The Mayans: What Is Human Sacrifice?

As far as religions go, the Mayans had a very “creative” one to follow. They were and are a very polytheistic society, worshiping 10 main gods, as well as many other “minor” gods . One of these types of worship, and probably the one that most Mesoamerican cultures are so well known for, is human sacrifice. A person might look at historical evidence of this and think about how horrific this ritual was; they would be right. However, based upon their beliefs, the Mayan people had a few good reasons to think that what they were doing was right. Firstly, in their religion, no one really died; their body might be physically destroyed, but their spirit continues to move forward, ever searching for paradise, or Tamoanchan. This was what death meant to the Mayans.

This leads to the second reason why the Mayans thought it was okay to sacrifice people. This reason is that there were a couple ways that someone could skip this perilous journey and head straight to Tamoanchan. Some of these include dying while giving birth, dying on the battlefield, and, you guessed it, by being sacrificed. So, as the Mayans saw it, they were doing their sacrifices a favor by giving them a “get-out-of-Xibalba-free card”. Speaking of this subject, humans had to make their way through 9 levels of the underworld, making the beginning of their afterlife pure “hell”. Literally. Then, they had to climb through the upper 13 layers to reach their paradise. It was because of these views and beliefs that human sacrifice became so popular, and even honorable. All of this information about the afterlife in Mayan culture is great, but what happened in the beginning? How did the Mayan culture come to