Filipino shamans

Filipino shamans, commonly known as babaylan (also balian or katalonan, among many other names), were shamans of the various ethnic groups of the pre-colonial Philippine islands. These shamans specialized in communicating, appeasing, or harnessing the spirits of the dead and the spirits of nature. They were almost always women or feminized men (asog or bayok). They were believed to have spirit guides, by which they could contact and interact with the spirits and deities (anito or diwata) and the spirit world. Their primary role were as mediums during pag-anito séance rituals. There were also various subtypes of babaylan specializing in the arts of healing and herbalism, divination, and sorcery. The most common native terms for shamans among Austronesian groups in Island Southeast Asia are balian, baylan, or cognates and spelling variants thereof. They are all derived from Proto-Western-Malayo-Polynesian *balian, meaning "shaman" (probably originally female, transvestite, or hermaphroditic) or "medium". Various cognates in other non-Filipino Austronesian languages include babalian, bobolian, and bobohizan (Kadazan-Dusun); wadian (Ma'anyan); belian (Iban); belian (Malay); walen or walyan (Old Javanese); balian (Balinese); bolian (Mongondow); balia (Uma); wulia or balia (Bare'e); balia (Wolio); balian (Ngaju); and balieng (Makassar). However *balian-derived terms have largely disappeared among lowland Filipinos after Christianization in the Spanish era. Some exceptions include Bikol where it persisted and acquired the Spanish feminine suffix -a as balyana. It also survives among some Muslim Filipinos like in Maranao walian, although the meaning has shifted after Islamization. The linguist Otto Dempwolff has also theorized that *balian may have ultimately derived from Proto-Austronesian *bali ("escort", "accompany") with the suffix *-an, in the meaning of "one who escorts a soul to the other world (a psychopomp)". However, the linguists Robert Blust and Stephen Trussel have noted that there is no evidence that *balian is a suffixed form, and thus believe that Dempwolff's interpretation is incorrect.

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Concepts associés (20)

Anito

Anito, also spelled anitu, refers to ancestor spirits, nature spirits, and deities in the indigenous Philippine folk religions from the precolonial age to the present, although the term itself may have other meanings and associations depending on the Filipino ethnic group. It can also refer to carved humanoid figures, the taotao, made of wood, stone, or ivory, that represent these spirits. Anito (a term predominantly used in Luzon) is also sometimes known as diwata in certain ethnic groups (especially among Visayans).

Philippine mythology

Philippine mythology is the body of stories and epics originating from, and part of, the indigenous Philippine folk religions, which include various ethnic faiths distinct from one another. Philippine mythology is incorporated from various sources, having similarities with Indonesian and Malay myths, as well as Hindu, Muslim, Shinto, Buddhist, and Christian traditions, such as the notion of heaven (kaluwalhatian, kalangitan, kamurawayan, etc.), hell (kasamaan, sulad, etc.), and the human soul (kaluluwa, kaulolan, makatu, ginokud, etc.

Ethnic groups in the Philippines

The Philippines is inhabited by more than 182 ethnolinguistic groups, many of which are classified as "Indigenous Peoples" under the country's Indigenous Peoples' Rights Act of 1997. Traditionally-Muslim peoples from the southernmost island group of Mindanao are usually categorized together as Moro peoples, whether they are classified as Indigenous peoples or not. About 142 are classified as non-Muslim Indigenous People groups, and about 19 ethnolinguistic groups are classified as neither indigenous nor moro.