The Concise Oxford Dictionary of World Religions (2733 page)

A religious community found among the Kurds of Iraq, Turkey, Syria, Germany, Armenia, and Georgia. Its nucleus was a Muslim
S
f
brotherhood founded in Iraq by the Arab sheikh Adi b. Musafir (
c.
1075–1162 CE), a descendant of the
Umayyad
caliphs (
khal
fa
). In the 14th–15th cents., a distinct religion emerged and was adopted by a number of the semi-independent Kurdish tribes. Expansion of the Ottoman Empire and subsequent persecutions caused massive defections to Islam. But the religion survived in the Sheikhan district N. of Mosul (Iraq), and in the Jebel Sinjar mountains to the West. Yezidis are also found in SE Turkey (many of them now in Germany), the Jebel Siman mountains west of Aleppo (Syria), and in Armenia and Georgia. The total number of Yez
d
s is around 200,000, of whom half live in Iraq.
The distinctive feature of the religion—a monotheistic faith incorporating many Jewish, Christian, and Muslim traditions—is the belief that the fallen angel
Lucifer
has been pardoned by God for his disobedience and that those who venerate him are the elect of humankind.
Yez
d
s are forbidden to use the term
Satan
, whom they call Melek Taus (‘Peacock Angel’). A large bronze image of a peacock is paraded at important festivals and for many years replicas were carried by alms-gatherers among Yez
d
villages. The Yez
d
s are not, however, devil-worshippers, as they have sometimes been called.
The tomb of Sheikh Adi at Lalish (a mountain valley north of Mosul, often itself called ‘Sheikh Adi’) is the principal shrine of the Yez
d