The Spirits of Galungan & Kuningan

it starts suddenly in the middle of the night while people are deep asleep it sounds like the wailing of a milk-lusting baby but the wailing soon dies out into a whine of despair and a last shriek of death...

Other similar squealing invades the silence of the night...These are not babies, but pigs being killed at the same time, all over the island, on the 'day of slaughter' or 'penampahan', the day preceding the Galungan and Kuningan festivals.

Among the many holidays in the Balinese 210-day calendar, the most prominent are undoubtedly those of Galungan and Kuningan, the former on the Wednesday of the Dungulan week and the latter on the Saturday of the Kuningan week.

Due to their frequency (once every seven Gregorian months) these festivals are not celebrated as national holidays, but don't try to do anything between Penampahan Galungan, the day for the slaughter of the pig that precedes Galungan, and Manis Galungan, the day following it or on the Friday preceding Kuningan as everything is closed. People go back to their village of origin to present offerings to their ancestors and village temples.

Unlike most Balinese festivals that celebrate the particular anniversary of a temple and which are scattered across the calendar, Galungan and Kuningan are island-wide holidays. Everywhere you look temples are all dressed up, with batik and white or yellow cloth wrapped around their individual shrines as a sign that they are 'occupied' - meaning the gods are visiting their descendants.

The rituals involved during Galungan and Kuningan are a reminder of the strong ancestry component of the Hindu-Balinese religion. This speaks for the tolerance shown by Hinduism during the process of Indianazation. When it took root in Bali, this religion, instead of throwing away the older traditions (as Christianity and Islam tended to do) integrated elements of ancestral beliefs and natural animism into its corpus, the rationale being that everything, and every belief can be interpreted as 'ray' or as a manifestation of the 'Ultimate Sun' of Surya (Siwa).

The ancestors do not come before being properly 'invited' back home to the island. They are expected to return on the 'Sugihan Jawa' day, when one makes offerings for the welfare of the world. The call is made in familiar language: "Mai jani mulih. Uba yang ngaenang banten. Mai delokin damuh-damuhe", which means: "Please, come back home for a visit. We have prepared you food. Please come and visit your descendants." This is all the more important for 'dead' souls that have not yet undergone the whole cleansing process.

If the dead are still buried in the cemetery, the soul is thought to be still hanging around nearby, provisionally entrusted to the god Prajapati. Thus it has to be handled with special care, and given the right 'punjung' offering, lest it wreak havoc among the living. But if the soul has been cremated and enshrined in the family temple the danger is lessened and the chances are that its influence will be beneficent on each return visit. The language will change, though, to become more formal and religious, and the offering will be different, too: this time it will be a 'saji'.

The visit of the ancestors is expected to last until Kuningan. It is understood that by Kuningan the spirits will have feasted long enough and it will be time for them to go back to their realm of death: another injunction will do: "Mangkin mantuk ke kedituan ," which literally translates,: "Go back over there to your abode of the dead".

Another way to interpret the Galungan and Kuningan festival is that adopted by modern religious officialdom, which is presented as a celebration of the forces of good over evil much as it took place in the mythical past in the victory of the Gods against the evil giant Maya Denawa. Yet it is possible to interpret the story as referring to the 'defeat' of Buddhism over Hinduism sometime toward the end of the first millennium. The fall of Maya Danawa would then symbolize the victory of Hinduism over an attempt at Buddhist reformation. The following is one of the numerous versions of the Maya Danawa story:

Once upon a time, in the kingdom of Bedahulu, there ruled a king by the name of Maya Danawa, strong and famous, the descendant of the seer Kasiapa and the Goddess of the Lakes, Dewi Danu. But Maya Danawa was also full of arrogance and conceit. He said that the truth laid within the self, and, thus, within himself, and would not heed the calls to prayers and offerings issued by Sang Kulputih, the holy priest of Siwa who had made his residence in Besakih, on the slopes of Gunung Agung, in the very place where Batara Putra Jaya (Mahadewa) himself had earlier been installed by the gods of Jambudwipa (India).

Maya Danawa had forbidden temple festivals and offerings, and as a result woes and evils were falling upon Bali at an alarming rate, with crops failing and epidemics raging, a proof of the gods' growing vexation. Thus, it went on, until Sang Kulputih, warned by daily trances, decided to ask for the gods' assistance to defeat Maya Danawa. And so the gods, summoned from Jambudwipa (India) by Pasupati (Siwa), came to Bali to attack the evil king, accompanied by their troops of 'gandrawa' and 'widyadara'. There were all the gods - Wisnu, the Green Lord of the South, Mahadewa, the Yellow Lord of the West, and Iswara, the White Lord of the East.

All had been summoned to destroy the king of evil, under the orders of Indra, the King of the gods. Maya Danawa was helped by troops from all over Nusantara, with regiments of Sasak, Bugis Sumbawa and Madura. But, despite their valour there was not much they could do against the superior forces of the gods and after the fierce encounter with Petemon the king had to flee - to this day his escape route is marked by the name of villages. Maya Danawa tried to flee by walking side-steps (Tampak Siring), and it became the village of Tampaksiring; he then tried to transform into a bird and became the village of Manukaya (from 'manuk' meaning bird); then into a coconut leaf (busung) and it became the village of Blusung. Outskilled, Maya Danawa tried a last ruse. He turned spring water into poison, and the gods, thirsty from all the fighting, drank heartily from the springs and were all killed except Indra. But Indra was not to be outwitted, he stuck two umbrellas into the ground creating the springs of 'Tirta Selukat' (purification water) and 'TirtaEmpul' (the spring water), whose water was then sprinkled to the gods and resurrected them – these sources are to this day a famous pilgrimage in Bali. Maya Danawa tried again to flee, but he was killed by Indra's arrow. His blood became the water of the Petanu river. From that day on, people say, "whoever dares to bathe in the Petanu shall be stricken down by illness, and whoever drinks it shall be poisoned". Thus, the Petanu river, due to his curse has not been used for irrigation purposes until recently.

Maya Danawa's arrogance has had its historical recurrences, which have always ended up in defeat and a new flurry of offerings. But what about the challenges of modernity? How will the Balinese cope with the new Maya Danawas and how does one recognize them and differentiate the reformers from the 'suppressors' of Balinese Hinduism?

Galungan and Kuningan are mainly family oriented events. It is the individual shrines of the households that are the main recipients of offerings and prayers, but there are otherwise no large-scale ceremonies, except on Kuningan when some temple festivals take place, such as the one celebrated on Serangan island. A few days before Galungan the whole island takes a festive allure. Its most spectacular sign are the 'penjor' decorative poles which are set in front of each Balinese compound.

The 'penjor' is an altar of sorts. One should not think that Balinese have such altars or shrines only in temples. Gods, they say, being 'emanations' of 'Embang', or the void, can sit anywhere, and, wherever they are placed people make shrines to address them through offerings. The 'penjor' is actually such a shrine, with its seat at the lower part of a pole. The curved bamboo and its decorative elements are 'additional components, all of which have their symbolic functions.

Some sophisticated Balinese see the 'penjor' as a remaining element of an ancient fertility cult. It is said to represent the dragon 'Anantaboga', a symbol of earth and prosperity ('Anantaboga' meaning unending food) with its head making up the 'shrine' and the tail its extremity. The fertility aspect is emphasized by the food hanging all along the bamboo and at its tip, as well as by the decorative bird. According to the 'Adiparwa' story it was a bird which brought agricultural produces to earth from the abode of the gods. Some 'lamak' have also a 'Cili', which is a symbolic representation of Sri, the goddess of rice.

The 'penjor' is designed to be a living entity. It has as such its three-coloured 'porosan', the symbol of the 'Trimurti' gods, Brahma, Wisnu and Iswara which is put at its furthest point inside the sampian, a wheel-like symbolic representation of the cosmos. As a living being it is also dressed in white and yellow. The coming to life ceremony of the 'penjor' takes place on the morning of 'Galungan' after the completion of the ceremony in the family temple.

The 'penyor' erected on the eve of Galungan stays in place for five weeks until the Buda Kliwon of Pahang. Then it is pulled out, burned and its ashes buried inside the compound in a final endeavor to produce fertility and prosperity.