Growing tension at Besakih Temple

Growing tension at Besakih Temple

By Degung Santikarma

KLUNGKUNG, East Bali (JP): As the afternoon shadows lengthen
across an elite neighborhood in Denpasar, a normally quiet house
becomes a feverish flurry of activity.

The booming voice of the father echoes through the halls,
ordering the maids to finish pressing his sarong and ceremonial
shirt. The mother, who is having her lips glossed and hair woven
into an elaborate construction crowned with fresh flowers and
gold leaves, yells at the children to stop playing video games
and start getting ready.

The houseboy checks the oil in the Mercedes, and the maids
load ritual offerings and incense, artfully arranged on a silver
tray, into the trunk. After warning the security guard to look
after the house, the father makes certain he has everything he
needs -- his mobile phone, driving glasses and hand-held hacksaw
-- and shepherds the family into the car for the long drive to
Besakih Temple.

According to tourist guidebooks and official Balinese Hindu
bureaucracy, Parisadha Hindu Dharma Indonesia (PHDI), Besakih is
Bali's "mother temple," where all Balinese have the right and
obligation to worship.

Rituals are held regularly at the temple, some on a truly
massive scale, such as the Eka Dasa Rudra, held every 100 years
in the Balinese calendar, and the Panca Wali Krama, held every 10
years. These rituals, supported financially and supervised
logistically by PHDI, attract worshipers from all over the
island, for every Balinese clan can claim a link to the temple.

And with its ancient history, its elaborate architecture and
its stunning location on the slopes of the sacred Mount Agung,
Besakih also attracts those traveling on more secular
pilgrimages: those sightseeing tourists seeking to experience
authentic Hindu holiness and exotic island allure.

Indeed, for many visitors to Bali, a postcard-perfect image of
Besakih reflects a condensed conception of all that is thought to
be special about the island: enduring traditions, deep
spirituality and harmonious relations within and between
communities. But what the casual visitor might not notice is that
Besakih has become, for many Balinese, a deeply divided place.

After a two-hour drive along steep winding roads, the family
from Denpasar finally arrives at Besakih. Night has already
fallen, but the huge parking lot at the base of the temple is a
buzz of life. Thousands of Balinese, dressed in their finest
traditional clothing, are making their way up the steep steps
toward the temple, ready to participate in the elaborate ritual
known as betara turun kabeh, or "the gods descend to earth,"
which takes place at the temple once every Balinese year.

But despite the festive scene, as the several thousand-strong
crowd prepares to witness the sacred rejang dewa dance to welcome
the gods and the tawur agung or "great sacrifice" designed to
bring the visible and invisible worlds back into harmony, there
is an undercurrent of anxiety in the air.

As the family steps out of their car, they spot familiar faces
in the crowd, including a group of men all dressed in identical
clothing and all, like the father, carrying saws.

They call out their greetings, and exchange the latest rumors
about tonight's ceremony. "Is it really going to go as Parisadha
promised?" asks one of the men, his red shirt emblazoned with the
name of his family clan, the powerful Pande, or traditional
metalsmiths of Bali.

"Don't worry, if our priest doesn't get to sit on the same
level as the other priests, we're going to use these saws to cut
down the platforms," the Denpasar man threatens, to the approval
of the group now gathered around him.

In precolonial Bali, Besakih Temple was held by the ruler of
the powerful kingdom of Klungkung. It eventually came under Dutch
rule when the Klungkung army was defeated by the Dutch colonial
military at the turn of the 20th century.

With Indonesian independence, the Balinese reestablished their
sovereignty over the temple, turning it into an icon of
nationalism and placing it under state control. But with
bureaucratic intervention came politicization, and Besakih became
a place to express growing tensions among different strains of
Balinese Hindu ideology, especially conflicts around the issue of
caste.

For the postcolonial period brought an expansion of economic
opportunities, especially as Bali became a center for
international tourism, and saw the emergence of a progressive,
anticaste movement challenging a system which consolidated power
in the hands of the triwangsa, those "three peoples" -- the
Brahmana priests, Ksatria rulers and Wesia merchants -- who were
regarded as having caste status. Many of these progressives were
well educated and economically powerful members of those clans
who were considered to fall outside of the caste structure,
including the Pande, Pasek and Bujangga.

They decried the fact that within the official Balinese Hindu
model they were jaba, or "outsiders," with no caste status, and
that their own priests were forced to sit lower than the Brahmana
priests at rituals. Ceremonies at Besakih, where Balinese from
all castes, classes and clans gathered, and where these
differences became visible in the spatial arrangement of
worshipers, priests and offerings, became a site for articulating
contesting opinions with the potential to erupt into conflict.

Even in contemporary Bali, where the ring of cash registers
and the cries of protesters sometimes seem to sound louder than
the bells of the priests, these social and religious rifts still
have an extraordinary power to provoke dissent.

As the family makes their way to the temple, a swirl of talk
surrounds them. "If our pedanda (Brahmana priest) is seated on
the same level as all the other priests, I'm going to boycott the
ritual," one man says to his neighbors. Another man, a noted
Hindu reformist intellectual, argues to his friends, "If all the
priests are not sitting together, it goes against the democracy
we have all been working for.

We will have to demonstrate in front of the Parisadha office."
And yet another man, whose meager salary as a tour guide has not
prevented him from showing up in an expensive ritual outfit,
responds worriedly, "I wish everyone would just calm down. There
are tourists and TV cameras here, and we're giving a bad
impression of Bali."

Nervous with anticipation, the Denpasar family finally enters
the main temple grounds. Sure enough, the ritual is being
conducted as a sarwa sedaka, one where "all holy people" are
given equal place, rather than a tri sedaka, where Brahmana
priests are given higher standing. Relieved, they stay to be
blessed and take back some holy water to use for their own
ceremonies. It's past midnight when they finally arrive home.

After the traditional clothes have been exchanged for pajamas
and the children tucked into their beds, the father gets up and
walks out the front door. "Where are you going at this time of
night?" his wife calls after him worriedly. "I left the saw in
the car," he says with a smile. "You never know when we might
need it again."