“One faces the future with ones past” Peal S. Buck
This is just a start of a long conversation about Quetzalcoatl. Volumes have been written about this God/hero/priest/ king of our culture. His name means the Plumed Serpent. I have been engaged for the last 50 plus years in the pursuit of what Quetzalcoatl means to me as a Mexican-American I can wager the regular “carnal” on the street would be unable to give any information about our cultural hero yet the land of Mexico is dotted with magnificent archeological sites and temples dedicated to him. The Hopi tribe is awaiting his return, the Mormons think he was Jesus and some in New Age Circles think he was a space visitor.
The fact remains he is ours. Our most ancient ancestors the Olmecs portrayed a winged serpent in murals on the walls of temples in the Mexican states of Veracruz and Tabasco. This dates back 1500 BCE. The Olmecs were our mother culture and from there we migrated north and were Toltec people and others went south and were the Mayan people. The Teotihuacanos started their great ceremonial, astronomical site in Teotihuacan about 200BCE. That’s where we find the amazing temple of Quetzalcoatl adorned with the dramatic stone heads of the Plumed Serpent. Our Spanish fathers destroyed ancient books chronicling the teachings of Quetzalcoatl. All that remained were the stories carved in stone on the sides of pyramids, temples and pillars all across Mexico. We are part of an oral culture that passed these stories on to save them. After the conquest a tremendous genocide happened and over 8 million people were killed or became ill from new diseases that were brought by the Europeans. As we became a new race the old stories remained but were modified because of the change in religion and culture. Eventually we stopped hearing these stories.
As I explained in my earlier post. I grew up living on the site of the pyramid of Cholula. Cholula was a sacred city dedicated to the worship of Quetzalcoatl. I wanted as much of the story of Quetzalcoatl as I could get. My grandmother helped me with the stories’ but in my heart I was confused. How could my people have been part of all this greatness and on the streets of Los Angeles we were depicted as sleeping under cactuses? My father was called a “beaner” because of his accent. And, on a drive to El Paso we encountered many gas stations and restaurants that said no Dogs or Mexicans allowed.
My grandmother told me that Ometecuhitli, the great God of the Universe, had created the world 4 times. Each time God destroyed it because the people he created were out of harmony with him. Things were bad again and so all the gods were called to Teotihuacan for a council meeting. Ometecuhtli explained to his children gods that he was thinking of destroying the world again. And he would probably never create humans again because they were too much trouble. Quetzalcoatl volunteered to take responsibility for humans and teach us greatness so we could please our Creator. He blew our Sun out of the council fire and the Fifth world began. He gave us corn so we could eat; music so we could sing and writing so we could create books. He gave us mathematics, the ancient calendar and taught us how to build the pyramids. He was the father of our Mesoamerican Culture.
For a while everything was paradise. Then a deity named Tezcatlipoca “Smoking Mirror” came on the scene to challenge all the goodness that Quetzalcoatl had created. As Tezcatlipoca became more powerful he threatened to destroy humans unless Quetzalcoatl left and let him take over power of the world. Because of his love for humans, Quetzalcoatl agreed. He then proclaimed that he would return at the end of time to usher his people into the 6th World, a place of peace and harmony.
What gets confusing is there was a Historical Quetzalcoatl also. He was a Toltec Priest King who lived during the 1100’s CE in a place called Tula. His court was humanistic and practiced the highest ideals of beauty and peace. It seems that there was a shift in politics and culture at that time and the Toltec people started warring. At that time the practice of human sacrifice began being practiced on a larger scale. This is when the priest king Quetzalcoatl leaves and travels to the Yucatan spreading his gospel along the way until he leaves on a raft into the Atlantic, promises to return at the end of time and is set on fire and disappears into the heavens as the Morning Star
These ancient stories needed to be suppressed by our European conquerors because it gave us power. It was a promise of a return from our culture hero to bring back our greatness. Slaves could not have stories like this existing simultaneously as part of their consciousness. People were burned by the thousands for believing in the old ways. Quetzalcoatl was replaced by Jesus.
Quetzalcoatl promised to return and establish an era of peace and alignment with God. This would be a time when we could heal the past from pain and persecution. This would be a time to rehabilitate our planet and bring it back to the paradise the Creator had intended. That was the promise we had forgotten. The promise was remembered by the oral traditions among the indigenous populations of Mexico. It was never lost. The story was encoded in the Calendar system created by the Toltec’s and Mayans. (It is erroneous to call it the Aztec Calendar as they were new-comers to Mexico In the 13th century they came from the north and inhabited the area around present day Mexico City. They adapted the calendar making it their own)
The ancient calendar mathematicians were able to count 25,000 year into the past and 25,000 years into the future. The end of the calendar and the start of a new time corresponds with the date Dec 21, 2012. This is when our Sun will arrive in its orbit at the center of our galaxy, the Milky Way. This occurs once every 25,800 years. At that time we will be closest to the galactic center, the place of our cosmic birth. Our ancestors did not have telescopes but said we would be arriving at the hole in the middle of our galaxy in 2012. Scientists now confirm that there is a hole in the middle of the galaxy. This is the predicted return of Quetzalcoatl.
I propose that the events we are experiencing today in Arizona are part of a preparation for us as a people to claim our personal and collective power. If we are brave enough to fight for our civil rights we can be brave enough to improve our planet for everyone. Our cultural stories have been “whitewashed” and suppressed. We are the largest minority in the United States. By our presence we certainly shape things. Politicians want to woo us. Corporations want our money. Industry wants our skills. The military wants our brave young men and women. We have yet to lead or define ourselves. We have not used our power yet. Talk about power can be intimidating. Rosa Parks used the power of saying no when she refused to give up her seat. Few of us are that brave, but we can all vote; we can all get 10 people to register to vote; we can all call our elected officials and tell them SB1070 isn’t okay; we can get on to the White House website and leave our president a message. We can be brave enough to start telling our story. We can get ready for this new era on our planet that our ancestors predicted. By our bravery now we can raise ourselves and others up to a better life
No comments:
Post a Comment