Why is the word savah cf. Saoshyant important?

What do you mean by Savah? The first part of the name of Saoshyant or Vouru-Savah, one of the six helpers of Saoshyant? Anyway the word seems to be related to the Persian word "saod" which means "benefit, advantage".

I think I can answer that question.  The most literal translation of the word 'Saoshyant' is "future deliverer or world-savior," but it is from this expression that the Hebrew and Greek Messiah and Christ, respectively, came to mean "future deliverer" as well.  Originally the word Messiah or Christ only signified one who had been through the anointed with oil.  

Originally posted by Baal Melqart So tell me Cyrus, what is the most literal translation of the word 'Saoshyant'?

About the Persian word saod, as I mentioned above, according to my Persian dictionary, it comes from the verb "sui" (to swell, to succeed, to be strengthened), so the word actually means "increasing in size or number" or "gaining something more", I think it can be related to Old English "swith" which means "strong, very much, exceedingly": http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/swith

I'm not sure where this former got his information but he did appear to be an established linguist and this is what he had to say about the saoyshant - soter connection.  I'm pretty sure I've read about the same point in "Zoroaster's influence on Greek philosophy," but I can't find where I read it:

Greek sozein "to save" and its actor-noun soter "savior", both ubiquitous in gospel of John and other New Testament books. (English, like Greek, generally uses -er for the actor-noun affix "one who does [such-and-such verb]" but the -ant on Saoshyant is also an old Indo-European affix for that role, seen in some Latinate words in English like claimant, one who makes a legal claim, or Protestant, originally meaning one who protests.) The root is not the same *SALWE/SARWE discussed last time, but something like *SOTYE with a "palatalized" T that turns into a sibilant in some of the Greek (soZEin) and all of the Persian (saoSHYant) forms. What is particularly interesting linguistically here is that the initial S- in Saoshyant is from an original S in the Indo-European: I told you that "all" the original S turned into H, but there are a handful of exceptions (the word Avesta is another), and this suggests that these words were used religiously for centuries before Zoroaster (words used in repetitive chants, etc., are resistant to the pronunciation shifts that words used day-to-day undergo). The Greek word did not originally have a religious usage, and probably came to acquire one under the influence of the Persian cognate.

So is this forumer essentially saying that the Greeks adopted the Persian cognate or just that their usage of soter was influenced by the usage of its Iranian cognate?

Originally posted by mojobadshah I'm not sure where this former got his information but he did appear to be an established linguist and this is what he had to say about the saoyshant - soter connection.  I'm pretty sure I've read about the same point in "Zoroaster's influence on Greek philosophy," but I can't find where I read it: Greek sozein "to save" and its actor-noun soter "savior", both ubiquitous in gospel of John and other New Testament books. (English, like Greek, generally uses -er for the actor-noun affix "one who does [such-and-such verb]" but the -ant on Saoshyant is also an old Indo-European affix for that role, seen in some Latinate words in English like claimant, one who makes a legal claim, or Protestant, originally meaning one who protests.) The root is not the same *SALWE/SARWE discussed last time, but something like *SOTYE with a "palatalized" T that turns into a sibilant in some of the Greek (soZEin) and all of the Persian (saoSHYant) forms. What is particularly interesting linguistically here is that the initial S- in Saoshyant is from an original S in the Indo-European: I told you that "all" the original S turned into H, but there are a handful of exceptions (the word Avesta is another), and this suggests that these words were used religiously for centuries before Zoroaster (words used in repetitive chants, etc., are resistant to the pronunciation shifts that words used day-to-day undergo). The Greek word did not originally have a religious usage, and probably came to acquire one under the influence of the Persian cognate. So is this forumer essentially saying that the Greeks adopted the Persian cognate or just that their usage of soter was influenced by the usage of its Iranian cognate?