Mercedes de la Garza, renowned researcher at UNAM, recreates a scene in which, sitting in a shrine, a Mayan supreme priest explains to his younger colleagues the creation of the universe by the gods.
In the great city of Gumarcaah, founded by the fifth generation of Quiche rulers, the Ah-Gucumatz, priest of the god "Serpent Quetzal" took the sacred book from its enclosure in the temple and went to the square, where the main families of the community were gathered, to read them the stories of the origin, to teach them how the beginning of everything. They had to know and assimilate, in the depths of their spirit, that what the gods had decided at the beginning of time was the norm of their life, it was the path that all human beings should follow.
Sitting in a shrine in the middle of the square, the priest said: “This is the beginning of the ancient stories of the Quiché nation, the narration of what was hidden, the story of Grandmother and Grandfather, what they told in the beginning of life ”. This is the sacred Popol Vuh, “Book of the community”, which tells how heaven and earth were formed by the Creator and the Maker, the Mother and the Father of life, the one who gives breath and thought, the one who gives birth to children, the one who watches over the happiness of the human lineage, the sage, the one who meditates on the goodness of everything that exists in heaven, on earth, in the lakes and in the sea ”.
Then he unfolded the book, folded in the form of a screen, and began to read: “Everything was in suspense, everything was calm, in silence; all motionless, silent, and empty the expanse of the sky ... There was not yet a man or an animal, birds, fish, crabs, trees, stones, caves, ravines, grasses or forests: only the sky existed. The face of the earth had not appeared. There was only the calm sea and the sky in all its extension ... There was only immobility and silence in the dark, at night. Only the Creator, the Maker, Tepeu Gucumatz, the Progenitors, were in the water surrounded by clarity. They were hidden under green and blue feathers, that is why they are called Gucumatz (Serpent-Quetzal). In this way there was heaven and also the Heart of Heaven, which is the name of God ”.
Other priests lit the copal in the censers, placed flowers and aromatic herbs, and prepared the ritual objects for the sacrifice, since the narration of the origins there, in that sacred site, which represented the center of the world, would promote the renewal of life ; the sacred act of creation would be repeated and all participants would locate themselves in the world as if they had just been born, purified and blessed by the gods. The priests and the old women sat silently praying around the Ah-Gucumatz, while the Ah-Gucumatz continued to read the book.
The words of the high priest explained how the council of gods decided that when the world was formed and the Sun rose, man should appear, and they related how when the word of the gods rose, by prodigy, by magical art, the earth emerged from the water: "Earth, they said, and instantly it was made." Immediately mountains and trees rose, lakes and rivers were formed. and the world was populated with animals, among which were the guardians of the mountains. The birds, the deer, the jaguars, the pumas, the snakes appeared, and their dwellings were distributed to them. The Heart of Heaven and the Heart of Earth rejoiced, the gods who fertilized the world when the sky was suspended and the earth submerged in water.
The gods gave voice to animals and they asked them what they knew about the Creators and about themselves; they asked for recognition and veneration. But the animals only cackled, roared and squawked; They were unable to speak and were therefore sentenced to be killed and eaten. Then the Creators said: "Let us now try to make obedient, respectful beings that sustain and feed us, that venerate us": and they formed a man of mud. The Ah-Gucumatz explained: “But they saw that it was not well, because it was falling apart, it was soft, it had no movement, it had no strength, it fell, it was watery, it did not move its head, its face went to one side, it had veiled the view. At first he spoke, but had no understanding. It quickly got wet in the water and couldn't hold up ”.
The people of Gumarcaah, respectfully seated around the group of priests, listened with fascination to the story of the Ah-Gucumatz, whose portentous voice echoed in the square, as if it were the distant voice of the creator gods when they formed the universe. She relived, moved, the vibrant moments of the origins, assuming herself as the true children of the Creator and the Maker, the Mother and the Father of everything that exists.
Some young people, residents of the house where the boys, starting from their puberty rite celebrated at the age of thirteen, learned the priestly office, brought bowls of pure water from the fountain to clear the throat of the sacred narrator. He continued:
"Then the gods consulted the soothsayers Ixpiyacoc and Ixmucané, the Grandmother of the Day, the Grandmother of the Dawn:" We must find the means so that the man we form, sustain and feed us, invoke us and remember us. and the soothsayers cast lots with grains of corn and bunting, and told the gods to make wooden men. Instantly the wooden men appeared, which resembled man, spoke like man and reproduced, populating the surface of the earth; but they had no spirit or understanding, they did not remember their creators, they walked without a diamond and crawled on all fours. They had no blood, moisture, or fat; they were dry. They did not remember the Heart of the Cycle and that is why they fell from grace. It was just an attempt to make men, said the priest.
Then the Heart of Heaven produced a great flood that destroyed the stick figures. An abundant resin fell from the sky and the men were attacked by strange animals, and their dogs, stones, sticks, their jars, their comales were turned against them, for the use they had given them, as punishment for not recognizing the creators. The dogs said to them: "" Why didn't they feed us? We were barely looking and they were already throwing us from their side and throwing us out. They always had a stick ready to hit us while they ate… we couldn't speak… Now we will destroy you ”. And they say, concluded the priest, that the descendants of those men are the monkeys that exist now in the forests; these are the sample of those, because only of wood was their flesh made by the Creator and the Maker.
Narrating the story of the end of the second world, that of the wooden men of the Popol Vuh, another Maya from regions very far from the ancient Gumarcaah, a priest of Chumayel, in the Yucatan peninsula, established in writing how the second epoch ended and how the following universe was structured, the one that would house true men:
And then, in a single stroke of water, the waters came. And when the Great Serpent (the sacred vital principle of heaven) was stolen, the firmament collapsed and the earth sank. So… the Four Bacab (sky-holding gods) leveled everything. The moment the leveling was finished, they stood in their places to order the yellow men… And the Great Ceiba Mother rose, amid the memory of the destruction of the earth. She sat upright and raised her glass, asking for everlasting leaves. and with its branches and its roots it called to its Lord ”. Then the four ceiba trees that would support the sky in the four directions of the universe were raised: the black one, to the west; the white one to the north; the red to the east and the yellow to the south. The world, thus, is a colorful kaleidoscope in eternal movement.
The four directions of the universe are determined by the daily and annual movement of the Sun (equinoxes and solstices); These four sectors encompass the three vertical planes of the cosmos: heaven, earth, and the underworld. The sky was thought of as a great pyramid of thirteen layers, on the top of which the supreme god dwells, Itzamná Kinich Ahau, "Dragon Lord of the solar eye", identified with the Sun at the zenith. The underworld was imagined as an inverted pyramid of nine layers; at the lowest, called Xibalba, resides the god of death, Ah puch, "El Descamado", or Kisin, "The Flatulent", identified with the Sun at the nadir or the dead Sun, Between the two pyramids is the earth, conceived as a quadrangular plate, residence of man, where the opposition of the two great divine opposites is resolved in harmony. The center of the universe is, therefore, the center of the earth, where man lives. But what is the true man, the one who will recognize, worship and feed the gods; the one who will therefore be the engine of the universe?
Let's go back to Gumarcaah and listen to the continuation of the sacred account of the Ah-Gucumatz:
After the destruction of the world of the wooden men, the Creators said: “The time of dawn has come, for the work to be finished and for those who will sustain and nurture us to appear, the enlightened children, the civilized vassals; that man, humanity, appear on the surface of the earth ". And after reflection and discussion, they discovered the matter of which man should be made: the corn. Various animals helped the gods by bringing the ears of corn from the land of plenty, Paxil and Cayalá; these animals were Yac, the wild cat; Utiú, the coyote; Quel, the parrot, and Hoh, the raven.
Grandmother Ixmucané prepared nine drinks with ground corn, to help the gods to form man: “Their meat was made from yellow corn, from white corn; The man's arms and legs were made of corn dough. Only corn dough entered the flesh of our fathers, the four men who were formed.
Those men, said the Ah-Gucumatz, were named Balam-Quitzé (Jaguar-Quiché), Balam-Acab (jaguar-Night), Mahucutah (Nothing) e Iqui Balam (Wind-jaguar). “And as they had the appearance of men, they were men; they spoke, they conversed, they saw, they heard, they walked, they held things; they were good and beautiful men and their figure was the figure of a man ”.
They were also endowed with intelligence and perfect eyesight, which reveals infinite wisdom. Thus, they instantly recognized and worshiped the Creators. But they realized that if men were perfect they would not recognize or worship the gods, they would equal themselves to them and they would no longer spread. And then, the priest said, “The Heart of Heaven cast a mist on their eyes, which became cloudy as when blowing on the moon from a mirror. Their eyes were veiled and they could only see what is close, only this was clear to them ”.
Thus reduced the men to their true dimension, the human dimension, their wives were created. "They begat men, small tribes and large tribes, and they were the origin of us, the: Quiché people."
The tribes multiplied and in the dark they headed towards Tulán, where they received the images of their gods. One of them, Tohil, gave them fire and taught them to make sacrifices to support the gods. Then, dressed in animal skins and carrying their gods on their backs, they went to await the rising of the new Sun, the dawn of the present world, on top of a mountain. First appeared Nobok Ek, the great morning star, announcing the arrival of the Sun. The men lit incense and presented the offerings. And immediately the Sun came out, followed by the Moon and the stars. “The small and large animals rejoiced,” said the Ah-Gucumatz, “and rose up in the plains of the rivers, in the ravines and on the top of the mountains; They all looked where the sun rises. Then the lion and the tiger roared ... and the eagle, the king vulture, the small birds and the large birds spread their wings. Immediately the surface of the earth dried up because of the sun ”. Thus ended the story of the high priest.
And imitating those primal tribes, all the people of Gumarcaah raised a song of praise to the Sun and the Creator gods, and also to those first ancestors who, transmuted into divine beings, protected them from the celestial region. Flowers, fruits and animals were offered, and the sacrificing priest, the Ah Nacom, immolated a human victim at the top of the pyramid to fulfill the old pact: feed the gods with their own blood so that they continue to give life to the universe.
