Bomoh

A bomoh, dukun or pawing/pawang in various languages, is a Malay shaman.

Etymology

The word Bomo(h) (medicine man) was mentioned as early as ±1600-1625 in Hikayat Aceh, which was written in Jawi script.

Hikayat Aceh 127:7 "... gajah tuanku ini. Diperhamba suruh ubati kepada [bo]mo gajah tuanku. Berilah makanannya."

Hikayat Aceh 127:7 "... this king's elephant. The king asked it to be treated by the elephant [bo]moh. Give it food."

Background

The bomoh's original role was that of a healer and their expertise was first and foremost an in-depth knowledge of medicinal herbs and tajul muluk or Malay geomancy. This was supplemented by Sanskrit mantera (mantras) owing to the ancient Hindu-Buddhist influence in the region.

Since 1980s

The bomoh's craft remained largely unchanged even after Islam became dominant until the Islamic revival in the 1970s and 80s. Bomoh were then seen as deviant from the Muslim faith because of their invocation of spirits and the potentially harmful black magic they were accused of practicing. This period saw a drastic decline in authentic bomoh and many fraudulent shamans filled the void. As a result, bomoh are today looked at with suspicion even though they are still commonly consulted for personal reasons.

Cosmology and function

Malay metaphysical theory holds that the body, and in fact the universe itself, is made up of the four classical elements of fire, water, earth, and wind. Illnesses are often said to be caused by an imbalance of these elements. To restore this balance, patients are advised to bathe in cool water to which lime juice is added. The bomoh also works with rituals and incantations, called jampi.

Spirits

Some bomoh use cemeteries to summon spirits to fulfill requests by supplicants, while others only deal with a single spirit. It is said that sometimes the bomoh selects the spirit, while other times, it is the spirit who selects the bomoh. Spirits are said to be able to heal the sick, seek missing persons or even investigate reasons for bad luck. Spirits can also be used to attack people, cause sickness and misery and many other bad things. Bomoh who have a particular religion may incorporate their religious practices into their craft.

Traditionally, healing rituals of some bomoh involved music and dance, such as the main puteri or main peteri (a trance-dance from Kelantan and Trengganu often connected to mak yong), the main lukah (a fisherman's dance from Pahang), and the main saba (which re-enacts the heavenly princesses [puteri kayangan] dancing around a saba tree). The music is played by an assistant called the tuk minduk.

In popular culture

In 2014, shortly after the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, Dato Mahaguru Ibrahim Mat Zin, also known as Raja Bomoh (King of Bomohs) with his male assistant, attempted to locate the missing plane by conducting a series of rituals at the Kuala Lumpur International Airport. The ritual involved the using of a pair of bamboo binoculars to see inside a bubu, a traditional fish trap. Ibrahim Mat Zin claimed that the plane was suspended on the air amongst three locations which were the Philippines, South China Sea and on an unidentified country and it was hidden by the bunian people (a supernatural race resembling human, akin to elves in Malay legend). Beside the ritual, Ibrahim Mat Zin also stated that 100,000 silat gayung martial artists from Persatuan Silat Gayung Ghaib dan Selendang Merah (Assosiation of Mystical Silat Gayung and Red Shawl) has performed a prayer for the missing plane and its passengers. A few days later, he and his four assistants, three males and one female came to KLIA, bringing along a water gourd, a holy Zamzam water from Mecca, a small Surah Yaasin book and several other items to conduct another ritual. This time, Ibrahim Mat Zin used two coconuts and knocked them against each other with his two bare hands while shouting takbir. Then, his three male assistants sat on the "magic carpet" and using a number of "magical artefacts" such as a walking stick, a basket and two coconuts, and thus started the infamous scene, while local and international photographers took a few shots. Ibrahim Mat Zin claimed that the purpose of the ritual is to weaken the spirits. The incidents drew international ridicule until it became a subject of an online game application called “Bomoh: Rescue Run” developed by Triapps, which has surpassed more than 100,000 downloads in Google Play. Khairy Jamaluddin, who is the Minister for Youth and Sports, were not amused by the antics of the bomohs. He tweeted, "Somebody should arrest those magic carpet bomohs. Memalukan (embarrassing)". He even contacted Jamil Khir, minister for Islamic affairs, to deal with the bomohs. While JAKIM, a Malaysian Department of Islamic Development had issued a fatwa that Ibrahim Mat Zin's methods contradict the Islamic teachings. The antics of the bomohs mimic a scene in one of the late P. Ramlee's movies, Laksamana Do Re Mi (Admirals Do Re Mi) where the main characters are riding on a flying carpet, and the bamboo binoculars session once held by Ibrahim Mat Zin to locate the missing plane mimics Re's magic single vision binocular in the movie.

See also

• Animism in Malaysia
• Pawang