The Bat God
The town of Tzinacatlan from Chiapas (Mexico) is inhabited by the Tzoctziles (people of the bat) from the Mayan family and the town of Tzinacantepec in the valley of Toluca. In the Popol Vuh (Mayan Bible) the bat is a great angel who descended from heaven in order to behead the first Mayan people who were made of wood. He is the same Heavenly Bat who in the Popol Vuh advised Ixbalanque and Hunab Ku what they should do in order to become victorious in the ordeal within the cavern of the Bat God.
We find the Tzinacan (bat) sketched upon steles, codices and Mayan vessels holding the livened of the God of the air. He is shown with a nasal appendage and triangular teeth that protrude downwardly from the commissures of his lips. He was always sketched on Aztec hearths, goblets and basins, like the vampires from the hot lands of the South of Mexico.
His mouth is characteristic because of its canine and inferior incisive teeth covered by his tongue that always appears protruded in the Zapotec urns. He has big and well-formed ears and protruding from them in the shape of leaves appears the tragus made of jade. He has short fingers in his paws which point towards the heights in order to utilize the suckers from the palm of his hands (the suckers that serve the bat when it hung itself from smooth surfaces) and his nasal appendage in the form of a mounted chair or leaf.
The Nahua temples in the form of a horseshoe were dedicated to the cult of the Bat God. His altars were of pure gold and oriented towards the East.
The Bat God has the power to heal any type of sickness; yet, he also has the power of cutting the silver cord of life that unites the physical body to the soul. The Nahua Masters invoked the Bat God to ask him for the healing of their disciples or for healing of their profane friends. Only Initiates assisted in that invocation, who without touching their hands or bodies, and alternating men with women, formed a human chain in the interior of the temple. The extremes of the chain were starting at both sides of the altar and all of them were seated in squatting position with their back towards the wall. Freshly cut flowers were placed upon the altar and towards its sides; upon two small columns carved in basalt were full- size clay hearths painted in red, the symbol of life and death. Logs of cypress (symbol of immortality) were burning within the clay hearths, whose aroma was mixed with the smoke of copalli (copal), odorous resins and the powder of white seashells. The Master wore the livened of the God of the Air and Maxtlatl around his waist. Then, in the front, and raising the extended palms of his hands, he vocalized three times the mantra ISIS, dividing it in two syllables, as follows:
IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIISSSSSSSSSS IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIISSSSSSSSSSS (3 times)
(I=ē as in weep, deep)
Afterwards, with an obsidian knife whose hilt was made with jade and gold, he blessed the assistants and in silence he performed the ritualistic invocation:
“Lord of life and death, I invoke thee so that thou can descend to heal all of our aches.”
An imposing silence interrupted only by the crackling of the hearths; then suddenly, the sound of flapping wings together with an aroma of roses and spikenards was expanding all over the temple. A flame that elongated itself as if it wanted to touch the heavens was coming from the hearths; and the Master with the assistants were prostrating until placing their forehead on the ground.
The Nahua deity of Death (the Bat God) descended wearing the livened of the God of the air or in the shape of an owl to the funerary ordeals of the Thirteenth Arcanum. The front stoop entrance to the temples of Nahua Mysteries had thirteen steps, and Huehueteoti, the Old God, has thirteen locks on his head of hair.
A circular temple dedicated to the Sun existed inside the precinct where the Major Temple of Tenochtitlan was erected; this circular temple was orientated towards the East, and its ceiling allowed the sunlight to penetrate unto the altar. A gigantic Sun of pure gold was placed upon the interior background wall of that temple; this gigantic Sun was the visible representation of the great Invisible Deity Ipalnemoani. Its door-entrance was the opened jaws of a serpent whose curved and menacing fangs protruded from its commissures and in bas-relief upon the floor a great and bifid tongue protruded from the door of the temple. In the frontispiece of the temple in bas-relief there were the opened jaws of another serpent with very sharp fangs that symbolized the monster against which the Adepts of the august Order of the Knight Commanders of the Sun had to fight.
The Tzinacalli (house of the bat) existed within the secret chambers of that temple of mysteries; it was a broad chamber with the interior aspect of a somber cavern where the rituals of initiation to attain the higher degrees of Ocelotl (tiger) Knight and Cuauhtli (eagle) Knight took place. Upon the lintel of the small door that was concealed within the interior background wall of the cavern, a door that which gave access to the temple, hung a great obsidian mirror; and in front of that small door a bonfire with pinewood burned on the floor.
The candidate for the initiation was taken to the Tzinacalli where he was left alone during the very late hours of the night. Previously, he was indicated to walk in the obscurity towards the light of a bonfire and once in front of it, to talk to the Guardian of the Threshold: “I am a child of the Great Light; darkness move away from me.” The bats then began to screech and to tumble through the air upon the head of the candidate. The pinewood fire slowly diminished until only embers were left in it, which reflected upon the mirror. Suddenly, emerging from the gloom with a very noisy flapping of wings and releasing a terrifying howling, a human shadow appeared who with bat wings and maxtlatl around his waist struck with his heavy sword and threatened to decapitate the intrepid invader of his domains.
Woe to the candidate who withdrew in terror! A door that until then was hidden on the rock opened in silence and at the hinge post a strange person appeared who was aiming the way towards the outside world of the profane from where the candidate had come.
Yet, if the candidate had enough presence of courage and he dauntlessly resisted the assault of Camazotz (the God of the Bats), the small door hidden in front of him was softly opened and one of the Masters approached to encounter him; the Master then discovered and incinerated an effigy that was molded in amethyst paper that had the likeness of the candidate and that was hidden within the shadows of the cavern; meanwhile the other Masters welcomed the candidate and invited him to enter into the temple. This ritual symbolizes the death of the passions of the personality of the Initiate in his passing from the darkness into the light.
Through the tests of this ordeal to which the candidates of the Initiation were submitted in the ancient schools of Nahua mysteries, their animal soul was sometimes depicted as a bat, because like the bat the soul is blinded and deprived of its power for the lack of the spiritual light of the sun.
As vampire bats, the depraved and the avaricious ones fly down upon their prey, and afterwards they lazily go back into the gloomy caverns of their senses where they hide from the light of the day as those who live within the darkness of ignorance, desperation and evil.
The world of ignorance is governed by fear, hate, greed, and lust. In it wander men and women who are only floating listlessly to and fro upon their passions. Only when the human being comes into the realization of the spiritual verities of life does he then escape from this underworld, from that damned cavern of bats over which Camazotz, who sometimes even kills with his sole presence, hidden, lies in wait for his victims. The sun of truth rises in the human being and illuminates his world when he lifts his mind from the darkness of ignorance and selfishness into the light of wisdom and altruism. A symbol of this state of consciousness in the human being is the pair of eagle eyes that, upon the tarsus feet of Coatlicue, try to see towards the infinite.
Practice
We recommend you choose a private place in any of your rooms, so that every week, in that place, upon a small desk or table, you can study these chapters. A white mantle, a small wooden or metallic cross and the light of two lit candles made of wax or paraffin must not be missing upon that desk. Choose the hour from any day of the week, for instance, Thursday from 9 to 10 or from 10 to 11 p.m. Before performing the invocation of Camazotz, the Bat God, you must for three days nourish yourself only with fruits, legumes, rye bread and milk. Do not be afraid to perform the invocation of Camazotz with whom you have to confront yourself to successfully continue on our studies. The soul purified by love and sincere devotion to his internal God must neither fear anything nor anybody, but only fear itself. Keep such an experience of the path of your life only for you.
Samael Aun Weor