[Aztlan] on the rightness or wrongness of human sacrifice

[Rodrigo Garcia]

Jaime Andres Pretell [jaime_pretell at hotmail.com] wrote:

>But the question is if the ones that died shared in those beliefs. If the
Aztec victims that died were in themselves willing participants >and
believers in the sacrificial value of others, then I would agree they were
part of the belief system, the norm values of the group.  >And that is my
question, did they? Were all sacrifices from within the Aztec belief
system and willing participants in it when it came to >others?

 

Just a thought coming from a non Archeologist (and sorry for my poor
English): 

 

Is it possible that human sacrifice was mostly imposed by the ruling
elites to establish control over the general Aztec population through fear
(and using religion)? We all know that religion has played this role in
other cultures, (like the idea of eternal hell used to manipulate people
and justify extreme barbarities for political means). So maybe in
Mesoamerica, human sacrifice was not so much a belief shared and wanted by
everyone as much as we think but instead a known mechanism used throughout
Mesoamerica by the educated elites to establish control and power over the
general population. I also wonder if there were sectors of the population
that were trying to change things and were being suppressed, or Aztec
philosophers and rebels that were silenced because of their liberal ideas
just like ancient philosophers were silenced in the western world when
they spoke against the established religion.

 

Rodrigo