Maya, Seven (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly; Rebecca Henschke, Marco Werman, The World (PRI) |
| Sacred Tantric Yoga practices enhance intimacy and a sense of union with a partner. |
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| Next let's visit sexy Gunung Kemukus? Asian Muslim tourists at Borobudur (TrevThompson) |
"Eat, pray, love" the American Elizabeth Gilbert famously advised.She had just come back to the U.S. from Hedonistic-Catholic Italy and Hindu-Buddhist India and Bali (Indonesia).But Islam now dominates the massive island nation. Its remaining traditionally Theravadan Buddhists will gladly tell anyone about it from Southern California (visit: Facebook, DhammaCakraTra.org).In Indonesia, people seek "salvation" at shrine to anonymous sex |
| Housewife Fitri has come up to the mountain for a good Friday night out. She hooked up with Ishlam, who is here to improve the fortunes of his small business (Rebecca Henschke). |
(PRI) Every 35 days, Muslims from across Indonesia flock to a hilltop Islamic shrine in central Java. They come to find blessings and good fortune -- through a ritual that involves adulterous sex. When they arrive at the shrine, known as ["the ritual of the hill"] Gunung Kemukus, they offer prayers and flowers at a sacred grave. Then, they find a stranger for anonymous sex.- Question: Didn't this "sacred [sex work]" happen in ancient Greece? In Corinth, Delphi, in Athens and even Sparta, with The Oracle (the living Goddess Pythia, like the virgin Kumari of Nepal) and the temple priestesses, who were the Greek-version of Geishas called Hetairai? The Old World knew how to live better than our Puritanical shame and guilt about sex allows us to live now in a world saturated with porn.
When I arrive there, darkness is starting to shroud the hillside. By candlelight, people are sitting on mats around sacred dewadaru trees. - [These are not the American deodara/Asian devadaru trees, both of which are favored haunts of woodland fairies or dryads called devas in Buddhism and Hinduism, a Sanskrit word (cognate Latin deus, dīvus, Spanish dios, French dieu, Proto-Indo-European deiwos), a term at the root of our English diva, deity, and divinity].
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| Siddhartha and deva-like maras under Bo tree |
And they are sitting amidst the twisting roots of massive fig trees [like the Buddha sat under a sacred fig, Ficus religiosa or peepal, that became the Bodhi tree]. There are lots of women standing by themselves and lots of men in groups.
Pak Slamat is one of the men. He is balding, has a moustache, wears a leather jacket and glasses, and is reading from
the Koran [Muslim Bible]. He's married, but hasn't told his wife he is here because she wouldn't let him
come. [
Ehem.] She thinks he has gone somewhere to pray [but he's really here to eat and love or just love].
"In all the rooms around here there are couples," he says. "They are small-business people, and, if you ask them, they say it works -- that before business was slow and now it's good. This is the work of Allah, through our traditional ways. I am keen to do the ritual; it's just a matter of finding someone who wants the same thing."
AUDIO (The World)
History of infidelity
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Pilgrims on stairway to "heaven" (Ali Lutfi) |
Like tens of thousands of others, Slamat has come to be blessed in a ritual that dates back hundreds of years.
The ritual's origin is a legend about a young royal, Prince Pangeran Samodro, who was raised in the court of Demak, a Muslim sultanate on Java’s north coast. He fell in love with his stepmother, Nyai Ontrowulan. The two ran off to Gunung Kemukus [this hill, with stairs leading to the shrine], where they were discovered by soldiers from Demak and slain. Their bodies are supposedly in a grave at the shrine.
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| Ancient romance on walls |
According to some versions of the story, the couple didn't finish having sex before they were discovered, so the ritual sex completes their union.
In another version, the ritual helps minimize the shame of their act by offering a more shameful act to [to compare it with? After all, no one brings a stepparent, taking instead an anonymous partner]. Regardless, many believe that coming to Gunung Kemukus provides a blessing that can boost one's fortune -- an incentive that seems to have special appeal for needy workers, like bus drivers, farmers, or small-market traders.
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| I'd do it, I'd totally do it! How much? lol |
Ibu Winda is a grandmother in her early 60s and is dressed in a gold jacket with flowers, a short mini-skirt, and leather jacket. For makeup, she wears bright red lipstick and has powdered her face.
She runs a small food stall in her hometown and has been coming here for ten years. "Ever since I have come here, business has been good and life has been easier," she says. "Praise be to Allah."
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| I love both of you; that's why it tears me apart! Borobudur (TrevThompson/flickr.com) |
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| Lois, my leather jacket is too tight (Family Guy) |
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| Sexy figurines of Borobudur |
This ritual [is Islam but] isn't Islam as most would recognize it. It is a mix of Islam with earlier Hindu, Buddhist, and traditional [animistic] beliefs -- something that is typical in Indonesia, and especially Java.
"Indonesia is amazing because whatever religion comes into Indonesia, it changes its color," says Kunijoro Soeparno, a professor of sociology who’s been researching these traditions for decades.
"The Islam is not just Islam like it is in Arab countries. Hinduism is different here to what it is in India. Buddhism is different from China. The Catholic Church is different from in Rome," he says. [It's just like Gilbert said -- Rome, India, Buddhist Asia -- all of the ingredients to eat, pray (ecstatically meditate), and love!] More
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| The most amazing thing about jungle Borobudur is not its massive size or pyramids, but its many "Time Travel Bells" (stupas, Die Glocke) with Buddhas inside at dawn (TrevThompson). |
Buddhism in IndonesiaCC Liu, Dhr. Seven, Wisdom Quarterly (Wikipedia edit) |
| Buddhist monastics on path under a sacred Bodhi tree, Sewu Temple, Indonesia (TJP) |
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| Buddhist Borobudur, Indonesia (TrevThompson) |
Hinduism and [Hindu-saturated] Mahayana Buddhism arrived in Indonesia from India [where Indo, or Indra (
Sakra) was a prominent Buddhist deity, one important to the
Sailendra] in the 4th and 5th century, as trade with India intensified under the south Indian
Pallava dynasty [
Guide to the Temples of Java (Indonesia), Approach Guides, David Raezer and Jennifer Raezer].
From the 7th century, the powerful
Srivijaya naval kingdom flourished as a result of trade and the influences of Hinduism and Buddhism that were imported with it (
Indonesia: Peoples and History, Jean Gelman Taylor, 2003, Yale University Press; M.C. Ricklefs, A History of Modern Indonesia since c.1300, 2nd Ed., 1991, MacMillan).
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| From earthquakey Aceh in the west to Papau (not New Guinea) in the east (wiki) |
Between the 8th and 10th centuries, the agricultural Buddhist Sailendra and Hindu
Mataram dynasties thrived and declined in inland Java, leaving grand religious monuments such as Sailendra's
Borobudur and Mataram's
Prambanan. The Hindu
Majapahit kingdom was founded in eastern Java in the late 13th century, and under Gajah Mada, its influence stretched over much of Indonesia [
Peter Lewis, "The Next Great Empire," Futures 14 (1): 47–61, 1982].
Although Muslim traders first traveled through Southeast Asia early in the Islamic era, the
earliest evidence of Islamized populations in Indonesia dates to the 13th century in northern
Sumatra (
Ricklefs, 1991, pp. 3-14). Other Indonesian areas gradually adopted Islam, and it was the dominant religion in Java and Sumatra by the end of the 16th century...
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What causes people to fixate on someone [or something] so much that it takes over their being and wipes out whatever common sense and self-esteem they have for themselves?
The irrational behavior reaches fever pitch when they are rejected by the object of their affection. Their feelings of ultra-attachment turn into hurt and open bitterness. It becomes a frenzy of texting, calling, and harassing the person who scorned them.
