well-known place for Malukat is Tirtha Empul – one hour north of Ubud. The residence of the first Indonesian president is located on the closest hill because the place is both holy and beautiful. A big pond collects water from many springs around a temple. You submerge yourselves dressed in a sarong only after engaging in a small ritual at the shrine on the bank. Standing in the water you bow down before each spring, putting your head under the stream of water. After taking a drink from this stream one continues on to the next one. Everybody always feels calm and happy after flushing away all impurities from one’s body, mind and soul. After changing from a wet sarong into a dry one, you go to the main temple in order to perform a ritual of gratitude to the god of this place and also to all of the gods.
Another place for purification is smaller being located in Tegalalang. This is a natural waterfall with an open temple on the bank, where you can submerge yourselves in the stream (dressed in sarong only). Of course, it is not just the bathing in crystal water but the worship of the gods that is required for real success. Because the temple is so small, you will rarely see a priest there. Balinese people perform all the necessary rituals by themselves, while westerners should bring a priest along with them (if they really want to do everything in a proper manner). We have organized many individual and group tours there since Made Mangku is a priest and can help in this situation.
There are many other types of ritual purifications in temples, and they all vary to some degree although they remain traditional. From the very beginning I was impressed by the Flower Malukat developed by Made Mangke himself. He uses it in his healing process for cleaning aura and releasing karma from past lives. The result is the opening and balancing of the chakras as well as important first step to recovery from disease or difficult situation. After checking the karma, he decides how many flowers the person will need for purification and puts them into water for one hour or longer. Then, he invites the person to sit opposite the vessel and pray to God while he pours the flower water over him. I have observed many Malukats, and each one was both unique and beneficial.
Pilgrimage to Sacred Mountains
Atma Ananda. Pilgrimage to Sacred Mountains. // “Ubud Community’ (Bali, Indonesia), №45 | May 2010.
The Hindu tradition in India appreciates pilgrimage (yatra) as a very important part of its ritual culture. A pilgrimage can consist of visiting temples in the Himalayas or bathing in prayag (meeting of holy rivers) or going to a sanctuary in distant places. Pilgrimage is not just trekking; conversely, it has the opposite goal and must be done with a different state of mind. Rock-climbing is a demonstration of physical strength accompanied by pride in the mind of a person: “I have done this!” A pilgrimage to the top of a sacred mountain is a sacrifice of your body’s strength to God with gratitude for His mercy in allowing you to reach His abode. It is a ceremonial action of unity with God.
Mount Agung is the highest and the most sacred mountain on the island of Bali, and is also where the main temple of Besakih is located as well. The lower half of this dormant volcano is covered by forest, but the upper portion is rocky. You can begin a pilgrimage from two different points but either way you will have the temple at the base of the mountain for the initial ceremony. Finally, upon reaching the crater, you will see many offerings left by previous pilgrims after their personal ceremonies there. The path is long and difficult enough so that one needs to really concentrate with slow steps in order to merge into the process. What you see at the final point of destination looks like “the end of the world’, since it is a bottomless abyss full of misty clouds.
Mount Batukaru has a lower elevation and is covered by forest up to its peak. It has the famous Batukaru temple and about a hundred small temples on its hillsides including an open sanctuary at the top. Usually these forest temples have a very large tree in the center of the shrine, and are marked by a white-yellow length of cloth. At the time of tirtha-yatra around the area, my Balinese friends collected holy water from each temple where we performed a ceremony. Another time we came to the top of the mountain, receiving a blessing of Sun over the sanctuary and then descending under driving rain which turned our journey into a real adventure. Even though the road became dangerous, we were grateful to God that nobody was injured.
Mount Seraya is not well-known (as it is not of much interest for climbing), but it has the important Lempuyang temple on the top. The path has steps leading to the peak, and climbing it takes only two hours, so it is easy in comparison with other mountains. But the temple is usually empty and totally quiet as even the priest is not always there. It is a good opportunity for your personal prayer and meditation. Moreover, it has a beautiful view of Mount Agung and an amazing seascape on other side. Actually, there are three Lempuyang temples: one at the base, one midway, and one on the top.
Yoga – Physical Transformation
Atma Ananda. Yoga – Physical Transformation in the context of Balinese Spirituality // “Ubud Community’ (Bali, Indonesia), №39 | Nov 2009.
Now I would like to discuss Yoga in Bali – which apparently has become famous here not through an Indian influence, but rather more through a Western one. After communicating with some local Yoga instructors, I discovered that they barely understood the differences between Yoga as the way to conscious Samadhi (Vedantic tradition) and Hatha-Yoga, as the method of physical transformation (Tantric tradition). Moreover, some of them teach modern Westernized styles without knowing the origin of Hatha-Yoga and its main ideas.
Well, my third degree studies in the university dealt with the philosophical basis of modern Hatha-Yoga schools. After getting my master’s degree, I spent five years in India, worked with many Yoga teachers, and then published some of my own books on Yoga. So, I will attempt to explain here the main paradoxes of Yoga today.
Paradox 1. Yoga or Meditation? Yoga IS Meditation!
When you look through many advertisements for spas, fitness centers, etc., you will notice that they offer “Yoga” and “Meditation’ as two different practices. As a result, many people accept Yoga as a method for attaining fitness and physical health without any sense of its “spiritual nature.”. . This opinion is supported by modern styles (like Ashtanga Vinyasa or Iyengar) which became the base for Acro-Yoga and so on. Believe me, just as there is no real coffee in instant coffee, there is no real Yoga in Acro-Yoga! Fortunately, those Yoga instructors at least know “Yoga-Sutras’ in which Yoga means “chitta vritti nirodha’ (that is “tranquillization of conscious fluctuations’ in Sanskrit) or the way to Samadhi (total concentration) and Kaiwalya (liberation). From the very beginning Yoga IS Samadhi (or meditation in its highest sense), as it requires only the asana (posture) – namely Padmasana, or just “sthiram sukham asanam’ (easy comfortable sitting posture). This is because it stills the consciousness.
Paradox 2. Yoga for Body? Yoga AGAINST Body!
So, “Yoga-Sutras’ (VI BC – II AC) were the beginning, but not the end of Yoga. Different kinds of asanas (postures) were developed through centuries of practice by Hatha-Yogis. Their Bible was “Hatha-Yoga Pradipika’ (written in XVI AC) by Yogi Swatmarama from Natha-Sampradaya (one of the Tantric orders). Basically, they accepted Yoga as the way to liberation, as well. But they were not satisfied by just conscious liberation – they strove for complete physical liberation! By that I mean that they developed asanas in order to transform the ordinary human body into the so-called “light body’. Literally, their spiritual ideal was the total conversion of the material body into the energy body and finally into the spiritual body. As a result, they didn’t strive to improve the physical body but worked for its dissolution and final disappearance into the light of consciousness. What a wonderful dream! Who would believe in this nowadays? In this era, most people want to enjoy being in their bodies as long as possible, if not forever.
Paradox 3. Yoga as Healing? Yoga AS development!
Another modern