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TOLTECS AND TOLTECÁYOTL…why exalt them?

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Some people ask me why I exalt so much the Toltecs and Toltecáyotl. The answer is very simple, first because they represent the best we have "own-ours" and second, because of the mental and cultural colonization this information is unknown and denied.

But in addition, I might add, the Greco-Roman or the Anglo-Saxon cultures, are exalted limitless and endlessly, but when one exalts "the own-ours", -because we must remember that we are part of one of the six oldest civilizations in the world-, immediately comes the fierce, biased and colonizing judgment... "you are too idealizing too much, the Toltecs were not perfect! the English colonizers were worse than the Spaniards, etc."

It's funny, but people in general in this country are completely misinformed of the history, culture and philosophy of their mother civilization, and those people who supposedly "are informed", their sources are Hispanic and colonizing, beginning with the so called "official history" written by the victors in what the battle won by the Mexica against invading foreigners is known as "de la noche triste" (sad night). [1]

The fact that the texts written by conquerors, missionaries and colonists at the beginning of the invasion/occupation, after five centuries continue being taken as "true historical sources" completely exposes the structure of the historical winners’ discourse, since Hernan Cortes all the way to Mel Gibson.

These texts were written by personal and petty interests, Hernan Cortes when trying to legalize his fugitive condition from the law of Cuba; Bernal Diaz after tens of years, already old, writes in seeking a pension from the Spanish Crown, the missionaries to depict the culture and religious practices of the invaded-colonized and to make more effective the destruction of their culture and religion, by the Catholic Church.

All have in common the rejection and total incomprehension of a civilization that was, on its social, cultural, and religious precepts far superior to that of Europe, barely out of the middle ages. The lack of interest of truly knowing and trying to understand the vision of the world and the life of the invaded is remarkable. They never "discovered the other", the anahuaca was be subsumed to the known European world, reason why they were called "Indians", thinking that they had reached India. To date the dominant society does not know, nor are interested in knowing the vision of the world and the life of the so-called "indigenous" peoples. What interests them are their territories and natural resources.

When I say that the anahuaca was a civilization superior to the European, it is based on comparing the quality and standard of living of the average citizen of Madrid with one of Tenochtitlan in 1519, by the way, period of the postclassical of decadence in the Anahuac. In food, health, education and social organization the anahuacas were in a much better condition at the level of ordinary people than the Spaniards in Europe.

Of course, colonized minds immediately will argue that the Aztecs made "scary human sacrifices", but the truth is that the Spaniards also made them, they only called them "auto-da-fé "[2] under the charge of the Holy Inquisition, where people were burnt alive in public squares.

The colonized hispanists argue that the Mexicas were warriors and fought against the neighboring towns. Peninsular spaniards had been fighting Arabs centuries, and the Middle Ages culture was characterized by permanent wars between Kings and feudal lords for a thousand years. Something omitted is the violent conquest made by the kingdoms of Castile and Aragon, in those same times, of the kingdoms that existed in the peninsula to forge, -by blood and fire- the Kingdom of Spain in 1516 (the double conquest).

The Mexica, only from 1440 when Moctezuma Ilhuicamina took power and through the "flowered wars" where it was forbidden to kill the enemy started 81 years of a limited domain, only of the Central Highlands and part of the coasts of the Gulf, but they never dominated all the Cem Anahuac, that's a colonizer myth.

However, "colonized hispanists" never talk of the more than thousand years of the classical period of splendor of the Anahuac (200 BC to 850 AD). They never take into account that in this period there were no wars, no human sacrifices, invented the mathematical zero, perfect count of the time, in which the largest number of pyramids in the world were built.

But furthermore, the "colonial hispanists" do not talk about that we are the only ancient civilization that invented their food, i.e. corn. Who developed an amazing and effective food system, from the milpa, to irrigation, chinampa, excellent food and hygiene for both family and community. They don't speak of the intelligence and wisdom of the Anahuac that gave the world chocolate, prickly pear, vanilla, amaranth, squash, over forty products that today nourish humanity.

Nor do they speak about the civilization of the Anahuac being the first to have a system of education in the world. Indeed, since probably 1500 BC all the children of the Anahuac had to go to school from 7 to 18 years, and that this education was compulsory, public and free, something the colonizers immediately disappeared, destroying schools, burning codices and murdering teachers. Europe had the first public education system in Italy until 1596 AD.

They do not mention that weapons were not invented in Anahuac. Those same we receive from prehistoric times, after over seven millennia, were those used to face the invasion. Although the Mexica culture was warrior, it only prevailed in the Central Highlands and part of the Gulf Coast for about 81 years, namely from 1440 to 1521. The colonizers want to make us believe that "the history of the Mexica" (1325 to 1521) represents the history of the Anahuac civilization (6000 BC to 1521 AD). Totally false and fraudulent.

Apologists of the “colonizing hispanicity" do not argue that in Anahuac currency was not made to prevent the development of trade, exploitation and the hoarding. "Private property" was not allowed, everything was communal and community. But fundamentally, the social purpose was eminently of spiritual character. Indeed, just as in the current dominant Western culture the social, family, personal and State purpose is to generate material wealth, understood as accelerating consumption and economy, in the Anahuac it was supported on the spiritual significance of the material world.

In short, it was not a civilization based on the war, private property, trade and consumption. The irrefutable evidence is that the vestiges of their great structures such as Teotihuacan, Monte Alban, Chichen Itza, Palenque and Xochicalco, to mention only a few, were not built like fortresses, palaces and residential areas. Their large and majestic buildings, such as Monte Alban, in which 1350 years were invested in its construction process demonstrate that there was "a Community purpose shared through many generations" and that it had a very high objective-purpose that did not expire or went out of fashion.

The truth is that all this civilization splendor that led to the highest levels of "human development", had a widespread collapse from Nicaragua to the northern U.S. A concerted action in which the venerable teachers suddenly abandoned and destroyed these wonderful buildings. Leaving in the mythology anahuaca a prophesy that they would return to restore the wisdom and balance in the year "one cane" which is repeated every 52 years.

From the year 850 he began the philosophical and religious decline in Anahuac. Lordships were created, and began developing rivalries, envies, and of course conflicts and wars. The arrival of northern Mexicas as Chichimecs (Barbarians), the "people without face", marked the last cultural period of the Anahuac with the foundation of Tenochtitlan in 1325 and philosophical and religious transgression of the ancient Toltec wisdom known as Toltecáyotl, but was not the longest nor the most important period.

Finally, I want to say that it would be real nonsense be to suppose that in the Anahuac and their long-lived civilization "human perfection was achieved". The essence of humanity is precisely imperfection. If we were perfect, we would not be humans, perhaps angels or heavenly beings. Wisdom and virtue is precisely realizing that imperfection and work accordingly to improve, knowing that perfection in unattainable.

In the Cem Anahuac existed and continue to be individuals and groups of little development and limited consciousness. Even in the very splendor days, there were primitive or basic people, little evolved who were bellicose and warriors. Just as today in the richest and capitalist country the world there are 30 million poor people. Fortunately, the human condition is diverse and plurality overwhelming, that is one of the “wonders of the human".

But if it can be generalized and we ought to generalize when building the foundations of a Cultural identity and a "historical memory" of a nation. Just as the West based their "civilization" myths on the benefits and virtues of Greco-Roman culture, knowing that the Greeks were a bunch of slavers, warriors and disunited people, in permanent fratricidal wars, and that the Romans were an imperialist, exploiting society that reached shameful levels of moral, ethics and political degradation. The West bases their civilizing model on the best achievements of these cultures. This is valid and everyone agrees.

In the same way, those of us who consider ourselves as the children of the children of the original peoples, who consider to be legitimate heirs of human wisdom accumulated, systemized and transmitted over eight millennia until today, no matter if we speak a native language or live in the mountains, deserts or in a city, those that have activated the " cultural information gene bank", which we have inherited and that is our greatest cultural heritage, we feel proud to be part of this civilization, current vibrant and vital, that has not died. We are proud of the Anahuac and the Toltecáyotl, as other peoples are proud of India and Hinduism or China and Taoism or Confucianism. Neither more nor less.

Those who believe that there are other ways to relate between humans, nature and the cosmos. That human beings these ten thousand years of human "civilization" are not only been thinking about accumulating, exploiting, trading, subduing others, war, dominating and exploiting nature. That there have been many civilizations, cultures and peoples who have sought humanist and spiritual goals, based on respect, balance and fairness.

Those of us, outraged by the everyday excesses and injustices of the people of the "Mexico-deep-anahuaca" at the hands of the “creole-imaginary-Mexico", and shameless cynicism and abuse of a handful of corrupt people in the political and economic power that have un-governed and destroyed "their country" since 1821, excluding the great popular mass of people in decision-making and wealth distribution.

Those who believe that the future of our people is precisely in the knowledge and practice of values and ancestral principles that guided our venerable ancestors in the most elevated and virtuous human development moments. Those who believe that the Toltecáyotl is a rich heritage, that can change, for the better, our destination, as individuals, families, peoples and nation. For these reasons, I dedicate my work to investigate, promote and disseminate the Anahuac civilization and its philosophy, the Toltecáyotl. From this perspective, its exaltation is an emerging and urgent need.

 


[1]  La Noche Triste ("The Night of Sorrows", literally "The Sad Night") on June 30, 1520, was an important event during the Spanish conquest of Mexico, wherein Hernan Cortés and his invading army of Spanish conquistadors and native allies were driven out of the Mexican capital at Tenochtitlan following a natives’ massacre by spanish and the death of the Aztec king Moctezuma II, who had been held hostage by the Spaniards.

[2]   An auto-da-fé or auto-de-fé (from Portuguese auto da fé, meaning "act of faith") was the ritual of public penance of condemned heretics and apostates that took place when the Spanish Inquisition, Portuguese Inquisition or the Mexican Inquisition had decided their punishment, followed by the execution by the civil authorities of the sentences imposed.

The first recorded auto-da-fé was held in Paris in 1242, under Louis IX.

On 1 November 1478, Ferdinand II of Aragon and Isabella I of Castile received permission from Pope Sixtus IV to name Inquisitors throughout their domains, to protect Catholicism as the true faith. It originally applied to the Crown of Castile — the domain of Isabella — but in 1483, Ferdinand extended it to his domain of the Crown of Aragon. Ferdinand's action met with great resistance, and resulted in the assassination by converses in 1485 of Pedro de Arbués. In spite of this social discontent, in the following years between 1487 and 1505 the Chapter of Barcelona processed more than 1,000 people, of which only 25 were absolved.

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