The Secret Teachings of All Ages · 218 of 236

The Crucifixion of Quetzalcoatl

One of the most remarkable of the crucified World Saviors is the Central American god of the winds, or the Sun, Quetzalcoatl, concerning whose activities great secrecy was maintained by the Indian priests of Mexico and Central America. This strange immortal, whose name means feathered snake, appears to have come out of the sea, bringing with him a mysterious cross. On his garments were embellished clouds and red crosses. In his honor, great serpents carved from stone were placed in different parts of Mexico.

Insight

Quetzalcoatl in Mesoamerican religion is the feathered serpent, a creator deity in the Mexica-Aztec pantheon and the wind god (Ehecatl) in his second aspect. The historical Topiltzin Quetzalcoatl was a Toltec priest-king of the tenth century who was identified with the deity and whose departure 'on a raft of serpents' generated the legend that he would return — a legend Cortés famously exploited. The crucifixion-of-Quetzalcoatl claim Hall makes is found in some nineteenth-century syncretist works (Le Plongeon especially) but is not supported by the codices or the modern Mesoamericanist literature; the Aztec religious imagination did not include a crucified savior figure. The cross-shaped symbol Cortés found at Cozumel is a real archaeological feature whose pre-contact significance is contested.Carrasco, Quetzalcoatl and the Irony of Empire (1982)

The cross of Quetzalcoatl became a sacred symbol among the Mayas, and according to available records the Maya Indian angels had crosses of various pigments painted on their foreheads. Similar crosses were placed over the eyes of those initiated into their Mysteries. When Cortez arrived in Mexico, he brought with him the cross. Recognizing this, the natives believed that he was Quetzalcoatl returned, for the latter had promised to come back in the infinite future and redeem his people.

In Anacalypsis, Godfrey Higgins throws some light on the cross and its symbolism in America: "The Incas had a cross of very fine marble, or beautiful jasper, highly polished, of one piece, three-fourths of an ell in length, and three fingers in width and thickness. It was kept in a sacred chamber of a palace, and held in great veneration. The Spaniards enriched this cross with gold and jewels, and placed it in the cathedral of Cuzco. Mexican temples are in the form of a cross, and face the four cardinal points. Quexalcoatl is represented in the paintings of the Codex Borgianus nailed to the cross. Sometimes even the two thieves are there crucified with him. In Vol. II. plate 75, the God is crucified in the Heavens, in a circle of nineteen figures, the number of the Metonic cycle. A serpent is depriving him of the organs of generation. In the Codex Borgianus, (pp. 4, 72, 73, 75,) the Mexican God is represented crucified and nailed to the cross, and in another place hanging to it, with a cross in his hands. And in one instance, where the figure is not merely outlined, the cross is red, the clothes are coloured, and the face and hands quite black. If this was the Christianity of the German Nestorius, how came he to teach that the crucified Savior was black? The name of the God who was crucified was Quexalcoatl.

The crucifixion of the Word in space, the crucifixion of the dove often seen in religious symbolism--both of these are reminders of pagan overshadowing. The fact that a cross is formed by the spread wings of a bird in relation to its body is no doubt one of the reasons why the Egyptians used a bird to symbolize the immortal nature of man, and often show it hovering over the mummified body of the dead and carrying in one of its claws the sign of life and in the other the sign of breath.