Just like any other tradition with symbols and the rituals of worship, the Mayan people used the fire, water, air and the earth. Fire was the most superior in their worship and this was so because all the others according to the Maya people had their own weakness. As far as water was concerned, it was believed that it was used for cleansing, thus it was full of impurities and the air was always polluted. In the Mayan rituals, they believed that the fire was a communication media between them and God. The rituals involving the fire were perceived as source of strength and balance (Molesky 4).
According to The Mayan culture, the human body was viewed as a combination of the body and the souls. The body of a human is made of flesh and blood. The human nature has a group of soul that they believe resides in the heart of a human. The part of the human they referred to as the soul was also viewed to be in three aspects which were the “bird” of our heart. This was the life holding part of the Mayan people.
This small bird in each human holds life and when the bird leaves the body, the body falls sick and eventually dies. The second form of the soul was the ch’ulel, it was also believed to be dwelling in the hearts of people and also played an important part in the living of the body, in addition, this soul played part in the shaping of the human character, it was responsible for memory, feelings and emotions. The third nature of soul was the ch’ulel in Ch’iibal mountain, the Maya people believed that for every human born, there is a pair of soul created for him; one to reside in his heart while the other resides in the mountain (Pitarch 25).
The human body can be able to communicate to the environment and to other bodies. This gives the body the ability to pass the condition of the inner body to the outer environment. The Mayan people believed that the blood could speak. This means that the blood could communicate to the inner and the outer environment of the body. The Mayan people considered the blood as an animate substance with the ability in some individuals of sending signals or even speaking. Such sensations in the body as tingling, jumping twitching or twigging in the muscles or the blood were viewed to be ways of conveying message about the past, the prospect of patients or the divinatory clients. When administering treatment, the shamans could receive information from the patient’s body by feeling the pulse of the patient at different pulse points.
The point of blood speaking has not yet received a systematic description but the ethnographic literature of the highland Guatemala has frequently mentioned it. Physical; gender, time and direction, alignment of the body are viewed symbolically, when the priest visits the four mountains. The visit to the mountain on the east was associated with the ability to divine the future, a visit to the west was associated with the ancestors, a visit to the south was associated with male special ceremony. The right side was viewed as the male side and finally the priest’s visit to the north, left side; it was viewed as a female special ceremony. This day was symbolically recommended for marriage proposals (Tedlock 140).
Pertaining to rituals, treatment and culture, all societies has the responsibility of developing procedures to prevent and treat illnesses. The procedures revolve around the ingredient of cultural structure which is sensitive to social values (Rubel 3). Some studies done on the folk illnesses have created an assumption that they are psychiatric in nature hence ignoring the contribution of organic nature even when the symptoms and signs are clearly organic. This has made it hard for the creation of cultural response to the illnesses because of the inability to separate diseases from the cultural response to them. Study on the ritual response to illnesses have shown failure of the traditional healing to report the after treatment conditions of the patient, thus it is thought that the traditional treatment was effective but presents no supporting information (Rubel 6).
Works Cited
Molesky-Poz. “Ceremony: The Fire Speaks” In Contemporary Maya Spirituality: The Ancient Ways are Not Lost. Texas: University of Texas Press. 2006. Print.
Pitarch, Pedro.“The Ethnography of the Soul” In The Jaguar and the Priest: An Ethnography of Tzeltal Souls. Texas: University of Texas Press. 2010. Print
Rubel, Arthur, O’Nell, Carl and Collado-Ardón Rolando“Introduction to Susto”, “The Samples”, “Descriptions of Susto” In Susto: A Folk Illness. Texas: University of Texas Press.1991. Print.
Tedlock, Barbara. “The Blood Speaks” In Time and the Highland Maya. Texas: University of Texas Press. 1992. Print.