Indonesian Astrology and Silat

Discussion in 'Silat' started by Narrue, Dec 25, 2005.

  1. Narrue

    Narrue Valued Member

    Think of how the magi, skilled astrologers used astrology to locate the baby Jesus.

    In ancient times most cultures believed in the importance astrology played in everyday life.

    Even western culture was heavily influenced by astrology. An example which comes to mind is how western doctors treated patients using a combination of astrology and herbal preparations. Even the month, week, day and time herbs were picked was taken into account.

    In china martial arts were also influenced by astrology and many Qi gong and particularly Taoist practices try to follow and benefit from astrological or lunar influences in their training.

    Today these practices are dying out as modern martial artists no longer feel such things are in any way important.

    Indonesia would have been heavily influenced by both Indian and China, both of which put a heavy emphasis on the importance of astrology.

    What of Silat though, did astrological knowledge have any influence? If so what were they and are such things important in modern times?
     
    Last edited: Dec 25, 2005
  2. tellner

    tellner Valued Member

    It's one of those things that was important, but frankly isn't any more. A lot of people used to believe in astrology, but the advance of the physical sciences and the debunking of a lot of old superstitions and magic has left it by the wayside along with palmistry and reading sheep livers. Don't worry about it except for historical interest, says I.
     
  3. nechesh

    nechesh Valued Member

    I dunno Tellner, MY sheep livers are still pretty accurate as far as i know... ;) :D
     
  4. tim_stl

    tim_stl Valued Member

    i was speaking to a sundanese man once and he mentioned a sort of 'zodiac' they have based on the day of the week on which you were born. one of the symbols was a flower, another was a tree. unfortunately, i can no longer get in contact with this man- if this sounds familiar to anyone, could you fill me in?



    tim
     
  5. Narrue

    Narrue Valued Member

    Is Indonesian astrology based on the Chinese, Indian Astrological system or is it completely different?
     
  6. tellner

    tellner Valued Member

    It's extremely accurate in one way. It predicts a very bad day for the sheep.
     
  7. serakmurid

    serakmurid Valued Member

    Serak has a training method based on the seasons, but I don't know if we have any astrology, probably not.
     
  8. Crucible

    Crucible Valued Member

    Hello serakmurid,

    Perhaps it varies in each serak tradition, but as I was told by a brother pesilat who teaches from the VDT line, the pontjar used in serak is actually an ancient calendar. It corresponds to the seasons, numerology and the anatomy of the human body(similar to Da Vinci's drawing of the man in the circle).

    I am not a serak practitioner so perhaps a serak pesilat could come forward and elighten us further?
     
  9. Crucible

    Crucible Valued Member

    I am not an Indonesian pesilat, but in Pak O'ong Maryono's most excellent book he has a few brief and telling snippets on the topic of astrology. The book is not in front of me, so I will look it up later. I invite every one to purchase his book as it is probably the best written in the english language on the topic of silat.
     
  10. Narrue

    Narrue Valued Member

    Sounds a bit like the old western astronomical medical chart. It was common in such times to cure a medical condition using a combination of astrology, elements, planetary influences, lunar influences, seasonal influences and herbs. I have seen similar ancient charts for all the above. Charts like this were common in the west in ancient times, also India, Tibet, China…. Not sure about Indonesia but I would think so.
     

    Attached Files:

  11. serakmurid

    serakmurid Valued Member

    Crucible, I could tell you more about the dalam of the Pantjar, but alas, my teacher wishes to keep it dalam for those who are not in our aliran. But you ARE right, sir. The numerology of the art is most...intriguing. In our last seminar with Pak Victor de Thouars in late October of this year, he expounded at length about this. Also on many other occasions Pak Vic has slowly revealed the "deep structure" of the art. But as Ustad Guru Dan Inosanto puts it, "There are no guessing games (about Serak)".
     
  12. tellner

    tellner Valued Member

    I don't know about training methods based on the seasons except that we do more groundwork and heavy conditioning during the Summer. In the Winter it's too damned cold in the Guru's welding shop; people get hurt.

    As far as the "inner" meanings of the pancar or other visual training aids, well, it depends. They may have been there from the beginning or "discovered" later. It makes little difference. What's important is to learn what the teaching methods have to teach you and not get too wrapped up in them as ends in themselves. Some of the more elaborate over-intellectualization detracts from training rather than adding to it, at least until the student has developed a certain amount of technical skill and ability to apply what he or she has learned. I've seen students in some aliran get so obsessed with "this is the water side of langka empat, and that's the air side, and this stepping represents the song of Bar Ney the Mauve Monitor Lizard" that they lose perspective and their training suffers. This is a Bad Thing(tm).
     
  13. Gajah Silat

    Gajah Silat Ayo berantam!

    You get a roof? :D For me it's the back yard :cry:

    I don't get the seasons theory though in most of Indonesia it's hot or not quite so hot but wet :eek:
     
  14. tellner

    tellner Valued Member

    The pancar is a training aid designed to give the student guidelines for footwork and an appreciation of important angles. It's easy to overuse it and get into the whole "finger pointing at the moon" craziness. The fact that it's based on the length of the practitioner's footstep kind of guarantees that it will have something to do with the anatomy of the human body :rolleyes: Seasons? Astrology? Numerology? Try the Law of Large Numbers. You can pull any hidden meaning you want out of something as elaborate as the pancar. They have more to do with the inside of your own head than anything inherent in the geometry of the figure.

    It's kind of like Thibault's famous footwork diagram from the Spanish school of fencing. You can make all sorts of intellectual constructions about the elements, the humors, Sacred Geometry, magic and astrology. When it comes down to it the good practitioners get an appreciation for distance, angling, footwork and timing. The really elaborate stuff - "Step from A to 4, then slide along the lesser interior collateral while your opponent moves along the Path of Death" - ick, no. It's just organized despair and over-intellectualization.
     
  15. Kiai Carita

    Kiai Carita Banned Banned

    www.babadbali.com

    Peace to all,

    Narrue, astrology in silat is considered to be part of timing training. It is most important at a certain level for certain reasons. If you look up www.cimande.com you wil find a page on Jumat Kliwon days, which show that these guys think that Kliwon Friday is important.

    Many calendars have been and are used in Jawa, the Saka (solar) calendar, the Christian calendar, and also the Hijriah (lunar) calendar. Check out www.babadbali.com for a more thorough research. Contact the tradition activists who run it for expert information.

    Other ethnic groups also developed astrology and calendars.

    Warm salams to all,

    KC
     
  16. serakmurid

    serakmurid Valued Member

    Reply to tellner

    Ha, Ha Ha, Mas Todd Ellner, you have some funny things to say on this thread! :D
    But seriously you really never heard of the "Four Seasons"? That is from the Baduy. It has nothing to do with the weather or where you train. Guru Plinck didn't teach you that one? I've only done it twice myself.
    Ah, do be more polite when you talk about the dalam and the philosophy of Serak, sir. I learned much rahasiah from some extremely skilled men, no their training was not lacking for all the depth of knowledge of the deep structure of the art they have.
    We should model Hormat in front of our Indonesian brothers, yes?
    Hormat to you. :Angel:
     
  17. tellner

    tellner Valued Member

    The basics are difficult enough without adding magic and piling on layers of abstraction. Once I can make the stuff I have really work and have mastered things like intention, focus, technical principles, morality, and being able to fight efficiently there will be time to worry about the metaphysics and superstition. That's not likely to happen any time soon. I've met almost nobody who has gotten that far including practitioners with decades of experience and more certificates than the New York Stock Exchange.

    As far as the dalam goes, well, it depends very much on what you mean by "the dalam". If you mean the ability of good training to affect personal development including spiritual and religious, of course. If you mean that there are non-obvious ways of looking at things that can make you a better fighter or pesilat I have no argument. If you believe adding mysterious woo-woo to training in order to impress the marks or make them feel like they're privy to the Secrets of the Universe, then no. My teacher's teacher said "The truth is hard enough. Don't give them [word forbidden by terms of service]."

    A friend of mine and sometimes-participant in this forum spent way too much time and money memorizing the associations of the four elements to the sides of langka sliwa and "making hormat to the pancar". His training really took off when he began to work with teachers (in Indonesia as it happens) who were less interested in pseudo-mysticism and more interested in turning his students into good Silat players.
     
  18. serakmurid

    serakmurid Valued Member

    Actually I have never seen or heard Pak Victor say or claim anything we did was magic, superstition, woo-woo or whatever (I am not being defensive here, just stating my experience). I know enough from the other arts I've studied and teach, Jun Fan/JKD, Lacoste-Inosanto Kali, Wing Chun to recognize blather for what it is. Pak Victor is also not one for abstractions either. Whatever theory or philosophy he has taught us about Serak has been very practical in nature, ie it helps us understand the art better. Particulartly because he teaches the Mas Djut, Mas Roen and Pak Sera phases and they each have a different approach to Serak. If anything, it might be in teaching the history or the cultural roots of the Badui that the more symbolic stuff gets taught. That just helps the Serak practitioner understand, why things are the way they are, like why are there 18 jurus? What is the relationship between the first 3 langkah Pantjars and why is the 4th different from the first 3?, etc.
    Huh, I haven't been taught that about Langka Sliwa yet, only the footwork and that it taught structures to avoid being in.
     
  19. Silatyogi

    Silatyogi Valued Member

    esoterics & Silat

    Its deffinetly ok to use archetypes and attitudes to improve your fighting and Silat. But you have to also keep a level head about it and not get caught up in the Hoopla and WOOO WOOO of mysticism.


    In esoteric studies the following symbols relate to the various elements, and also various types of movents. The concept came from the Hindu's Esoteric concepts.

    This may help for example to get the mental attitude needed to get the job done if you are on a Langkah. Although my silat teachers never told me about this stuff directly, my yoga teachers did and it does indeed seem to relate with the energy and or intent used with the various Langkahs. I know Kalari has some of these concepts I am sure at somepoint it was taught in Silat aswell. Maybe in Indonesia it could be still learned. What is most important about it is not the over mystified stuff but more the simple mind attitudes & Intent to get the job done.

    Triangle is related to Fire
    Square is related to Earth
    Cross/circle is Related to Air
    Zig Zag/crecent is related to Water
    Formlessness is related to Void

    I wrote a small article about it you can find it on the link below. You may have to scroll down.

    http://doblesinstitute.com/wst_page7.php

    It is well known that many styles of Silat also use archetypes of animals to improve their way of moving and also "getting into the Spirit of things".

    the Tantrics & Buddhist Warriors of Tibet would use certain ritual dances and invoke certain deities to become in resonance with those particular archetypes in order to accuire a type of "Inner Power" before going to war.

    Its also common in Native american warrior cultures.

    But no matter what or how esoteric it may or may not be you still have to just be real and simple and work your art from the physical standpoint and train your Butt off!


    Peace

    Santiago
     
  20. tellner

    tellner Valued Member

    Precisely. I'm not at the level where most of this will do anything except get in the way. So I work on the basics. When they are really and truly dialed in, then there will be time to do other stuff. Until then, as they say,if your poop's weak, your poop's weak.

    Using animals to model intention can be a very useful training method. The problem I usually see is that people get into the whole "finger pointing at the moon" syndrome. They spend a lot of time trying to move the same way a tiger or a praying mantis does or convincing themselves that they have been possessed by animal spirits. They lose sight of what the training method is supposed to accomplish.

    So much of it is cultural context. Things that make perfect sense to someone who grew up in the time and place will require lots of translation to a foreigner and may still miss the mark causing more confusion. References to the Mahabarta or the Ramayana will be intensely familiar to most South and Southeast Asians. Not to Europeans. Mnemonics won't work quite the same way. Neither will intuitive associations. Add a hunger for the exotic and you have a recipe for confusion unless the teacher is very sensitive to the nuances and the student's headspace.
     

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