The Latin Americanist, June 2009

THE ANCIENT SPIRITUALITY OF THE MODERN MAYA. By Thomas Hart. Albuquerque:

University of New Mexico Press, 2008, p. 286, $39.95.

In the early 1990s, Thomas Hart, having an opportunity to spend some time in a Guatemala
bedeviled by a civil war, was struck by the vital traditions of Mayan religion and spirituality. Here,
he realized, was an expression of cultural identity that had survived every assault leveled against
it for the last half millennium; it had taken on all challengers and remained strong by using a
syncretistic judo that accepted much, blending and weaving, rather than blocking and striking
back. In 1993, Hart, formerly with the BBC, decided to move from London to rural Guatemala in
order to spend six months or so doing research for a book about Mayan spirituality and its
significance vis-à-vis indigenous rights. Instead, years passed as he found himself being pulled
deeper and deeper into a way of life that sacralized the natural world and provided complex notions
of health and well-being to its participants. In time, Hart would even be initiated as a Mayan priest
himself, though that is not what this book is about.
The Ancient Spirituality of the Modern Maya is about a religious tradition that incorporates
ancient elements from a Mayan worldview with newer elements from Catholicism and elsewhere.
The book, seemingly, is an ethnography without an ethnographer. For what Hart was interested in
writing down, and what he hopes his readers will be interested in reading, are the voices of those
contemporary highland Guatemalans (mainly K’iche’ and Mam) who continue to practice a
spiritual tradition handed down over many generations. The author’s voice is muted; he did not
want to create a top-heavy monograph about his own interpretations and experiences. The chapters
focus on such central themes as the Mayan calendar, the importance of shrines and altars,
divination, illness and curing, the fascinating and always popular Maximón, and the role of Mayan
spirituality in the modern world. Each chapter begins with a brief discussion of its particular
focus—often including key citations from Mayan sacred literature or classic ethnographies—and
then quickly launches into excerpts and narratives that Hart has collected from his respondents
over the last fifteen years. These accounts are studded with gems. Consider this gracefully
translated statement from a Mayan priest: “God sleeps in stone; God grows in plants; God walks
in animals; and God thinks in Man” (27).

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 Book Reviews

All the excerpts are woven together with strands of description to highlight their meaning and
provide juxtaposition with prior narratives. The careful selection and placement of each piece lends
unity and coherence to the text. The invisible hand at work here suggests that Mayan spirituality
eschews orthodoxy, prefers intuition over rationalism/rationality, and yet somehow a unity
emerges from this great diversity. The reader is left with an enriched sense of the ways in which
practitioners utilize their heritage to make sense of their lives and the world.
Reading The Ancient Spirituality of the Modern Maya, one is convinced that this is
primarily an anthropological text. Though not trained as an anthropologist, it is clear that Hart has
read all the relevant ethnographies and contextualized his own data using some of their prior
constructs. It is also clear that Hart has exerted great efforts to be accurate and fair to the opinions
that have been shared with him. In a landscape of New Age fabulists and travelers’ tales, Hart’s
work clearly sides with scholarship. But scholars may not always side with Hart, as he does not
use the overarching theoretical frameworks and orientations that many require.
Anyone who has studied Mayan spirituality understands how slippery it can be. The beliefs
resist any systematic theology, the practices change from one town to the next, and the credibility
of a Mayan priest is lauded by some and disparaged by others even within the same community.
Given its protean nature, some ethnographers attempt too strenuously to wrestle it down with a
theory and force its secrets. Others are content to focus on one small part, as if that part could be
sensibly discussed without understanding its relationship to a larger whole. Hart seems to find just
the right balance between form and content with the thematic approach he provides. The accounts
he relates are so rich, and so deeply informed by thoughtful consideration over fifteen years of
work, that all should find sufficient reason to appreciate this book. And if one is gently confused
by Mayan spirituality upon reaching the end, then the author has probably done an expert job at
being truthful and informative.

John J. McGraw, PhD Candidate

Department of Anthropology
University of California, San Diego

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