Avesta as "Fragments Tahmuras"; and the "Hadokht Nask" "volume of the scriptures" with two fragments of eschatological significance. Only texts preserved in the Avestan language count as scripture and are part of the Avesta. Several other secondary works are nonetheless crucial to Zoroastrian theology and scholarship. The most notable among the Middle Persian texts are the "Dēnkard" ("Acts of Religion"), dating from the ninth century; the "Bundahishn" ("Primordial Creation"), finished in the eleventh or twelfth century, but containing older material; the "Mainog-i-Khirad" ("Spirit of Wisdom"), a religious conference on questions of faith; and the "Book of Arda Viraf", which is especially
Violence and the Sacred Brown writes that Girard's purpose in "Violence and the Sacred" is to frighten people into returning to orthodox religion; Brown claims that Pope John Paul II liked the book. The religious studies scholar Catherine Bell writes that Girard uses "Freudian notions of desire, guilt, and an original murder at the hands of the group" to present "a theory of ritual sacrifice as the central act of a cultural system generated by primal violence." Bell finds Girard's views similar to those of the classicist Walter Burkert, as expressed in his book "Homo Necans" (1972). Chris Fleming writes that "Violence and the