Abstract
In his classic article Order in the Atoni House, Clark Cunningham described the ways in which the Atoni of Timor construct dwelling space as a representation of social and cosmological order.
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Notes
- 1.
C. Cunningham, “Order in the Atoni House,” Bijdragen tot de Taal-, Land- en Volkenkunde, vol. 70, 1964, pp. 34–68.
- 2.
R. Heine-Geldern, “Conceptions of State and Kingship in Southeast Asia,” Far Eastern Quarterly, 2, 1942. M. Eliade, The Myth of the Eternal Return or, Cosmos and History. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1954.
- 3.
Op. cit., pp. 12–20.
- 4.
The lineal structure of the Javanese kraton differs fundamentally from those of the Hindu and Buddhist palaces of mainland Southeast Asia and of pre-Muslim Java. Hindu and Buddhist palaces replicate the structure of the cosmos, forming a mandala or series of concentric circles. The Buddhist palaces of Thailand, Burma and Buddhist Java are structural replicas of Mount Meru, the cosmic mountain at the center of the Buddhist universe. The Javanese kraton is, therefore, a clear departure for the Indianized traditions of pre-Muslim Java. The analysis of the Yogyakarta kraton has major implications for the more general study of Javanese religion. The thesis that the architectural symbolism of houses, palaces and temples reflects that of the cosmos as a whole is one of the central axioms of Southeast Asian cultural studies. This is, in large measure, the reason why Clark Cunningham’s Order in the Atoni House is such a classic. It is also the reason while the earlier version of this chapter included in Islam in Java: Normative Piety and Mysticism in the Sultanate of Yogyakarta proved to be extremely controversial. Indonesianists committed to the Islamaphobic Orientalism of Dutch colonial and missionary scholarship were outraged at the suggestion that anything as obviously sacred as the kraton could possibly be Islamic. M. C. Ricklefs, Journal of the Asian Studies Association of Australia, vol. 14(3), 1991, resorted to combination of ad hominem remarks directed as important officials of the Yogyakarta court as well as myself and what appear to be intentional failures to note references to readily available Javanese texts in an attempt to dismiss this analysis as “unhelpful.” Mitsuo Nakamura, who is well known for his Islam affirming studies of Javanese culture, was more positive. He wrote: “This is an astonishing discovery.” M. Nakamura, Review of “Islam in Java” in: Journal of Asian Studies, 1990:718.
- 5.
Behrend presents an alternative interpretation of central Javanese kraton in which he argues that the symbolism of Mount Meru, rather than the Sufi Perfect Man is the celestial archetype on which palace architecture is based. T. Behrend, “Kraton and Cosmos in Traditional Java,” Archipel, 37, 1989, pp. 173–187. Unfortunately, Behrend relies largely on pre-Islamic sources and the assumption that one can use such sources to explain contemporary Javanese religion and symbolism. He does not appear to have encountered the contemporary texts discussed here. This is peculiar, at least, because they are available, at nominal cost, at the entrance to the Yogyakarta Kraton, and the old royal cemetery at Kota Gede, and have been continuously since 1975.
- 6.
Op. cit., passim.
- 7.
For a thematic analysis of the Qur’an see F. Rahman, Major Themes of the Qur’an Minneapolis: Bibliotheca Islamica, 1980.
- 8.
For an overview of Islamic cosmological and cosmogonic thought from the classical period see A. Wensinck, The Ideas of the Western Semites Concerning the Navel of the Earth. Amsterdam: Johannes Muller, 1916 and Nasr, S. Hossein, An Introduction to Islamic Cosmological Doctrines. Boulder: Shambhala, 1978.
- 9.
In this respect of study of cosmology, symbolism and sacred architecture in Islamic Southeast Asia is more challenging than it is on the Theravada Buddhist Mainland. On cosmology and sacred geography in Buddhist Thailand see S. J. Tambiah, World Conqueror and World Renouncer. A Study of Buddhism and Polity in Thailand Against a Historical Background. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1976. The Javanese cosmological text most closely resembling the kraton cosmology is the nineteenth century Serat Wirid by the Surakarta court poet Roggowarsito which Hadiwijono describes as “an example of the Javanese attempt to create unity in the varigated streams of Javanese mysticism,” H. Hadiwijono, Man in the Present Javanese Mysticism. Baarn: Bosch and Keuning, 1967, p. 12. It is, however, clear that the kraton is not based on Serat Wirid or probably on any other textual model, but rather that its meanings draw on a wide range of similar mystical traditions. It is not a physical representation of a text or group of texts but is rather an architectural product of the same process of bricolage from which literary and ritual texts emerged.
- 10.
Op. cit., p. 234
- 11.
This distinction is among the basic themes of Ibn al-Arabi’s understanding of God which has had a profound influence on Javanese religious thought. See W. Chittick, The Sufi Path of Pnowledge: Ibn al-Arabi’s Metaphysics of Imagination. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1989, p. 9.
- 12.
R. Nicholson, Studies in Islamic Mysticism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1921, p. 78.
- 13.
Op. cit., p. 29.
- 14.
Op. cit., p. 30.
- 15.
Op. cit. p. 107.
- 16.
See A. Wensinck, “Ka’ba” in H Gibb and J. Kramers, The Sorter Encyclopedia of Islam. Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1953, pp. 191–198.
- 17.
1. The most readily available classical source on the creation of the Kab’ah is F. Rosenthal, The History of al-Tabari Volume I General Introduction and From the Creation to the Flood. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1989.
- 18.
A. Schimmel, The Mystical Dimens of Islam. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1975, pp. 191–198.
- 19.
R. Nicholoson, The Mystics of Islam. An Introduction to Sufism. New York: Schocken Books, 1975, pp. 91–92.
- 20.
Schimmel, op. cit., p. 106.
- 21.
Quoted in.J. Smith and Y. Haddad, The Islamic Understanding of Death and Resurrection. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1978, p. 212.
- 22.
1.From Arabic Bait al-Mu’haram, which has the same meaning and can be used to refer to the Ka’ba.
- 23.
Hadiwijono op. cit., pp. 108–109 None of the information on the religious meanings of sections of the kraton are included in the Dutch literature. According to K.P.H. Poerwokoesoemo, the reason is that the Javanese chose to keep them in ignorance.
- 24.
A. Milner, “Islam and the Muslim State,” Islam in South-East Asia. (Ed.), M. Hooker. Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1983, pp. 23-49.
- 25.
The association of the kraton gates and the openings in the body is well known in Yogyakarta, however, I have been unable to discover which gate is linked with any particular bodily orifice. I was told by several princes that there was not a precise correspondence and by others that this knowledge had been lost during either the Java War or the Japanese occupation.
- 26.
Op. cit., p. 17.
- 27.
Folk etymologies are one of the most common means through which Javanese attempt to unite diverse elements of mysticism and history. Any phonetic similarity is held to be sufficient grounds for positing an historical and mystical relationship between two terms, be they Arabic, Javanese, Sanskrit or even Indonesian. As Ricklefs observes many of the “folk etymologies” on which the symbolism of the kraton relies are wildly inaccurate when viewed from the perspective of historical linguistics. Ricklefs missed the point. From a Javanese perspective it is phonetics and not historical linguistics which is important. The critique of the analysis presented in this paper which he bases on supposedly incorrect etymologies is insignificant.
- 28.
In the most general sense the term barzak means barrier. In Muslim eschatology it is the state in which souls exist between death and judgement. Sufis have used it to refer to the border between the material and spiritual worlds. The view that the souls of unborn children as well as those of the dead abide in barzak is a logical outgrowth of the doctrine that souls were created from the Nur Muhammad (A. light of Muhammad) prior to the creation of the heavens and earth. This belief is common in Sufi theories of creation Massignon, op. cit., p. 452.
- 29.
Ricklefs questions this identification stating that Mijen is derived from piji meaning set aside. The English version of Brongtodiningrat!s text op. cit., p. 9, states: “This word comes from ‘wiji,’ which means seed.” The Indonesian version, op. cit., p. 13, states: “Mijen, berasal dari perkataan Wiji (Benih).” The literal translation of this is: “Mijen, which originates from the expression Wiji (semen).”
- 30.
This interpretation was supplied by a Yogyakarta prince. He continued that the walls surrounding the two trees serve the same purpose as a sarong and observed that in Islam it is essential that the genitals be covered at all times.
- 31.
Ricklefs, Op. Cit., reserved his most virulent criticism of the thesis that the architecture of the Yogyakarta Kraton is based on the Javanese/Islamic doctrine of the Perfect Man for this portion of the exegesis of the southern segment of the kraton. He states: “Nor should a serious scholar of Islam accept an interpretation supplied by a Yogyakarta Prince” that “the essence of God [is] located in the genitals (p. 205) whether by this is meant mankind’s genitals or the even more bizarre idea that God is endowed with genitalia.” This statement combines an apparent disregard for the religious views of Yogyakarta princes and perhaps of other Javanese as well, with an extremely limited knowledge of Islam and other religions and/or deliberate obfuscation. Anthropomorphic conceptions of divinities, including endowing them with genitalia, are extremely common. Christianity provides an obvious example, unless one is prepared to entertain the heretical view that Christ was somehow less than fully human. The eminent Tubingen Islamicist Josef van Ess (1988) has shown that debates between advocates of anthropomorphism and those of a transcendent understanding of God figured significantly in the formative period of Islamic theological discourse and that both positions can be upheld on the basis of close readings and exegesis of the Qur’an. Professor Ricklefs would appear to be unfamiliar with this facet of Islamic theology. It is, however, extremely unlikely that, a specialist in Javanese history and literature, he would be unfamiliar with the anthropomorphism of Serat Wirid, although he seems not to have read Brongtodiningrat’s works. While such errors, and perhaps even the deliberate misrepresentation of fact, can be excused in a highly polemical review, the orientalist dismissal of indigenous opinion and exegesis can not. Javanese Princes are at least as well qualified to speculate about the nature of God as professors at Australian Universities. Professor Ricklefs seems inclined to view his own musing about the nature of God as somehow superior to those of Javanese religious thinkers. It is indeed unfortunate that my informant is no longer able to reply to Professor Ricklefs’ (apparently) Protestant Christian polemic. For reasons of his own my informant, on this and many other matters related to the Yogyakarta palace, wished to remain anonymous for the remainder of his earthly life, but gave me explicit permission to use his name once he had joined his ancestors. He was the noted Javanese lawyer, journalist, author and from 1947 until 1966, mayor of Yogyakarta, Kangjen Pangeran Hario Poerwokoesoemo. Pak Poerwo, as he was affectionately known in his later years, was a trusted advisor of Sultan Hamengukuwana IX and regarded by many in Yogyakarta as one who, by virtue of his combination of learning, wisdom and experience, was well qualified to speculate about the nature of God. Unfortunately, Pak Poerwo left this world, or as is commonly said in Indonesian “returned to the mercy of God,” prior to the publication of Professor Ricklefs’ comments. I have no doubt that he could have formulated a more theologically sophisticated reply to Professor Ricklefs than I.
- 32.
During the colonial period regional officials were required to present themselves on the Alon Alon on the morning of the Garebeg. Failure to appear was treason.
- 33.
On the Muslim theory of alms see Weir, in Gibb and Kramers, (eds.) op. cit., pp. 483–484.
- 34.
According to some Sufi teachings God is separated from the human soul by as many as seventy thousand veils. The purpose of Sufism is to remove these veils. This imagery is also present in a ritual performed by the Sultan at the state mosque on the occasion of the Garebeg Malud Dal (a larger, more complicated version of the Garebeg Malud staged only in the year Dal of the 8 year Javanese windu). At this time the Sultan kicks down a brick wall while leaving the mosque. This is said to represent the destruction of the veils separating him from the divine essence.
- 35.
Prior to 1945 the Penghulu and other officials of the state mosque wore similar coats. This same design is used in batik patterns which form a sampler of the most common designs. This pattern could be worn only by the Sultan and the Penghulu.
- 36.
The symbolism of the Alon Alon resembles that of the Dewa Ruci story from the Javanese wayang literature, in which Bhima discovers Dewa Ruci in the middle of the ocean. The names of the two trees are said to be derived from a conjunction of Sanskrit based Javanese terms for gods (dewa) and the world (jaga) and the Arabic term (dar al) for domain. They mean domain of the dewa and domain of the world respectively. Ricklefs suggests an alternative etymology according to which daru is a Javanese term for “fire ball.” While this is possible many kraton Yogyanese mention the combination of Arabic and Sanskrit terms mentioned here. In either case the significance of the trees is that the represent the identity of microcosm and macrocosm, a concept shared by Sufi and Hindu Javanese cosmologies. Yet another interpretation included in Keterangan Tentang Museum SitiHinggil-Pagelaran Kraton Yogyakarta is that Kyai Dewadaru was brought to Yogyakarta from the east Javanese Hindu/Buddhist kingdom of Majapahit and the Kyai Wijayadaru, as it refers to the tree on the eastern side, was brought from the west Javanese Hindu/Buddhist kingdom of Pajajaran. According to this text the meaning of the two trees is that the world (dunia) is inherently dualistic being characterized by opposite pairs of attributes (sifat). The text does not offer any further explanation. This is however a common theme in Javanese religious thought.
- 37.
The Dewa Ruci lakon is considered to be among the most esoteric tales in the Javanese wayang tradition. The hero, Bima, dives into the ocean searching for the essence of life. He encounters a miniature of himself, referred to as Dewa Ruci. He enters Dewa Ruci’s body and is surprised to discover that it contains the entirety of creation.
- 38.
K.P.H. Poerwokoesoemo supplied me with the text of the prayer.
- 39.
Questions concerning free will and determinism played a central role in the development of Islamic theology. Javanese and other Southeast Asian Muslims have long been associated with the Asharite position which maintains the teaching of determinism. For a discussion of these concepts in the Arabic tradition see Montgomery Watt, The Formative Period of Islamic Thought. Edinburgh, Edinburgh University Press, 1973 and R. Martin, M. Woodward and D. Atmaja, Defenders of Reason in Islam. Mu’tazilism from Medieval School to Modern Symbol. Oxford: One World, 1997.
- 40.
I. Goldziher, Introduction to Islamic Theology and Law. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1981, p. 81.
- 41.
P. Zoetmulder, Pantheism and Monism in Javanese Suluk Literature. Islamic and Indian Mysticism in an Indonesian Setting. (Translated by M. Ricklefs) Leiden: KITLV Press, 1995, pp. 220–225.
- 42.
Schimmel, op. cit., pp. 205–207.
- 43.
See Chapter 3 for a more detailed discussion of this concept
- 44.
See Chapter 5.
- 45.
On Javanese understandings of death and the afterlife see M. Woodward, 1989: 172–176.
- 46.
Gold is also the color of royalty. Only the Sultan is allowed to use a gold umbrella (J. payang).
- 47.
Sunan Kalijaga is the mythical Javanese Islamic saint who is believed to have instructed the founder of the Mataram dynasty on the conduct of state ceremonies. He is widely regarded as the patron saint of Javanese mysticism. See Woodward, op. cit., p. 96–98.
- 48.
Two of the holiest pusaka are Kangjeng Kyai Ageng Plered, a spear which is said to have originally belonged to Seh Maulono Maghribi, one of the nine wali and later to have been used by Senopati in the founding of Mataram, and Kangjeng Kyai Tunggul Wulung, a black flag which is said to have been made from the cloth used to cover the grave of the prophet Muhammad.
- 49.
For a discussing of the role of light in Islamic theology and mysticism see Massignon, op. cit., pp. 451–452.
- 50.
C. Geertz, Islam Observed. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1968, p. 40
- 51.
Ibid.
- 52.
Artillery and cavalry units were disbanded and have never been reestablished. Even these ceremonial units were disbanded and their firearms confiscated by the Japanese in 1942. They were re-established in 1970. Horses and elephants were re-introduced in small numbers in the 1980s.
- 53.
Hamengkubuwana X, Introduction, S. Alimin, (ed.) Kraton Yogyakarta: The History and Cultural Heritage. Yogyakarta: Indonesian National Marketing Association, 2002
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Woodward, M. (2011). Order and Meaning in the Yogyakarta Kraton . In: Java, Indonesia and Islam. Muslims in Global Societies Series, vol 3. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-0056-7_4
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