Aztec Gods - or God?

Aztecs are considered by most experts nowadays as Politeists. This may be true, but as is well known, the religion of the Aztecs was inherited mainly from the Toltecs, whose empire's history still survived in the Anahuac (Valley of Mexico) when the Aztecs, a band of barbarians come from the north, arrived here. At first working as mercenaries in exchange for a place to live, soon the Aztecs fought their own battles that led to the domination of the Anahuac and the largest empire in central Mexico. They picked up the culture of the Toltecs, Teotihuacan, The Totonacas, Zapotecas and even Mayas, lacking a civilization of their own, and created a new one - the last one.
Though in practice the Aztec religion may have been composed of many Gods, its origin is a Pantheist religion. A single, all-powerful deity was present everywhere and with many aspects. What was later considered deities were actually aspects of the original one, or its agents and helpers.
One factor that helped the idea of politeism is the convenient similarity between the word theos, from the greek god and the word teotl of the aztec language. The spanish used this similarity to their advantage when christianizing the region. The error consists in that teotl actually means wonderful, vast and in some cases terrifying. So the -teotl sufix on many aztec 'deities' doesn't necessarily mean God of Something.

Consider, for example, the catholic religion: it is full of saints; worshipped, shrined, prayed upon. Not to mention the Virgin, angels and other entities. The catholics, though, are not considered to be politheist. The reason for this is that there is a big difference between God, the only deity, and the entities that help him.
Well, according to many experts, this is the case with the religion the Aztecs picked up. There was only one God, or true deity, called Ometecuhtli. This god is the father of all the other 'deities' of the aztec pantheon. Actually, mother and father. Ometecuhtli is, literally, Lord of Two or Lord of Duality. He had a feminine aspect, Omecihuatl - Lady of Duality - and many other dual aspects, like good-evil, light-darkness, or creator-destructor. This duality is the source of everything else that exists.
This duality reflects in all the other entities of aztec mysticism, which were never conceived as good or evil. They were neutral. Every one of them had a task, like death or natural forces, and were not ill intentioned towards humans; simply did their jobs no matter what.
To pray for rain, for example, aztecs would turn to Tlaloc - either Ometecuhtli's water aspect or the natural entity in charge of it. Not actually the God of Waters.

Origin of the gods and the world

It is not the scope here to provide a detailed list of deities and functions of the Aztec mysticism, just a brief explanation of the main entities of their pantheon and the myths of their creation.

Originally, Ometecuhtli and Omecihuatl lived in the World of Darkness, where there was no light, stars or white flowers. They used to go for long walks in the darkness, where only ocasionally the glitter of a monster's eyes could be seen. On one ocassion, Omecihuatl touched one of these monsters, and instantly it became a perfect point of bright light. Marveled by this, they both started touching every monster they found until the sky was full of stars. Soon they wanted more; they wanted to create the world, so they would't be alone anymore.
They went back home and created the four Tezcatlipocas: The White Tezcatlipoca, Quetzalcoatl; The Red Tezactlipoca, Xipetotec; The Blue Tezcatlipoca, Huitzilopochtli and The Black Tezcatlipoca.

Quetzalcoatl and Tezcatlipoca chose a monster all covered with eyes and mouths and split it in two to create the sea and the land, to become the Lady of the Earth. Huitzilopochtli created from Her hair the woods, jungles and prairies. The fourth brother filled it with creatures for land, water and air.
As the world became more complex, many other entities appeared to take care of the created place, Camaxtli as God of the beasts and the hunt; Tlaloc, 'The one that brings growth' as God of rain and water; Opochtli in charge of the sea and all of its creatures. Anything and everything had its caretaker: roads, art, creatures, places, things. But the rulers of the four cardinal points were the four brothers that created it all: Xipetotec ruled the East, Quetzalcoatl ruled the West, Huitzilopochtli ruled the south and Tezcatlipoca the North. Ometecuhtli and Omecihuatl were very pleased with the creation, and started sending little drops of light to be the souls of children, and they still send their drops to the pregnant mothers.

But the creation wasn't that easy. Mictlantecuhtli, in charge of the Underworld and death realized that the sun was too weak, just another little star, and said that a bigger, better sun was needed. This is how the story of the five suns, or ages, starts.

First, Tezcatlipoca offered himself to be the sun, but he was the god of dreams and of magic and he had the ability to become a tiger; this was his alter-shape, his Nagual. Soon the world was full of wild beasts that ate the people.
Then Quetzalcoatl offered to be the sun. When he took his place the winds and hurricanes were unleashed, for he was the god of winds. Horrorized, the other gods turned the people into monkeys, so they could run to the woods and take refuge in the trees.
Then Tlaloc offered himself as the sun, but then the rain of fire started and the whole world was set afire. Now the people were turned into birds so they could fly away. The gods were very disappointed, for they had already created humans three times. The people wasn't perfect on each try, either. First they were too small, very good artisans and goldsmiths but too small to work the land. Then they were too big; when they greeted each other they said 'don't fall down' because they were too big and weak to stand up if they fell.
Then Quetzalcoatl proposed Chalchiuihtlicue, goddess of water, to be the sun. The rain started, the people was washed away and the gods turned them into fishes and all the creatures that live in the water.
Then the gods decided to choose somebody, a man, to be the sun so it wouldn't be too powerful. They chose Tecuciztecatl, though another called Nanahuatzin had offered himself. The gods prepared a big ceremony with a bonfire, and when they were ready they told Tecuciztecatl to jump in. He aproached the fire, but when he felt the heat the backed away. He tried again and again but he just couldn't walk into the fire. When Nanahuatzin saw his hesitation, he ran and threw himself into the fire. Tecuciztecatl, seeing his place and duty being taken like this, he felt ashamed and finally jumped in, but it was too late. The gods watched as two suns raised from the east. Quickly Quetzalcoatl took the first thing he could grab, a rabbit, and threw it to the face of the second sun, shading it with its shape and thus creating the moon. The gods were finally happy with the sun they had made, because this time the people they created were perfect: not too big nor small, not too strong nor weak. The sun is now known as Tonatiuh, The Rising Eagle.
This was the fifth sun, the current one, called Ollin (movement). It is said that the destruction of the current age will come through earthquakes, to make room for the sixth sun if mankind proves not to be worthy of this world.

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