The Role of Ancestors in Iban Traditional Religion

Authors

  • Kyle Clark University of Evansville
  • Riki Rikando Yayasan Riak Bumi

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.33736/jbk.6147.2023

Keywords:

ancestor worship, Iban, supernatural beings, religion

Abstract

Cross-cultural studies of religion have consistently treated ancestor worship as a specific, narrow practice that is found in many traditional societies but far from all of them. In contrast, Steadman, Palmer, and Tilley (1996) have proclaimed that ancestor worship was a universal behavior in traditional, small-scale societies and that the practice is found in societies where it was previously thought to be absent. In this paper, we describe one such society, the Iban, whose religious practices are often claimed to not include the worship of ancestors, despite ancestors being central to their religion. We demonstrate that many of the gods and spirits of the Iban supernatural pantheon are most clearly understood as ancestors. Furthermore, we argue that the Iban example may not be an outlier, and that ancestor worship may be prevalent in many more societies than previously claimed. We end by describing the weaknesses of some of the common reasons used to downplay the ubiquity of the practice in previous ethnographic treatments and cross-cultural studies.

 

References

Barrett, R. J., & Lucas, R. H. (1993). The skulls are cold, the house is hot: Interpreting depths of meaning in Iban therapy. Man, 573–596.
Béguet, V. (2012). Iban Petara as Transformed Ancestors. In P. Couderc & K. Sillander (Eds.), Ancestors in Borneo Societies: Death, Transformation, and Social Immortality (pp. 243–276). Nordic Institue of Asian Studies.
Bilon Senang, B. M., & Tugang, N. (2018). The Iban Traditional Religion: Miring. Journal of Borneo-Kalimantan, 4(1), 37–42. https://doi.org/10.33736/jbk.920.2018
Bloch, M. (1996). Ancestors. In A. Barnard & J. Spencer (Eds.), Encylopedia of Social and Cultural Anthropology (pp. 66–67). Routledge.
Clark, K. J. (2021). Cultural traditions and fitness interdependence. Evolutionary Behavioral Sciences.
Clark, K. J., & Coe, K. (2021). The interdependence of ancestors and their descendants. Religion, Brain & Behavior, 1–13.
Clark, K. J., & Palmer, C. T. (2016). Ancestor Worship. In V. Weekes-Shackelford, T. K. Shackelford, & V. A. Weekes-Shackelford (Eds.), Encyclopedia of Evolutionary Psychological Science (pp. 1–3). Springer International Publishing. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-16999-6_3085-1
Coe, K., & Begley, R. O. (2016). Ancestor Worship and the Longevity of Chinese Civilization. Review of Religion and Chinese Society, 3(1), 3–24.
Couderc, P., & Sillander, K. (Eds.). (2012). Ancestors in Borneo societies: Death, transformation, and social immortality.
Cramb, R. A. (1989). Explaining variations in Bornean land tenure: The Iban case. Ethnology, 28(4), 277–300.
Crespi, B., & Summers, K. (2014). Inclusive fitness theory for the evolution of religion. Animal Behaviour, 92, 313–323.
Davison, J. (1987). Images and Metaphor: An Analysis of Iban Collective Representations [Doctoral dissertation School of Oriental and African Studies]. ProQuest 10673183
Davison, J., & Sutlive, V. H. (1991). The Children of Nising: Images of Headhunting and Male Sexuality in Iban Ritual and Oral Literature. In Female and Male in Borneo: Contributions and Challenges to Gender Studies (Vol. 1). The Borneo Research Council.
Fortes, M. (1961). Pietas in Ancestor Worship. The Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland, 91(2), 166. https://doi.org/10.2307/2844412
Freeman, D. (1961). Iban augury. Bijdragen Tot de Taal-, Land-En Volkenkunde, 1ste Afl, 141–167.
Freeman, D. (1970). Report on the Iban. The Athlone Press.
Geddes, W. R. (1957). Nine Dayak Nights (Vol. 243). Oxford University Press.
Glowacki, M., & Malpass, M. (2003). Water, Huacas , and Ancestor Worship: Traces of a Sacred Wari Landscape. Latin American Antiquity, 14(4), 431–448. https://doi.org/10.2307/3557577
Hasegawa, G. (2018). Iban gawai rituals in their twilight in Kapit, Malaysia. Indonesia and the Malay World, 46(135), 198–217.
Hose, C., & McDougall, W. (1912). The Pagan Tribes of Borneo.
Hu, A. (n.d.). Ancestor Worship in Contemporary China: An Empirical Investigation. The China Review, 16(1), 169–186.
Jensen, E. (1974). The Iban and Their Religion. Clarendon Press.
Kedit, P. M. (1991). “Meanwhile Back Home...”: Bejalai and Their Effects on Iban Men and Women. In Female and Male in Borneo: Contributions and Challenges to Gender Studies (Vol. 1). The Borneo Research Council.
King, V. T. (1980). Structural analysis and cognatic societies: Some Borneo examples. Sociologus, 1–28.
King, V. T. (1993). The Peoples of Borneo. Blackwell.
Lahti, D. C. (2009). The correlated history of social organization, morality, and religion. In The biological evolution of religious mind and behavior (pp. 67–88). Springer.
Lawuyi, O. B. (1988). Obituary and Ancestral Worship: Analysis of A Contemporary Cultural Form in Nigeria. Sociological Analysis, 48(4), 372. https://doi.org/10.2307/3710874
Low, H. (1848). Sarawak: Its inhabitants and productions: being notes during a residence in that country with HH the Rajah Brooke. R. Bentley.
MacMullen, R. (2010). Christian Ancestor Worship in Rome. Journal of Biblical Literature, 129(3), 597. https://doi.org/10.2307/25765954
Mashman, V. (1991). Warriors and Weavers: A Study of Gender Relations Among the Iban of Sarawak. In Female and Male in Borneo: Contributions and Challenges to Gender Studies (Vol. 1). The Borneo Research Council.
Masing, J. J. (1997). The coming of the gods: An Iban invocatory chant (timang Gawai Amat) of the Baleh River Region, Sarawak (Vol. 1). Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies, Australian National University.
Metcalf, P. (1976). Birds and deities in Borneo. Bijdragen Tot de Taal-, Land-En Volkenkunde, 96–123.
Peoples, H. C., Duda, P., & Marlowe, F. W. (2016). Hunter-gatherers and the origins of religion. Human Nature, 27(3), 261–282.
Pringle, R. (1970). Rajahs and rebels: The Ibans of Sarawak under Brooke rule, 1841-1941. Cornell University Press.
Rappaport, R. A. (1999). Ritual and Religion in the Making of Humanity (Vol. 110). Cambridge University Press.
Sandin, B. (1968). The Sea Dayaks of Borneo: Before White Rajah Rule. Michigan State University Press.
Sandin, B. (1980). Iban Adat and Augury. Penerbit Universiti Sains Malaysia.
Sandin, B. (1994). Sources of Iban traditional history (C. Sather, Ed.; Vol. 46). Sarawak Museum Journal.
Sather, C. (1980). Symbolic Elements in Saribas Iban Rites of Padi Storage. Malaysian Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, 53(2), 67–95.
Sather, C. (1993). Posts, hearths and thresholds: The Iban longhouse as a ritual structure. In Inside Austronesian Houses: Perspectives on Domestic Designs for Living (Vol. 67, pp. 67–113). ANU E Press.
Sather, C. (1994). Introduction. In Sources of Iban Traditional History (pp. 1–66). Sarawak Museum Journal.
Sather, C. (2001). Seeds of Play, Words of Power: An ethnographic study of Iban shamanic chants. Tun Jugah Foundation in cooperation with the Borneo Research Council.
Sather, C. (2012). Recalling the dead, revering the ancestors; Multiple forms of ancestorship in Saribas Iban society. In P. Couderc & K. Sillander (Eds.), Ancestors in Borneo Societies: Death, Transformation, and Social Immortality (pp. 114–152). Nordic Institue of Asian Studies.
Sheils, D. (1975). Toward a unified theory of ancestor worship: A cross-cultural study. Social Forces, 54(2), 427–440.
Sheils, D. (1980). The great ancestors are watching: A cross-cultural study of superior ancestral religion. Sociological Analysis, 41(3), 247–257.
Steadman, L. B., & Palmer, C. T. (1995). Religion as an identifiable traditional behavior subject to natural selection. Journal of Social and Evolutionary Systems, 18(2), 149–164.
Steadman, L. B., & Palmer, C. T. (2008). The supernatural and natural selection: The evolution of religion. Paradigm Publishers.
Steadman, L. B., Palmer, C. T., & Tilley, C. F. (1996). The Universality of Ancestor Worship. Ethnology, 35(1), 63. https://doi.org/10.2307/3774025
Sutlive, V. H. (1978). The Iban of Sarawak: Chronicle of a Vanishing World. Waveland Press.
Swanson, G. E. (1962). The birth of the gods: The origin of primitive beliefs. University of Michigan Press.
Tatje, T., & Hsu, F. L. K. (1969). Variations in Ancestor Worship Beliefs and Their Relation to Kinship. Southwestern Journal of Anthropology, 25(2), 153–172. https://doi.org/10.1086/soutjanth.25.2.3629199
Tugang, N., & Kiyai, G. (2022). Worldview Mali dalam Kearifan Tempatan Penganan Iban di Sarawak: Satu Penelitian Warisan Tidak Ketara. Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences, 4(1), 37–51. https://doi.org/10.36079/lamintang.jhass-0401.346
Turdieva, D. M. (2022). Peculiarities of the Spread of Religions in Southeast Asia.
Turner, V. (1967). The forest of symbols: Aspects of Ndembu ritual (Vol. 101). Cornell University Press.
Wadley, R. L. (1999). Disrespecting the dead and the living: Iban ancestor worship and the violation of mourning taboos. Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, 595–610.

Downloads

Published

2023-12-28

How to Cite

Clark, K., & Rikando, R. (2023). The Role of Ancestors in Iban Traditional Religion. Journal of Borneo-Kalimantan, 9(2), 66–76. https://doi.org/10.33736/jbk.6147.2023