The Aztecs by Carrasco David;

The Aztecs by Carrasco David;

Author:Carrasco, David;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Published: 2012-09-22T04:00:00+00:00


Worldview and sacrifice

The ritual practice of human sacrifice is closely connected to the shape and rhythms of Aztec worldview or cosmovision, which posited two distinguishable parts of the universe: the space-time of the gods and the space-time of the creatures of this world that the gods created. Human beings, animals, plants, celestial objects, minerals, and rain occupied this visible space-time world that divine beings penetrated through malinalli, or double-helix-shaped portals located in trees, creeks, caves, and elsewhere. In Aztec mythology, divine beings temporarily departed their space-time and infiltrated everything on earth giving them their identities, energies, and powers to live and procreate. All creatures and forces on earth and in the air were made up of subtle, eternal divine substances and hard, heavy, destructible worldly substances that served as shells to the divine substance. All life forms on earth were hard shells covering the divine substance within.

During various stages of the creation of the world some gods violated divine laws and were expelled from their cosmic region, and then came to the surface of the earth in primordial times. In one version of this creation story, a group of divinities gathered in the darkness in Teotihuacan and created a fire to help them determine the cycles of life on earth and in the heavens. One of these earthbound divinities, Nanahuatzin, threw himself in an act of self-sacrifice into the bonfire at the center of the group and descended into the underworld. As the other deities waited apprehensively around the fire in the darkness, Nanahuatzin was transformed into the first creature of the new cosmos in the form of the sun that slowly appeared above the horizon in the east. But once it appeared above the horizon, the sun stopped its upward movement and wobbled from side to side. The other gods, realizing they too had to “sacrifice” themselves in order for the first solar cycle to commence, sacrificed each other and descended into the underworld for a period of incubation. Like the sun, they acquired the heavy and destructible coverings associated with life in this space-time and appeared above the surface of the earth shrouded in these material coverings.

All the beings on the surface of the earth, such as fish and amphibians, deer and other animals of the forest, insects and birds, thus became manifestations of deities whose sacrifices and descents into the otherworld had turned them into creative beings. When these multiple sacrifices had taken place, the sun started to move on its celestial path as human, plant, and animal life began to exist. In this worldview the self-sacrifice of the divinities led to the creation of life in the earthly space-time. In addition, the multiple sacrifices of the gods were required to bring about the creation of the world.

Within this cyclical system of creation, destruction, and rebirth, a regular system of communication between the world of the deities and the world of creatures was established. Gods could enter and withdraw from the world through malinalli portals located throughout the world.



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