Life and death are two complementary aspects of ‘life’ (kawsay/jakaña) in a meta-individual and cosmic sense. The axis of Andean runasophy or jaqisofía is not the individual person (‘I’) and his or her particular fate, but the collective personhood of the family and the ayllu. Therefore, the ancestors (almas/achachilas) continue ‘living’ as members of the collective group and are ritually and ceremonially ‘presented’ as protective ‘spirits’ (nuna/achachachila) of the ayllu. There are also ‘negative spirits’ (soq’a, ñak’aq/kharisiri, anchanchu, awki, saqra/saxra, supay/supaya)38 that reveal a certain disturbance in the personal, collective or even cosmic balance.
These are not souls in a strict sense, but ‘privative’ phenomena that occur when the network of relationships is severely damaged. The irruption of the white human being with the Conquest has given rise to the phenomenon of the ñak’aq/kharisiri (pistaco, disgorger, sacker) as a phenomenon of ‘crisis’ and violation of the principle of reciprocity. The ñak’aq/kharisiri is supposedly white and grabs the runakuna/jaqinaka at night to remove their tallow (another symbol of life) in order to run their machines, cars and even computers
Estermann Josef – Filosofia andina