From Lanka Eastwards (original) (raw)

He holds a series of Australian Research Council grants (Discovery and Linkage) looking at Indonesian-Australian connections, labour and industry in Southeast Asia, and Balinese art. my PhD supervisor, now at EFEO Jakarta), Australia (Helen Creese) and Indonesia (Titik Pudjiastuti) the idea to submit an application, in the hope that our joint collaboration would stand a good chance in a competitive selection process. We were indeed able to nd the ANRC willing to act as main sponsor of a workshop, which was held at the premises of the KITLV branch in Jakarta on May th-th , and which was made possible by substantial extra contributions from the EFEO and the Stichting J. Gonda Fonds of the Royal Dutch Academy of Arts and Sciences. e theme of the workshop was e Old Javanese Rāmāyaṇa: Text, History, Culture. lock's idea of a 'Sanskrit Cosmopolis' and a 'Vernacular Millenium'. It is no exaggeration to observe that crucial, and o en controversial, issues within various academic elds relating to Indonesia involve the interpretation of facts drawn from the Kakawin Rāmāyaṇa. e Old Javanese poem indeed constitutes a source of primary importance for the historical study of ancient Central Java. But the poem itself was clearly not the only version of the Rāmāyaṇa story that circulated in Indonesia at that time. e story as a whole, as well * * * is volume includes a selection of nine of the twenty-one papers presented during the workshop, which saw participation from four scholars af liated with Dutch academic institutions, ve with Australian, seven with Indonesian, two with American institutions, and one with a French University, as well as two Dutch independent scholars. Nationalities represented were Indonesian, Australian, Dutch, American, Italian, Singaporean and German. An Indonesiabased scholar from the USA, omas Hunter, could not attend the workshop but submitted a paper for publication, which we were glad to accept in the volume as tenth contribution. One of the explicit conditions of the workshop funding received from the ANRC was the participation of Southeast Asian scholars, and the workshop indeed saw participation of seven Indonesian scholars, plus one Singaporean. One of the purposes of the ANRC workshop grants is capacity building, and so we were glad to count among these eight participants three We have presented the papers in two parts, the rst entitled Old Javanese Kakawin and the Kakawin Rāmāyaṇa, the second e Rāmāyaṇa at Caṇḍi Prambanan and Caṇḍi Panataran. Part One starts with two papers giving general perspectives on Kakawin as a genre. S R starts from a perspective internal to the genre, identifying a speci c formal feature that might be offers an overview of the locally composed Kakawins inspired by the Rāmāyaṇa story. Despite the persistent popularity of the Rāmāyaṇa Kakawin itself in Bali, the Old Javanese prose version of the Uttarakāṇḍa turns out to have been much more in uential in Balinese Kakawin production, both as a source of themes and as a point of reference for themes le unexplored in that text but made the topic of a long stream of poetic compositions. ese local Balinese Kakawins remain almost entirely unstudied, and the available manuscript sources are therefore presented in detail. A V takes up a Balinese painting to show how also locally produced prose (parwa) works, in this case the thus far unstudied Kapiparwa, were composed in Bali under inspiration from the Rāmāyaṇa cycle, and have themselves come to in-Hymns of Praise in Kakawins aim of those striving a er nal release, and as the lord of creation (.-.). is induces Śiwa to relinquish his terrifying aspect […]. (Zoetmulder :-) e hymn itself is found in Cantos and , a total of only ve stanzas, and is termed a stuti (in. d and. a). Another example is to be found in the Kakawin Ghaṭotkacāśraya (my personal favourite). Abhimanyu's affair with Kṣiti Sundarī has been discovered, and so Baladewa is furious and determined to marry her off to Duryodhana's son before Kṛṣṇa can get back. Abhimanyu is forced to ee, and while he is asleep the demon Karālawaktra nds him. Quoting from the summary in Kalangwan, On hearing that he is a servant of the goddess Durga, who has sent him to look for prey, either animal or human, which is to be brought for her to devour, Abhimanyu persuades him to accept him as a prospective victim. Together they go to the abode of the goddess. She appears, frightening to behold, her hands outstretched to seize him, but halts when she hears his mantras. She listens to him worshipping her and praising her as the goddess who is one with the Supreme Being, and is merciful and generous to her devotees, but terrifying to her enemies, and so she becomes kindly disposed towards him and favours him with her advice. He is to seek help from Ghaṭotkaca […]. (Zoetmulder :). Here is the substitute for yourself-come, look, arise! Come, cast it into the holy Fire, make haste, So that the impurities will be gone and burnt up, And in this way you can focus your mind on the prince'. . Dr. Supomo (email of-) has kindly pointed out that we nd in Bhāratayuddha .-a passage addressed to the dead body of Droṇa (who is likened to Paśupati), that is termed a stawa (Bhāratayuddha. d) and pangastuti (Bhāratayuddha. a). Stuart Robson. e princess was elated and immediately did her worship: Flowers, incense and lamps were arranged, e offerings for the sacred diagrams were complete, And the prayers of offering were carried out perfectly.. e wick of the Deity blazed up very quickly, And while she did homage she approached the 'golden jewel'; Jānakī was indeed deeply devoted, And her petition (prārthana) was that the prince should be victorious:. 'Oh Lord Hutipati, consumer of oblations, You are the 'Mouth of the Gods' , supreme ruler of the gods, Kind to worshippers, the Lord Guṇawidhi, e bearer of mountains, earth and sea.. You are the highest god, the supreme re of Śiwa, You are the eight manifestations, the gods revealed; e divine eight qualities are always with you, And likewise the three qualities you control.. You are valiant and mighty, a powerful ruler-Gods and Dānawas praise you, Siddhas and celestial singers worship you, And your light can be compared to a hundred thousand suns.. And you, Bhārata (= Agni), are the welfare of the world, compassionate, You grant great happiness to your devotees; None other than you are the goal of those who perform austerities, And those who are endowed with right judgment, forever happy.. You are always compassionate and full of goodness, You are the source of happiness and virtue, And it is you who endow a knowledge of the holy texts-You are the reason we reach the realm of release.. You, Lord, are soul alone, and happiness is your purpose, e reason that stains and impurities will be removed, And that existence will be freed from af ictions and calamities, Because of your love for all men.. Oh God of Fire, Lord of the ree Worlds, Look upon me, Lord, with favour: Hymns of Praise in Kakawins Let Rāmabhadra be victorious, May he love me and may we be happy when we meet'. . is was the princess's intention (prayojana), indeed most wonderful. She ceased insisting on dying, now that she had heard that the prince was alive. But the pain of separation had not yet completely disappeared, And lying on her couch she amused herself with reading. So Sītā's address to the god Agni is quite long (and perhaps a little confused, in keeping with her state of mind). We need not dwell on the philological details, but note a few important points. Firstly, Sītā begins with making offerings, before embarking on her petition. Secondly, the Fire is seen as having the function of burning up and removing impurities (. c and. b), and is therefore appropriate in this context. And thirdly, Sītā hopes that the god will be kindly disposed by her offerings and praise, and will grant her petition, which is spelt out in full clarity (. cd). But this is not the rst time that Agni has been invoked. If we turn back to an earlier passage in the same sarga, we nd Sītā contemplating killing herself by descending into the re (. d).. It was the middle of the night, when people were sleeping, No one uttered a sound, all fast asleep; en she built a re, that blazed up amazingly-She was praying, of course, that they should die together. 'theology of the Kakawin'. . Quoted with approval by Curtius :. He would never falter, for the Void he strives, His striving is heroic, he is erce in quietude. Robson understands gal of DW. d as perhaps related to Modern Javanese 'agal, ''rough, coarse'' or […] Old Javanese agul-agul, '' erce, warlike'' '; and sana as perhaps derived from 'sama, ''quietude'' '. e terms 'contingent' and 'non-contingent' here mean that the repeated phrase of a yamaka falls immediately a er its original ('contingent') or is separated by several other words, phrases. Cited from Tubb (:-).. I have taken the liberty of changing the syntax of the (a) and (b) lines, which should have the extended noun phrase of the (b) line as subject to the verb phrase of the rst line, using instead a passive formation using 'with' rather than the usual 'by' of a by-phrase.