MYTHS AND TRUTHS ABOUT THE MAYAN CALENDAR
(Comment by Víctor Sánchez on the December event 2012 in Real Fourteen, SLP. Mexico.)
Because the cycle of 5125 years of the Long Count of the Mayan-Toltec Calendar comes to an end this coming December, many people are prophesying either the end of the world or the beginning of a new era of spiritual enlightenment for humanity. For my part, I think it will be neither one nor the other..
What is popularly known as “Mayan calendar” it is actually the Mesoamerican calendar and because the Toltecs represent the most important cultural matrix of Mesoamerica, the Mayan calendar is in fact also the Toltec Calendar. Actually this calendar is not a single calendar but a combination of three: the sacred calendar (called Tsolkin among the Maya and Tonalpohualli among Nahuatl-speaking groups, like the aztecs and the mesicas), the solar calendar and the long count. However, hollywood movies, the books of the so-called new age and the endless stream of rumors have promoted the idea that the Mayans prophesied the end of the world for December 2012. Those ideas don't make sense, because the understanding of time of the Toltecs and the Mayans did not have the pretense of predicting the future. With their calendars they wanted to count the time, understand their own history and from a philosophical point of view, reflect on the place and responsibility that corresponded to them within the endless timeline.
In any case, the end and restart of such a long calendar is not a trivial matter. It only happens every 52 centuries and only a couple of generations in the history of humanity have the opportunity to be present during such a special moment. As far as meaning is concerned, the understanding of time reached by the Toltecs and the Mayans has much to teach us in this era in which time seems to consist of that everyday space in which everything seems to be reduced to: buy-as-much-as-you-can-right-now-and-that-is-all.
When I started hearing stories about the supposed “mayan prophecies” that the world would end in december 2012, my first reaction was disbelief: How did we get to the point of inventing that the Mayans were prophets of disasters??. My second reaction was to want to embark on a counter-campaign against those stories based on fiction that generated a false representation of Mesoamerican culture. By contrast, what I wanted was to spread the understanding that authentic knowledge of the ancient indigenous cultures of Mexico, it's beautiful, powerful and inspiring just the way it is, if you need to pretend “beautify it” mixing it with fantasies. It was then that I thought that -on the other side- whether it makes sense to celebrate the new year after a cycle of only 365 days, perhaps it would make much more sense to celebrate the closing of a cycle of time of more than 5000 years. To be exact, a cycle of 1,872,000 days. Of course I am aware that in our modern world we do not live using the Mayan Calendar and that we do not contemplate time from such a long perspective as they did.… but maybe we should. if we did, perhaps we could better understand human evolution and personal responsibility from a broader and deeper perspective than - for example- better contribute to the cause of our survival as a species.
It is due to this reflection that I decided to organize this special event that was born with a double purpose.:
1. Celebrate the end of the Baktun 13 (the long count has 13 Back tuned, What are periods of 144,000 days, each) y…
2. Promote the understanding of the true treasures that the Toltec and Mayan knowledge about time and spirit, have in store for us.
It was in this context that I had the vision of a Celebration of the New Cycle of the Mayan-Toltec Calendar. But, how should we celebrate such a long and extraordinary cycle? Well-I thought- a celebration is a matter of joy… but how could joy be there, if we did not understand what we are celebrating? Then I had the image that the celebration should include both joy and learning and understanding of what we celebrate. At the same time, this kind of understanding requires more than words and ideas. It requires the kind of learning that can only be achieved through experience and that more than our mind, it touches our hearts. And this is how, finally, I came to this idea of celebrating by enjoying learning -through experience- about the magical heritage that the Mayans and Toltecs left us.
I hope you are not missing.
VS
