Aztec Philosophy: Understanding a World in Motion

by James Maffie

In  Aztec Philosophy , James Maffie shows the Aztecs advanced a highly sophisticated and internally coherent systematic philosophy worthy of consideration alongside other philosophies from around the world. Bringing together the fields of comparative world philosophy and Mesoamerican studies, Maffie excavates the distinctly philosophical aspects of Aztec thought.
 
Aztec Philosophy focuses on the ways Aztec metaphysics—the Aztecs’ understanding of the nature, structure and constitution of reality—underpinned Aztec thinking about wisdom, ethics, politics,\ and aesthetics, and served as a backdrop for Aztec religious practices as well as everyday activities such as weaving, farming, and warfare. Aztec metaphysicians conceived reality and cosmos as a grand, ongoing process of weaving—theirs was a world in motion. Drawing upon linguistic, ethnohistorical, archaeological, historical, and contemporary ethnographic evidence, Maffie argues that Aztec metaphysics maintained a processive, transformational, and non-hierarchical view of reality, time, and existence along with a pantheistic theology. 

Aztec Philosophy will be of great interest to Mesoamericanists, philosophers, religionists, folklorists, and Latin Americanists as well as students of indigenous philosophy, religion, and art of the Americas.

Genres: Philosophy, History, Nonfiction, Religion, Metaphysics, Anthropology

512 pages, Hardcover

First published May 15, 2013

Reviews

[Matthias · Rating 5 out of 5]

There are many negative things that I could say about this book. That it's repetitive, repetitive, and also repetitive. That Maffie imposes an artificial coherence on a body of thought that, if it's as reflective as he claims, surely contained a great deal of disagreement. That the evidence he brings to bear on many interpretations amounts to "well, if we interpret things loosely enough it doesn't *strictly* rule it out."

But who cares? This is the most interesting book I've read in years. The world is bigger and stranger and also more surprisingly ordered after I've read this book. Both because of the vision offered as a whole - while the thought of the tlamatine as presented by Maffie is evidentially wrong on many particulars, it's not more so than that the world-visions of Plato and Aristotle, who may be plausibly right when we abstract from those particulars - and for the wealth of cultural details placed in a context that orders them. One can see how it made rational, ethical sense for an Aztec priest to ritually murder men on the altar, just as (knowing the history of Western philosophy) it made rational, ethical sense for Spanish priests of the same era to ritually murder men in the auto-da-fe. (That there are deeper materialist reasons for these practices, unknown to their practitioners, takes nothing away from this.)

For the curious, here is a video lecture version of the main points of the book: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6uaIe...

Recommended for anyone who cares about philosophy, in the sense of how "things, in the broadest possible sense, hang together, in the broadest possible sense."

[J.D. Steens · Rating 5 out of 5]

Maffie uses the word “Aztec” as shorthand for “the Nahuatl-speaking peoples of Central Mexico,” which included “those residing in Mexico-Tenochtitlan known today as the Aztecs.” As I understand it, “philosophy” in this book is a generic term for metaphysics, which is “the backdrop of Nahua religious, theological, and philosophical thought (including moral, political, epistemological, and aesthetic thought) as well as Nahua ritual praxis.” These elements of Aztec society flow from, and are given meaning by, Nahua metaphysics. “Prosaic, everyday practices such as weaving, farming, hunting, and childrearing likewise presuppose …metaphysical views.” Metaphysics “aims to advance our understanding of things broadly construed. It is about the nature of reality, existence, being, time and space” and this is the focus of his book.

For the Aztecs, the cosmos is constituted by “just one thing,” which is teotl. This is energy. It is “dynamic, vivifying, eternally self-generating and self-regenerating sacred power, force.” It is one thing that is manifested everywhere. It moves from one to many and from many back to one, over and over, always. It is an impersonal field of force that removes energy differentials so that disequilibrium becomes equilibrium, which becomes disequilibrium again. There is no static “beingness.”

The book discusses various cultural practices that reflect this cosmic outlook, including the extensive human sacrifices conducted on the Aztec pyramids. Victims were splayed on the sacrificial stone in the four directions of the cosmos by four priests; the victim’s heart was centered over the stone and represented the cosmic center. Here the 5th (and lead?) priest cut out the victim’s heart and placed it in a receiving vessel. This and the flowing blood transmitted life’s energy to its source, teotl, thereby restoring balance to the cosmos. Thus, from one to many becomes many to one, once again. It is a brutal, but rational, ritual, given their metaphysical system.

Noting the similarity of teotl to the tao of Daoism, Maffie also discusses the heavy Western bias against non-Western philosophy. Even though Western philosophers “are unable to agree among themselves upon a suitable definition of philosophy,” all seem to be able to agree “that non-Western thinkers do not (cannot) do it” and that there’s a pronounced “chauvinistic chorus” that denies “membership in Club Philosophy to non-Western thinkers.” Since religiosity pervades Aztec philosophy and since a main argument in the “West’s self-narrative” is that philosophy “begins where religion ends,” Aztec religious practices and belief systems are dismissed. Yet, Maffie observes, the “religiosity of St. Augustine, Maimonides, St. Aquinas, Ockham, Descartes, Spinoza, Kant or Whitehead (to name only a few bona fide philosophers by Western lights”)” is apparent. Interestingly, and perhaps reflecting the somewhat successful secularization of Plato’s thought, Maflie does not include Plato on his list of philosophical religiosity. Plato’s metaphysics (perhaps reflecting Vedic thought), provides a direct line to Christianity (heaven) and then to modern-day rationalism that is preoccupied with Being, an external and eternal Absolute, not the Becoming of the Daoist tao or the Aztec teotl.

This is a book that needed to be written. It takes a book like this to show how much of Western thinking is bound by its own paradigm. It might explain why Western philosophy could never crack the code on Schopenhauer’s teotl-like Will with its emphasis on cosmic energy, dialectical interaction, and transformation. Also, and especially, the book describes the type of philosophy that emanates from the deepest currents of human nature, absolutely divorced from the influence of the Western/Indian philosophical worldview.

Maflie separates the peoples of central America from its relationship to the wider “Indian” peoples of North and South America, but it would be interesting to see if there are similarities in worldviews. For example, is Chaco Canyon isolated from Mesoamerica, metaphysically, or is one but an extension of the other?

Maffie, a philosopher by training, draws heavily on Western philosophical terminology to explain what he sees in Aztec philosophy and how it does and does not relate to standard Western philosophical canons. This book is heavy on this and also on the details of the Aztec worldview that might overwhelm the reader. A first reading might focus on the overarching themes to avoid getting bogged down.

[Justinian · Rating 5 out of 5]

2016-09 - Aztec Philosophy: Understanding a World in Motion. James Maffie (Author) 2014. 608 Pages.

This is a book that had been on my Spring religious reading list but I did not get to it during my normal spring religious reading period. I finally got it through interlibrary loan. Wow! I am not well grounded in Philosophy and usually this has been a hindrance, but in this case not so much. The reason is that the Aztec world view is outside of the Philosophical tradition of the West as established by the Greeks and filtered through Christianity. In order though to grasp what is being discussed you will need to be capable of setting aside your mental boundaries of belief and conception …i.e. step outside of your own or at least recognize your own underpinnings and limitations and views on the world and how it works. Because you cannot do an apple to apple comparison. Basic assumptions (such as Good vs. Evil) as well goals (Eternal life someday vs. Living here and now) simply do not align. Those that can, will be well rewarded by an excellent text. The layout, and the unfolding of the ideas is well done and is comprehensive and understandable. The larger question of; “well what does this all mean in a society and in daily life?” Is for another book … this is foundation building. There are no value judgements and constant compare and contrast ... instead the ideas are presented on their own. The author does a credible job of explaining his sources and analysis along the way. He discusses when he disagrees with others and why. At times the I think it would be beneficial to be better versed in Nahuatl (a language) then I am but that is nitpicking. Well worth the read and effort. I devoured this book. There is also an excellent two part youtube series of the author discussing some of the key concepts. I did approach the author through e-mail and he was gracious and willing to assist in my directed study of Meso-American religious thought. This is a book that will challenge basic assumptions long normalized in western thought … for me it is as influential as “The Slippery Earth” was and that says a lot. I benefited by reading widely so the ideas were not completely jarring but felt like the buildup of a wave. Great stuff!

[Gina · Rating 3 out of 5]

I am not a huge fan of philosophy, so my critique may not be completely fair or informed. I do think he was overly repetitive at times. There has to be a balance between thorough and overdone.

Or maybe it should not be balance, because the main point of the book was that everything was teotl, that energy constantly creating and transforming everything in the universe, so the balance is achieved through cycling, not stasis.

A lot of time is devoted to analyzing language use, so linguists and people familiar with the Aztec language, Nahuatl, should find the book especially interesting. Also, weavers, because weaving was used as a way of understanding the cosmos.

I was surprised that Einstein was not brought up, because with eternal energy that becomes things and then energy again, that felt relevant. Then there was an explanation of how time and place relate, that sounded a lot like the timespace continuum. Then, almost at the end of the book, there was a little throwaway line about "unless you embrace relativity". Okay.

Maybe it is a philosophy thing.

[Ana · Rating 5 out of 5]

Exhaustively explained, but I suppose that is what philosophy is for. The cosmos is a weaving in progress. Thank you, Mia.

[Ethan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Is Maffie right about all this? He seems to have put in the scholarly work, but at the end of the day I'm not an expert in this area, so I'm not sure. Is this some of the most fun I've had reading philosophy in years? Most definitely.

[Jarin Jove · Rating 5 out of 5]

Definitely one of the most thorough and well-researched books I've ever read. The details were just staggering. My mind is still trying to process all of it. Only real question I have is how much disagreement or variation existed regarding the belief in Teotl among Aztec / Mexica peoples. Although, the thorough descriptions of the belief structure seems ambiguous enough to suggest there'd be power struggles over what constitutes Nepantla / Middling among the city-states that composed the Mexica civilizations. I'm more curious now as to what the Toltecs may have believed as the Mexica / Aztec socio-religious historical narrative indicates Toltec scholars abandoned them and a lot of Aztec metaphysics seems as if they were close to figuring out Newton's Laws of Motion, if they had spent more time on research and less on militarism. Nepantla, more than Ollin and Mallinalli, seems to be the problematic philosophical concept that prevented them from harboring more inquisitiveness about the world. I'm more curious now on the Northern Indigenous civilizations as, insofar as I understand, they seemed to have a greater awareness of herbology and a better appreciation for women's rights than the Aztecs / Mexica, which resemble European Monarchic dynasties more closely than other Indigenous civilizations. I was surprised to learn the cultural history of North American indigenous groups that had matriarchal systems like the Navajo. Perhaps that, too, is the reason for European cultural fascination with the Mexica above other groups. An affirmation for a false narrative of the ubiquity of patriarchy, when in fact the US deliberately and successfully committed cultural genocide upon Matriarchal family systems via Christian Boarding Schools.

Anyway, this is a fantastic read and a great resource for learning Aztec / Mexica philosophical belief systems for anyone curious about indigenous cultures before the genocidal violence imposed upon them by Western cultural norms and values as per the Doctrine of Discovery -- which is still imposed upon by the US government upon Native American people of the US who were effectively barred from suing their rapists until 2013 when the Violence Against Women's Act was amended under President Obama and the subsequent lack of accounting for predominately white, male registered sex offenders who hunt down, rape, and murder Indigenous girls (meaning children) throughout the US and for which both Republicans and Democrats protected and continue to shield from lawsuit under the 1978 Supreme Court case of Oliphant vs Suquamish and the Indian Civil Rights act which allows White male, violent sex offenders (who are more likely to be Bible-thumping Christian conservatives who believe in the Bible literally, according to research done by the US Justice department under George W. Bush's administration in 2006) to rape and kill Indigenous girls and women as per the patriarchal war-raping religion of Christianity's Doctrine of Discovery, which the US Supreme Court still upholds to this day in the US denying Native American women equal rights to due process. And if you think I'm lying or exaggerating, read Amnesty International's updated report on the issue.

Overall, although I'm only beginning to read into Mesoamerican and Indigenous American belief structures, I think the author hit the mark and helped explain a lot of the graphical imagery and supposed contradictory belief structures. Inamic Unity and the foundation being process-metaphysics helped to explain the terminology of the "deity" names and the supposedly contradictory elements that existed in each of them. The culture of twoness is rather fascinating and it is interesting to observe and read about cultures that grew-up naturally to have supernatural views on diametric oppositional systems and structures that weren't inherently related to Manichean concepts; even in the context of a "purity" culture that was completely unrelated to vilifying sexual intercourse. It's rather sad that it took so long for curiosity to flourish regarding the coherence of indigenous belief structures against the more racially charged and bigoted views regarding their beliefs that dominated the 1800s, 1900s, and early 2000s views of them and even sadder that the US public and US government still don't care to rectify tossing away hateful, racist power structures like the doctrine of discovery that continue to dehumanize and promote violence against both Indigenous women and Indigenous men throughout the US (Indigenous men and young boys have been hunted and murdered by violent sex offenders and murderers throughout the US as well, but not as extreme as what Indigenous women continue to suffer due to Christian colonial-based laws in the US that are still in effect).

[Lannan · Rating 3 out of 5]

He just... overargues and overcomplicates a simple concept that had less direct impact on ancient Mexica culture than he wants to believe, and far less spiritual impact of the specific texture that he's trying to sell us on.

[Rusty del Norte · Rating 4 out of 5]

James Maffie's work "Aztec Philosophy" is a work that details the cosmology of the Aztecs up through the late 16th/early 17th century. In it, he goes through how this society understood the world through teotl. He thoroughly explains hows this is best understood through his eyes as a form of pantheism as opposed to the traditional polytheistic approach that was first supposed by the Spanish.

The work is full of Nahuatl (or Nawatl) terms, many of which are little explained or given guides in how to correctly pronounce. Some others (like ometeotl) are given full chapters. The work does not go into detail on everything, and it gets repetitive in the last 3 chapters.

Still, if you don't mind the higher learning curve this book presents & you want a non-Westernized philosophy to understand, this might be something you wish to give a chance.

[E. · Rating 3 out of 5]

"Life on earth is slippery because order and being are always sliding into disorder and nonbeing. The existence and well-orderedness of the things upon which humans depend slip away from under their feet, causing them to lose their balance and suffer pain, hunger, thirst, sorrow, disease, and death."

An at time dense and other time exciting (for example, the philosophical importance of sweeping with a broom) survey of Aztec metaphysics. Since reading an article by Maffie some years ago, I've wanted to understand Aztec thought better, because of this core idea that the world is constantly changing and that to live well is to develop balance. That seems more useful than the centrality of certain foundations and unchanging ideas in much Western thought.

[Ring Chime · Rating 3 out of 5]

Certain portions are a bit more repetitive than I would like. I enjoyed the book overall though.

[Joel Blackstock · Rating 5 out of 5]

Video Review: https://youtu.be/QHJ3JWCM4EE?si=idBrJ...
Podcast Review: https://gettherapybirmingham.podbean....

[Mark · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great read... deep and introspective for the lover of cultural history and philosophy of ancient Mexico, so familiar.