Mexican expert: Don’t believe false 'end of world' Mayan prophecies

Mexico City, Mexico, Nov 20, 2009 / 15:54 pm

Renowned Mexican journalist Carlos Villa Roiz wrote an article this week urging Mexicans to learn their country's history and to reject the supposed end of the world prophecies that Hollywood scriptwriters attribute to the Mayans in the film “2012” that never existed.

In an article published by “Impacto El Diario,” Villa Roiz points out that the Mayans surfaced around 1500 B.C and existed until the end of the 17th century.  “They were astronomers, mathematicians, priests, warriors and wise men who developed two complex but precise calendars based on the “katun” (periods of 20 years).  One was the solar or civil calendar of 365 days and the other was the Tzolkin lunar calendar of 260.  They ran together because they both are divisible by five,” he explains.

Villa Roiz notes that “although there are different interpretations about the equivalencies between the Mayan dates and our calendar, the director of the movie took advantage of this in order to concoct that 2012 would be the end of an era, and his fantasy was embellished by the suicide of a Mayan community (that was already mixed-race) that fell into despair because the time of fulfillment of the Mayan ‘prophecies’ was approaching.”

According to Villa Roiz, “When it comes to novels and movies, scriptwriters can do what they want, they can dream up aliens, goblins, witches, whatever.  The result can be fun, deplorable or offensive, such as the case with the Dan Brown books. What is worrisome is that people buy into them and turn these fantasies into supposedly hidden dogmas.”

“Now well-into the 21st century, when many people shun the historic religions under the influence of materialism, relativism and scientific methodology, it is deplorable that this vacuum is filled by horoscopes, tarot card or tea leaf reading, and film,” he writes. 

“In Mexico,” he adds, “where embarrassingly people read maybe two books a year, it is sad that many believe all these lies,” and therefore he urges students to read Sylvanus G. Morely, one of the foremost experts on the Mayans.  “What the Bible says about the end of the world is merely that ‘no one knows the day nor the hour, but only the Father’,” Villa Roiz concludes.