Rambang Ngawan, OP
Discovering the Person of Dayak Uud Danum’s
Traditional Law/Adat Law
The
attempt to discover the culturally based meaning of person in Dayak Uud Danum’s
point of view is, in our mind, a harmonious agreement between a truthful idea
on the level of abstraction and a truthful reality, considering the
concreteness of the object studied i.e. the individual Dayak, as a clear and
careful study of the reality of the Dayak people who in their lives and
traditions have made an eternally unbreakable tie with God, nature and fellow
human beings. Thus, in relation to this, what will be discussed in the
succeeding pages are unspotted reflections of the long-standing cultural
treasure of the Dayak people, a worth studying legacy that will place the
person of the Dayaks, particularly Dayak Uud Danum at the central stage of this
study.
Admittedly, Dayak’s culture and
tradition are diverse, meaning to say that though we can still find major
similarities among all the Dayak ethnics around Borneo Island, there are
distinct divergences among these cultures as they stand as unique and
incomparable traditions on their own. In this respect, Dayak Uud Danum has
something to share to the cultural and philosophical study of person. This
article itself, however, is attempting to discover the philosophical and cultural
understanding of person available both in written materials (squeezing out the
concept of person in the written traditional law and other literary works) and
verbal materials (through the ordinarily used term in conversations that
depicts the meaning of person). Knowing that this article in its novelty is
attempting to discover the meaning of person in Dayak Uud Danum’s point of view
by means of philosophical conceptualization, in the process this article will
as much as possible be faithful to the truest meaning of person as understood
by Dayak Uud Danum’s tradition. And in order to get the total understanding of
Dayak worldview, we shall start off with the fundamental elements that
constitute the foundation of the Dayaks as persons.
a)
The
Literary and Historical Origin of the Traditional Law/Adat Law
In
this part, we shall give more attention to how Dayak Uud Danum people perceive
man’s actions under the lenses of ethics. Ethics play a central part in the
lives of all the sub-ethnics of Dayak people. The traditional law can be
perceived as the safeguard for the people to deal with their fellow Dayaks and
nature. The traditional law will assure the Dayaks that their conducts should
never harm any member of the community and bring harmony to the whole elements
of nature. First and foremost we must consider the historical and literary
views of the origin of the traditional law. Dayak Uud Danum community is
enriched with many kinds of literatures.
In
Dayak Uud Danum society, there are quite many verbal literatures which we can
still observe. Generally, these verbal literatures can be grouped mainly into three:
Kolimoi, Tahtum, and Kesah. Kolimoi is a verbal literature that
tells about the stories of Uud Danum people in the heavens. The main characters
are Oling, Songalang, Sohavung, Songumang, Uhko’, Komandai, Timbang, and Jambang for the male, then Pongota’,
Bura’, Uhit Miou, Tipung, and Selung for the female. Kolimoi is the second era in the history
of verbal literatures. There are hundreds of stories in this Kolimoi era.
Tahtum is an epoch of heroic stories like that
of Mahabrata or Ramayana in the Hindu tradition. The main characters in these
stories are Tambun, Bungai, Sangen, Bitih, and Shepung for the male, then Karing, Bulou, and Tobala’ for
the female. In one of the episodes of Tahtum
it is told that a King’s son from Majapahit Empire
came to propose a Uud Danum princess. There are also hundreds of stories found
in this third era of Dayak Uud Danum’s history of verbal literatures. Tahtum era lasted until the time of
Majapahit Empire.
The
third era is Kesah which is the
fourth era in the history of Uud Danum people. The era of Kesah started after Tahtum
and approximately until the colonization of the Dutch and the Japanese. Kesah is the youngest era among the
three. In this Kesah era, there are
thousands of stories that can be found. According to the elder people, the
characters during these three eras were once living with Dayak Uud Danum
people. In order for the stories of their lives and their heroic conducts to be
always remembered by their descendants, these aforementioned characters then
ask other people who are good at literatures to tell stories about them. These
literati then tell the stories about them with their own versions.
Consequently, there are various stories with the same characters that tell
about their lives. Especially for Tahtum,
the traces of it can still be found until now and we can still see them. But
unfortunately, many of this remaining historical legacies have been destroyed
by the tractors of logging companies.
With
regards to the origin of the traditional law, the legend tells us that during
the era of Kesah it is told how Sohavung frequently visits the earth. He
uses Polaka’ Bulou to transport from
heaven to the earth. This Polaka’ Bulou is
a squared vessel made of pure gold. This vessel is tied with a rope made of
gold as well which is elongated to earth. Accordingly, at that time the
distance between heaven and earth is not that far. The Uud Danum people who are
living in the world can still climb up to reach heaven. However, at a certain
period, the people of heaven decide to keep a distance from the earth worrying
that bad influences will infect them. Furthermore, it is recorded that Sohavung has visited the earth for seven
times at the same respect. It is said that he has the power to divide himself
into many and be present in different places at the same time. When he is on
earth, he marries people of the earth. Uniquely, the girls to whom he is
married are not always from Dayak Uud Danum communities but also from other
Dayak sub-ethnics. His mission on earth is to stop the conflicts among Anak Danum Kolunon or among human beings
who at that time frighten each other with headhunting activities. Sohavung also constitutes traditional
laws for several groups of people whom he meets.
All
of the stories above used to be told orally by the elders to the young in the Rumah Betang (long stage house). A Rumah
Betang or long house is the traditional house of the Dayaks which can
rarely be found nowadays due to the modern reorganization of residences. There are only few Rumah Betang left in
Kalimantan. Rumah Betang is made of
private houses or rooms which are connectedly built. Its construction is made
of kayu belian (iron woods). Each
family lives in one of these rooms. The number of the rooms can be more than 50
and so there can be more than 200 people living in this Rumah Betang. The
occupants of this Rumah Betang are related by blood and this Rumah Betang can form one village with their educational, religious,
political and social systems. That is why during the olden times, Rumah Betang was so central in the lives of the Dayaks. The transfer of
knowledge from the elders to the younger generation was done effectively in
this Rumah Betang.
During
the olden times, the Dayaks still lived in the long houses. All the
intellectual and cultural riches that they had were generated to their
descendants by means of oral transmission. The activity of passing down of
these cultural and intellectual heritage was done mostly inside these long
houses by the elderly members of the communities. But when time changed
especially when modernity was slowly introduced to the Dayaks, there was also a
perceptual change of living in communities. The Dayaks started to abandon their
traditional way of living in Rumah Betang,
and moving out of these long houses, they formed new communities which were not
anymore based on these long houses. Modern houses were also introduced to the
Dayak communities which are basically independently detached from one another.
The Dayaks do not anymore live as one big clan inside the long house, but
instead they form villages whereby their close relatives become their
neighbors. In order to preserve the cultural and intellectual riches that have
become their daily basis of living, the Dayaks must have initiated that these
riches, specially the customary law, to be documented or written on papers. By
the time that the customary law became a written or documented law, most of the
Dayaks must have acquired certain levels of education.
In doing their
routine, the Dayak people will never lose sight of their traditional religious
practices and beliefs which have been continually handed down from their
ancestors, especially in their interaction with their surroundings. They
believe that in their strife to attain goods for their physical nourishment,
health and safety, they must not only depend on their own efforts but also rely
on the intervention of “what” they believe. In other words, their religious
tradition teaches them that everything they acquire in their lives -whether
good or bad- there will always be interventions coming from other elements
beyond human world. Some people would use the term religions of the Dayaks to
address these traditional religious practices and beliefs.
The term
religion in this context includes the understanding of existing religious
practices and are still observed but not fully by the Dayak horticultural
societies. This religion is a tradition that is handed down from generation to
generation which later called as religious tradition or in Dayak languages is
called Adat.
In this Adat (religious tradition) is
found all the rules, norms and the ethics that govern the correlations between
man and man, man and all non-human elements (nature and super-nature) in this
life system. This religious tradition differs in all Dayak ethnics as it is
noticeable in the forms of prayers, food offerings, kinds of rites, and
mystical sites of every region.
Adat or Adat Istiadat
(traditional religious beliefs and practices) and Hukum Adat (traditional law) are the Dayaks’ cultural outputs that
come from accumulated experiences of their adaptive strategy in life towards
environment for the purpose of keeping the harmony in nature/Alam and also a guiding principle in the
society. Adat influences and forms
the characters and the behaviors of the Dayak society in interacting with their
fellow Dayaks and the supernatural world. This then leads to the Dayaks’ mode
of looking at nature/Alam with so
much respect. Adat as a rule
functions to control the attitudes and behaviors of the Dayaks and possesses an
authoritative power both spiritually and socially. When a Dayak man is doing
the right thing for the benefits of the others, his fellow human beings and his
surroundings, the Dayak man will be rewarded with spiritual and social
benefits. Any wrongs that man performs can endanger the harmonious and balanced
relation in the life system of the Dayaks.
In addition, all
the religious traditions, norms, and ethics have a significant role in preserving
the environmental system of the Dayaks. The environmental ethics that is
contained in the Adat and then
confirmed through cosmological and mythical views of the society has created a
continuous life process which makes the relation between men and the world
harmonious and balanced. As the result, the environment is well preserved and
orderly as in the original form.
b)
The
Person/Kolunon as Mirrored in the
Traditional Law
In order to be able to define the concept of
person in the Dayak Uud Danum’s worldview, the term Kolunon will be used. The word Kolunon
is always used in ordinary conversations of the speakers of Uud Danum language
and it can take two forms in its definitions.
First,
Kolunon in its usage can be
understood as the physical man or suppositum,
the substance that has its existence and is capable of motion, relation and
interaction. The first sense of Kolunon
speaks of a person in his pure physicality. Some expressions in Dayak Uud Danum
language that use the term Kolunon can be seen in the following sentences:
First sentence:
“Kolunon erih yam taai buso ngorih
boram.” Which is translated as:
“That person
cannot be drunk when drinking tuak
(traditional alcoholic beverage).”
Second sentence:
“Kolunon erih was
jadi kolunon.” Which is translated
as:
“That person has
become a person.”
The
second meaning of Kolunon, as in the
second sentence, often takes a more abstract form and can be understood as the
ideal person of Dayak Uud Danum. For the sake of conceptualization, indeed, the
word Kolunon is existing as a word.
But a word is just a simple word if we do not put meaning in it. It is man at
first who defines a word not the other way around. And for this very reason, we
will try to find out what meaning have the people of Dayak Uud Danum given to
the word Kolunon.
We
admit that the limitation of the attempt to define Kolunon aided by the written traditional law will give limitations
to the definition of the word as well. As the matter of fact, the definition of
Kolunon can be built up after
extracting the very core value of the Dayak Uud Danum’s view of person from the
abstract level of understanding of the people of Dayak Uud Danum. This of
course would be possible we believe if the scope of the article will be
focusing on the definition of the word Kolunon
per se and the researches to support
the study are done extensively. However, at this point in time, what interests us
is to look a bit closer to one dimension that contributes to the definition of Kolunon and in this case it derives part
and parcel from the traditional law. Although, we agree that the written
traditional law cannot fully provide the complete understanding of Kolunon, the philosophical analysis that
we attempt to make may still be beneficial as a first step towards the study of
person of Dayak Uud Danum in particular.
Moreover,
we are always keeping in mind that Kolunon
is not a result of abstraction thus reducing the person of the Dayak as a mere
object of the intellect. However, Kolunon
as a concept has been practiced and lived out by every Dayak Uud Danum
individual who finds his existence in the universe as a true model of a person
who lives by Dayak Uud Danum’s cultural values.
And
now, let us first look closely at the traces of the person of Dayak Uud Danum
as ideally mirrored in the Hukum Adat
(traditional law). We will only pick some important sentences that wisely
picture out the concept of person of Dayak Uud Danum as it is written in the
book of Hukum Adat Suku Dayak Uud Danum
Kecamatan Serawai dan Ambalau, Kabupaten Sintang (2002). We will put
this into categories:
On
Birth
Dayak Uud Danum society
understands very well the meaning and the value of human life. The importance
given on life can be seen in the following sentences as written in the book of
Hukum Adat (traditional law):
Translation:
Pregnancy
is by nature belongs to women, and it is imaginably perilous for a woman to be
in the period of pregnancy as her life is prone to danger and this can be
likened to an egg placed on top of a horn, where at any moment her soul is at
risk; preventing herself from eating the food that can harm the health of the
mother and the child, expecting the care from her husband with sincerity. For
this reason, Dayak Uud Danum society since the ancient time has understood this
thing with its totality that this thing cannot be without the consideration of hukum adat (traditional law).
The Majapahit Empire, based on the island of Java in what is
now Indonesia,
was a wealthy trading state that controlled one of the key choke-points along
the Indian Ocean trade routes, the Straits of Malacca. It lasted from 1293 to
1527. At its height, the Majapahit Empire ruled most of maritime Southeast
Asia, from Sumatra in the west to New Guinea in the east, and also including
areas that now make up Singapore, Brunei, East Timor,
the southern Philippines,
Malaysia,
and southern Thailand. http://asianhistory.about.com/od/glossaryko/g/Majapahit-Empire.htm
(accessed on December 17, 2013).
Tuak is fermented
traditional alcoholic beverage of the Dayaks which is made of glutinous rice. Tuak is an important element in all the
religious rites and cultural celebrations of the Dayaks.
