The Virgin of Guadalupe: Tonantzin or Mary...
Stories about the Virgin of Guadalupe in Mexico are as numerous as they are varied and colorful. On December 9, 1531, according to one popular version, a beautiful dark-skinned woman miraculously appeared to Juan Diego, a humble Indian peasant, as he was crossing the hill of Tepeyac just north of present day Mexico City. Declaring herself to be the Virgin Mary, Mother of Christ, she called Juan her son. He reported his vision to Bishop Juan de Zumarraga, who demanded proof.
On December 12 Juan Diego returned to Tepeyac, where the Virgin told him to gather roses where none had grown previously. When the Indian delivered the roses to the Bishop, the image of the Virgin Mary miraculously appeared on his cloak, further proof of the apparition. A small church was constructed on the spot, which eventually became one of the most famous sites in Christendom. Today millions of pilgrims visit the shrine of Guadalupe annually. Thus far the simple story of the Virgin of Guadalupe.
Other historical accounts are somewhat more complicated. Before the fall of the Aztec capital of Tenochtitlan in 1521, the hill where Juan Diego had his vision had also been the site of an ancient temple to the Aztec goddess Tonantzin (our mother), later leveled to the ground by the Spaniards. She was also known as Ilamatecuhtli (a noble old woman) and Cozcamiauh (a necklace of maize flowers). Aztec deities could be of double gender and presented many different facets of their character. It is not surprising therefore that even the great Franciscan ethnographer, Sahagun, associated Tonantzin with the dread goddess Cihuacoatl (a serpent woman), whom he identified not with the Virgin Mary but with Our Mother, Eve and her encounter with the serpent of good and evil in the Garden of Eden. Perhaps it was no accident that Juan Diego's beautiful Virgin was also dark-skinned.
The fame of the Virgin of Guadalupe rose rapidly after the Conquest and has continued to the present day. In 1709 a larger church was erected on the site of the original sanctuary. In 1745 the Vatican recognized Juan Diego's vision as a miracle and two new Basilicas were built, one in 1904, the present one in 1976. Today the feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe, also known as the Queen of Mexico, is celebrated on December 12th, the date of Juan Diego's second vision.
The fortunes of Juan Diego have followed suit in the confusion. When the Vatican decided to canonize him, their investigation reportedly revealed that the humble Indian lad had actually been a prince, the son of a king of Texcoco, who helped Cortes defeat the Aztecs. His royal blood and social standing are sometimes said to account for the large numbers of Indians who were baptized after the apparition of the Virgin in 1531. In this account Juan Diego is a royal prince and a warrior, called the Tlacateccatl (he who commands the warriors), an honorific title given to the general in command of a troop of 8000 men.
Depending on the source, Juan Diego was either a humble peasant lad wandering over the hill of Tepeyac or one of the most influential and powerful men in the Aztec Empire at the time of the Conquest. Between the time of the destruction of the Aztec Empire in 1521 and the apparition of the Virgin Mary in 1531, Juan Diego could indeed have been transformed from a noble to a peasant under the influence of the Franciscans. Why it took so many centuries to discover the whole truth about Juan Diego's background is another question.
Juan's cloak with the miraculous impression of the Virgin Mary also has its share of speculation. According to some accounts, her image on the cloak has remained unchanged over the centuries, although it is also said to have been retouched in 1929 in order to repair damage sustained through time and circumstance. Various explanations have been offered.
Confusion sometimes arises over the uncritical use of Nahuatl, the classical Aztec language, in the various accounts of the Virgin of Guadalupe. Misspelling of the name Tonantzin, for example, is a minor detail in itself, but possibly indicative of other more serious, hidden, factual errors.
"What is truth?" asked Pontius Pilate as he washed his hands of responsibility at the trial of Jesus Christ. The answer is that there is more than one kind of truth, what we might call absolute truth and relative truth. For example, the site of the former temple of Tonantzin or the later construction of the Basilica of Guadalupe at Tepeyac are historical facts, but the concept of the goddess Tonantzin or the Virgin of Guadalupe represents another kind of truth, a religious or spiritual truth. Which is the absolute and which the relative depends initially at least, on whether one believes or not, although it can be argued that absolute truth remains absolute regardless of individual opinion. It's called faith.
Essentially, there are two main approaches to the question: the higher criticism and the lower criticism. These are relative terms with no implication that one is superior or inferior to the other. The first deals with theology, metaphysics, and matters of belief or faith; the second with concrete or factual evidence, such as textual analysis or archaeological artifacts. But the two are complimentary not confrontational. Likewise, the ancient Aztec belief in Tonantzin and Christian faith in the Virgin Mary today are not necessarily contradictory.
Christianity in Mexico has been described as Mesoamerican Catholicism, an inextricable blending of Prehispanic religion with the symbols and tenets of Christianity. From one point of view, the converted Indians in Mexico transferred their beliefs and practices from Tonantzin, the Goddess of the Earth, to Mary, the Mother of God. This confirmed the validity of the church in Mexico and the role of the Virgin of Guadalupe (or Tonantzin) as a symbol of the Republic of Mexico. Equally valid is the view that the Indians simply transformed the beliefs and practices of the Catholic Church to conform with and support their own Prehispanic religion and world outlook. Whichever way you look at it the symbolism represents the universal search for answers to the human dilemma, the mystery of death and the meaning of life.
This article appears courtesy of the Chapala Review, a monthly Newspaper published in Ajijic, Jalisco, Mexico. The focus is the Lake Chapala area. The goal is to provide quality information about the area, its stories, events, history, culture and people.
