Traditional Priests Research Articles

Indonesia. Songs from the thrice-blooded land: Ritual music of the Toraja (Sulawesi, Indonesia). Volume one: Ethnographic narrative; Volume two: Florilegium Toraja: A selection of Toraja songs; Volume three (DVD): Multimedia argument/multimedia musical anthology. By Dana Rappoport. Paris: Editions Epistèmes / Editions de la Maison des Sciences de L'Homme, 2012. Pp. 213 (vol. I), 181 (vol. 2). Photographs, Musical recordings, Video,

Songs from the thrice-blooded land: Ritual music of the Toraja (Sulawesi, Indonesia). Volume one: Ethnographic narrative; Volume two: Florilegium Toraja: A selection of Toraja songs; Volume three (DVD): Multimedia argument/multimedia musical anthology By DANA RAPPOPORT Paris: Editions Epistemes / Editions de la Maison des Sciences de L'Homme, 2012. Pp. 213 (vol. I), 181 (vol. 2). Photographs, Musical recordings, Video, Animation, Maps, Figures, Glossary, Bibliography, Index. This work is the product of over a decade of patient and intensive labour, and of close and sustained collaborations across several cultures. With its boldly innovative integration of multimedia with written text, it represents a breakthrough in the presentation of research in ethnomusicology. Indeed it deserves attention from ethnographers generally, demonstrating as it does the potential for more multidimensional and comprehensive ways of presenting and preserving our research. What Dana Rappoport has achieved is remarkable for a number of other reasons too. This is the first study to provide a close contextual analysis of the music that is central to Toraja ritual performance, and it may well be the last. The Toraja traditional religion, known as Aluk To Dolo (Way of the Ancestors), comprised a great corpus of ritual, famed for its complexity, and divided into two spheres, associated on the one hand with the West (mortuary rites) and on the other with the East (rites for the enhancement of fertility and prosperity). During the colonial period, the gifted Dutch linguist H. van der Veen recorded some of the long poems which were part of these rites, and published them in translation, but these texts, valuable as they are, lack the ethnographic context which could bring them to life for the reader. The religion itself is now on the verge of extinction, since a great majority of the people have converted to Christianity. The riches of Toraja oral poetry are at the same time being extinguished, since none of the traditional priests or to minaa who are the carriers of this remarkable oral literature have any successors in training. Rappoport, who commenced her fieldwork in 1993, was thus only just in time to benefit from the knowledge of two notable to minaa, Ne' Ambaa and Ne' Lumbaa, both from the region of Rindingallo. Although she met and worked with many other officiants, it was with these two men that she developed particularly close relationships. Ne' Ambaa died in 1994, shortly after she completed her first fieldwork. Although one or two kinds of Toraja ritual (notably funerals and house inauguration ceremonies) are still being vigorously executed in Christianised form, converts do not generally allow traditional priests to officiate at their ceremonies, and thus their poetry no longer has an audience. As well as their own long solo recitations, they also provided the verses for the song masters who lead collective performances, thus there is a rupture of transmission when they are excluded from modified rituals. More specifically, while funeral laments are still regularly performed, the great rites of the East which were the occasion for group performances of other types of sung verse are now very rarely carried out, so that one half of the tradition is much more vulnerable to loss than the other. Songs from the thrice-blooded land comes in a boxed set of three components, and is available in French, Indonesian or English versions. To produce the latter, the author has worked closely with both a Toraja and an English scholar (Stanislaus Sandarupa, who has a Ph.D. in anthropology from the University of Chicago, and Elizabeth Coville, of Hamline University). Volume One is an ethnographic analysis of the vital role of music and song in Toraja ritual life. Volume Two provides a more detailed presentation and discussion of the entire Toraja texts of several different kinds of songs, together with their translations. …

Priests, Aristocrats, and Millennialism in Fiji

The millenial movements which here punctuated the recent history of Fiji have been instigated by traditional priests who are fundamentally opposed to traditional chiefs as well as Europeans and Indians. They are aimed at creating new social groupings which are intended to replace kinship organizations headed by chiefs. This paper illusrates these features by the examples of two movements.

“La parole de paix n’a jamais tort.” La paix et la tradition dans le royaume d’Oussouye (Casamance, Sénégal)

AbstractThis article analyses the role of tradition among the Joola-Huluuf of Oussouye. It underlines that the Joola are not homogeneous and that Joola tradition is local and particularistic. In Oussouye, there has been since the 1980s a reconciliation of the Catholics and followers of traditional religion, which has increased participation in such traditional rituals as initiation, has reemphasized the traditional shrines, and has made the sacred-king a more central figure. Though Abbe Diamacoum comes from a village near Oussouye, most people identify neither with the independentist nationalism of the rebels, nor with the loyalist nationalism of the Senegalese state. The rebels have the support of none of the traditional priests, but at the same time, local people see the Senegalese state as alien. The king, whose role traditionally was to assure harmony, peace, and the rice harvest, has put pressure on both sides to respect the desire for peace in Oussouye.

Why Respect Culture?

do not have moral reasons respect culture in any direct sense. he tensions that surround culture and normative claims made for it in political debate pervade western press coverage. In 1994, for instance, The New York Times opened year with an ominous warning about need protect indigenous peoples from impending extinction that threatens them in face of relentless political and economic development (Wilford 1994). This basically was a plea protect and preserve particular Yet Times also has roundly criticized well established, indigenous cultural practices. For example, it recently focused on ritualized female slavery practiced illegally in several West African states (French 1997a, 1997b). Here families of young girls surrender them traditional priests whom girls serve sexually and otherwise in atonement for crimes committed by relatives. In their coverage, then, our press often displays deep ambivalence about whether and on what terms might, by turns, protect and criticize other This same ambivalence characterizes recent writings of many political philosophers who also are preoccupied with normative status of culture. Consider a prominent example. Charles Taylor defends a politics of cultural recognition that, while committed traditional rights, is wedded neither uncompromising insistence on application of rules defining these rights without exception nor individualist skepticism regarding collective goals. He presents this communitarian political vision as an alternative liberalism of rights. He claims in first place that while his view allows for uncompromising application of such universalist rights as habeas corpus, it nevertheless allows him to weigh importance of certain forms of uniform treatment against importance of cultural survival, and opt sometimes in favor of latter (Taylor 1994, 60-61). Taylor then endorses a still stronger position. He defends presumption-which he embraces in something like an act of faith-that we owe equal respect all cultures. According Taylor this presumption requires that respect the equal value of different cultures; that not only let them survive, but acknowledge their worth (Taylor 1994, 64-69).

Hindu Counselling in the Nederlands

Increasing participation of Muslims and Hindus in church-state relations in the Netherlands is bringing about a slow change in the different cultural and historical backgrounds of “non-indigenous” religious traditions and in their self-esteem and religious attitudes. We may call this participation, and especially the changes it causes, a good example of Systemzwang, the systematic power of the dominant but historically grown social and cultural order in which newcomers are expected to fit. This process of external influence will be demonstrated by the example of the development of the traditional Hindu priest, the pandit, to a modern professional pastoral or Hindu-spiritual counsellor and by the mutual-learning process of the religiously different pastoral professionals in the semi-governmental service organizations.

SALVADOR AND THE INDIGENOUS PEOPLES

The Conference on World Mission and Evangelism, convened in Salvador, Bahia, Brazil by the World Council of Churches (WCC) under the theme Called to One Hope -- The Gospel in Diverse Cultures, was of great significance for the ecumenical movement, and similarly for the Indigenous peoples, whose representatives gathered in Salvador to share the outcomes of regional encounters on gospel and culture processes undertaken prior to the conference. It was unfortunate that the thirty-eight participants in the preconsultation did not stay, but the final statement was shared with all the participants. Indigenous identity Indigenous women, men, youth, ministers, lay persons and traditional priests, representing various cultural backgrounds at the conference, affirmed that their cultural and spiritual identity is deeply linked to the principle of balance between the creation, the cosmos and the community, in which the Mother Earth (Pachamama) is the generator and the sustainer of life. The preservation of this gift of the creator is the responsibility of all people, and was clearly exposed in the encontro, the Bible study sessions, the worship, as well as within the group discussions. At the WCC's assembly in Canberra (1994), the Australian Aborigines manifested that the Indigenous peoples were no longer the recipients of the truth. On the other hand, at Salvador, Indigenous peoples demanded to be heard and challenged the churches to engage in an urgent process of dialogue with which they could identify themselves. This process has to have the full participation of Indigenous peoples in order to develop new expressions of Christian spirituality. The new plant With the good news announced by Jesus and transported to new cultures through Christian mission, the church gave birth to new forms of Christian expression, as a result of the interaction between the Indigenous peoples' projects of life (gospel) and the projects of life of the Christian gospel. The presence of Indigenous peoples at Salvador is a clear sign that Indigenous persons participate in the work of the church in general. The conference witnessed that they give their gifts as preachers, deacons, administrators, Sunday school teachers and heads of churches. New plants are growing from old seeds and they are claiming to be subjects in the new dialogue between cultures, spiritualities and theologies. At Salvador, Indigenous peoples reaffirmed that their spiritualities should not continue to be clandestine, nor be only the recipients of a truth but that instead they want to be subjects and protagonists of their own histories. Tradition and the old cloth During the conference it was observed that there is still an effort to keep forms of doing mission that come from the colonial periods. They want to keep the same methods of teaching that support the dominant culture hegemony, assuming that this culture is the owner of the truth, tradition and authority to transmit the truth to other cultures and peoples. However, the results of the dialogue process between gospel and culture that took place before the conference challenge the churches to shake the old cloth woven by the church for Indigenous peoples. There is a sign of willingness to hear and initiate a meaningful dialogue on the part of the church. This attitude inspires hope that the process of dialogue will be based on mutual respect for the cultures and spiritual values of others. Indigenous peoples expressed at Salvador that they want the right to exercise and celebrate their rituals freely and in the manner with which they feel most comfortable. …