Path of the Traveling Staffs
Las Varas, sacred staffs of indigenous unity and sometimes called the ‘traveling staffs’, were passed from Guatemala to Mexico on September 22, 2010. As you may recall from an earlier essay (Las Varas), the staffs had been passed to Guatemalan Mayans from the indigenous people of Bolivia in 2009. These are objects of power, passed from country to country and tribe to tribe for decades, and carrying with them the spiritual power of those who have held them.
I was honored have been invited to the Continental Assembly of Indigenous Spiritual Guides held in September at the ancient Kaqchikel capital of Iximche and nearby Tecpan. Originally planned for June, the meeting had been delayed because of Tropical Storm Agatha, and Guatemala continues to slog through the wettest rainy season in 60 years. Spiritual Guides from several countries in the Americas met and prayed for 3 days before discerning the path of the staffs.
Iximche was the Kaqchikel capital city from 1470 until its abandonment in 1524. The Kaqchikel had been close allies of the K’iche, the K’iche king K’iq’ab honoring Kaqchikel rulers with royal titles. It became clear, however, that the king’s sons were jealous of the Kaqchikel, and K’iq’ab advised the Kaqchikel to leave K’iche lands for their own safety, and held back his son’s plan to attack while they built their defensible capital Iximche on land surrounded by ravines on 3 sides.
The equation quickly changed when the Spanish attacked and conquered the K’iche in 1524. The Kaqchikel attempted a short lived alliance with the conquering Spanish, and the conquistador Pedro de Alvarado named Iximche the first capital of Guatemala. Under Spanish oppression the Kaqchikel soon abandoned their city and moved into the mountains.
In addition to the transfer of the staffs of the condor and the eagle, the Varas, the assembled spiritual guides prayed for our mother the earth, and discussed many of the environmental threats facing their home countries. The Mexican delegation of course was much concerned with the BP deep water oil well that had exploded in the Gulf of Mexico, and the unknown damage lying hidden beneath that vast living sea that we here in the US share with Mexico. The Guatemalans were concerned about a new wave of gold and silver mining going on in Guatemalan areas supposedly protected, and the cyanide pollution being left behind. The government had announced there is no danger to the environment without an investigation, and US universities are now becoming involved to document the actual impact of these mining operations.
The Mexican delegation receiving the staffs was from San Cristobal de las Casas, a town in Mexico’s southernmost state, Chiapas. Chiapas is rural and poor, largely Mayan, and neglected and sometimes discriminated against by the federal government. It is where violence broke out in 1994 between the Mexican government and the Zapatista army. Increasingly, gangs and narcotraficantes, drug lords, threaten Chiapas and nearby Guatemala. It will be home to the traveling staffs for the coming year.
Presentation of staffs to the spiritual guides from Chiapas, Mexico.