Evening star., 1950-08-25
Religion Of Mayo Found
To Be Worship of Time
Mathematics and Astronomy
Developed by Jungle Indiuns
By Thomos R. Henry

By Thomos R. Henry
weird time worship was the religion
Of the Maya
and devils in the strange mysticism of
the most Intellectual Of New World
aboriginals.
This was in part responsible for the
remarkable mathematics and astronomy
which these jungle Indians developed
to q point beyond anything reached in
the Europe Of their day. It was essen
tial for their time pantheon.
Such are the conclusions Of DR.. j.
Eric Thompson. veteran Maya expert
Of the Carnegie Institution of WASH
ineton. The major results Of his many
Maya hieroglyphics have just been pub
lished by the institution. with what is
probably the most comprehensive treatise
people yet to appear.
Symbols Interpreted.
The meaning Of almost majority of
their symbols remains unknown and DR..
Thompson has worked on the thesis
that they can be interpreted only in
the light Of the basic ideas of the people
themselves, insofar as they can be de-
duced by analogy and otherwise.
The Maya week consisted of 20 days.
Their mathematical system was based
on the number 20, instead of TO- as in
the Arabic system. and appears to have
been just as convenient The people.
or at least their priests, prayed to the
days themselves. They symbolized them
in various forms, such as jaguars,
GF1o KAR all I,;A
glyphic symbols in a system which
never quite advanced to the stage of
writing.
The time religion" must have been
. major concern Of the Maya mind, DR..
Thompson believes. It made them es-
sentially an impractical people who,
despite their accomplishments in pure
science. never achieved the domestica-
tion OF work animals or such useful
devices as the wheel
One OF the most remarkable aspects
Of the Maya theology described by the
anthropologist was the grouping of thei.
gods in fours, each deity an individual
in his own right yet all four considered
as one god. This was curious parallel
to the Trinity OF Christian theology.
Gods of All Sorts.
There was host of gods of all sorts
gods Of hours and weeks and years, of
birth and death, seedtime and harvest,
the various trades. But all of these
may have been mystical aspects of the
primary time gods.
Some Of the living Maya, retaining
traditions of their ancestors, Dr. Thomp-
son says, still bow down to the days
and worship them
'The rhythm of time enchanted the
Maya" he reports. The never-ending flow
Of days from the eternity of the future in
to the eternity of the past filled them with
wonder. Like miser counting his hoard,
the Maya priest summed the days that
had gone and the days that were to
come, stacking them in piles, juggling
combinations to learn when the re-en-
tering cycles of time would again pass
abreast the turnstiles of the present"
The Maya remains which have aroused
the most wonder are the ruins of their
Cities" now restored from the jungle,
with their temples, palaces, observa-
tories and ceremonial courts. They
often cover considerable areas The
construction must have involved enor-
NOUS and prolonged labor Yet, DR..
Thompson holds, there is no reason to
believe anybody ever lived in these
cities. The houses were unsuited to
habitation. At the most, priests and
novices may have spent weeks or months
within them during publication fasts.
Otherwise they were purely ceremonial
centers. The people presumably lived
in mean shacks scattered about the
countryside. They were primarily small
farmers who were forced to give a con-
siderable part Of their time to religious
work.
On the whole. DR.. Thompson believes,
they were kindly and peaceful people.
Doubtless humans were at times sacri-
feed to the time gods, but by no means
to the extent reached later among the
AZtecS