2012 - Science Or Superstition?/Segment/9

Izapa and the Creation Mythology

Narr: While the majority of Mayan scholars have focused on classic sites in Mexico, Guatemala, Belize and Honduras, John Major Jenkins has devoted much of his research to the once-obscure site of Izapa, in southern Mexico. There he found a great number of stelae - stone monuments depicting the mythology and cosmology of the Maya.

JMJ: The early Maya site called Izapa - the site that invented this long count calendar that gives us the 2012 end date is really a key to understanding how the early Maya thought of 2012 and the Galactic alignment. The monuments of Izapa were found in the 1950's and 60's as they were left some 1800 years ago. So they're in situ. They're still oriented to certain horizons in certain ways. One of the key horizon alignments at Izapa is the December solstice sunrise. So we start to see how Izapa is a site that helps us understand the galactic alignment in 2012.

For example, stela 11 from Izapa portrays Hun Hunahpu, the father of the hero twins. He represents the December solstice Sun. And he's emerging from the upturned mouth of a frog - that's the rebirth place. The mouth of the frog or the mouth of the snake represents the dark rift. His arms are outstretched - basically a period-measuring gesture. He's basically measuring a cycle of time. So what this is saying is that at the end of the cycle the December solstice Sun is lined up with the dark rift, and this carving, stela 11, points right to the rising December solstice Sun. That's just one example of how Izapa encodes information about 2012. You might refer to that as the astronomical reference at the site. But there's also a prophecy and a spiritual teaching that's encoded on the monuments that has to do with the Mayan belief about what is going to happen, you might say. [Talk]

Narr: While John Major Jenkins' research has gained wide-spread acclaim as a breakthrough in understanding the Mayan calendar system and its message for us, the academic mainstream have yet to fully embrace his insights.

AFA: It is true that when the Sun is at the [December] solstice, it more-or-less lines up in the direction of the constellation of Saggitarius, which is close to what we would call the centre of the Milky Way galaxy, which was not determined until even later. I stress this because when one wants to argue about precision here, I could say in a very general way that the [December] solstice Sun comes through that general area of Saggitarius, whether it's conceived of as the center of the galaxy or not - somewhere between the years 1900 and 2150. To dare to pinpoint it any more accurately is to suggest that the Maya did. Any I'll go back to what I always go back to: I've got to see the evidence. And I've got to see something more than just some interpretation of an iconography on a stela. I've got to see it in the codices, I've got to see it in writing, I've got to see the numbers. If the astronomers cared about that, they would have backed it up with numbers. So one does have such an alignment, but in the crudest possible sense you could imagine. [Talk]

Narr: Whether or not the Maya accurately predicted the relative location of the Earth, the Sun, and the centre of the Milky Way galaxy on December 21, 2012 (sic), the fabled galactic alignment, their observations of the heavens above directly influenced their world-view below, on Earth. The Mayan shamens, or spiritual leaders, used hallucinogenic plants and substances to enter an altered state from which they were able to bring back wisdom and knowledge enabling them to interpret their heavenly observations.

JMJ: Izapa really was a kind of New World Eleusis. In the Old World, Eleusis was a place where seekers were initiated into the sacred mysteries. And at Izapa initiates, those seeking knowledge were brought through a process of understanding this new galactic cosmology and clearly, sacred plants was part of this. We know that ritual mushroom stones were found in the region around Izapa, so we know that there was a kind of mushroom cult going on there. And we also that dimethyltriptamine is a powerful hallucinogenic that can be harvested from the glands of the bufo toad. And stela 6 at Izapa, for example, depicts the bufo toad and it actually shows the toad's glands with vision scrolls coming out of the glands. This actually indicates a very clear proof that they were aware of the vision-producing effects of the gland secretions. So it's very clear that Izapa was an initiatory centre that utilised hallucinogenic plants and substances in order to facilitate expansion of consciousness so that larger perspectives could be embraced. [Talk]

AV: The Inca, the Hopi, the Mayans, were all shamanic cultures. And they entered into altered states of awareness in order to access this body of wisdom, which is infinite. So to do that, they had to step outside of ordinary time, which is the opportunity we all have today as we come to the "end of time," to step into infinity, to step into this body of ancient wisdom. [Talk]

GH: We can learn from ancient civilisations. And so, I hope I've played some part in re-introducing the wisdom of the ancient world to the modern world and helping people to open their eyes and open their ears and hear what then ancients have to say to us. And more recently also, the recognition that the shamans of tribal and hunter-gatherer societies around the world with their systems and techniques for contacting the spirit realm directly also have a great deal to teach us. And so, I would advocate a kind of reversal of the normal order of things. It's not we, in our scientific and technological world, where everything is rooted and grounded in a material and mechanistic view of the universe, it's not we who may place ourselves above civilisations of antiquity. We may not say that we are greater than, or better than a shaman in a small village in the Amazon. Those civilisations of antiquity and those tribal shamans today have a huge amount to teach us. And we can only recover the better part of ourselves if we are willing to listen to what they have to say. That's what I've tried to do, I've tried to say, this that came before, this knowledge of the spirit world the shamans still possess today, this is what really matters about us - let's listen to it. [Talk]

AV: Sacred plants will give you access to these domains, but that's the easy way. Shamanic training is very rigorous. It demands that you spend time in nature, in vision quest, and not just increase the serotonin levels in your brain so you can experience the divine for a fleeting moment and then come back into a life that is hell. So you have to be willing to pay your dues, to do the work, to spend time in nature, to spend time with yourself, and not just increase the levels of dopamine or certain brain chemicals that stimulate bliss. The psychedelics have opened the doors for many people in the West, but opening the doors and walking through them are very different things. [Talk]

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2012 - Science Or Superstition?/Segment/10