Wings 2 Fly
Page 16
December 2009
Sacred Sites
CHICHEN ITZA, MEXICO
PYRAMID OF KUKULKAN
“EL CASTILLO”
Pyramid of Kukulkan—
Kukulkan—El Castillo
Starting with this newsletter and in
future ones we are going to visit sacred sites around the globe. We begin
with a visit to Chichen Itza, Mexico,
the largest of the ruined Mayan cities
found on the Yucatan peninsula.
For example, each face of El Castillo
has a stairway made of 91 steps. Adding the steps of the 4 faces plus the
common step at the top gives us 365
steps. We don’t often think of dividing
the year into four 91 day periods but
the fact is, an ancient extra-biblical
book called the Book of Enoch does
the exact same thing. The Book of
Enoch is actually quoted in the Bible in
Jude, verses 14-15.
The stairways divide the faces in two
with 9 sections or terraces on each
side of each stairway. This gives us 18
sections on each face. One calendar
the Mayans used had 18 months of 20
days each with a special 5 day period
at the end.
Though founded centuries before,
Chichen Itza rose to prominence beginning about the 10th century when
the Mayans were joined by the Toltecs
at Chichen Itza.
During the spring and fall equinoxes
something very amazing takes place
at Chichen Itza. The light of the sun
seems to create a serpent’s undulating
body along the north face. The body
ends at the serpent’s head at the bottom of the pyramid.
One of the rulers of Chichen Itza was
a man named Kukulkan. This was also
The undulations create 7 light secthe name of a Mayan God. Kukulkan is
tions, shaped much like a triangle with
often translated as “Feathered Serpent.” At Chichen Itza you can
visit the Pyramid of Kukulkan, also
The serpent’s
known as El Castillo, the most imbody
pressive structure at the site. It is
a stepped pyramid with a square
base and a temple on top rising
The Serpent’s
about 30 metres high (nearly 100
Head
feet).
Mayan structures are often a combination of form, style, function,
religion, philosophy, mathematics
and geometry. El Castillo has many
astronomical, astrological and spiritual components.
6 dark sections in between. Is this
significant? Creation in the Bible takes
place over 7 days and 6 nights. The
Jewish menorah has 7 lights with 6
spaces between the lights.
7 days
+ 6 nights
13 heavens
We spoke of the Mayan Calendar in
another article in this newsletter but
now we will look at another facet of
their calendar. The Mayans had several calendars to be exact. One calendar was a Long Count and it consisted
of 13 baktuns. One baktun was
144,000 days, a number of great significance in the Bible. Thirteen is also
very significant. Though superstition
has turned 13 into an unlucky number, this was not always the case. For
example, every Hebrew letter has a
numerical equivalent. The letters in
the Hebrew word for love, ahav, add
up to 13 as do the letters in the Hebrew word, echad, which means one,
oneness or unity
Many archaeologists have come to the
conclusion that the beginning date
of the Long Count we are now currently in, was August 11, 3114 BC.
Thirteen baktuns take us to December 21st, 2012.
Another calendar the Mayans used
was called the Tzolkin. It was 260
days long. It had 20 different days,
i.e. Manik, Ix, Lamat, etc. Each of
those days would appear 13 times
in the Tzolkin and would be numbered appropriately from 1-13, i.e.
Manik 1, Manik 2 up to Manik 13,
Ix 1 and Ix 2 and so on. The days
Wings 2 Fly
December 2009
and
the
numbers
changed so Manik 1
was followed my Lamat
2 followed by Mulak 3
and so on.
Page 17
HAND CLAPPING
The Quetzal
The Mayans believed
that there were 13
heavens or 13 ages,
each ruled by a particular “god” or “energy.” To the Mayans, these “gods” or “energies” that
were “above” also were experienced
“below” in very practical ways. For
example, each baktun in the Long
Count would be “ruled” by one of the
“gods” and so the “energy” of that
“god” would be experienced during the
related baktun. Some view the “gods”
or “energies” ruling the 7 odd numbered baktuns to be more nurturing
and feminine whereas the “gods” ruling the 6 even numbered baktuns
were more masculine and warlike.
This is beyond the scope of this article
but it is very interesting to overlay
human history with a cycle of the 13
Mayan heavens (ages) and see what
took place in each one and how it confirmed the “god or energy” portrayed
in the Mayan cycle/calendar.
This cycle of 7 days and 6 nights is
portrayed in another building at
Chichen Itza, the Temple of the High
Priest or High Priest’s Grave (above).
Below the common top on each side of
the stairway, we have 6 dark horizontal ridges creating 7 sections.
It seems the Maya did everything for a
reason. The Pyramid of Kukulkan, excluding the Temple of the top, has 9
terraces. The Mayans spoke of 9 periods of time stretching forth from Creation called the 9 Underworlds. Each
underworld contained 13 heavens
made up of 7 “days” and 6 “nights.
If you stand in front of
the stairs of the Pyramid of Kukulkan and
clap your hands, you
hear an “echo” but it
isn’t the sound of your
hands clapping. Kukulcan, the Feathered Serpent was associated with the Aztec
god, Quetzalcoatl, the plumed serpent
god. Both names relate to a native
bird called the Quetzal. When you clap
your hands, the sound that you hear
sounds very much like the call of a
quetzal. Apparently the Mayans may
have known a lot about sound and
acoustics as well as mathematics, geometry, astronomy, etc.
The Observation Tower
In the half ruined high tower of El Caracol are 3 “windows.”
These are
viewing shafts enabling viewers to
look at the northern and southern locations of Venus as well as the equinox sunset.
VENUS
I was going to end this article with the
Venus is both the morning star as well
statement that Chichen Itza is truly a
as the evening star depending on
spectacular place and the Mayans
where Venus is in its cycle. The cycles
were an amazing people but I realized
of Venus played prominent roles in the
that there is problem with that statecalendars of the ancient peoples and
ment. Chichen Itza is truly a spectacuthe Mayans were no exceptions. El
lar place but to say that the Mayans
Caracol, the observatory at Chichen
“were” an amazing people is only half
Itza is situated to maximize the viewtrue. Not only “were” they an amazing
ing of Venus and her 584 day cycles.
people but they “are” an amazing peoThey knew that 5 Venus cycles equaled 8
The Observatory
solar years and they
knew the northernmost
El Caracol
and
s ou t h e r n m o s t
points
Venus
would
appear in the sky and
so El Caracol was set
up accordingly. For example, the front staircase of the observatory is out of alignple and they are speaking out today
ment with the other structures on the
from Guatemala, Mexico, etc. offering
site. It is aligned 27.5 degrees north
their wisdom to humanity. They are
of west, which means it is lined up
very much present with us today.
with Venus’s northernmost point in the
Perhaps they deserve our attention to
sky.
a much greater degree.
It has been suggested that out of the
29 possible astronomical events that
the Mayans could be interested in,
such as equinoxes, solstices and
eclipses, sight lines for at least 20 of
them were available in El Caracol.
A diagonal formed by the southwest
and northeast corners of the observatory align with the summer solstice
sunrise and the winter solstice sunset.
The End
Kukulcan
As
Venus