Prophets and followers in Batak millenarian responses to the colonial order : Parmalim, Na Siak Bagi and Parhudamdam, 1890-1930 / by Masashi Hirosue

• VerfasserIn: Hirosue, Masashi 1952-
• Place / Publishing House: Canberra, 1988
• Year of Publication: 1988
• Language: English
• Classification: 15.78 - Südostasien
• Physical Description: xi, 407 Seiten; Illustrationen
• Notes: Literaturverzeichnis Seiten 377-407
• ac_no: AC17179731
• Hierarchical level: Monograph
• Statement of Responsibility: by Masashi Hirosue

During the latter part of the 19th century, the Toba Batak area in north Sumatra was exposed to European influence after the defeat of the traditional power symbol, Si Singa Mangaraja. Millenarian expectations began after Batak people were obliged to recognize the superiority of European power, yet were in many cases not satisfied with the new order. The Parmalim movement was started by Guru Somalaing, a datu (magician), who claimed to be able to gain access to the source of European power(Jehova) while retaining the essence of Toba Batak values. Parmalim followers believed that someday the Dutch would be driven away by the aid of Raja Rum (identified with an Italian traveller Modigliani) and some German missionaries working in Toba who they believed were really Batak divine kings. Toba perceptions of European power gradually changed as the people became disillusioned with the increasingly heavy colonial regime. At the turn of the century, Na Siak Bagi started another millenarian movement by preaching that colonial rule in the Batak country was a punishment from the Batak High God Mulajadi Na Bolon because of their sins but that through Na Siak Bagi's message the people would be liberated from the foreign regime. His preaching influenced by Christianity also drew Christians to the movement. The development of anti-colonialism among Muslims in Indonesia in the middle of the 1910s was the inspiration for another endeavour to revitalize the beliefs in Mulajadi Na Bolon and Si Singa Mangaraja, this time by Parhudamdam prophets using many Islamic terms. The esoteric art of invulnerability and the belief in Si Singa Mangaraja, both of which had seemed to be dying under the colonial regime, were revived as sources of anti-colonialism among followers of the movements, who resorted to a millenarian rebellion against the colonial power. The thesis concludes that the main source of support for millenarian protests was their promise to initiate people into the ultimate source of power, as newly defined in relation to the European incursion.