Rangda, Bali’s Child Eating Demon that can Heal?

6 Comments

Today’s Bali Photo of the Day is of a beautifully carved and painted mask of Rangda. We recently took our Wellness Retreatto The Mask and Puppet Museum outside of Ubud, Bali. We highly recommend a visit and future blog posts will cover much more from one of Bali’s newest and most interesting museums.

Bali Eco-Villas Mask

A Balinese mask of Rangda ~ Floating Leaf Eco-Resort and Spa

Rangda is a very important figure in Balinese mythology and healing traditions. She is the dramatic manifestation of the Goddess of the underworld, Durga and is the demon queen of the leyaks. Leyaks are ghost like figures in Bali that appear as humans during the day, but at night their head and entrails break free from their body and fly around cemeteries and villages.

An important, but difficult, thing to remember about Balinese religion and mysticism is that no god or demon is all good or all bad. In fact, the words demon and witch are a poor translation in English. Of course that is hard to tell from the description above. Can there be a good which whose head and entrails fly around and haunt villagers? Well, she also eats children and leads an army of evil witches that are forever in battle against the forces of ‘good’ represented by Barong. But that can’t be all bad, right? Sounds like a nice lady. I don’t mean to make light of the heavily layered Balinese rituals as I am a student of these disciplines and enjoy them greatly. It is simply quite difficult for a Westerner to wrap their heads around these dichotomies.

Rangda is a word from ancient high Balinese and the old Javanese language called Kawi that means widow. Rangda is the female embodiment of divine negative energy. As much of the artwork in Bali, the Rangda mask is layered with symbolism. The large protruding eyes represent anger, cruelty and self-centeredness. The long white boar-like fangs remind us she is a merciless wild beast. And her meter-long blood-red tongue of fire represents her eternal insatiable hunger.

As a basic element of the Balinese Hindu cosmology, Rangda is linked in eternal battle with her counterpart, the male embodiment of positive and constructive forces called Barong. He is a fun-loving shaggy four-legged dog-like creature. The two fight in traditional dances in a struggle for spiritual equilibrium that is at the core of all Balinese ceremonies. They appear in many ceremonies and dances including Barong, Legong Semarandana, Calonarang, Wayang Calonarang, Barong Landung and several others.

The eternal conflict between Rangda and Barong is not as simple as my feeble attempt to explain this complex concept. As mentioned above, this extends far beyond a simple battle of good and evil. Although they represent rival ideologies that can be viewed as positive and negative, they are portrayed by the Balinese as inseparable and symbiotic forces that could not exist in isolation from one another. Like Yin and Yang, each contains elements of the other: Rangda can heal as well as to destroy, and Barong’s protective power has the potential to be misused as well. There is never a winner in these battles as the state of equilibrium is an ongoing struggle.

To learn more about Floating Leaf Eco-Resort’s Wellness Retreats please click here. To learn how you can bring your own group to Bali and take part in yoga, meditation, cultur tours, photography, organic gardening and much more, click here.

Bali Yoga Wellness Villas and Spa

Yoga, meditation, spa treatments, luxury villas, wellness retreats~ Floating Leaf Eco-Resort has it all.

6 Comments. Leave new

  • Wonderful pictures ! Keep on showing up such nice & origial views from Bali
    Regrads

    Reply
    • Thank you very much Philippe.
      That means a lot to us as we love what we do and we love it even more when it is appreciated. Actually, its hard to take a bad photograph here in Bali so I can not take much credit but I do appreciate you having a look and taking the time to let us know. Hopefully we will see you here in Bali soon!

      Warm regards,
      Michael

      Reply
  • Sara Duarte
    May 22, 2013 12:33 pm

    Thank you so much for this description! I recently purchased a mask from a little junk store and have been combing the web ever since to figure out what the heck it is. Finally narrowed it down to Balinese after thinking it was Chinese and then figured out is Rangda mask. Woohoo!!!! I’m so glad to find out a little of the symbolism behind it. Of course now I want to find a Barong mask to create some balance:)

    Reply
    • Hello Sara and thank you for taking the time to comment. We really appreciate it. Yes! You certainly get it and including a Barong mask is exactly what you need. The concept tends to be quite difficult for Westerners as they commonly desire good to triumph over evil but for the Balinese its all about the balance and they feel their greatest job is to maintain that balance. We hope you can come experience this in Bali and whenever you are ready, we will be overjoyed to help you make the most of the experience. Thanks again and congratulations on your exciting purchase.
      Warm regards,
      Mikaku

      Reply
  • Hello, a little while ago my dad had found one of these Balinese masks, and had given me it. Ive done my research to conclude that it is a Rangda mask, it looked to originally serve the purpose of being a wall decoration with old ratted stickers saying it was imported from Bali to Pier 1 Imports. I wanted to obtain a Barong as well but am unsure if i should pair it with the Rangda i have now seeing how it isn’t authentic. Any suggestions?

    Reply
    • Hello and thank you for sharing.
      Indeed, Barong and Rangda are the perfect pairing and appear together in the most coveted and perhaps most important ceremony in Bali. They fight each other but in the end, there is never a winner as the eternal battle of good vs evil always exists and always need to result in harmony.
      Have you been to Bali? Come see us!
      Warmest regards,
      Mikaku

      Reply

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