Balinese and Sassaks.
Primitive and later Religions and Cultures.
On the obscure religious and social relations in these Lesser Sundanese Islands much light has been thrown by Capt. W. Cool, an English translation of whose work With the Dutch in the East was issued by E. J. Taylor in 1897. Here it is shown how Hinduism, formerly dominant throughout a great part of Malaysia, gradually yielded in some places to a revival of the never extinct primitive nature-worship, in others to the spread of Islam, which in Bali alone failed to gain a footing. In this island a curious mingling of Buddhist and Brahmanical forms with the primordial heathendom not only persisted, but was strong enough to acquire the political ascendancy over the Mussulman Sassaks of the neighbouring island of Lombok. Thus while Islam reigns exclusively in Java—formerly the chief domain of Hinduism in the Archipelago—Bali, Lombok, and even Sumbawa, present the strange spectacle of large communities professing every form of belief, from the grossest heathendom to pure monotheism.
As I have elsewhere pointed out[502], it is the same with the cultures and general social conditions, which show an almost unbroken transition from the savagery of Sumbawa to the relative degrees of refinement reached by the natives of Lombok and especially of Bali. Here, however, owing to the unfavourable political relations, a retrograde movement is perceptible in the crumbling temples, grass-grown highways, and neglected homesteads. But it is everywhere evident enough that "just as Hinduism has only touched the outer surface of their religion, it has failed to penetrate into their social institutions, which, like their gods, originate from the time when Polynesian heathendom was all powerful[503]."
Hindu Legends in Bali.
A striking illustration of the vitality of the early beliefs is presented by the local traditions, which relate how these foreign gods installed themselves in the Lesser Sundanese Islands after their expulsion from Java by the Muhammadans in the fifteenth century. Being greatly incensed at the introduction of the Koran, and also anxious to avoid contact with the "foreign devils," the Hindu deities moved eastwards with the intention of setting up their throne in Bali. But Bali already possessed its own gods, the wicked Rakshasas, who fiercely resented the intrusion, but in the struggle that ensued were annihilated, all but the still reigning Mraya Dewana. Then the new thrones had to be erected on heights, as in Java; but at that time there were no mountains in Bali, which was a very flat country. So the difficulty was overcome by bodily transferring the four hills at the eastern extremity of Java to the neighbouring island. Gunong Agong, highest of the four, was set down in the east, and became the Olympus of Bali, while the other three were planted in the west, south, and north, and assigned to the different gods according to their respective ranks. Thus were at once explained the local theogony and the present physical features of the island.
Running Amok.
Despite their generally quiet, taciturn demeanour, all these Sundanese peoples are just as liable as the Orang-Maláyu himself, to those sudden outbursts of demoniacal frenzy and homicidal mania called by them mĕng-ámok, and by us "running amok." Indeed A. R. Wallace tells us that such wild outbreaks occur more frequently (about one or two every month) amongst the civilised Mangkassaras and Bugis of south Celebes than elsewhere in the Archipelago. "It is the national and therefore the honourable mode of committing suicide among the natives of Celebes, and is the fashionable way of escaping from their difficulties. A Roman fell upon his sword, a Japanese rips up his stomach, and an Englishman blows out his brains with a pistol. The Bugis mode has many advantages to one suicidically inclined. A man thinks himself wronged by society—he is in debt and cannot pay—he is taken for a slave or has gambled away his wife or child into slavery—he sees no way of recovering what he has lost, and becomes desperate. He will not put up with such cruel wrongs, but will be revenged on mankind and die like a hero. He grasps his kris-handle, and the next moment draws out the weapon and stabs a man to the heart. He runs on, with bloody kris in his hand, stabbing at everyone he meets. 'Amok! Amok!' then resounds through the streets. Spears, krisses, knives and guns are brought out against him. He rushes madly forward, kills all he can—men, women, and children—and dies overwhelmed by numbers amid all the excitement of a battle[504]."
The Látah Malady.
Possibly connected with this blind impulse may be the strange nervous affection called látah, which is also prevalent amongst the Malayans, and which was first clearly described by the distinguished Malay scholar, Sir Frank Athelstane Swettenham[505]. No attempt has yet been made thoroughly to diagnose this uncanny disorder[506], which would seem so much more characteristic of the high-strung or shattered nervous system of ultra-refined European society, than of that artless unsophisticated child of nature, the Orang-Maláyu. Its effects on the mental state are such as to disturb all normal cerebration, and Swettenham mentions two látah-struck Malays, who would make admirable "subjects" at a séance of theosophic psychists. Any simple device served to attract their attention, when by merely looking them hard in the face they fell helplessly in the hands of the operator, instantly lost all self-control, and went passively through any performance either verbally imposed or even merely suggested by a sign.