Toltec Tripod Vessel (Quetzalcoatl Rebirth)
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$ 190.00
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Quick Overview
Jesus Christ, the Plumed Aztec Serpent
Surprisingly, the old Mesoamerican gods lived on long after the Spanish monks destroyed the Aztec capital of Tenochtitlan and imposed Catholic Christian culture and doctrines.
Spanish monks found that the Aztecs were quick to take to the new faith. The Aztecs appear to have seen in the adoration of Jesus Christ a similarity to the worship of the Plumed Aztec Serpent Quetzalcoatl. They also saw that Jesus’ teachings on brotherly love were in concord with the ancient god Quetzalcoatl’s pious and passive views on how government should function . And, the Christian idea of the second coming of Christ clearly resonated with the ancient Aztec myth of Quetzalcoatl’s leaving and promised return.
Indeed, before the subjugation of the Aztecs, the sighting of white bearded men that arrived from the sea on floating mountains was believed to be Quetzalcoatl’s return. First hand sightings that were reported to the Aztec ruler Moctezuma II also mentioned that these beings rode on top of colossus deer and harnessed thunder and lightning from staffs they brought with them . Their skin was described as glossy and hard. What else but gods could fit this description? During the fight for the Aztec capital Tenochtitlan, it became clear that these bearded men were not gods but the religion they imposed clearly requires the worship of a deity that seemed one and the same with Quetzalcoatl. In an unlikely union of faiths, the Plumed Aztec Serpent became intimately associated with Jesus Christ.
The Mexican Aztec also adapted Roman Catholic Christian practices to the old faiths and continued to follow aspects of the old religion by cleverly concealing their significance from the Christian monks priests. Old Aztec gods were coupled to Christian saints, Tlaloc the Aztec god of rain was revered under the guise of St. John the Baptist. Traditional practices were also aligned with Christian festivals; the yearly visit to the graves of the ancestors was carried out on All Souls’ Day. This holiday now known as the “Day of the Dead” is yet practiced throughout Mexican Aztec lands.
In 1531, a recent convert named Juan Diego had a vision of a dark Virgin Mary near a temple to the Earth goddess Tonantzin. There, he supposedly received instructions concerning the construction of a church in her honor. The new church was to be located on the very spot where Tonantzin’s temple had stood. Under the name of the Virgin Mary of Guadalupe, this hybrid Mesoamerican-Christian deity became and continues to be Mexico’s patron saint.
The way in which the Aztecs accepted Christian practices while maintaining the ways of the old Aztec gods is typical of the Aztec approach to religion. They were mostly willing to accept that new gods and new practices were an extension of what they already knew, rather than a wholly new departure. Aztecs built upon existing practices rather than replacing them.
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