One of my pet projects for the last couple of years has been reconstructing the pre-Colonial magico-religious system of the Aztec civilization, which is really the religion of Mesoamerica in general dating back to the Olmec (each successive civilization borrowed from the former one).

One of my reference books for the project is David Carrasco's City of Sacrifice (Beacon Press, 1999). In it, he lists 5 factors that are informed by J.Z. Smith's "locative view of the world", which Smith defines as "a map of the world that guarantees meaning and value through structures of conjunction and conformity."

Here are the 5 factors:

1. There is a cosmic order which permeates every level of reality;

2. This cosmic order is the divine society of the gods;

3. The structure and dynamics of this society can be discerned in the movement and patterned juxtaposition of the heavenly bodies;

4. Human society should be a microcosm of the divine society;

5. The chief responsibility of priests and kings is to attune human order to the divine order.

This seems like a sound structure to me. I was wondering what some of you think of it?

Caelum Rainieri