeit’. July 12.

2016

Rezania, Kianoosh. 2016a. ‘Circumambulation of Fire in Contemporary Zoroastrianism and Its Transgression in Shiite Iran’. In Threads of Continuity, edited by Shernaz Cama, 251–59. New Delhi: Parzor Foundation.

———. 2016b. ‘Malkūs’. In Encyclopaedia Iranica, edited by Ehsan Yarshater. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. https://iranicaonline.org/articles/malkus-demon.

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———. 2016c. ‘Richard E. Payne: A State of Mixture. Christians, Zoroastrians, and Iranian Political Culture in Late Antiquity’. Entangled Religions. Bochum: Ruhr-Universität Bochum. https://doi.org/10.13154/er.v3.2016.cxlvi-cliii.

———. 2016d. ‘Pious Citizens: Reforming Zoroastrianism in India and Iran’. Iranian Studies 49 (6): 1109–12. https://doi.org/10.1080/00210862.2016.1241634.

2015

Rezania, Kianoosh. 2015a. ‘Einige Anmerkungen zur sasanidisch-zoroastrischen Religionspraxis im Spiegel der interreligiösen Dialoge der Christen und Zoroastrier’. In Begegnungen in Vergangenheit und Gegenwart, edited by Claudia Rammelt, Cornelia Schlarb, and Egbert Schlarb, 172–80. Berlin: LIT Verlag.

———. 2015b. ‘On the Old Iranian Social Space and Its Relation to the Time Ordering System’. In Before Islam, edited by Anna Krasnowolska and Renata Rusek-Kowalska, 1:177–90. Kraków: Jagiellonian Univ. Pr. https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/studies-on-the-iranian-world-before-islam/on-the-old-iranian-social-space-and-its-relation-to-the-time-ordering-system/D683345C499E983ED17CCCFF4EA2D3AD.

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———. 2015c. ‘The Economic Study of Ritual-Oriented Religions: The Neglect of Priesthood’. Presented at the IAHR World Congress, Erfurt, August 24.

Rezania, Kianoosh, and Kianoosh Rezania. 2015. ‘Siahpoosh, Hassan: Das Familien- Und Erbrecht Im Iran’. Orientalistische Literaturzeitung [ISSN: 0030-5383] 110 (1): 5860. https://doi.org/10.1515/olzg-2015-0021.

2014

Rezania, Kianoosh. 2014a. ‘Das Zentrum und sein Kreis, Ahura Mazdā und sein Kosmos: die rituellen und zeitlichen Homöomorphismen eines topologischen Modells’. In Raumkonzeptionen in antiken Religionen, edited by Kianoosh Rezania, 69:211–44. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz.

———. 2014b. ‘Einleitung: Raum und Religion’. In Raumkonzeptionen in antiken Religionen, edited by Kianoosh Rezania, 69:1–20. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz.

———. 2014c. ‘Immanenz und Transzendenz im Zoroastrismus: Absenz, Nachbarkonzepte und Entstehung’. Estudios Iranios y Turanios 1 (1). http://www.academia.edu/9835352/Immanenz_und_Transzendenz_im_Zoroastrismus_Absenz_Nachbarkonzepte_und_Entstehung.

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———, ed. 2014d. Raumkonzeptionen in Antiken Religionen: Beiträge Des Internationalen Symposiums in Göttingen, 28. Und 29. Juni 2012 (version Publisher’s Version). Philippika 69. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz.

Rezania, Kianoosh, and Camilla di Biase-Dyson. 2014. ‘Die altiranischen Raumkoordinatensysteme nach den avestischen und altpersischen Zeugnissen’. Presented at the Göttinger philologisches Forum, Göttingen, June 19.

Rezania, Kianoosh, and Kianoosh Rezania. 2014. ‘Panaino, Antonio / Sadovski, Velizar: Disputationes Iranologicae Vindobonenses, I’. Orientalistische Literaturzeitung [ISSN: 0030-5383] 109 (4–5): 377377. https://doi.org/10.1515/olzg-2014-0118.

2013

Boer, Roland T., Daniel Boyarin, Jörg Frey, Isaac Herskovitz, Gian Luca Potestà, Kianoosh Rezania, Hermann Spieckermann, and David Thomas. 2013. ‘Dualism, I. Ancient Near East’. Edited by Hans-Josef Klauck, Volker Leppin, Bernard McGinn, Choon-Leong Seow, Hermann Spieckermann, Barry Dov Walfish, and Eric Jozef Ziolkowski. Encyclopedia of the Bible and Its Reception. Berlin: De Gruyter. https://doi.org/10.1515/ebr.dualism.

Kreyenbroek, Philip G. 2013. Teachers and Teachings in the Good Religion: Opera Minora on Zoroastrianism (version Publisher’s Version). Edited by Kianoosh Rezania. Göttinger Orientforschungen 10. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz.

Rezania, Kianoosh. 2013. ‘Circumambulation: An Old Zoroastrian Ritual Practice?’ Presented at the Celebrating a treasure: 140 years at the First Dastoor Meherjirana Library, Navsari, January 14.

2012

Rezania, Kianoosh. 2012a. ‘Geschlechtsmoral Und Gleichgeschlechtlichkeit Im Zoroastrismus’. ZDMG.

———. 2012b. ‘Mazdakism and the Canonisation of Pahlavi Translations of the Avestan Texts’. In The Transmission of the Avesta, edited by Alberto Cantera, 20:479–94. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz.

———. 2012c. ‘Von der altiranischen Dichtung zur Yasna-Liturgie: über die Kanonisierung der liturgischen avestischen Texte im Zoroastrismus’. Zeitschrift für Religionswissenschaft 18 (2): 199–228. https://doi.org/10.1515/zfr.2010.18.2.199.

2011

Rezania, Kianoosh. 2011. ‘Pīrān Und Zeyāratgāh. Schreine Und Wallfahrtsstätten Der Zarathustrier Im Neuzeitlichen Iran’. Iranian Studies.

2010

Rezania, Kianoosh. 2010. ‘Die zoroastrische Zeitvorstellung: eine Untersuchung über Zeit- und Ewigkeitskonzepte und die Frage des Zurvanismus’. Göttinger Orientforschungen, N.F., 7. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz.

2009

Omarkhali, Khanna, and Kianoosh Rezania. 2009. ‘Some Reflections on Concepts of Time in Yezidism’. In From Daēnā to Dîn, edited by Christine Allison, Anke Joisten-Pruschke, and Antje Wendtland, 333–48. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz.

2008

Rezania, Kianoosh. 2008a. ‘Berliner Pahlavi-Dokumente: Zeugnisse Spätsassanidischer Brief- Und Rechtskultur Aus Frühlislamischer Zeit; Mit Beiträgen von Myriam Krutzsch Und Maria Macuch’. Studien Zur Indologie Und Iranistik.

———. 2008b. ‘Persische Zarathustrische Monāğāt: Edition, Übersetzung, Tradition Und Analyse’. Studien Zur Indologie Und Iranistik.

———. 2008c. ‘Zurvan: Limitless Time or Timeless Time?: The Question of Eternity and Time in Zoroastrianism’. Journal of the K. R. Cama Oriental Institute 2008 (68): 48–71.

Undefined

Akasoy, Anna, Sven Bretfeld, Alexandra Cuffel, Licia Di Giacinto, Zara Pogossian, Kianoosh Rezania, Julia Heinig, and Thomas Jurczyk. Published. Entangled Religions. Edited by Volkhard Krech. Bochum: Ruhr-Universität Bochum. http://er.ceres.rub.de/.

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Projects and Affiliations

Director of CERES Early Career Researchers' Program

Principal Investigator of How Sasanian Science and Literature passed on to the Muslims , CRC 1475 „Metaphors of Religion“ and Zoroastrian Middle Persian: Digital Corpus and Dictionary

Professor of Center for Religious Studies , CERES Directorate and CERES Teaching

Coordinator of History of Western Asian Religions

Project Leader of Graduate School of Metaphor and Religion and Subproject A04

Cooperation Partner of NFDI4Memory

Former Projects and Affiliations

Director of Käte Hamburger Kolleg

Individual Researcher of The Pahlavi-Literature in Its Context

Fellow of Käte Hamburger Kolleg

Colleague of Käte Hamburger Kolleg