The Native Encounter With Christianity: Franciscans And Nahuas In Sixteenth Century Mexico

By: Francisco Morales, OFM (Historian, Order of the Minor Friars, i.e., Franciscans, in Mexico)

Published in: The Americas
Vol. 65:2 October 2008, 137-159
Copyright by the Academy of American Franciscan History 
[Abridged and reprinted with the author's permission 
by Mexico City Ambles; words in italics in brackets are those of MCA]

Among the nations of the New World, Mexico is probably the country in which the Franciscans worked most intensively. Having been the first missionaries to arrive in Mexico, they covered most of its territory and worked with numerous native groups…This activity left an indelible mark in Mexico, a mark still alive in popular traditions, monumental constructions, popular devotions, and folk art. …

(T)he favorite concern of Franciscan pastoral activity was the indigenous population. Thus, Franciscan schools and colleges, hospitals, and publications were addressed to it. For their part, the native population showed the same preference for the Franciscans.

This peculiar symbiosis is the topic of this lecture. My question is: how did this association occur? What sort of obstacles did both the Franciscans and the natives have to overcome to achieve such an understanding? Were there only Franciscan missionary ideals, or were there also native motivations behind this mutual and singular encounter?...

(T)wo absolutely different worlds were confronting one another face to face.

On one side was the Christian religion in its medieval manifestation, enriched by Franciscan mystical practice. The first 12 Franciscans were exceptional representatives of that religious current. They formed part of a spiritually radical group that since the early fifteenth century was trying to return to the original ideals of the Franciscan order based on the strict observance of St. Francis’ Rule and Testament [centered on a life of poverty].

On the other side was the complex and, to the western Christian mind, incomprehensible Nahua religion. While not attempting to simplify its complexity, some fundamental elements are worth noticing in order to see which ones could offer a link to Christianity and which ones were totally unacceptable to it.

Mesoamerican religion was based on a strong relationship of humanity to the universe of the gods. According to the primordial events in Mesoamerican cosmogony, life—both human and cosmic—was only possible through the sacrifices and penance of the primeval gods, one of whom, Quetzalcoatl, the Feathered Serpent god, symbol of divine wisdom, bled his body to give life to human beings. In fact, the Nahuatl word for human beings was “macehualtin,” which means “those made worthy [of existing] by divine sacrifice.” Thus the “detestable human sacrifices” reported by the Franciscans .. were reenacting the primeval action through which life took place in the universe. Mesoamerican natives felt the necessity of constantly propping up the cosmic order which was always in danger of being destroyed.

But in spite of this religious burden of human sacrifice, in many ancient texts the Nahuas expressed the value they placed on human life and their concern about what was appropriate and right. Nahua children were taught at home, schools, and temples what was good and righteous and how to avoid evil; to live in accordance with one’s destiny and to perform properly the ritual acts through which one became worthy of his destiny in relation to the plans of the “Ometeotl”—the dual [male/female] divinity and supreme god.

The Beginning Of Understanding 

It took a good while for the Franciscans and Nahuas to know each other and establish the first steps of mutual understanding. Ceremonial practices, rather than doctrinal discussions, were the first points where real contact began. Let us look at the following text of Motolinia [One of the group of twelve who took the Nahuatl word for poor, motolinia, as his last name].

[A Miracle Promotes the First Conversion]

Motolinia writes,

For five years the Indians of Mexico were very apathetic, either because of the arduous works with which the Spaniards aggravated them for the reconstruction of Mexico [City, over the ruins of Tenochtitlan] or because the old folk showed little interest [in their conversion to Christianity]. 

Fortunately, during this period there were events that provided opportunities for unexpected mutual encounters. One of them happened in 1528.

In the fourth year after the arrival of the friars in this land it rained very much,
ruining the corn fields and causing many dwellings to collapse. Up to then no
processions had ever been held among the natives. On that occasion the
natives of Tezcoco held one with a simple cross. And, having rained incessantly
for many days, it pleased our Lord in his mercy, through the intercession
of His Holy Mother and of St. Anthony, who is the chief patron saint of
this town, to put a stop to the rains on the day of procession, in this way confirming
the newly converted Indians in their languid and weak faith.

From then on, Motolinia continues,

The Indians made many crosses, banners of saints, and other ornaments to be
used in processions. And forthwith the natives of Mexico [Tenochtitlan] came [to Tezcoco] [on the eastern shore of Lake Texcoco] to get patterns of them. Soon after, in Huejotzingo, the Indians began to fashion rich and elegant drapery for crosses and also processional platforms (andas) of gold and feathers. Before long the Indians everywhere began to adorn their churches, to make altarpieces and ornaments, and to hold processions while the children learned dances in order to make the processions more attractive. [MCA note: As we have seen at fiestas such as Santa Cruz, Holy Cross, they still drap crosses and in virtually every fiesta there are andas, often elaborately decorated with fresh flowers, to carry saints on their processions through their pueblos.]

In other words, what seemed like a simple public prayer [seen as producing miraculous results] became the beginning of a meaningful encounter. In sixteenth-century Spain, a good number of religious demonstrations—such as processions—were held on the occasion of natural disasters to implore the local saints’ help…

In these rituals the Franciscans … discovered an important point of contact that was common to both religious systems. The Nahuas invoked their supreme god in natural disasters, just as the Spaniards did…(T)he friars found in these celebrations an excellent opportunity for transmitting the Christian message.

Motolinia describes the solemnity with which the Nahuas, by the beginning of the 1540s, were celebrating the most important liturgical feasts, and how the friars used them to instruct the community in Christian doctrine. Motolinia writes,

“The Indians celebrate the feasts of the Lord, of Our Lady and the principal Patrons [saints] of the towns with much rejoicing and solemnity.”

These celebrations, … can be considered as the origin of the fiesta system so characteristic of popular religion in today’s Mexico.

They are reported by Motolinia in the following way:

They [the Nahuas] decorate their churches very tastefully, . . . with tree branches, flowers, reed mace and sege. ... Where the procession is to pass, they erect numerous arches made of roses and adorned with trimmings and garlands of the same flowers. The wreaths of flowers they fashion are very attractive.” (F)lowers are the most important element. [Flowers remain a preeminent component of present-day fiestas, adorning saints, altars, church and atrium entrances and procession andas. In some major fiestas, floral arches are erected over the streets. They are almost always erected as portadas over church entrances.]

Motolinia continues:

Attired in white shirts and mantles and bedecked in feathers and with a bouquet
of roses in their hands, the Indian lords and rulers perform a dance and
sing in their language the songs with the explanation of the feast which they
are celebrating. The friars have translated these songs into the Nahuatl language
and the Indian masters have put them into the rhyme that would fit and
be sung in accordance to the rhythm of their old songs. [MV Note: The conchero dancers, who place their origins in this transitional time, still wear white tunics, explaining that that is how the friars required that they dress to participate in Catholic rituals. The wearing of Aztec dress, modeled from the codices written by the monks and their Nahua informants, is a late 20th century phenomena.]

This short text provides us with one of the most important moments in the origin of Mesoamerican Christianity. There appear, naturally,

• the Christian elements (liturgical cycles and saints’ advocations [as intercessors with God on behalf of for their pueblo]), but at the same time,
• the Mesoamerican ones (“Flowers and songs”, "in xochitl in cuicatl", the core of the Mesoamerican culture).

A remarkable feature is the role played by the lords and rulers in these celebrations, 

...attired in white shirts and mantles and bedecked in feathers and with a bouquet of roses in their hands, dancing and singing in their language the songs with the explanation of the feasts which they were celebrating.

… In sum, what this text suggests is that the fundamental architects of Mesoamerican Christianity are not only the Franciscans …but also the Nahua community with their lords, the tlatoani, and their sages, the tlamatinimeh (those who know what is Above us and the Region of the Dead [below]) In other words, both friars and natives made possible the spiritual and intellectual transfer of the Nahua religion to Christianity.

The Bridge For Understanding: Learning Nahuatl 

What made this transfer possible? Jerónimo de Mendieta, in a delightful narrative on the Twelve Franciscans’ arrival to the city of Texcoco, has a singular answer. He writes that when these Franciscans met the three Belgian friars (Peter Moer, Johan Dekkers [or van der Tacht], and Johan van der Auwera, who had arrived a year before), 

“observing that the temples and idols were still alive and the Indians were practicing their idolatries and sacrifices, they [the 12 Franciscans] asked fray Juan de Tecto [Johan Dekkers] and his brothers: ‘What have you been doing or taking care of [during this time]?’ To which fray Juan de Tecto answered: ‘We are learning the theology that St. Agustin completely ignored, meaning the native language, and giving them to understand the great profit that they would get from its knowledge.”

Motolinia, writing in the 1530s, says:

It is a great science to know the language of the Indians and to understand
these people. Knowledge of the Indian language is necessary for speaking,
preaching, teaching and administering the Sacraments. No less necessary is it
to be knowledgeable concerning the natives of New Spain, who are by nature shy
and very reserved.  

The way to learn the native languages was a very Franciscan one: namely, becoming children with the native children. Mendieta writes:

[Those venerable old friars], getting rid of their persons’ seriousness, started to play straw and little stones with them [native children] during the recreation time. The friars always had paper and ink in their hands, and on hearing a word they wrote it down, indicating the circumstances in which it was said. In the afternoon the friars used to meet to interchange their writings and, the best they could, adapted the Nahuatl words to the Spanish terms that they considered most appropriate. And it used to happen that what one day they had understood the following day they would find out not to be so. [After some time] some of the grown-up children, as they saw the friars’ desire to learn the language, not only corrected their mistakes, but also asked them many questions that were a source of happiness [for the friars].

When fray Juan de Zumárraga [a Franciscan and the first bishop of Mexico City] arrived in Mexico
at the end of 1527, fray Pedro de Gante was already an accomplished Nahuatl speaker, which was one reason why Zumárraga took him as his translator.

Strengthening The Bridge: The School System  

The language was only the first step toward a mutual understanding. Education was the cornerstone for building what the friars, by the second half of the sixteenth century, called “La Iglesia Indiana,” the Indian Church, as opposed to the post-Constantinian Church of the Spanish laymen and secular clergy, what present scholars have called, “The Nahuatlization of Christianity.”

From the beginning, the Franciscan educational system followed two traditions: the European and the Mesoamerican. As soon as the friars established themselves in their monasteries, Mendieta says, they asked the native community to build …“a hall where their children would be lodged and taught…” These buildings replaced the native calmecatl, a Mesoamerican educational institution of long tradition located in the old ceremonial centers. There the pipiltin, children of nobility, received religious, military, and civic education. The early Franciscan educational system was addressed to both the pipiltin and the macehualtin [children from the lower classes]. [MCA Note: Thus, challenging an existing division in indigenous society and what would become an entrenched division in Colonial and Mexican society between los de arriba, those from above, and los de abajo, those from below.]

The relationship of this system with the medieval Franciscan monasteries was very close. In the latter, there was the practice of accepting young boys for educational purposes. In Mexico too, the children learned not only Christian doctrine, but also reading and writing, the liturgical hours, and how to serve the Holy Mass. As in Spain, they were not destined to become friars.

By 1532 over 5,000 children were receiving education in various monasteries of central Mexico, (including), Tula, Coyoacán, Cuernavaca,… and Tlaxcala. The largest group was in Mexico City, where fray Pedro de Gante [at San José de los Naturales convent] taught some 600 children. This school was famous not only for its large number of children, but above all, for its advanced educational program. Thanks to the friars’ humanistic training, this school’s program included the study of Latin.

Santa Cruz De Tlatelolco: College [and] Scriptorium 

Not many years later, in the early 1530s, this educational system culminated in the foundation of the “Colegio de Santa Cruz” in Tlatelolco, which was the first college in the Americas. …(T)here is enough documentation to support the remarkable significance of this college for the formation of the “Iglesia Indiana,” or the Nahuatlization of Christianity.

From the commentaries circulating at the time of its establishment we can conclude that rather than the formation for the priesthood (though it was not excluded), the main motive which gave rise to Santa Cruz College was the persuasion that higher education for the natives constituted an indispensable lay support for the Franciscan missionary efforts.

By the middle of the sixteenth century Santa Cruz College had already formed the first group of Mexican humanists, perfectly trilingual, speaking and writing Latin, Spanish, and Nahuatl fluently. This group did a splendid work for the formation of a native Christianity, translating from Latin into Nahuatl many Biblical texts and some Franciscan classics... The best example is the Coloquios y doctrina cristiana, which is considered a classic of Mesoamerican Christianity.

The “Indian Church”

All these experiences contributed to a much-beloved project of the Franciscans: the establishment of a Church different from that of the Old Continent… critical of European Christianity for its lack of appreciation for evangelical poverty… (B)y the end of the fifteenth century various Franciscan groups had founded places [in Europe] where they could put into practice their favorite ideals of poverty and the evangelical simple life. None of these places, however, was comparable to the lands and people of Mexico.

Jerónimo de Mendieta expressed it in this form,

“It can be asserted as truth that no nation or people have been discovered in the world better disposed and prepared for salvation (if they are helped to) than the natives of this New Spain.”

Mendieta explains the reasons for his assertion, namely the simplicity and poverty of the natives’ life. … Arguing for the natives’ great dispositions to reach salvation, he says:

“I say that many natives, in spite of being so lowly and despised . . . have shown by their deeds that they spurn the world and wish to follow Jesus Christ with such efficacy and such good spirit as I, a poor Spaniard and lesser brother, might wish to in following the evangelical life.”

This idealistic approach to the natives’ conversion, motivated undoubtedly by the unfulfilled yearnings for apostolic poverty and simplicity that the Franciscans could not find in Europe, persuaded the friars that they were founding a new church quite distant, geographically and spiritually, from the church of Europe. Mendieta called it the “Iglesia Indiana,” the “Indian Church” as opposed to the “Church in the Indies.” Behind this idea was the image of the Primitive Apostolic Church as a prototype of their missionary labors.

One of the main features of this new church was its independence from the institutions that, in the eyes of the Franciscans, had caused the ruin of European Christianity: wealthy parishes and bishoprics. The new church had to be under the mendicant orders and under bishops elected by the friars, as they elected their provincials. Mendieta was convinced that a project of this nature would let them establish “the best and healthiest Christian society of the World.”

This Franciscan project has singular importance. At a time when the Catholic European Church, motivated by the Protestant Reformation, was emphasizing her juridical and hierarchical aspects…the Franciscans in Mexico were trying to go back to the Apostolic Church…. The friars never claimed that the hierarchical Church had to be abolished. They simply said that such a Church was not fitting the realities of the new lands in Mesoamerica. For a new land and people, new forms of service and ministry were necessary.

Coloquios y Doctrina Cristiana: Its Origins and Theological Contents 

The Franciscan project of a new face for the native church … also was supported by a remarkable effort to express the Christian message in Nahua terms. The best testimony of such a project is the previously mentioned “Coloquios y doctrina cristiana,” a work that was written by the group of native humanists of Santa Cruz of Tlatelolco College under the direction of fray Bernardino de Sahagún.

Sahagún and other sixteenth-century Franciscan chroniclers tell us that, upon the arrival of the first friars to México, Hernan Cortés called the native rulers of Tenochtitlan and of the nearby towns to introduce the newly-arrived missionaries. Sahagún writes:

Once they [the rulers] met, Hernán Cortés, in front of the friars and throughhis own interpreter, made a long speech in which he gave an explanation onwho the [newly arrived] persons were, who had sent them and for what purpose, as well as on the reverence and obedience that [the native] rulers should give them. From then on, those apostolic men began to call the [native] rulers every day and through an interpreter had long talks on the motives of their coming [to Mexico] and on our Holy Faith matters.

A rough draft of these early dialogues preserved in some old papers was obtained by Sahagún in 1564. With his trilingual humanists of Santa Cruz College and the editing assistance of some old sages—experts in the Nahua language and of the native religious beliefs—Sahagún turned this old version of the dialogues into a refined text ready for publication.

The manuscript, which never reached the printing press, has two columns: in the first one Sahagún reproduces the polished Nahua text prepared by the Tlatelolco students and sages; in the second one, parallel to the first one, he wrote his Spanish translation… Going through this text, one has to conclude that the “Coloquios” are one of the greatest efforts to express the Christian message in an ideology totally different from that of Western thought…

The Concept of Divinity

…(T)he basic theme of any religious system is divinity. This issue has been one of the most challenging problems in the history of Catholic missions, hence the importance of examining this matter in the “Coloquios.” A close reading of this work will show us that the friars, as limited as they were, opened the doors to what in our present day is called, “inter-cultural dialogue.”

… What interests us in the exposition of this theme in the “Coloquios” is its closeness to the Nahua idea on divinity. For example, in chapter four, which in the Spanish text has this heading: “Quien es el verdadero Dios, Señor universal, que da ser y vivir a todas las cosas” (Who is the True God, Universal Lord, Who gives being and life to all things), in the Nahuatl text becomes: “Who is He, the Very True God, the Lord, He by Whom all live, The One that is Near, The One that is Close” (Onca mitoa in ac iehoatzin, Uel Nelli Teotl, Tlatoani, in Ipalnemoani in Tloque Nahuaque).

…(T)he attributes, Tlatoani, Ipalneomani, and Tloque Nahuaque are the same ones attributed to the … important Nahuatl god, Tezcatlipoca. Thus, … the main purpose of this chapter is not to explain the doctrine of God according to the [Catholic] catechisms of that time, but to argue that the “Nelli Teotl” (the True God), the “Tlatoani” (The Lord), the “Ipalnemoani” (He by Whom all live), the “Tloque Nahuaque” (The One that is near, The One that is close) is the Christian God…

…(T)he “Coloquios” could not ignore the fundamental truths of the Catholic faith about God, namely, incarnation, redemption and the Holy Trinity. (However), they treat these concepts not with the techniques of scholastic theology, but with the poetic technique of Nahua literature,…using synonymous images.

For example, the incarnation is expressed in the following way: “And specially… in love for people, in mercy for them, for us, He made Himself a man here on earth, a male. He came to make Himself, such as we, we common people, He took for Himself our flesh of common people.”

Two Nahuatl expressions attract our attention in this text, both of which have a profound and remarkable meaning: “In tiuhque, in tehoantin timacehualti” (such as we, we common people) and “Oquimocuilico in tomacehualnacaio” (He took for Himself our flesh of common people). As mentioned earlier, the original meaning of “macehualtin” (plural of macehualli) was “those made worthy [of existing] by divine sacrifice.” By the time of the Spanish conquest, the word was applied only to common people. Thus, in the “Coloquios” it is quite clear that the identity of Jesus Christ is with the poor Nahua people…

Redemption is expressed in the same manner: “Likewise for us, He came to die. He came to shed His precious blood for us. By it, he came to make us free from the hands of those very evil ones, those who hate people very much, those very wrathful ones, evil-hearted ones, those who are our enemies, the devils.”

In these and other texts dealing with the concept of divinity, the “Coloquios” avoid making a clear reference to the Persons of the Holy Trinity and to the Person who became man and shed His precious blood for us. No doubt Sahagún and the first Franciscans were worried about the danger of falling into the polymorphism of the native deities. For that reason, very likely, there are only general references to God (“Huel Nelli Teotl”).

On only one occasion, in the context of the “dialogue” with the native sages, when they asked, “What is the name of your God?” the Franciscans answered, “His precious name is Jesus Christ.” To His already known attributes, “Ipalnemoani and Tloque Nahuaque,” they add two more: “Nelli Oquichtli” (True Man) and “Temaquistiani” (literally, the Liberator, the Savior).

The Scriptures

In the Council of Trent (Session IV) two sources are mentioned for the teachings of the Church: the Holy Scripture and the unwritten traditions. In the “Coloquios” only the “divine words,” or the “divine book” (“teutlatolli, teuamoxtli”) are mentioned. A more open expression of this unilateral source for the Catholic dogma is found when one comes to the origin of these “divine words.”

Here, again, in a rhetorical way the friars make the natives ask: “That divine word (“teutlatolli”), where does it come from? How was it manifested? Who has shown it to you? Where did the great lord of the divine things [the Pope] find it?” In the friars’ answer, one can see their catechetical effort to introduce the different moments of Salvation history with the help of Nahua concepts. The Franciscans say that first the “Nelli Teutl Tlatoani” (the True God and Lord), the “Tloque Nahuaque” (the One that is near, the One that is close), the “Ipalneomani” (the Giver of life), decided to show His predilection and His knowledge to the kind-hearted and righteous people: the Patriarchs and Prophets [of the Old Testament].

Then, He, the “Nelli Teutl Tlatoani” (“The True God and Lord”) deigned to come to our world to make Himself a man: “Cainca tlaltipac oquichtli mochiuhtzinoco.” As a man (“uel iehoatzin oquimotlacanochili”), He was able to call the Apostles and Evangelists to hand them over His precious breath (“in ihiyotzin”), His word (“in itlatoltzin”), and the divine words (“in teutlatulli”). These … were written by the Lord’s command “so they will be preserved on earth” (“inic tlaltipac pieloz”) so that “with them [the divine Words] men will be taught on earth” (“inic ixtlamchtilozque tlaltipac tlaca”). These “divine words” are safeguarded in the “teuamuxpan tlillotoc, tlapallotoc,” literally “in the divine book, with black ink, with red ink,” a Nahuatl literary figure emphasizing the importance of the Bible (“black ink, red ink” were used to refer to the sacred Nahua codices).

The Church

A final point in this interesting way of presenting the Christian message in the Nahuatl culture is the treatment of the concept of Church. The Middle Ages (at least in western Christianity), by insisting on the canonic and clerical regime of the Church, over-emphasized its juridical aspect to the detriment of the theological meaning that is hidden in the sentence that continuously appears in the Gospel, “the kingdom of God.” It is only recently, thanks to the Second Vatican Council, that the concept of the “Kingdom of God” was recovered as the main image to represent the Church (“Lumen Gentium”).

The Franciscans made use in the “Coloquios” of such an image to explain what the Church is. The chapter dedicated to this topic bears the following title: “Chapter Five: Where it is told how on the earth is His kingdom, of Our Lord Jesus Christ, as man (“Oncan mitoa, ca in tlalticpac, onca in itlatocaiotzin, inic oquicht, totecuiyo Iesu Christo”).

The three Nahuatl terms “itlatocaiotzin,” “tlalticpac,” and “inic oquichtli” are full of native meaning. The friars, instead of using the Nahuatl term “teopan” (“place for god” [i.e., temple]) for “church,” prefer to employ the descriptive image of the earthly kingdom (“tlalticpac itlatocaiotzin”) and make an open reference to our Lord as a man “oquichtli”).

The friars’ purpose of using Nahua concepts to explain the Church becomes more evident when they describe in detail this earthly kingdom. They write: “He, the Only True God and Lord (“In iehoatzin in can iceltzin Nelli Teutl Tlatoani”), the Creator of men (“teiocoiani”), He who gives freedom to people (“temaquistiani”), Jesus Christ, here on earth, (“Nican tlalticpac”), He established His Kingdom (“Quimotlalili itlatocaiotzin”). He set down His mat, His seat (“ipetlatzin, icpaltzin quimotecuili”), this is what it is called the Kingdom of heaven (“auh in iehoatl in, itoca ilhuicac tlatocayotl”). As has been mentioned before, “mat” and “seat” are quite common Nahuatl literary figures meaning authority or the place of power from which to command.

Only after having explained this concept with Nahua images, do the friars use a Spanish term for the Church: “Ioan itoca Sancta Iglesia Católica” (“Its name is Holy Catholic Church”). Following the theology of their times, the friars maintain that the Catholic Church is the only way to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven…

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