Teotl

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Let's begin our examination of Aztec metaphysics. Western philosophy standardly defines metaphysics as the study of the nature, structure, and constitution of reality at the most comprehensive and synoptic level. Metaphysics aims to advance our understanding of the nature of things broadly construed. Metaphysicians seek answers to puzzles concerning the nature of existence, causality, consciousness, space, time, God, personal identity, and the relationship between human beings and the world. Ontology is a branch of metaphysics that focuses more narrowly on the nature of being per se and on what things exist and the kind of existence they enjoy. Aztec metaphysics accordingly consists of the Aztecs' view of the nature, structure, and constitution of reality. Aztec ontology consists of the Aztecs' view concerning what exists and the kind of existence that existing things enjoy.

Section 1.1 sketches in broad strokes the general contours and fundamental features of my interpretation of Aztec metaphysics. My defense of this interpretation begins in section 1.2 and continues throughout the remainder of the book. Section 1.2 situates my understanding within existing scholarship on Aztec metaphysics. Section 1.3 discusses the artistic and shamanic elements of Aztec metaphysics, while section 1.4 explores several salient implications of along with several objections against my interpretation. Section 1.5 briefly summarizes the chapter's findings.

1.1. Teotl

At the heart of Aztec metaphysics stands the ontological thesis that there exists just one thing: continually dynamic, vivifying, self-generating and self-regenerating sacred power, force, or energy. The Aztecs referred to this energy as teotl. Teotl is identical with reality per se and hence identical with everything that exists. What's more, teotl is the basic stuff of reality. That which is real, in other words, is both identical with teotl and consists of teotl. Aztec metaphysics thus holds that there exists numerically only one thing — energy — as well as only one kind of thing — energy. Reality consists of just one thing, teotl, and this one thing is metaphysically homogeneous. Reality consists of just one kind of stuff: power or force. Taking a page from the metaphysical views of contemporary Mixtec-speaking Nuyootecos of the Mixteca Alta, we might think of teotl as something akin to electricity. Nuyootecos speak of a single, all-encompassing energy, yii, which they liken to electricity. What's more, the Aztecs regarded teotl as sacred. Although everywhere and in everything, teotl presents itself most dramatically — and is accordingly sensed most vibrantly by humans — in the vivifying potency of water, sexual activity, blood, heat, sunlight, jade, the singing of birds, and the iridescent blue-green plumage of the quetzal bird. As the single, all-encompassing life force of the cosmos, teotl vivifies the cosmos and all its contents. Everything that happens does so through teotl's perpetual energy-in-motion. Teotl is the continuing "life-flow of creation": "a vast ocean of impersonal creative energy."

Aztec metaphysics is therefore monistic in two distinct senses. First, it claims that there exists only one numerically countable thing: teotl. I call this claim ontological monism. Aztec metaphysics thus rejects ontological pluralism or the view that there exists more than one numerically countable thing. Second, it claims that this single existing thing — teotl — consists of just one kind of stuff, to wit, force, energy or power. Teotl is metaphysically uniform and homogenous. I call this view constitutional monism. Since the cosmos and all its contents are identical with teotl as well as constituted by teotl, it follows that the cosmos and all its contents consist uniformly of energy, power, or force. Everything consists of electricity-like energy-in-motion. Aztec metaphysics thus denies constitutional pluralism or the thesis that reality consists of more than one kind of stuff (e.g., spiritual stuff and physical stuff). Together, ontological and constitutional monism entail that the apparent plurality of existing things (e.g., sun, mountains, trees, stones, and humans) as well as plurality of different kinds of stuff (e.g., spiritual vs. material) are both derivable from and hence explainable in terms of one existent and one kind of stuff: teotl. In the final analysis, the nature of things is to be understood in terms of teotl.

Teotl is nonpersonal, nonminded, nonagentive, and nonintentional. It is not a deity, person, or subject possessing emotions, cognitions, grand intentions, or goals. It is not an all-powerful benevolent or malevolent god. It is neither a legislative agent characterized by free will nor an omniscient intellect. Teotl is thoroughly amoral, that is, it is wholly lacking in moral qualities such as good and evil. Like the changing of the seasons, teotl's constant changing lacks moral properties.

Teotl is essentially power: continually active, actualized, and actualizing energy-in-motion. It is essentially dynamic: ever-moving, ever-circulating, and ever-becoming. As ever-actualizing power, teotl consists of creating, doing, making, changing, effecting, and destroying. Generating, degenerating, and regenerating are what teotl does and therefore what teotl is. Yet teotl no more chooses to do this than electricity chooses to flow or the seasons choose to change. This is simply teotl's nature. The power by which teotl generates and regenerates itself and the cosmos is teotl's essence. Similarly, the power by which teotl and all things exist is also its essence. In the final analysis, then, the existence and nature of all things are functions of and ultimately explainable in terms of the generative and regenerative power of teotl.

Teotl is a process like a thunderstorm or flowing river rather a static, perduring substantive entity like a table or pebble. Moreover, it is continuous and ever-continuing process. Since there exists only one thing — namely, teotl — it follows that teotl is self-generating. After all, there is nothing outside of teotl that could act upon teotl. Teotl's tireless process of flowing, changing, and becoming is ultimately a process of self- unfolding and self-transforming. This self-becoming does not move toward a predetermined goal or ineluctable end (telos) at which point teotl realizes itself (like Hegel's absolute spirit) or at which point history or time comes to an end. Teotl's tireless becoming is not linear in this sense. Like the changing of the seasons, teotl's becoming is neither teleological nor eschatological. Teotl simply becomes, just as the seasons simply change. Teotl's becoming has both positive and negative consequences for human beings and is therefore ambiguous in this sense. Creative energy and destructive energy are not two different kinds of energy but two aspects of one and the same teotlizing energy.

Teotl continually and continuously generates and regenerates as well as permeates, encompasses, and shapes reality as part of its endless process of self-generation-and-regeneration. It creates the cosmos and all its contents from within itself as well as out of itself. It engenders the cosmos without being a "creator" or "maker" in the sense of an intentional agent with a plan. Teotl does not stand apart from or exist outside of its creation in the manner of the Judeo-Christian god. It is completely coextensive with created reality and cosmos. Teotl is wholly concrete, omnipresent, and immediate. Everything that humans touch, taste, smell, hear, and see consists of and is identical with teotl's electricity-like energy. Indeed, even humans are composed of and ultimately one with teotl and, as such, exist as aspects or facets of teotl. Teotl's ceaseless changing and becoming, its ceaseless generating and regenerating of the cosmos, is a process of ceaseless self-metamorphosis or self-transformation-and-retransformation. In short, teotl's becoming consists of a particular kind of becoming, namely transformative becoming; its power, a particular kind of power, namely transformative power.

Since teotl generates and regenerates the cosmos out of itself, it would be incorrect to think that it creates the cosmos ex nihilo. Contrasting the Quiché Maya concept of creation in the Popol Vuh with the Judeo-Christian concept creation in the Bible, Dennis Tedlock notes that for the Maya the cosmos does not begin with a "maelstrom" of "confusion and chaos." The same holds for Aztec metaphysics. The cosmos does not begin from chaos or nothingness; it burgeons forth from an always already existing teotl. Consequently Aztec metaphysics may aptly be described as lacking a cosmogony, if by cosmogony one means the creation of an ordered cosmos from nothingness or primordial chaos. There are no absolute beginnings — or absolute endings, for that matter — in Aztec metaphysics. There are only continuings. Death, for example, is not an ending but a change of status, as that which dies flows into and feeds that which lives. All things are involved in a single, never-ending process of recycling and transformation. There is furthermore no time prior to or after teotl since time is defined wholly in terms of teotl's becoming. Nor is there space outside of teotl since space, too, is defined wholly in terms of teotl's becoming.

Teotl continually generates and regenerates as well as permeates, encompasses, and shapes the cosmos as part of its endless process of self-generation-and-regeneration. It penetrates deeply into every detail of the cosmos and exists within the myriad of existing things. All existing things are merely momentary arrangements of this sacred energy. Reality and hence the cosmos and all its inhabitants are not only wholly exhausted by teotl, they are at bottom identical with teotl. That which we customarily think of as the cosmos — sun, earth, rain, humans, trees, sand, and so on — is generated by teotl, from teotl as one aspect, facet, or moment of teotl's endless process of self-generation-and-regeneration. The power of teotl is thus multifaceted, seeing as it presents itself in a multitude of different ways: for example, as heat, water, wind, fecundity, nourishment, humans, and tortillas. Yet teotl is more than the unified, kaleidoscopic totality of these aspects. It is identical with everything and everything is identical with it.

Process and transformation thus define the essence of teotl. Teotl is becoming, and as becoming it is neither being nor nonbeing yet at the same time both being and nonbeing. As becoming, teotl neither is nor is not, and yet at the same time it both is and is not. Aztec metaphysics, in other words, embraces a metaphysics of becoming instead of a metaphysics of being. Teotl processes, where to process is understood as an intransitive verb such as "to become," "to proceed," or "to walk in a procession." Teotl's processing does not represent the activity or doing of an agent. Nor does it have a direct object. Teotl's processing is a nonagentive process such as the changing of the seasons, the coming and going of the tides, and fluctuations in a magnetic field. Because identical with teotl, reality is essentially process, movement, becoming, change, and transformation. Because identical with teotl, the cosmos is processive and as a consequence lacks entities, structures, and states of affairs that are static, immutable, and permanent. Everything that teotl creates out of itself — from cosmos and sun to all earth's inhabitants — is processive, unstable, evanescent, and doomed to degeneration and destruction.

David Cooper proposes that we understand the term, God, in the mystical teachings of the Jewish Kabbalah as a verb rather than as a noun. He suggests God be understood along the lines of "raining" and "digesting" rather than "table" or "planet." Doing so better captures the dynamic, processive nature of the deity discussed in these teachings. Similarly, David Hall argues in his study of classical Daoism that we better understand the term dao as "primarily gerundive and processive" rather than as nominative and substantive. Dao signifies a "moving ahead in the world, forging a way forward, road building." Since doing so better reflects the dynamic nature of teotl, I propose we think of the word teotl as primarily gerundive, processive, and denoting a process (rather than as nominative and denoting a static substantive entity). Teotl refers to the eternal, all-encompassing process of teotlizing. Since the cosmos and all its contents are merely moments in teotl's teotlizing, they, too, are properly understood as processes.

Aztec metaphysics' understanding of teotl is shaped by several further fundamental guiding intuitions. First, it subscribes to the notion that that which is real is that which becomes, changes, and moves. Reality is defined by becoming — not by being or "is-ness." To be real is to become, to move, and to change. In short, Aztec metaphysics embraces a metaphysics of Becoming. It embraces flux, evanescence, and change by making them defining characteristics of existence and reality — rather than marginalizing them by denying them existence and reality. It maintains the ontological priority of process and change over rest and permanence. It squarely identifies the real with the constant flux of things. Since teotl is sacred, it follows that the sacred is defined by becoming, change, and motion as well.

The Aztecs' metaphysics of Becoming stands in dramatic contrast with the metaphysics of Being that characterizes the lion's share of Western metaphysics since Plato and Aristotle. The latter defines reality in terms of being or is-ness. On this view to be real is to be permanent, immutable, static, eternal, and at rest. (E.g., real love, as popular sentiment would have it, is eternal, immutable, and undying love.) That which becomes, changes, perishes, or moves is not real — or at least not wholly or fully so. Mutability, evanescence, and expiry are criteria of non- or partial reality, whereas immutability, permanence, and eternality are criteria of reality. Plato's metaphysics serves as a paradigmatic expression of this intuition. It denies complete reality, is-ness, and being to all things that change and assigns them to an ontologically inferior realm of semireality. Perishable and mutable things occupy his famous Cave where they suffer from semireality and semiexistence. This is the realm of Appearances. Eternally unchanging things occupy his famous the realm of the Forms, where they enjoy complete reality and is-ness. This is the realm of the Real.

One's view on this issue has important implications for one's understanding of the sacred. For example, if one upholds a metaphysics of Being and if one also defends the reality of the sacred (e.g., the gods), then one must a fortiori see the sacred as eternal, immutable, and defined by pure Being. The sacred cannot therefore be identified with that which becomes, changes, and perishes. The latter must be characterized as nonsacred or profane. Furthermore, if the world about us changes then the sacred must be metaphysically divorced from the world and instead identified with a transcendent, metaphysically distinct realm of Being. On the other hand, if one upholds a metaphysics of Becoming, then one may identify the sacred with the mutable, evanescent, and perishable, and hence with the changing world about us.

Second, Aztec metaphysics equates reality with the exercise of power, that is, being real with making things happen, influencing things, acting upon things, and effecting change in things. As always active, actualized, and actualizing power, teotl is continually doing, effecting, and making happen. Carl Jung articulates the intuition nicely: "Everything that exists acts, otherwise it would not be. It can be only by virtue of its inherent energy."

A third intuition claims essence follows from function. That is, what something is follows from what it does as well as how it does it. This intuition replaces the traditional Western metaphysical principle operari sequitar esse ("functioning follows being") with its own principle esse sequitar operari ("being follows from operation"). Teotl therefore is what teotl does. And what does teotl do? Teotl makes everything happen as well as happen the way it does. Teotl is the happening of all things, the patterns in the happening of all things, and the co-relatedness between the happenings of all things. It vivifies all things and is essentially vivifying energy. It energizes the life cycles of plants, animals, and humans; the cycles of the seasons and time; and the creation and destruction of the five Suns and their respective Ages or what I call (for reasons that will become clear in chapter 4) "Sun-Earth Orderings." Teotl is the power behind and the power of the becoming, changing, and transforming of all things above the earth, on the surface of the earth, and below the earth.

The foregoing suggests Aztec philosophy embraces what Western philosophers call a process metaphysics. Process metaphysics views processes rather than perduring objects, things, or substances as ontologically basic. What seem to be perduring things are really nothing more than stability patterns in processes. As the products of processes, entities are derivative. Process metaphysics treats dynamic notions such as becoming, power, activity, change, flux, fluidity, unfolding, creation, destruction, transformation, novelty, interactive interrelatedness, evanescence, and emergence as central to understanding reality and how everything hangs together. What's more, processes are what processes do. Essence follows function. This intuition, like others we've seen, contradicts the dominant view in the history of Western philosophy since Plato and Aristotle, namely, substance metaphysics. Substance metaphysics views perduring things or substances as ontologically basic and processes as ontologically derivative.