Comparing the Catharists of the Albigensian movement in 13th century Languedoc with the Nahua religions of Northern Mexico
Recently,
JF Quackenbush asked me to make a comparison between the Catharists of 13th century France to the Nahuas (Aztecs et al) for a project he is working on. This is the essay I wrote, which it only just now occured to me to post to the blog.
"The passing vanities of the world are like the green willow
It falls before the axe,
Is uprooted by the wind,
Is scarred and saddened by age
"Life's splendors are like flowers whose color and whose fate they share.
The beauty of flowers lasts only as long
As their unsullied blossoms
Gather and store
The precious pearls of dawn
And let them fall
in liquid dew.
But when the Lord of All
Causes the sun
To shine upon them, their beauty and their glory fade.
"The reign of flowers is short
In morning they boast
Of their beauty and strength
But by evening they mourn
For the downfall
Of their thrones
And the misfortunes
That lead to loss, poverty,
Death, and the grave."
- Nezahualcoyotl
translated from the Nahuatl by Irene Nicholson
Comparing the Catharists of the Albigensian movement in 13th century
Languedoc with the Nahua religions of Northern Mexico.
A breif understanding of the Nahua:
By Nahua I refer to the native American Indians who lived in the region of
Mexico north of the Yucatan and south of what is now Texas. The common
tongue of this region was Nahuatl. To the south of the Nahua lived the
Mayans, who spoke the Mayan language, acheived an unprecidented
understanging of cosmology, calendrical time, produced extremely boroque
art and craftwork and generally abandoned their own civilization around
11th or 12th centuries, AD for reasons that are still not properly
understood. The Nahua and Mayan regions are jointly referred to as
"Mesoamerica", and cover the land that is today Mexico, Guatemala,
Honduras and Belize. To the north of the Nahua lived nomadic tribes who
the Nahua refered to under the catch all name of "Chichimecas", who we
now think of as North American indians. The Nahua region was home to the
first civilization in the Americas in the form of the Olmecs around 2000
B.C., and at the time of the Spanish arrival the Aztecs where the most
powerful nation in the Americas.
Each individual city of the Nahua world where generally dedicated to a
different God, in the manner of the ancient Greeks and Egyptions. And so,
the Aztec capital was dedicated to the war god and patron of the Aztecs,
Huitzilopoctli (Southern Hummingbird), Cholula was dedicated to the
wind/sky god Ehecatl Quetzalcoatl, and so forth. The home of the
poet/philosopher king Nezahualcoyotl (Hungry Coyote) was Texcoco,
which was dedicated to the worship of Ometeotl, the Lord of Duality, a
cult of worship that Nezahualcoyotl was primarily responsible for
spreading throughout Mesoamerica. The Ometeotl of Nezahuacoyotl was also
called "Tloque Nahuaque, the Unknown God, the God of Causes, the Master of
the Close and the Near, the Lord of the With and the By, He Who Invented
Himself, the Giver of Life, Who is as Night and as the Wind", and in the
temple of the god at Texcoco Nezahuacoyotl allowed no images whatsoever,
and no sacrifice of anything except flowers and incense.
The Albigensian Catharists, as I understand them
The Catharists where dualists, they believed that the world was created by
the Devil, who also called himself Yah-Weh, and that all worldly things
where the domain of the Devil. The object of Catharism was to appeal to
the spiritual non-worldy plain, and thereby escape the worldly bonds into
a non-corporial heaven upon death. One did this by, among other things,
abstaining from sex, and meat eating. The priests who did this where
considered "pure", and while ordinary members could marry they must go
through a purification ritual in order to ensure a place in heaven. The
Catharists believed in the coming of a Messiah who would be the son of a
widow. It is said they believed in reincarnation, with the sins of past
lives carrying over into the next.
First I shall compare Catharism to the worship of Ometeotl, and then to
the Quetzalcoatl/Tezcatlipoca duality.
Catharism vs. Ometeotl
The worship of Ometeotl has more in common with Eastern religions then
western ones; Ometeotl is alternately seen as a dualistic energy force
(who is "as the night, as the wind") much like the Tao (indeed the
interlocking symbol of Ometeotl is very similar to the Yin Yang symbol of
Taoism), and all gods and all living things are all seen as an embodiment
of it like Brahman.
However, the non-corporial over-God of the Catharists can easily be
compared to the non-corporial over-God Ometeotl. And the most obvious
comparison is that Ometeotl is a god of dualism, and the Catharists where
strict dualists. Of course, in an Ometeotl world-view a "devil" and a
"God" would both be extensions of Ometeotl, but since in any Christian
view God created the Devil, it doesn't take much of a leap to say the
Devil is an extension of God, part of his great plan.
Also, as revealed by his poetry, Nezahuacoyotl believed that worldly
things paled in comparison to Ometeotl, and that the collection of
worldly goods was ultimately futile. Consider this passage of
Nezahuacoyotl poetry:
"All the earth is a grave and nothing escapes it, nothing is so perfect
that it does not descend to its tomb. Rivers, rivulets, fountains and
waters flow, but never return to their joyful beginnings; anxiously
they hasten on the vast realms of the rain god. As they widen their
banks, they also fashion the sad urn of their burial."
Priests of Ometeotl where celibate, like priests of the Catharists,
however vegetarianism was unknown the the Mesoamerican world and a totally
foreign concept.
Catharism vs. Quetzalcoatl/Tezcatlipoca
However, dualism in the Mesoamerican world was not limited to Ometeotl.
Dualism runs through virtually every legend and story and the myths of the
Nahua and the Mayans are littered with hero twins, significant pairings,
and opposing forced.
The most significant such pairing in the post-Toltec Nahua region was that
of Quetzalcoatl and Tezcatlipoca, whose rivialry extended back to the
beginning of the world. According to the creation myths of the Nahua,
Teszcatlipoca becomes the first sun (we are currently in the fifth sun),
and Quetzalcoatl the second, each knocking the other out of the sky and
destroying the world in the process. Fundamentally, Quetzalcoatl can be
seen as a day god and Tezcatlipoca as a night god. In the Toltec epic, as
related by the Aztecs, Topiltzin Quetzalcoatl (seen as an avatar of the
god, who is Ehecatl Quetzalcoatl) is terrorized by Tebeyo Tezcatlipoca (an
avatar of the god Tezcatlipoca), and driven out of the Toltec capital,
Tollan, an action which eventually leads to the downfall of the Toltecs.
Topiltzin Quetzalcoatl is the son of a widow, Chimalman, who gives birth
to Topiltzin after eating a piece of jade or a ball of feathers. The
comparisons between Topiltzin (who is seen as being white skinned with a
beard) to Jesus are thus many, and have been explored at length by many a
sixteenth and seventeenth Spanish missionary. The widow aspect is similar
to the Catharist messiah - according to the epic Topiltzin's Uncle kills
his father, and steals his throne and Topiltzin goes into hiding. When
he's full grown he returns to give his father's bones proper burial, and
kill his uncle and take his rightful place on the throne of the Toltecs.
After his abandonment because of the terrors of Tezcatlipoca, he promises
to return and reign destruction on the deciples of Tezcatlipoca and return
Anahuac (the Mesoamerican world) to its former glory. This prophecy can be
seen as similar to the Catharists view of the coming of a Messiah, who I
must assume is the return of Jesus since the Catharists believed in Jesus.
Much has also been made of the fact that Montezuma believed that Cortes
was Quetzalcoatl returned, but I digress.
Also like the Catharists and the Ometeotlans, priests of all of these
Nahua gods where celebate, including Topiltzin. One of the terrors
Tezcatlipoca visits upon Topiltzin - and the final and most serious one
- is that he gets him drunk on Pulque and gets him to sleep with a
priestess, a terrible transgression to his vows of celebacy.
Quetzalcoatl is also seen as a man of wisdom, a bringer of knowledge, a
Prometheus figure, and in that sense is also comparable to Jesus.
Also, significantly, Tezcatlipoca became a Jupiter god after the ousting
of Topiltzin; Tezcatlipoca was seen as the ruler of the Gods and the most
powerful among them under Ometeotl. This is easily comparible to the
Devil/Yah Weh beliefs of the Catharists.
Conclusion
One could then mix Catharism with Nahua mysticism by viewing the Catharist
God as Ometeotl, Jesus as Topiltzin Quetzalcoatl, and the Devil as
Tezcatlipoca. In fact, details aside, the beliefs kind of neatly overlap.
The biggist problem I can see is that Ometeotl is seen as both Male and
Female, someone who made love to itself in order to create the Universe.
However, Catharist objections to sex aside, an over-God who embodies both
masculinity and femininity is not irreconcilable with Catharist thinking.
There are even certain Nahua sects who believed in reincarnation. It was
said that the universe resided on a cross (!) made of fire, and at the
center of the cross was Huehueteotl/Xiuhtecutli (the Old, Old God, or the
Lord of the Calendar - the fire and time God who is either presented as
the first and most fundamental manifestation of Ometeotl or the only
creature seperated from it). The souls of men would travel along this
cross to the various afterlives of the Nahua mythos, but could
circumnavigate the afterlives and return to the crossroads and be reborn.
Related links:
Nahuatl metaphysics -
http://www.paideusis.matco.ro/e1n2jm.html
More poetry of Nezahualcoyotl -
http://www.red-coral.net/Hungry.html
Hope this helps.
E
Posted by Eric Rosenfield at February 13, 2003 01:48 AM
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