Rerajahan soul of the keris

[David]

Originally Posted by Pusaka

Alan, Thanks for the info about the de-laminated keris with paper inside. I myself have seen many keris for sale including shady talismanic keris but have never seen what you describe.

Can you define "many"? Surely you must be aware that Alan has seen and physically handled more keris over the past 50 years than the majority of our membership combined. That you or i may not have encountered this is neither surprising nor of any consequence.

Originally Posted by Pusaka

You mention lontar text, I do know that the images used to construct jimat are taking directly out of lontar text.
For now I guess the way forward is to locate those two text spoken of and perhaps get talking with Balinese pande and ask them directly.

I admire your optimism on this front, though i suspect you will find the task of locating these two texts about as easy as locating the Holy Grail. But i wish you luck and would love to hear about your findings if you ever are able to get your hands on them.
I also wish you luck when you finally locate a Balinese Pande and meet with him face to face to ask that he impart to you all his greatest secrets for the preparation of a "living" keris. Ah, to be a fly on the wall for that conversation.
I am sure that you realize that we are indeed fortunate to have, right here in this conversation, a man who studied directly with two acknowledged Mpus and who has created some fine keris himself. I find it interesting that when he tells us, "There is no tradition of which I know, nor that my teachers knew, nor that is contained in the primary Surakarta Empus Text-book, that calls for the inscription of magical drawings into any part of the metal used to produce a keris blade" that you don't seem to even skip a beat. I am not suggesting that you look no further, but you seem to prefer the mythos of Dynamo Jack as popularized by Lorne and Lawrence Blair or the legends of keris passed on through Westernized Silat to the accounts of someone who has actual firsthand knowledge working with well known Mpus. True, as Alan states, he has not worked with a Hindu pande and it certainly would not be surprising to find some things done a bit differently there given they still adhere to Hinduism in Bali. However, we should also consider that keris in Bali are a direct line of descent from the Mojopahit empire of Jawa.
Of course, this does not mean that Alan is infallible on these matters and certain i have disagreed and debated him on numerous points over the years. But it is remarkable to me how easily you seem to brush off his experience because it does not jibe with or give you the answers that to seem to have already assumed to be true.

Originally Posted by Pusaka

"Some of the ancient lontar texts included complex drawings along with corresponding Balinese calligraphy that are used by balians to create amulets called jimats. Jimats are created for a variety of uses, healing is one usage. In constructing a jimat, the balian redraws the illustration, first asking permission to engage in this activity, then proceeding with focused intention upon the sick recipient.

A Balinese sacred healing image
The illustration is usually drawn upon paper, although some are executed on white material or metal, depending upon the usage. Next, additional aksare are etched with a sacred tool onto a small piece of gold, silver, copper and bark of an indigenous Balinese tree. The balian folds the drawing in half, shaves incense into the crease then continues folding adding incense shavings with each fold until a small square approximately 1-1/2" is reached. The metals and wood are placed on top of the drawing with shaved incense in between each layer. The entire piece is slipped into a sheave of white cloth, then secured on all sides with threads."
http://www.drgrotte.com/BalineseMedicine.shtml

I'm trying to understand what this information shows us in regard to keris. You seem to keep coming back to this idea that the keris is nothing more than another form of jimat, a talisman, a charm. Certainly there are keris we can regard as being "talismanic", but i believe we sell the keris short if we insist that all it is or can be is just a talisman. I don't think anyone will disagree with you that this method of Rerajahan may well be used in Bali to create simple talismans or charms. Of course, balian are highly respected healers in Bali and people there frequent them more often than medical doctors, especially when their problems seem to be more a matter of niskala rather than sekala. But a balian is not an mpu or pande and showing that they may use Rerajahan in the creation of jimat is hardly evidence that keris pande also use the same process. It seems quite a jump from there to then state that Rerajahan is the "soul of the keris".
In your post (#25) you stated your reasons for starting this thread:
1 because no such thread discussing Rerajahan in the construction of keris existed prior to it and thought it would be good to change that.

2 and my main reason was I was hoping that some member/s of this forum would have some knowledge in this area maybe even share some examples of Rerajahan used in keris making.
As both Alan and i have pointed out, there may indeed be reasons why there was no such thread on "Rerajahan" here as it might relate to keris. But for you, this void, this hole, this flaw in our keris knowledge "says it all'. No Pusaka, not just here, but actually not anywhere that i know of (and i participate in 4 major online keris forums and moderate on 2 of them and can find no mention of Rerajahan there either). As i believe i have already stated, and you must realize this having some knowledge of the use of sigils in Western Magick, this process of magically charging objects with letters, sigils and words (chants) is quite common is esoteric circles across many cultures and certainly we can find that it is indeed a practice in Bali. That does not, however, support the notion that Rerajahan is specifically used in the creation of keris. Yes, we do see a pande in the marvelous video to posted inscribe something quickly on the billet before he begins, but it doesn't seem to be anything like what i image is the more complicated procedure of Rerajahan. I do find Alan's explanation that he may be inscribing an aum as an offering to Ganesha to open the way for the start of the work very plausible however. Of course, this is all changed now so when we google the term "Rerajahan + Keris" people will undoubtably be directed right here. I thank you for that.
I'm afraid your second and main reason for opening this thread seems a bit fantastic to me. Let's say for a just a minute that your suspicions about Rerajahan and keris are correct. As i stated early, if there was hard evidence to support this i would not find the concept too farfetched. Let's also say that there was someone in our membership who had a direct line of understanding about it and its application to keris (though i would think that if anyone here was privy to such knowledge it would be Alan). Why on earth to you suppose for even a minute that person would be willing to share such information in an open forum like this? I mean seriously, would not the exacting methods of instilling isi into a keris blade be the most highly guarded secret amongst Mpus? I would think that if such a secret did exist the details of it would not be revealed even to the Mpu's apprentice until the very final stages of their training. You are not going to find this sort of information in online forums, videos, articles or even books. Or i should say that you may find things that might appear to be such knowledge, but are not, because every step along the path of spiritual knowledge is fraught with hucksters, con men and fools. Deep truths are never revealed this way because people would learn them before they were ready to actually know them and that can be a very dangerous situation indeed. It is always easy to find the "truths" we want to hear because there are always people ready and able to provide such misdirections, especially if they can find a way to make a living doing it. But if you ever do meet a pande keris who is willing to teach you his greatest secret of how to bring life into a piece of forged iron i would not be the least bit offended if, after careful consideration, you decided not to reveal such a great secret in an open forum such as this.