A beautiful woman, having four hands, standing on a big lotus, and is accompanied by a swan and a peacock are a little bit appearances of Saraswati. Who is she? Balinese sometimes call her The Goddess of Knowledge and she is given homage every 210 days by special ceremony and various offerings. She is the eternal consort of Brahma (the creator)

The Goddes Saraswati has four hands. Each hand holds respectively Genitri, Keropak, Wina, and Lotus. Genitri is something like rosary beads. This is a symbol of neverending knowledge. Knowledge will never be destroyed all around the age, knowledge is everlasting. That is why it is symbolized by Genitri; when we count it we will never find the end of it. It is similar with knowledge that has no end.

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In the paradise island of Bali, when it comes to offering (banten) for the ceremony the Balinese women holds the sway. Balinese women prepare all the offerings (banten) that is needed for the ceremony. If you look at glance you can see that the stuffs called banten consists of various parts and hard to remember all in a few minutes. Each stuff has its own role and function. Sometimes if banten is not complete then traditional ceremony can not be held. There is a stuff named tumpeng which is need in several ceremonies.

Tumpeng is made from rice. Balinese women usually form the rice with their hands and with help of shaper. This shaper is usually created by their hands using coconut leaves. Its shape like cone then obviously rice which is put into it will have the same form and Balinese call it tumpeng. In order to produce tight and firm tumpeng Balinese women should press the rice to the cone using their thumb. Their thumb will be tired when they have to make 100 until 300 tumpeng in each Galungan and Kuningan day.

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Tomorrow evening, 05/27/08, the real Sanghyang dedari dance will be held in Bukit Buluh Temple, in Banjar Gunaksa (Gunaksa hamlet), Ababi village, Karangasem regency. When I say the “real Sanghyang Dedari” what I refer to is not the popular Sanghyang Dedari dance that is staged for tourist consumption in Batubulan or other tourism resort. The Sanghyang Dedari that will be performed tomorrow is a ritual that is performed to exorcise the plague or pestilence.

Here is some information in relation with Sanghyang Dedari: Sanghyang Dedari is a sacred dance which can be found Badung, Gianyar and Bangli regency. This sacred dance is used to ward the pestilence or plague which swept Bali when the fanged demon living on the little island of Nusa Penida comes to Bali. Two dancers are chosen from all the girls of the village for their psychic aptitudes by the temple priest, to receive the spirit of heavenly nymphs, Dedari Supraba and Tunjung Biru (Blue Lotus). At the death temple, the Sanghyang Dedari dancers in white skirts kneel before a brazier of smoking incense in front of the altar.

During a trance ceremony, the priest makes offerings to the temple deity, requesting protection for the village. A chorus of women is seated in a circle around them, singing the Sanghyang song, which asks the celestial nymphs to descend from heaven and dance before the people through the girls’ bodies and incense is wafted about them.

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Here is an interesting writing on Buddhism in Bali by venerable S. Dhammika. It is interesting to see the point of view of a Buddhist Monk form outside Bali on Buddhism in Bali.

Much attention has been given to how far west Buddhism extended in ancient times. The most westerly Buddhist monument that can be is the foundations of a large stupa in the south east corner of the ancient citadel of Khiva in Turkmenistan. Small communities of Buddhists may have existed beyond this but if they did they would have been insignificant, isolated and exceptional. We can say therefor that the outer edge of Buddhism in the west was what is now eastern Iran. But how far to the east did Buddhism spread its gentle and civilizing influence? To the outer islands of Indonesia, to Australia or perhaps beyond? In the 1920’s a superb bronze bust of the Buddha was found on Sulawesi, one of the larger islands that make up Indonesia. This is the eastern most point that any Buddhist antiquity has ever been found. There is, though, no evidence of an enduring Buddhist presence either on Sulawesi or beyond it; no ruined temples or monasteries, no inscriptions or references to it in the historical records. However, only a few hundred miles south west of Sulawesi is the small island of Bali where MajapahitG and literary evidence shows that Buddhism existed along side Hinduism for about seven hundred years.

Indian merchants first arrived in Bali in about 200 BCE and it was probably these people who introduced Buddhism and Hinduism. A Balinese work of uncertain date called the Nagarakertagama by the Buddhist monk lists all the Buddhist temples in Bali, twenty six altogether, and mentions that in 1275 King Kretanagara underwent a Tantric Buddhist initiation to protect his kingdom from an expected invasion by Kublai Khan. The island’s history is scant until 1343 when it was conquered by and absorbed into the Majapahit Empire of Java-Sumatra. Hinduism and Buddhism both received state patronage although the type of Buddhism that prevailed gradually became indistinguishable from Hinduism. A Javanese Buddhist work from about the 12th century contains this telling verse. “The one substance is called two, that is, the Buddha and Siva. They say they are different but how can they be divided? Despite differences there is oneness”. Clearly at the time these words were being composed some Buddhists were struggling to maintain the uniqueness of the Dharma while others were stressing its similarity with Hinduism. Eventually in both Java and Bali the integrators prevailed. Incidentally, the phrase “Despite differences there is oneness” ( Bhineka tunggal ika ) has been taken as the motto for the Republic of Indonesia. With the collapse of Mahapahit in 1515 and the ascendancy of Islam, Java’s old intellectual and religious elite, including the last surviving Buddhist monks and scholars sought refuge in Bali.

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This Saturday, 17th May, 2008, Tumpek Wayang, one of my favorite Agama Hindu Bali Holydays honors, respects and celebrates Wayang Kulit shadow play. On this day the Dalang, (shadow artists) display their Wayang (shadow characters) and place offerings around the characters, Gamelan instruments, and other objects (the screen, lamp, etc) used in shadow performances.

About 15 hours after this ritual occurs on Bali, especially in the Banjar Babakan community of Sukawati, it happens again in a tiny section of California, in the Banjar Mission Hills community of Los Angeles, where devoted students of Wayang and Gamelan reside. Since we are unable to find flowers like cempaka or ylang2, or snacks like jajan kampung, we must substitute. Desa, kala, patra - a teacher once told me - do what you can depending on where you are, when it is, and what you can obtain, something like - it’s the thought that counts!

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