Mystical symbolism of the Sufis in “Gulshan-i Raz”
D. The mole
II. Cultural Egoism: Towards a prescription
Culture as text are hybrid. With the vast sophisticated interweb, everyone can access certain cultures by mental cognition, that before the practical proceeding comes later via traveling, into the cultural cosplaying, and the amateur ethnography. Beware not to use the term cultural appropriation, as Balinese would not know or have problems with its praxis. Balinese products are a free market and anyone from anywhere can have them just fine. Balinese traditional clothing, Balinese cultural performances, Balinese lands, etc. Culture is sold so the economy can rise. As Michel Picard put it, “In the temple we ask for a blessing, and at a hotel we ask for money” (1990:
37). Picard’s argument on how Balinese assimilates any cultures for economic growth without sacrificing their own is outdated, as he wrote this thesis in 1990.
Bali in the twentieth century is much more modern (rather “cryptically advanced”—for better or worse) than even the Balinese would ever expect.
Assimilation most of the time only concerns, or to highly value “the inevitable” invasion of the dominant culture to the less dominant. All of those
“friendly” narrative the west put into the east, that from tourists all around the globe to Bali, make Balinese act like a tiresome noddy circus for the whimsical energetic sentients. The sacredness of
180 high cultures as we should switch with
better ones are now in a sorry state. It looks like it’s sacred, but feels bleak in ethics and aesthetics. A tremendous responsibility for a habitat so wide in the open to protect its favorable branding, that of the sacred and the magical experiences of the land. On the opposite example from Bali, we take the Sentinelese in the Northeast Indian Ocean whose habitat “uncontacted” with the rest of the world for a thousand years.
Are they cruel, killing the people that tried to approach them? It’s between condemning them as a savage and backward primitive civilization, or simply not blaming the Sentinelese because they do not know that they are part of India and the applicable laws. The first response is to refute the literary myth of the noble savage, or that humans were inherently good before the touch of modern civilization. “Every culture is horrible in its own way”, said Slavoj Žižek. The second response, moreover, the Sentinelese show that the conception of global cohesion at a higher level than their own togetherness can be rejected.
They tell the modern world regarding the definition of the sacred, mystical, and magical in a more concrete ontology, or not onto-theology, through their experience of finding objects on the shores of their islands like plastic waste, or when there is a plane or helicopter passed over them. For us, they are the true embodiment of what sacred language, magic, and mysticism are all about. Not some metaphysical orientation, but the solid cultural predicament except one wants to exchange their life for their “good will”
and being helpful for those in need. The true mistaken egotistical turn, with anthropology and related humanistic studies that always have this good
sentiment: "To understand better”. To share experience so esoteric and knowledge so needed. To understand better yet to take something more and think it is a good idea. It’s all nothing but the ego and the will, cornered and ill when someone tells one as “egotistical”.
It is not wrong per se, only appears to be right. The great ego is the ego to eliminate, to opt out, not to add more, especially when it harms others because one is too blinded by his grandeur intention. The modern man should stop positioning themselves as aliens who visit past worlds. These culturized people hide their ego in the appearance of warm friendliness for the natured people. It is not human in the zoo looking at animals anymore, but the animals with their imitated habitat so better than the humans have, it turns the human as the spectacle of animality.
Max Stirner in his book The Ego and Its Own (1995: 44), regarding the cultured man: “It is precisely among cultured people that fanaticism is at home; for man is cultured so far as he takes an interest in spiritual things, and interest in spiritual things, when it is alive, is and must be fanaticism; it is a fanatical interest in the sacred”. Sacredness in Stirnerian ideas is anything towards the objective value. The unshaken and everlasting blinding intimidation of sacrifice. Sacrifice for the people, for the Gods, for love, for the country, but ourselves. Sacredness is a “sacred language” on its own, founded and reproduced by the sages as the exhortation for a guided life. For formal definition in linguistics, we called some ancient languages “sacred”. This definition brings us languages that are rarely spoken and understood, but it is still possible to reach as long as the will demands it. But if it is sacred because one
181 might sacrifice their life for it, thus the
fear of making the decision, the praxis falls short because the will is detained by the anticipation based on the reality of the situation. This contestation of the will and practical reality is related to Stirner’s critique to Hegelian conception of history, in which Hegel used the term Geist. Geist is in German, and the English translations vary from that of the
“Spirit”, “Mind”, “Ghost”. Technically it means non-material existence, anything that doesn’t physically exist. The Spirit (let’s use this term) is a prominent idea from a particular time or era in history, that must move towards a goal, a perfection, a mighty prescription, to the absolute, or anything superlatives. In that process, human suffering is inevitable for the mechanistic world of the Spirit. This brings us nowhere but to religion and cultures, in which we have the term
“spirit” already explained synonymously with ghost, spook, and death. From both spirits, Hegel’s term and the cultural, meaningless suffering all the same. Both spirits demand sacrifice, and the question
“why” is always left unanswered. Human aspects are now so crowded with everything they strive and have, that they might finally do less sacrifice. Less suffering. Less in everything. Humans might start revolting against the cultures that shackles their being. To release their masked ego and go towards egoism.
“Egoism, is not opposed to love nor to thought; it is no enemy of the sweet life of love, nor of devotion and sacrifice; it is no enemy of intimate warmth, but it is also no enemy of critique, nor of socialism, nor, in short, of any actual interest. It doesn't exclude any interest. It is directed against only disinterestedness and the uninteresting; not against love, but against sacred love, not against thought, but against sacred thought, not
against socialists, but against sacred socialists, etc.” (Stirner, 2012: 41).
Sacred culture. We oppose sacred culture, but not culture. But can cultures not be sacred? It might. We go with the
“cultural egoism”, a constant dynamical resolution between the individual choice to participate in cultures, without nullifying the importance of subjective values one held at hand. It is an active act individually to oppose anything beholding our true desire and purpose in life, might that even nothingness we seek, it shall be better than the promise of the fullest heaven they promised. It is the realization of cultures sufficient enough that one does not excessively need them, beyond survival as for the self-ego.
However, this can be contradicting, as the common definition of culture itself is
“fixed ideas”, or “sacrifice”, or to serve for a greater good. Someone’s subjective values could actually be that of serving one’s culture. The altruistic act of egoism is not a typical act one made in which one sow only the inadequacies, and truly feel the suffering. Moreover, it ignites this sense of fragile heroism, the radical acceptance of the comical, absurd needs of culture and togetherness. Sacrificing oneself for the cause of the other gives one this sense of self assurance by “doing the good deed”. To destroy the perpetuation of the sacred is to deny that there is any. An affordable way for improvement is to leave our culture behind. It’s to take our house brick by brick, to let the air flow from the holes that appear. Cultures and every knick- knack has become pure amusement to us.
We select our type of suffering wiser at this moment, while the uncontested type is to eliminate within without increasing others. The will to fight for the prescription is what makes it worthy, rather than to stay hidden pretending to
182 do good when really is making
everyone’s life harder. To oppose the last statement, we choose to inflict our egoism to people that is worth the shot, not to everyone. While the mechanistic world represses our free will so we don’t really know who we offended, a good amount of estimation is worth the track.
This is what we shall call the “Cultured person”. To be a cultured person is not regarding intelligence, but nuance and fluidity. The art of living in a cultural life.
A dialectic in a well mannered lie, yet very practical.
III.Conclusion
The dominant conception in culture shall respect those who don’t want to be together, don’t want to be “cultured”, and other independent tendencies for self- interest. We as cultural subjects should seek the point of lesser consequences, considering our culture is a history full of aggression and conquest for the sake of curiosity, desire, and a “sturdy”
collective life. Moreover, cultural egoism is not threatening the social basis with its touch of culture and religion, as it is based upon moral obligations and stoic- like participation. Egoism that is related
to criminal matters is no different than the practice of culture of the case stated.
Culture must move progressively, not only from direct practice, but also from intellectual discourse, who often provide only descriptive narratives—to be able to produce works differently, more critically.
Acknowledgment
I thank Max Stirner for his great works that I owe in large measure the stimulation of my thoughts.
References
[1] Picard, Michel. “Cultural Tourism in Bali: Cultural Performances as Tourist Attraction,” Indonesia, April 1990, no.
49, pp. 37-74.
[2] Stirner, Max. The Ego and Its Own.
David Leopold, Ed. UK: Cambridge Press, 1995. (Original work published in 1844)
[3] Stirner, Max. Stirner’s Critics. Wolfi Landstreicher, translator. USA:
Columbia Alternative Library, 2012.
(Original work published in 1845)
183
Magic Elements in The Bakar Batu Custom in The Land of Papua
I Wayan Rai S.a, Ni Made Ruastiti a*, Gede Yoga Kharisma Pradanab
a Indonesian Institute of the Art (ISI) Denpasar, Bali, Jl. Nusa Indah, Denpasar, 80235, Indonesia
bThe Institute of Tourism and International Business, Jl. Tari Kecak No. 12, Denpasar, 80239, Indonesia
* Corresponding author : [email protected]
ABSTRACT
Bakar Batu is a customary cooking tradition for the tribes in the Land of Papua. Modern Papuan people should anti primitive, think logically & efficiently. But in reality, they still carry out the Bakar Batu custom to establish social relations as an expression of peace. The questions are : (1) What is the Bakar Batu custom?; (2) What magic elements are contained in the Bakar Batu custom?. This study uses a qualitative method. The data sources for this research are the Bakar Batu custom itself, tribal chiefs, who were selected based on purposive and snowball sampling. All data that has been collected through participatory observation, interviews, video recordings, still photos, and document studies was analysed using the theory of religion and structural functional theory. The research shows that : (1) The process of Bakar Batu is carried out in mutual cooperation by the people, starting from taking the ingredients, continuing through the cooking process until the food is ready to be served. In the Bakar Batu custom, it contains the value of preservation, the value of education, the value of togetherness, the value of peace, and the value of trust.;
(2) It turns out that there is also a magic element that can affect the flame of the fire when the process of burning the stone is conducted. The magic element is invisible but is believed to have greatly influenced their success when burning the stone. It is still preserved in the midst of modern times in Papua.
Keywords : Magic, Bakar Batu, Custom, Papua.
I. Introduction
The term Bumi Cendrawasih refers to an area of 421,981 km2 in the archipelago called Papua.
Papua is the designation by Portuguese sailors in 1511 for a large island in the eastern part of the archipelago. Dutch sailors called the island New Guinea because it reminded them of the black people of Guinea on the African continent [1,2,3].
During the Dutch colonial period, New Guinea was officially known as Papua New Guinea. In 1963, Papua was better known as West Irian or Irian Jaya within the territory of the Republic of Indonesia. In the reign of President Abdurrahman Wahid (Gus Dur), Irian Jaya was inaugurated under the name Papua.
Papua is the largest island of the Melanesian population in Indonesia with characteristics of black skin, black curly hair, and a tall and sturdy build [4]. Papua is divided into two provinces:
West Papua, with Manokwari as its capital, and Papua, with Jayapura as its capital [5,6].
The majority of the Papuan population is Christian. The population of Papua reaches 4.3 million people [7]. The large population of Papua
consists of hundreds of ethnic groups with special cultures, music, customs and languages [8,9].
Culturally, based on the diversity of characteristics of traditional traditions, the Papua region is divided into several parts, such as Anim Ha, Mi Pago, La Pago, Mi Pago, Seireri, Bomberei, and Domberei [10]. In this area, it is known that there are 250 ethnic groups living side by side in indigenous Papuan people in the highlands, valleys, rurals and coastal areas.
Papua is known as one of the most conflict-prone areas in the Republic of Indonesia. The hundreds of ethnic groups that comprise the Papuan population have not only contributed to over a hundred different cultural patterns, but have also resulted in a high potential for conflict among the Papuans. Wars between tribes often occur in the midst of the cultural diversity of the Papuan people. One form of cultural tradition that is a solution to inter-tribal conflicts is the Bakar Batu tradition. Apart from the fact that the Bakar Batu tradition is known to most ethnic groups in Papua, the Bakar Batu tradition has a magical element that seems to benefit the various ethnic groups in
184 Papuan traditional society. This phenomenon is interesting to study because some of them claim to be modern Papuans who are Christians.