By Isabelle Grime [Edited by Henry James Long and Sonia Hussain]
In what ways did the figure of the Virgin Mary offer a bridge between indigenous cultures and Christianity?
The figure of the Virgin Mary is widely viewed by historians as Christianity’s most adaptable figure. As a blessed virgin, she has attracted a multitude of meanings and beliefs outside of the Gospels as Christianity expanded over the centuries; the only constant being her role as the mother of Christ, and thus the Mother of God.[i] Scholars such as Dr Jaroslav Pelikan have described Mary as ‘a bridge builder […] to other traditions, other cultures, and other religions.’[ii] Whether this be through the multifaceted nature of her iconography, or the way in which her role in biblical events, such as the Immaculate Conception and the Assumption, generate fervent belief in her powers of protection, empowerment, consolation and granting salvation.
In this essay, I will be focusing on the depiction of Mary in Catholicism and the denomination of Christian faith which allowed her to achieve global standards of recognition from the fifteenth to the eighteenth centuries. Mary’s adaptable and transitional nature requires her to be studied across a broad timespan in order to successfully track the evolution of ideas and meanings attached to her by indigenous people. This period is fundamental to the exploration of Christian encounters with indigenous cultures due to the ongoing colonisation of the Americas by Western European powers, namely France in North America and Spain in the South. These regions will form the basis of the ‘bridges’ explored in this essay, as even today they are home to forty per cent of Catholics, who as a whole making up half of the 1.2 billion Christians worldwide.[i] Instructed by themes such as Mary’s role in spiritual conquests and religious exchange as well as military exploits and social developments for women, this essay will attempt to illuminate the diverse impacts of Marian devotion on indigenous cultures. It will argue that although she is a global figure, the bridges formed through the use of the Virgin Mary were very much localised and adapted to suit existing cultures and practices.
The gravity of the Virgin Mary’s role in spreading Christianity at this time is supported by Wilhelm Gumppenberg’s 1672 Atlas Marianus, a collection of legends about apparitions of her at pilgrimage sites, of which he details around 1,200 worldwide. Gumppenberg’s aim of defending Catholic devotion to the cult of the Virgin Mary from disdainful Protestants is shown through his attempts to legitimise the aura and venerability of each site. This is further evidenced by the fact that each account opens with the first line of the Hail Mary, ‘Ave Maria, gratia plena; Dominus tecum’, constantly reiterating the dedication of Marian devotees.[i] By 1672, the influence of Mary’s figure had become a global force to be reckoned with, not least due to the fact that his list of pilgrimage destinations came to a vast total.
These sites were part of the many physical and visual representations of Mary which are also integral to tracing the spread of Christianity. One key aspect regarding the encounters of indigenous populations with Christianity is the ‘appropriation’ of Mary to fit pre-existing beliefs.Different societal ideals were reflected in adaptations of Mary to help communicate her importance in Christian worship. In original orthodox Greek portrayals, Mary was traditionally a picture of stoic majesty surrounded by angels and saints. When Catholicism reached the west, however, she became a symbol of emotion and maternal love, gaining a family dynamic through the development and inclusion of the father figure, Joseph, who was not marginalised in the patriarchal society of the west as he had been elsewhere.[i] A suggested catalyst for this western challenge to eastern Europe’s dominance of Christian culture is the year 1000 with the ‘Golden Madonna’ statue of the Essen nunnery in Germany. Although the medium of the sculpture may be said to mimic the imperial wealth of Byzantium, the fact that Mary was now represented as a ‘figure in the round’, looking with motherly adoration upon her son, was a stark contrast to old interpretations.[ii]
It is somewhat ironic, therefore, that only a few centuries later when western missionaries ventured to the Americas, their aim was conversion via ‘total and unilateral displacement of native spiritual error by universal religious truth.’[i] This highlights one of the paradoxes created by using the Virgin Mary to facilitate the building of spiritual bridges; although she was an accessible communication tool of Christian values, there was no one ‘universal religious truth’. Mary had meant different things to Christians across Europe; hence she would inevitably be adapted in different ways by different indigenous cultures. For example, Mary has been described by historian William Hart as ‘a surrogate for existing female deities.’[ii] Although making connections between indigenous goddesses and Mary could be said to ease the transition between faiths, themes such as fertility and plentiful which were attached to her undermined the highly prized notion of virginity. This was prevalent in central Mexico where Mary was associated with the fruit of the Maguey plant, eaten to enhance fertility.[iii] Furthermore, the reinterpretation of Mary was difficult to control in rural regions of the Americas, where worship could not be supervised by missionaries and friars. In one case, a local Nahuatl confraternity was accused of committing turpitude with women they ‘turned into goddesses’ and called St Mary and Magdalena.[iv]
That is not to say that there the use of Mary was unsuccessful in creating successful spiritual bridges between Christians and indigenous cultures. During the Spanish inquisition, Jewish silk weavers in Toledo were successfully convinced of conversion through the use of chant books adorned with Marian illustrations and devotional stories, leading them to form the Christian Confraternity of San Pedro Martir.[i] Narratives and images of Mary presented her to converts as a figure of deep faith and prophetic knowledge, enhancing her ‘usability’, a concept stressed by Hart.[ii] A primary account which illustrates positive appropriation is the Apparition of the Virgin of Guadalupe from 1649, where Mary appears to ‘humble commoner’ Juan Diego at a site which had been sacred to pre-conquest goddess Tonantzin.[iii] The ‘total splendour’ and ‘resplendence’ used to characterise the apparition communicate that Mary came to be a much-venerated figure in the colonial Nahuatl interpretation of Christianity.[iv] The fact that a ‘beautiful image of the Virgin’ appears on Diego’s cloak to convince the Friar of his vision highlights the importance the visual manifestations of Mary in creating bridges and converging cultures and religion.[v] Tonzantin meaning ‘Our Mother’ in Nahuatl, suggests that when indigenous female deities shared the same attributes as the Virgin Mary, such as the maternalistic qualities rather than the clashing characteristics of virginity and fertility, a ‘stronger’ spiritual bridge was offered.[vi] This idea is consistent with Hart’s discussion of the assimilation of Mary with the Sky Woman goddess who belonged to the Huron and Iroquois people of seventeenth century New France, North America. For them, Mary offered a Catholic translation of ‘the blessed virgin’, as the Sky Woman also fell miraculously pregnant by a divine being yet remained a virgin.[vii] In this example, the bridging of faiths even extends to Christ as the good son of the Sky Woman, Teharonghyawago, was likened to him through their mutual teachings on ethical living.[viii]
Hand in hand with the spiritual conquest of indigenous cultures comes military conquest, in which the figure of the Virgin Mary was also wielded as a particularly powerful weapon by Christian colonisers. The earliest Aztec depiction of Spanish invasion shows conquistador Cortés leading his troops under the banner of Mary, as if invading by divine right endowed by the Mother of God herself.[i] Even decades after the fall of the Aztec Empire, there remained hope among indigenous people that their pagan mountain-gods would return to oust the Spaniards, however, this hope was eventually diminished by counter-myths such as the Virgin of Guadalupe and an apparition of Mary at Cuzco, where she supposedly blinded indigenous rebels who rioted in the absence of their Spanish rulers.[ii] These encounters served to amplify the utility of Mary as a weapon to assist and sustain the Iberian colonial enterprise in South America. Likewise in New France, Jesuit missionaries adopted Mary as the patron saint of their newly conquered territory in Quebec, realising that sustaining Christian conversion was more difficult than inciting it.[iii] By making Mary the protector of the Iroquois, rebellion against Christian indoctrination was ultimately harder and more self-destructive, especially as tribal denominations such as the Mohawks had begun to propitiate icons of Mary with sacrifices and feasts to ensure good luck in hunting, war and everyday life.[iv]
The idea of Mary as a protector was adopted by Bolivian converts in the eighteenth century with the painting of the Virgin of the Mountain of Potosi. The Virgin Mary appears incorporated in the mountain itself, perhaps to illuminate how colonialism spiritually, culturally and also physically refigured indigenous settings. Here, Mary formed a bridge between secular and religious authorities of Christianity and indigenous cultures, as both Pope Paul III and Emperor Charles V were pictured worshipping at the foot of the mountain, endorsing conquest, settlement and extraction as the indigenous Inca King was present to oversee the mining of silver from the mountain.[i]
It has been proposed that Mary was also used as a figure to resist colonialism, as although African slaves on Brazilian plantations were forcibly converted to Christianity, their shared faith incited the formation of ties of solidarity against colonial oppressors. Sermons on Marian values of nurture and kinship helped to fill in gaps that had been created by the plight of the slaves, allowing them to utilise the faith that had been projected onto them for their own gain.[i] This exemplifies the almost backfiring of Christian colonial conversion discussed by Griffiths, who argues that ‘in their endeavours to erect bridges between the two religions, Christians inadvertently compromised their message and […] allowed adaptation to take place’, particularly through the use of Mary.[ii] Indeed, the Marian prayer at the beginning of Gumppenberg’s Atlas Marianus, entitled ‘Alma Redemptoris Mater’, reinforces this idea of Mary as a consolation to the oppressed, asking ‘succurre cadenti, surgere qui curat’ [‘help the fallen people who strive to rise again.’][iii] This bridge of consolation and resistance between Christianity and indigenous populations persists through the figure of Mary to this day, again in Brazil where the Virgin of Guadalupe is the tattoo of choice among some prisoners in the seemingly most hopeless of situations.[iv] Burkhart also comments on this facet of the relationship between Mary and the oppressed by describing her typical historical role as the ‘Sinner’s Friend’.[v] This was an intermediary between the judgement of Christ and ourselves whom we ask to ‘pray for our sinners now and at the hour of our death’ at the close of the most universal Marian prayer, the Hail Mary.
The paradoxical nature of Mary as a Christian oppressor but also a comfort to the indigenous oppressed can be viewed through the lens of female encounters with her figure. Mary’s impact on contemporary ideas about gender roles and virginity were integral to the formation of social and cultural bridges. In the late sixteenth century, Jesuit Jose de Acosta described the attitudes of indigenous Peruvian people to the concept of virginity, stating ‘these barbarians despise [it] as vile and offensive.’[i] Here, Western ideals about the ‘esteem and honour’ of being a virgin, largely created by the veneration of Mary’s purity and chastity, assisted indigenous women as they challenged traditional teachings on marital rights, setting a new societal standard that maidens were ‘masters of their own body.’[ii] This was especially prominent among the Huron women of New France who were presented with the opportunity of marrying Europeans amongst whom their virginity would have been highly prized, revealing a new kind of bridge between indigenous women and Christian men.[iii] The newfound sexual autonomy afforded to indigenous women in turn sought to develop attitudes about female autonomy in general, exemplified by the primary account of a seventeenth century Huron woman. Upon her husband’s death she decided to give all of her material possessions away, half to the Church of the Blessed Virgin. When it turned out that the report of her husband’s death was false and he demanded answers, the Huron woman dismissed his reproachfulness, saying ‘one ought not to wait for death to detach oneself from creatures’, empowered by the figure and values of Mary.[iv]
Despite this, historians have argued that the veneration of Mary’s virginal purity sets unattainable standards for both Christian and indigenous women. The preservation of her virginity by not having any other children went against contemporary American ideals of fertility and provision, hindering the development of bridges in this manner. Even when incorporated into indigenous myths, Marian virginity was impossible to achieve; the only way the Iroquois Sky Woman was able to preserve her virginity was because she was killed by the ‘evil’ one of her immaculately conceived twin sons, ultimately showing that these social bridges were ‘more of an ideal than a reality.’[i]
The argument of a fourteenth century Franciscan exemplum, although preceding the time frame of this essay, appears to summarise the bridges formed by Mary between Christianity and the indigenous cultures this essay has explored. ‘Like a mother, she will come between thee and Christ, the father who wishes to beat us […] and soften the King’s anger against us.’[i] Although in this instance Mary was presented as a mediator between sin and salvation, the quote is reflective of a wider argument that Mary bridged the gaps and misunderstandings between Christianity and indigenous faith, the secular and holy, the oppressors and the oppressed and the patriarchy and virginity. Visual representations and tales of apparitions were integral to the creation of these bridges, and the importance of adaptation and appropriation of the figure of Mary to fit indigenous communities cannot be underestimated, as well as the straightforward adoption of her more positive values to fuse Christianity with existing religious traditions.
Notes
[i] Warner, Alone of All Her Sex, p. 285.
[i] Marina Warner, Alone of All Her Sex: The Myth and the Cult of the Virgin Mary (New York: Knopf, 1976) pp. 336-339; Hart, The Kindness of the Blessed Virgin, p. 74.
[i] Jose de Acosta, ‘De procuranda indorum salute’, in Rubin, Mother of God, p. 393.
[ii] Acosta, ‘De procuranda indorum salute’, in Rubin, Mother of God, p. 393; Rubin, Mother of God, p. 394.
[iii] Rubin, Mother of God, p. 394. [iv] Reuben Gold Thwaites (ed.), The Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents: Travels and Explorations of the Jesuit Missionaries in New France, 1610-1791 (New York: Pageant, 1959), pp. 203-205.
[i] Rubin, Mother of God, p. 395.
[ii] Griffiths and Cervantes (eds.), Spiritual Encounters, pp. 7-8. [iii] Gumppenberg, Atlas Marianus, p. 688. [iv] Rubin, “Encountering the Virgin Mary”. [v] Louise Burkhart, “Here is Another Marvel: Marian Miracle Narratives in a Nahuatl Manuscript”, in Griffiths and Cervantes (eds.), Spiritual Encounters, p. 101.
[i] Rubin, “Encountering the Virgin Mary”.
[i] Serge Gruzinski, Painting the Conquest: The Mexican Indians and the European Renaissance (Paris: Flammarion, 1992), p. 152.
[ii] Rubin, Mother of God, p. 391.
[iii] Hart, The Kindness of the Blessed Virgin, p. 71.
[ii] Hart, The Kindness of the Blessed Virgin, p. 84. [iii] Matthew Restall, Lisa Sousa and Kevin Terraciano (eds.), Mesoamerican Voices: Native Language Writings from Colonial Mexico, Yucatan, and Guatemala (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005), p. 196.
[iv] Restall, Sousa and Terraciano (eds.), Mesoamerican Voices, pp. 197-198; Louise Burkhart, The Slippery Earth: Nahua-Christian Moral Dialogue in Sixteenth-Century Mexico (Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1989), p. 155.
[v] Restall, Sousa and Terraciano (eds.), Mesoamerican Voices, p. 201. [vi] Restall, Sousa and Terraciano (eds.), Mesoamerican Voices, p. 196. [vii] Hart, The Kindness of the Blessed Virgin, p. 74. [viii] Hart, The Kindness of the Blessed Virgin, p. 74. [i] Nicholas Griffiths and Fernando Cervantes (eds.), Spiritual Encounters: Interactions Between Christianity and Native Religions in Colonial America (Birmingham: Birmingham University Press, 1999), p. 2.
[ii] William B. Hart, “The Kindness of the Blessed Virgin: Faith, Succour, and the Cult of Mary Among Christian Hurons and Iroquois in Seventeenth-Century New France”, in Griffiths and Cervantes (eds.), Spiritual Encounters, p. 74.
[iii] Miri Rubin, Mother of God: A History of the Virgin Mary, (London: Allen Lane, 2009) p. 389.
[iv] Rubin, Mother of God, p. 390.
[i] Rubin, “Encountering the Virgin Mary”.
[ii] Rubin, “Encountering the Virgin Mary”.
[i] Wilhelm Gumppenberg, Atlas marianus quo sanctae Dei genitricis Mariae imaginum miraculosarum origines duodecim historiarum centuriis explicantur <https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=JoQTgHR98ZoC&printsec=frontcover&dq=atlas+marianus+gumppenberg&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjvgLyMvqXfAhVlRhUIHQ6EAuEQ6AEIKjAA#v=onepage&q&f=false> [accessed 16 December, 2018], p. 689; Monique Scheer, “From Majesty to Mystery: Change in the Meanings of Black Madonnas from the Sixteenth to Nineteenth Centuries”, American Historical Review, 107/5 (2002). [i] Rubin, “Encountering the Virgin Mary”. [i] Miri Rubin, “Encountering the Virgin Mary” (Lecture, Global Encounters: Conquest and Culture in World History, Queen Mary University of London, 8 October 2018). [ii] Jaroslav Pelikan, Mary Through the Centuries: Her Place in the History of Culture (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1996), p. 67.
Bibliography
Primary Sources
Gumppenberg, Wilhelm. Atlas marianus quo sanctae Dei genitricis Mariae imaginum miraculosarum origines duodecim historiarum centuriis explicantur, <https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=JoQTgHR98ZoC&printsec=frontcover&dq=atlas+marianus+gumppenberg&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjvgLyMvqXfAhVlRhUIHQ6EAuEQ6AEIKjAA#v=onepage&q&f=false> [accessed 16 December 2018]
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Scheer, Monique. “From Majesty to Mystery: Change in the Meanings of Black Madonnas from the Sixteenth to Nineteenth Centuries”. American Historical Review. 107/5, 2002
Thwaites, Reuben Gold. (ed.), The Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents: Travels and Explorations of the Jesuit Missionaries in New France, 1610-1791. New York: Pageant, 1959
Warner, Marina. Alone of All Her Sex: The Myth and the Cult of the Virgin Mary. New York: Knopf, 1976