Coming back, now, from this long digression, your Reverence, Father Superior, could not imagine with what pleasure and blessings the Christians of those three visitas above mentioned, of Santa Fe, Manurígao, and San Luis, received the palay which your Reverence gave as an alms for the relief of those places because of that great scarcity of food of which I have spoken above. The heads of the families could not restrain their joy when they found themselves with palay which could be distributed to each one, although it was, it is true, very little compared to their great necessity. “How troublesome we are to you, Fathers,” they said, “and how much patience you must have with us. But God will be able to repay you superabundantly for the good that you are doing us. Had we not received help, of a truth, our sick and stricken would have died of hunger and poor food. But now with this palay, we shall have enough to put new life into us, and we shall keep some of it for a small field, which will give us hopes of enduring the famine better later on.” So did the poor wretches express themselves. They really planted their fields with the little palay which they could set aside for it; and at the date of the writing of this letter, some fields are seen so luxuriant and with so fine a heading of grain that within one month they are promised a moderate harvest. May God in His goodness preserve those fields and cause them to bear one hundred per cent.
The day following our arrival at Santa Fe, and the succeeding days, we managed to assemble in the convent all the Mandayas who appeared in the village. Father Pastells exhorted them to receive the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ, and many of them were baptized. Some of them obstinately refused, giving no other reason for their refusal, if reason it can be called, than Ualay gusto co, “I do not wish it.” And they could not be changed from that decision, notwithstanding all our arguments and eloquence. That happens to us at various times so that we missionaries may learn that the faith and baptism are gifts of his divine generosity, and that if God do not illumine and impel them with His powerful grace, in vanum laboravimus.[4] But if some of them resisted divine Grace, others, God be thanked, yielded to it, and gladly received holy baptism. All together, adults and children, we baptized forty. Among that number three women whom we call bailanas are worthy of special mention. Those women were clad in their baro or doublet, of a deep-red color throughout, a dress which is peculiar to their profession, and which differentiates them from other women. Since I have mentioned these important persons of Mandaya society, it will not be outside of my design, nor will it be without interest for your Reverence, to say something about the same. The bailanas are, as it were, the priestesses of the Mandayas. They exercise the functions of priestesses, for they offer sacrifices and other offerings to their false gods, invoke them for the cure of their sick, consult them in cases of necessity, etc., etc. Consequently, they possess considerable authority and influence among the Mandayas, since the latter look upon them as mediators between them and their gods, the instruments through whom is transmitted the will and mysterious orders of the gods, and, finally, as persons superior to themselves, although they may be baganis or petty kings, inasmuch as they believe them to be in direct communication with their gods or invisible spirits. This class of sharpers are not few among the Mandayas, both because those people are very superstitious and believe that their persons and whatever surrounds them are under the influence of good and evil spirits, and because the profession of bailan is a lucrative trade. For, for every religious act that the bailanas perform at the request of another, they receive their fee or at least they have a share of the sacrifice or offering that is made to the gods. Hence those women are the most difficult to attract to our holy faith, and even to enter the presence of the father missionary. For they fear that they will lose their influence, their repute, and their easy living, if they become Christians. Poor creatures, how mistaken they are!
And now your Reverence may behold one of their pagdiuatas or sacrifices which they perform in honor of their gods, Mansilátan and Badla. Several bailanas assemble in the place assigned for the purpose, together with those persons interested and invited to take part in it. They erect a sort of small altar on which they place the manáugs or images of the said gods which are made of the special wood of the báyog tree,[5] which they destine exclusively for this use. When the unfortunate hog which is to serve for the sacrifice is placed above the said altar, the chief bailana approaches with balarao or dagger in hand, which she brandishes and drives into the poor animal, which will surely be grunting in spite of the gods and of the religious solemnity, as it is fearful of what is going to happen to it; and leaves the victim sweltering in its blood. Then immediately all the bailanas drink of the blood in order to attract the prophetic spirit to themselves and to give their auguries or the supposed inspirations of their gods. Scarcely have they drunk the blood, when they become as though possessed by an infernal spirit which agitates them and makes them tremble as does the body of a person with the ague or like one who shivers with the cold. They seize in their hands a gong to which they give repeated blows with the third finger, snapping it with the thumb, thus making a kind of toccata with it. While they are doing this, after having belched forth a few dozen of times, they invoke the above-mentioned gods Mansilátan and Badla, to whom they chant the following Mandayan song:
Miminsad, miminsad si Mansilátan
Opod si Badla nga magadayao nang dunia.
Bailan, managunsáyao,
Bailan, managunlíguit.[6]
This means in Spanish: “Mansilátan has come down, has come down. Later [will come] Badla, who will preserve the earth. Bailanas, dance; bailanas, turn ye round about.” As soon as the invocation has concluded bailanas and non-bailanas, that is to say, all the people who have gathered, dance and cry out like disorderly persons, devour the hog, and end by getting drunk. Such is the conclusion and end of the demoniacal bucolic feast to the gods Mansilátan and Badla.
And although these things are so, the Catholic apologist will not fail to comprehend the most important teachings which he could utilize as a confirmation of the most transcendental questions of our true religion. For leaving aside the action of the sacrifice and the ceremonies that accompany it, is there not some glimpse in that song, Miminsad, miminsad si Mansilátan, etc., although an imperfect one, of the dogmas of the plurality of persons in God, and of the creation and redemption of the world? Indeed, it is so, and more if one keep in mind the signification in which the Mandayas understand it, according to the ancient and constant oral tradition received from their ancestors. That tradition which gives the true meaning to those verses has been taken down by Father Pastells from the mouth of many tigúlang or old men who have been converted to Christianity. It is as follows. Mansilátan, the principal god and father of Badla, descended from the heavens where he dwells in order to create the world. Afterward his only son Badla came down also to preserve and protect the world—that is men and things—against the power and trickery of the evil spirits, Pudaúgnon and Malímbung, the latter a woman and the former a man, who are trying by continual artifices to harm and injure them. Those evil spirits did not obtain nor will they ever obtain their most evil intents to destroy the earth and mankind, for they are under the power and protection of the powerful and invisible god Badla. Consequently, and in view of so great love and mercy on the part of the latter and because of so much goodness on the part of his father Mansilátan, the bailanas who are the priestesses of the same, can never do less than be joyful, and in the transports of their joy invite one another to dance and circle about their revered images as an act of reverence to so great benefactors. Also there is not wanting among the beliefs of the Mandayas one which gives, although in a confused and corrupted manner, the idea of the Holy Spirit, thereby completing the mystery of the holy Trinity. For they say that, from Mansilátan, the father of Badla his only son, also proceeds the god Búsao, who is nothing else than the omnipotent virtue of the former. This last is communicated to some men preeminent in valor and skill for their combats, so that it makes them strong and valiant above other men. Those privileged men who are animated by the spirit of Búsao are called in the Mandaya language baganis, which means valiant.
And now I desire to call your Reverence’s attention to those two spirits, Pudaúgnon and Malímbung, of whom I made mention above. Does it not seem to you, Father Superior, that they are an image, although disfigured, of that malign spirit and chief of all tempters, Lucifer, who caused Eve to fall by his lies and deceit, and by means of the latter, conquered and overthrew Adam, from which originated the ruin of all the human race and the innumerable ills that inundate the earth? It is quite apparent that there is something in that, and that opinion does not seem ill founded if we consider the etymology of the words Pudaúgnon and Malímbung, and the explanation which the Mandayas give of the said spirits. For, first, the word Pudaúgnon is derived from the root daug, which means “to conquer,” “to tempt,” and from the particles pu or pa, and non or on, which make the root a substantive adjective, and the resultant meaning is, if the person is a man, as in this case, “he who tempts” or “the tempter.” So also Malímbung is composed of the root límbung, which means “to deceive,” and the particle ma which makes it a substantive adjective. Thus it means, the subject being a woman, “she who deceives” or “the deceiver.” The Mandayas say, then, of those evil spirits that Pudaúgnon, the wicked and mortal enemy of mankind, strong as a man (which he is) and powerful as a spirit, pursues, attacks, and injures poor mortals as much as he is allowed; and that Malímbung, cunning and artful as a wicked woman, and endowed with an irresistible force of seduction like a spirit (which she is also) seduces by her deceits, and causes the strongest men, who do not guard against her wiles, to fall. In this woman, is there not a picture of Eve, the unhappy Eve, possessed for her sin, by the spirit of her tempter Lucifer, seduced and seductive, with whose golden cords, Adam, the most lofty cedar of Lebanon in this world, was bound and was dashed into the deepest depths of evil?[7]