Advantages
Music of Kebyar
Commoners
Temporal Perspectives
Village Fields
Knowledge
Magnificent
Betutu
Evidences
Tropical
Mahendradatta
Music of Kebyar
Administrative

Story of Bali, Indonesia

Continued...

Still such offspring provided they are legitimate chidren remain members of the father caste.The actual mechanism for father caste,in spite of any inferiorityimplied by his mother rankor his own birth position, remained obscure. Future Dutch ethnographers worked on the problem but negected the intimately related marriage system. Moreover, they regarded this subdivision of Brahmana Siwa as literal, historical fact, and they sought confiermation in the royal chronicles. Observers overlooked how such schemes might be rhetorically loaded to accentuate the status of Brahmana at the expense of Brahmana Boda. The Encyclopedia article notes the Brahmana male-tile (ida) and female title (idoyo) and the special role ot priests. From Brahmana came pedande priests, who stand in a very high regard and are considered more ar less as saints. Also persons belonging to the satria or Wesia caste in Lombok at least could acquire priesthood although in practice such a thing does not occur. Yet there is little sense that the Balinese of Lombok might be seeking to legitimate their own status in way expressly to out rival their land of origin, although this possibility had earlier been alluded to by Friederich. The Balinese of Lombok, and especially their prince, are much richer than those of Bali, and secondly, the Balinese of Lombok, and paeticularly the present prince, are looked down upon, and said to be ignorant in their religion and their customs, by the Balinese of Bali, and especially by the Dewa Agung, whom the people of Lombok do not acknowledge. Now to revute these unfavorable opinions, they show themselves to be much more precise in the performance of their religious duties than majority of the Balinese in Bali. Such aloofness by inhabitants of Klungkung and Gianyar remains proverbial even today. The relation between a pedanda priest and a novice is documented, by the Encyclopedia, along with the oft-intemized ideal ascetis-comportment of priests never lie, avoid wicked passions, abstain from pork Bali prized dish, maintain ritual purity and a sacred life, so to achieve divinity after death. Finally, the perpetual dilemma concerning priests and marriage arises. Women also can work their way up to the clergy and titled pedanda-istri, the wives of pedanda must in all events be consecrated in the learning of their spouses. Although it is considered very seemly for a pedanda to have only one wife, many pedanda have more wives, and from lower statuses as well. At the highest degree of holiness stands the priest who upon his consecration makes a vow to have no relationship with any women during his life. The image of the pedanda still harbors conflicting ideals in modern Bali. South Asian texts depict him as a celibate, pure renouncer. Bali-Hindu ritual requires him to possess a consort who helps in sacred ceremonies, and native chrocles of caste project an arch polygynist whose different wives produced the ranked subdivisions