Mictecacihuatl

Santa Muerte

Goddess of The Underworld

-

Mictecacihuatl – Aztec Goddess Of The Underworld

Source: https://goddessgift.com/goddesses/mictecacihuatl/

-

Most gods and goddesses are born to other gods and hence start their lives as already powerful deities. Still, some gods and goddesses have humble beginnings, as they are born as humans that “earn” their powers and immortality in various ways, for example, through heroic and selfless deeds.

-

Mictēcacihuātl belongs to the second group of gods that were humans before they became gods. However, she became a goddess through tragedy and cruelty: she was sacrificed as an infant to the unnamed gods.  As such, Mictēcacihuātl was appointed to become a goddess of the dead, along with her husband, the god Mictlantecuhtli God of The Underworld. Together, the couple ruled over the underworld, called Mictlán in Aztec mythology.

Read More Mictlantecuhtli God of The Underworld click

-

Mictlán

-

To further understand Mictēcacihuātl and her husband’s responsibilities as the rulers of the underworld, let’s take a look at how Mictlán was structured and how it functioned. Mictlán had nine levels that each soul had to travel.

-

The journey was long and exhausting, and it took four years for each soul to reach the ninth level. While on their journey, the souls had to pass several extreme challenges, such as swimming across a bloodied river filled with jaguars.

-

Nine Levels Of Mictlán

-

Similar to Dante’s Inferno, the Aztec underworld had nine levels. Each one of these levels had specific sets of dangers and obstacles that made it hard for a soul to pass them. It makes no wonder that it took four years to pass all nine levels!

-

The first level required the souls to pass the Apanohuaia river, which could only be crossed with the help of Xoloitzcuintle, a dog of white or vermillion color. The second level required the souls to pass between the hills. However, the hills would often get together, and the souls had to wait a long time for the hills to separate before they could continue their journey.

-

In the third stage, souls had to cross a path of obsidian. At the next level, souls had to go through a place covered in snow while a spirit reminded them of their saddest moments. To pass this level, souls had to let all of their sadness go.

-

In the fifth stage, souls arrive at a place with such strong winds that some souls can’t overcome it, and they get swept away. At the next level, an invisible hand throws arrows at souls, and souls must avoid them to pass. Each arrow represents one person from the soul’s life.

-

In the seventh stage, souls swim across the bloodied river, where jaguars wait for them to abandon anything worldly that they might still be carrying with them. In the eighth stage, souls watch their life pass.

-

When the soul finally reaches the ninth level, it meets with Mictēcacihuātl and Mictlantecuhtli. After that, the soul is finally allowed to enjoy its eternal rest.

-

However, Mictlán wasn’t the only destination for human souls. Depending on how they died, souls could also be sent to other destinations. For example, people who drowned or died from lightning, or anything related to rain and water, went to Tlalocan.

-

Warriors who died in the battle or people who died as a sacrifice went east, where they followed the sun in the morning. On the other hand, women who died in childbirth went west, where they accompanied the sun in the evening.

-

Mictēcacihuātl and Mictlantecuhtli were responsible for making sure that each soul reached the appropriate destination as its place of eternal rest.

Read More Mictlantecuhtli God of The Underworld click

-

Mictecacihuatl’s Role In Death And Rebirth

-

However, allowing the souls to go to their place of eternal rest wasn’t the only role of Mictēcacihuātl and Mictlantecuhtli. Just like many other cultures, Aztecs believed that death and rebirth were closely connected and vital parts of the circle of life.

-

This is why Mictēcacihuātl and Mictlantecuhtli were also employed by Quetzalcoatl The Feathered Serpent click, the Aztec god of sun and wind, to collect the bones of the dead and give them to Quetzalcoatl.  Quetzalcoatl would later use those bones to create new races of mortals.

-

Quetzalcoatl’s Struggle With Gods Of The Underworld

-

Of course, gods can sometimes be mischievous, and such was the case with Mictēcacihuātl and Mictlantecuhtli trying to sabotage Quetzalcoatl. In one version of the story, Quetzalcoatl went down into the Underworld to collect the bones of the gods that ruled before him.

-

In one version of the story, Quetzalcoatl tried to steal the bones, which angered Mictēcacihuātl and Mictlantecuhtli. After all, the underworld was their domain of rule, and stealing something from there was the same as stealing from them.

-

That’s why Mictlantecuhtli blocked Quetzalcoatl’s passage and forced Quetzalcoatl to drop the bones. Still, Quetzalcoatl later managed to gather the scattered bones and take them to the world of the living, where he used them to create many different races.

-

In another version of the story, Mictlantecuhtli created a deep pit where Quetzalcoatl fell while carrying the stolen bones. The bones shatter into million pieces, and Quetzalcoatl dies. However, Quetzalcoatl miraculously revives, and he takes the bones with him after all. Since the bones were broken into many pieces of different sizes, Quetzalcoatl created mortals in different sizes too.

Read More Quetzalcoatl The Feathered Serpent Venus Alchemy click

-

Mictecacihuatl And Santa Muerte

If you are at least a little bit familiar with Mexican culture, you have heard about Santa Muerte. Her name means “Holy Death” because Santa Muerte is the personification of death. Her role is to deliver the sound of her devotees to the afterlife, but she is often invoked to grant healing and protection.

-

After the Spanish conquered the Aztecs and brought Catholicism with them, the new religion was forced upon the conquered people, and it slowly started pushing out the old beliefs. However, as usually happens in these situations, old traditions survive by mixing with new ones.

-

Gradually, Mictecacihuatl evolved into Santa Muerte. Her clandestine worship continued up until the 20th century when the celebration of Santa Muerte became more public. Over the last few decades, the veneration of Santa Muerte became more socially acceptable, and today it is considered one of the national symbols of Mexico.

-

Through Santa Muerte, Mictecacihuatl “survived” the colonization and the almost certain erasure. Her role increased, and she became not only the ruler of the underworld but also the protector and guardian of those who worship her. It is worth noting that Santa Muerte didn’t evolve from Mictecacihuatl only, as she was influenced by two other Aztec goddesses, La Parca and Cōātlīcue.

-

Day Of The Dead

When speaking about the ties between Mictecacihuatl and Santa Muerte, it is impossible not to mention the Day of the Dead, also known as Día de Muertos. This is a holiday during which Mexicans celebrate their deceased loved ones.

-

Of course, such holidays exist in other cultures, for example, in various European cultures and countries. However, while the European holidays related to remembering the dead are solemn, Día de Muertos includes singing, dancing, and other activities that are more appropriate for celebrating than for mourning. During Día de Muertos, families build altars on which they lay their favorite foods and beverages, as well as photos and memorabilia of the deceased persons. By doing this, they hope to attract the souls of the deceased and to have their wishes granted.

-

Mictecacihuatl And Christianity

During the conquest of the Mesoamerican region by Spanish conquistadors, many native deities were syncretized with Catholic saints. Usually, there were some similarities between the native deities and Catholic saints that allowed them to be syncretized.

-

The relationship with death is an important aspect of every culture. Oftentimes, death is personified by a goddess, and this goddess is usually responsible for much more than just bringing death and ruling over the dead.

-

Mictecacihuatl is one of those goddesses. Apart from ruling the underworld and making sure the dead arrived at their designated destinations, she also helped create new races of mortals by collecting the bones for Quetzalcoatl.

-

As the Aztec Empire collapsed under the Spanish attacks, and the descendants of once powerful Aztecs were forcefully integrated into the Spanish Empire, Mictecacihuatl provided them with comfort and protection and helped them keep their traditions alive.

-

Mictecacihuatl teaches us that there is no life without death and that death shouldn’t be feared. Instead, we should embrace its imminence as a consolation that one day, all our problems will become irrelevant. When we die, our souls will rest for all eternity, away from all worldly problems and worries.

-

However, even though there was no hell in Aztec religion, the souls couldn’t reach their eternal rest without passing through various challenges, and it took four years to finish all of these challenges. Although this belief is related to the afterlife, it can be applied to the world of living as well. It teaches us that, to reach a place of comfort and happiness, we must overcome obstacles and challenges until we become wiser, stronger, and worthy.

-

To truly enjoy the fruits of our labor and our life in general, we need to learn how to let go of the things from our past. As long as we cling on to our past, we will never truly be at peace with ourselves.

-

As Mictecacihuatl was ruling the underworld and collecting bones for other mortals to be created, one of her most common symbols was bones. Bones represent death, but they also represent strength and growth, concepts that can be associated with Mictecacihuatl. Her other symbols are burning incense, the moon, and cemeteries.

-

Jaguars are often mentioned in Aztec mythology, and Aztecs even considered jaguars as kings of all animals. Since jaguars often appear in the stories of the underworld, they are symbols of Mictecacihuatl and her husband. Other animals that symbolize Mictecacihuatl are the animals that are often associated with death, such as owls, snakes, spiders, and even cats.

-

Cempohualxochitl, also named Aztec/Mexican marigold, was often used as a medicine and in the funeral rites of old Aztecs. This is why this flower symbolizes the goddess of death, Mictecacihuatl. Red or white roses are another symbol of Mictecacihuatl, and they became especially prominent as the symbol of Santa Muerte. Apart from roses and marigolds, any other flowers can be used to symbolize Mictecacihuatl.

-

There are many reasons why you might want to keep a healing crystal or stone close to you. Getting closer to your goddess by wearing her color or crystal is a great one. That they also look great as jewelry only makes it so much better! As the goddess of the dead, Mictecacihuatl can often be seen depicted with black, white, and red. You can also see her surrounded by other colors, especially yellow, orange, green, purple, and blue.

-

Meditations

·         Mictecacihuatl, help me accept my losses and deal with them in a healthy manner.

·         Protect me in my darkest hour and give me strength to overcome obstacles in my way.

·         Teach me how to leave my past behind in order to enjoy my present and the future.

·         Mictecacihuatl, give me the strength to sacrifice what needs to be sacrificed to achieve my goals and reach my full potential.

·         Allow me to connect with the loved ones that are no longer with me and help them guide me through life and its challenges.

·         Give me the strength to be proud and resilient as my ancestors who fought against the invaders.

·         Help me appreciate my origins and my roots, and help me embrace my culture while showing respect to other cultures.

·         Mictecacihuatl, send me the challenges that will help me grow as a person, and don’t let me fail or give up.

·         Provide me with rest and comfort when I need them, and offer me strength and energy when it is time to get into action.

·         Erase my fear of dying and teach me how to live my life properly.

·         From the bones of my past mistakes, help me create a future life.

·         Protect my loved ones, and don’t take them away too soon.

Want To Bring More Mictecacihuatl Qualities Into Your Life?

·         Just like you work on your body, work on your mind and soul too. Think of your past: is there anything that’s still bothering you? Are you still stuck in the past and unable to let go? Learn how to leave the past where it belongs – behind you.

·         Has someone insulted, hurt, or betrayed you in the past? Learn how to forgive them in order to let go of your anger and sadness. Only then will you feel free and truly happy.

·         Don’t forget to appreciate the good things that happened in your past. Take a look at old photographs, get in contact with old friends, and visit your favorite place from childhood.

·         If you lost a close person, light a candle for them. Pray to Mictecacihuatl to grant them easy and safe passage to their final destination. Celebrate their lives by living yours to the full.

·         Visit the graveyard and bring flowers. Take a look at other graves, too. Learn more about the lives of the people that are buried there. No one truly dies as long as they are present in the minds of living people.

·         Plant a seed. Bury it into the ground and watch it sprout into a new life. Just like that seed, people get buried and make a place for new life. Learn to appreciate this cycle of life, and you will be more capable of accepting death.

·         Celebrate the Day of the Dead. If you are of Mexican descent, your relatives can certainly help you celebrate this holiday. However, if you aren’t of Mexican descent, you can still celebrate as long as you are respectful and willing to learn. Mictecacihuatl accepts anyone who has an open mind and a pure heart.

-

Santa Muerte: The Saint Of Death That The Vatican Tried To Shut Down

Source: https://allthatsinteresting.com/santa-muerte?fbclid=IwAR2gt8U2-vNeXb5Q4rxZNdB_iK5EBr7UXhktOVXL4jxpfuXkKmzEMgSWhiw

-

Her worshippers vary from those pushed to the fringes of society to occultists, drug lords, and prisoners – and the Santa Muerte has garnered more followers in the past decade than any religion before it.

-

Santa Muerte, the folklorish female deity of Mexican-American culture, has gone from relative anonymity to being at the center of the fastest growing religious movement in the world. Her followers, from drug lords and prisoners to hard-working families, often call her Santisima Muerte — “most holy death.” The highest annals of the Catholic Church, the Vatican itself, has condemned Santa Muerte as satanic. But this hasn’t stopped her worshippers from every corner of the earth to bowing at her altar.

-

Although she has only become a popular figure in the last 10 to 15 years, Santa Muerte (literally translated as “Saint Death”) has been around for centuries. Andrew Chesnut, the Bishop Walter F. Sullivan Chair in Catholic Studies at Virginia Commonwealth University, relays that references to Santa Muerte begin as early as colonial Spain. As the Spaniards sought to turn the Aztecs and Mayans over to Catholicism, they introduced them to female Grim Reaper figures as a representation of death. But these native cultures already had death deities.

-

Before the arrival of the Spanish conquistadors, the Aztecs who inhabited the area that is now central Mexico worshiped Mictecacihuatl, the “Lady of the Dead.” This pre-Columbian death goddess ruled over the underworld and was often depicted as a partial skeleton or having a skull for a head, similar to Santa Muerte. It’s no coincidence that the modern “Bony Lady,” as her followers sometimes refer to her, is often depicted holding a scythe. Catholic missionaries brought figures of the Grim Reaper to the new world them as their own embodiment of death and it’s possible the figures of the reaper and Mictecacihuatl blended together to become Santa Muerte.

-

Santa Muerte largely disappeared from written history until well into the 20th century. Although there are a few references to her from the 1940s to 1980s, it wasn’t until the start of the drug wars in Mexico that Santa Muerte’s popularity really began to take off. The first modern shrine to Santa Muerte was opened in the Mexico City barrio of Tepito in 2001. Over the next dozen years, the sect which worshipped the skeletal figure would gain between 10 to 12 million followers across Mexico, Central America, and the United States, making it the fastest growing religious movement in the world.

-

Santa Muerte’s rise in popularity has coincided with the rising death toll from the drug wars in Mexico over the last 15 years. It’s very possible that the two events are not unrelated, since, as one priest explains, “a lot of devotees who feel like death could be just around the corner – maybe they’re narcos, maybe they work in the street, maybe they’re security guards who might be gunned down – they ask Santa Muerte for protection.”

-

The Bony Lady has actually gained something of a reputation as a “narco-saint,” a patron for the drug lords who so often deal in death themselves. The men who make up some of the worst elements of Mexico’s criminal underworld are some of the saint’s strongest devotees. For narcos and thugs attempting to reconcile their lifestyles with their religion, Santa Muerte is the perfect object of their devotion.

-

It isn’t just criminals and narcos who are turning to Santa Muerte for help, however. She has also found adherents among residents of Mexico’s poorest communities, single mothers, and homosexuals: people who have found themselves on the fringes of society and feel overlooked by the church. “[un]like the Catholic Church or the evangelical church, Death doesn’t discriminate. She takes all comers,” further explains Chesnut, author of the first significant English-language book on the Santa Muerte phenomenon.

-

Despite the fact that many of the people who pray to Santa Muerte are also Catholics, the sect has one very powerful and vocal enemy: the Vatican. Catholic Church officials have repeatedly denounced the worship of Santa Muerte and claim that the beliefs that fuel her followers directly contradict the teachings of the church. Santa Muerte is considered by the Church a “folk saint.” She is not seen as an official saint because the Catholic Church has not canonized her for having lived a holy life as the figure is simply the personification of death. Italian Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi declared that the worship of the Bony Lady “is the celebration of devastation and of hell.” For Catholics, death was the last enemy who was defeated by Christ and so to pray to a personification of death rather than to one of Christ is considered a perversion of the faith.

-

Santa Muerte’s association with the criminal underworld also led to her being officially condemned by the Mexican government. President Felipe Calderon declared Santa Muerte an “enemy of the Mexican State” and, in a move that would have been familiar to the Inquisitors of the colonial era, ordered the army to bulldoze dozens of her shrines in 2012.

-

Murder And Mayhem In The Saint’s Name

For some, the threat Santa Muerte poses goes far beyond ignorance of Catholic dogma. Father Gutierrez explains that “(Santa Muerte) is literally a demon with another name…I have had a number of people who have come to me as users of this practice and found themselves tied to a demon or demonic tribe.” For others, Santa Muerte presents a danger that is more physical than spiritual. In 2012, Mexican police arrested Silvia Meraz in connection with a series of murders that spanned three years.

-

Meraz and her followers allegedly sacrificed three people, including a ten-year-old boy, at an altar of Santa Muerte. Prosecutors claimed “They sliced open the victims’ veins and, while they were still alive, they waited for them to bleed to death and collected the blood in a container” which they then poured around an idol of the skeleton saint.

Read More Mictlantecuhtli God of The Underworld click

Read More Xibalba The Mayan Underworld The 12 Demon Lords click