Bali's Rangda and Barong in Cosmic Balancing

Abstract

Balinese calonarang performance is usually narratively related to a tenth-century queen known for sorcery. This old story was popularized in Balinese dance drama from the early nineteenth century and currently flourishes in both tourist performances and temple ceremonies. Analysis of performance events accommodates apotropaic interpretation regarding disease and disharmony, gender rethinkings by contemporary feminist artists, and indigenous ideas of the Balinese four spirit siblings (kanda empat) and their protective potentials for self-purification by New Age martial artists. Featuring “monsters” as both antagonist (Calonarang and Goddess Durga, in her furious manifestation) and protagonist (Baradah/Barong and God Siwa [Shiva] in his leonine form), the genre explores the relation of the microcosm (human) and macrocosm (divine). The “other/monster” is not an “outsider” but integral to being and “self.” The “demonic” does not accommodate a Christian model of “evil” or negative experience as an aberration from a divine plan, but is rather a natural outcome of being in the material world. Monsters are not good or bad, but loci of empowerment based on Hindu-Buddhist thought and such forces must be negotiated for personal and community safety.