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Maya religion
The traditional Maya or Mayan religion of the extant Maya peoples of Guatemala, Belize, western Honduras, and the Tabasco, Chiapas, Quintana Roo, Campeche and Yucatán states of Mexico is part of the wider frame of Mesoamerican religion. As is the case with many other contemporary Mesoamerican religions, it results from centuries of symbiosis with Roman Catholicism. When its pre-Hispanic antecedents are taken into account, however, traditional Maya religion has already existed for more than two and a half millennia as a recognizably distinct phenomenon. Before the advent of Christianity, it was spread over many indigenous kingdoms, all with their own local traditions. Today, it coexists and interacts with pan-Mayan syncretism, the 're-invention of tradition' by the Pan-Maya movement, and Christianity in its various denominations.
The most important source on traditional Maya religion is the Mayas themselves: the incumbents of positions within the religious hierarchy, diviners, and tellers of tales. More generally, all those persons who shared their knowledge with outsiders in the past, as well as anthropologists and historians who studied them and continue to do so.
What is known of pre-Hispanic Maya religion stems from heterogeneous sources (the primary ones being of Maya origin):
Traditional Maya religion, though also representing a belief system, is often referred to as costumbre, the 'custom' or habitual religious practice, in contradistinction to orthodox Roman Catholic ritual. To a large extent, Maya religion is indeed a complex of ritual practices; and it is, therefore, fitting that the indigenous Yucatec village priest is simply called jmen ("practitioner"). Among the main concepts relating to Maya ritual are the following ones.
The Maya landscape is a ritual topography, with landmarks such as mountains, wells and caves being assigned to specific ancestors and deities (see also Maya cave sites). Thus, the Tzotzil town of Zinacantan is surrounded by seven 'bathing places' of mountain-dwelling ancestors, with one of these sacred waterholes serving as the residence of the ancestors' 'nursemaids and laundresses'. As in the Pre-Hispanic past, an important part of ritual behavior takes place in or near such landmarks, in Yucatán also around karstic sinkholes (cenotes).
Ritual was governed not only by the geographical lay-out of shrines and temples (see also Maya architecture), but also by the projection of calendrical models onto the landscape. In contemporary Quichean Momostenango, for example, specific combinations of day-names and numbers are ascribed to specialized shrines in the mountains, signalling the appropriate times for their ritual use. In the northwestern Maya highlands, the four days, or 'Day Lords', that can start a year are assigned to four mountains. In early colonial Yucatán, the thirteen Katun periods and their deities, mapped onto a landscape conceived as a 'wheel', are said to be successively 'established' in specific towns.
Through pilgrimages, which create networks connecting places regionally as well as over larger distances, Maya religion transcends the limits of the local community. Nowadays, pilgrimages often involve reciprocal visits of the village saints (as represented by their statues), but also visits to farther-removed sanctuaries, as exemplified by the Q'eqchi' pilgrimages to their thirteen sacred mountains. Around 1500, Chichen Itza used to attract pilgrims from all the surrounding kingdoms to its large cenote; other pilgrims visited local shrines, such as those of Ix Chel and other goddesses on the islands off Yucatán's east coast. Eight centuries earlier, noblemen from sundry Classic kingdoms went on pilgrimage to the caves of Naj Tunich and had their visits recorded on the sanctuary's walls.
Offerings serve to establish and renew relations ('contracts', 'pacts', or 'covenants') with the other world, and the choice, number, preparation, and arrangement of the offered items (such as special maize breads, maize and cacao drinks and honey liquor, flowers, incense nodules, rubber figures, and also, cigars) obey to stringent rules. In the same way, a drink made of exactly 415 grains of parched maize was to be offered to participants in a pre-Hispanic New Year ritual, and on another occasion, the precise number of 49 grains of maize mixed with copal (incense) was to be burnt. A well-known example of a ritual meal is the "Holy Mass of the maize farmer" (misa milpera) celebrated at an improvised altar for the Yucatec rain deities. Particularly Lacandon ritual was entirely focused on the 'feeding' of the deities, as represented by their incense burners.
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Maya religion
The traditional Maya or Mayan religion of the extant Maya peoples of Guatemala, Belize, western Honduras, and the Tabasco, Chiapas, Quintana Roo, Campeche and Yucatán states of Mexico is part of the wider frame of Mesoamerican religion. As is the case with many other contemporary Mesoamerican religions, it results from centuries of symbiosis with Roman Catholicism. When its pre-Hispanic antecedents are taken into account, however, traditional Maya religion has already existed for more than two and a half millennia as a recognizably distinct phenomenon. Before the advent of Christianity, it was spread over many indigenous kingdoms, all with their own local traditions. Today, it coexists and interacts with pan-Mayan syncretism, the 're-invention of tradition' by the Pan-Maya movement, and Christianity in its various denominations.
The most important source on traditional Maya religion is the Mayas themselves: the incumbents of positions within the religious hierarchy, diviners, and tellers of tales. More generally, all those persons who shared their knowledge with outsiders in the past, as well as anthropologists and historians who studied them and continue to do so.
What is known of pre-Hispanic Maya religion stems from heterogeneous sources (the primary ones being of Maya origin):
Traditional Maya religion, though also representing a belief system, is often referred to as costumbre, the 'custom' or habitual religious practice, in contradistinction to orthodox Roman Catholic ritual. To a large extent, Maya religion is indeed a complex of ritual practices; and it is, therefore, fitting that the indigenous Yucatec village priest is simply called jmen ("practitioner"). Among the main concepts relating to Maya ritual are the following ones.
The Maya landscape is a ritual topography, with landmarks such as mountains, wells and caves being assigned to specific ancestors and deities (see also Maya cave sites). Thus, the Tzotzil town of Zinacantan is surrounded by seven 'bathing places' of mountain-dwelling ancestors, with one of these sacred waterholes serving as the residence of the ancestors' 'nursemaids and laundresses'. As in the Pre-Hispanic past, an important part of ritual behavior takes place in or near such landmarks, in Yucatán also around karstic sinkholes (cenotes).
Ritual was governed not only by the geographical lay-out of shrines and temples (see also Maya architecture), but also by the projection of calendrical models onto the landscape. In contemporary Quichean Momostenango, for example, specific combinations of day-names and numbers are ascribed to specialized shrines in the mountains, signalling the appropriate times for their ritual use. In the northwestern Maya highlands, the four days, or 'Day Lords', that can start a year are assigned to four mountains. In early colonial Yucatán, the thirteen Katun periods and their deities, mapped onto a landscape conceived as a 'wheel', are said to be successively 'established' in specific towns.
Through pilgrimages, which create networks connecting places regionally as well as over larger distances, Maya religion transcends the limits of the local community. Nowadays, pilgrimages often involve reciprocal visits of the village saints (as represented by their statues), but also visits to farther-removed sanctuaries, as exemplified by the Q'eqchi' pilgrimages to their thirteen sacred mountains. Around 1500, Chichen Itza used to attract pilgrims from all the surrounding kingdoms to its large cenote; other pilgrims visited local shrines, such as those of Ix Chel and other goddesses on the islands off Yucatán's east coast. Eight centuries earlier, noblemen from sundry Classic kingdoms went on pilgrimage to the caves of Naj Tunich and had their visits recorded on the sanctuary's walls.
Offerings serve to establish and renew relations ('contracts', 'pacts', or 'covenants') with the other world, and the choice, number, preparation, and arrangement of the offered items (such as special maize breads, maize and cacao drinks and honey liquor, flowers, incense nodules, rubber figures, and also, cigars) obey to stringent rules. In the same way, a drink made of exactly 415 grains of parched maize was to be offered to participants in a pre-Hispanic New Year ritual, and on another occasion, the precise number of 49 grains of maize mixed with copal (incense) was to be burnt. A well-known example of a ritual meal is the "Holy Mass of the maize farmer" (misa milpera) celebrated at an improvised altar for the Yucatec rain deities. Particularly Lacandon ritual was entirely focused on the 'feeding' of the deities, as represented by their incense burners.