BETWEEN THE KING AND THE SCIENTIST:MOUNT MERAPI ERUPTION, EARLY WARNING SYSTEM,
AND THE POLITICS OF LOCAL KNOWLEDGEFadjar I. ThufailResearch Center for Regional Resources, Indonesian Institute of Sciences

October 26, 2010. For several days, Mt Merapi had been active, thick smoke had been
billowing to the sky and lava flowing along the slope. Volcanic tremors were frequent,indicating an upcoming eruption. People had been evacuating their villages on themountain slope, moving to goverment-built shelters a few kilometers down. But inKinahrejo village, the village closest to the volcanic crater, a man decided to stay andrefused to leave despite request from his fellow villagers and instruction from therescue team. This man was Mbah Maridjan,1 a respected traditional leader, a mancalled the ‘guardian’ of Mt Merapi. At 17:35, the mighty Mt Merapi erupted, sending
pyroclastic ashes and cloud to the sky, followed by pyroclastic cloud running down theslope with lightning speed, destroying anything in its path, including Mbah Maridjan’shouse and a small mosque near the house where his body was later found. When therescue team reached the site, they found him in a kneeling position, facing the south
direction as though he was praying when the heat wave struck him.
Mt Merapi lies in Central Java province, about 40 km north of college town
Yogyakarta. Archaeological remains show the oldest recorded eruption dated back to
the 9th century A.D. The 2010 eruption was among the biggest events, it produced
pyroclastic cloud that wiped out anything 20 km south of the volcano. Volcanic ash
covered areas within the radius of 30 km from the mountain. 275 people died and287,699 took refuge at temporary shelters. The estimated damages cost USD
2,500,000 of rice fields, gardens, and community forests, and USD 647,000,000 ofprotected forest and natural parks.
In addition to the scale of destruction, the 2010 eruption le� a deep cultural
resonance for people living in Yogyakarta area and a dilemma among nationalscientists. When Mbah Maridjan surrendered to the power of the mountain a�er
successfully ‘guarded’ the mountain for many years, his sacrifice provoked anemotional controversy. Scientists and government oﬃcials blamed Mbah Maridjan forgiving a bad example by refusing to evacuate despite the emergency warning. On theother hand, families of Mbah Maridjan, local villagers, and cultural activists defended
his decision to stay as he was simply performing his sacred duty as the guardian of thevolcano. The public controversy stems from a more critical debate over the authorityof knowledge in shaping disaster early warning system.

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Mbah is a Javanese honorific title assigned to a respected and wise person. It literally means elder
or grandfather.

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Research on local knowledge as intangible cultural heritage o�en neglects howknowledge reflects a complex assemblage and negotiation between ‘traditional’ and‘scientific’ forms of knowledge. On the one hand, government scientists and policy
makers devise a tool to rationalize early warning knowledge regardless where it isapplied. On the other hand, for local people, early warning knowledge means a set ofskills to ‘read’ the signs of nature, how the volcanos, the animals, the trees, or thewaves ‘behave’. I will argue in this presentation that any recognition of intangible
cultural heritage should take into account this human-nonhuman relationship andshould not overlook the role of the nonhuman as an agent that may influence local
practical knowledge on threats and hazards. The example of Mt Merapi eruption
shows that the existence of intangible cultural heritage as knowledge in dealing with
Mt Merapi would depend on a guaranteed space given to local people to continue‘talking’ with the mountain. When scientists, government oﬃcials, or activists
intervene to stop the ‘conversation’, not only will they eradicate the cultural heritage,
but they will alienate local people from their familiar method of coping with disasterrisks.

Mt Merapi and Javanese Cosmology
Mt Merapi holds a special place in local Javanese cosmology. The Javanese believethat the mountain possesses supernatural power that could influence human affairs toa significant degree, even changing political regime. In the 16th century, attack on
Yogyakarta’s Mataram Kingdom by the vassal sultan from Demak (coastal north Java)
had been thwarted with the help of what the legend says Merapi spirit. The enemy
troops set up a military camp near the Mataram territorial border, but when they
were about to ambush the Mataram palace, Mt Merapi erupted and threw volcanic
rocks that destroyed the campground. The Sultan of Demak and his troop had noother choice than retreating and returning to Demak, and the Mataram Kingdom was,once again, safe. Many other important historical events are said to happen aroundthe time when the volcano is active.
Mt Merapi is one of three sacred sites (Mt Merapi, the Yogyakarta Palace, and theSouth Sea) connected by a mythical imaginary line that runs across the former
Mataram territory. The line maintains a symbolic balance among the three sites, a
disturbance in one of the sites would throw the imaginary line off balance and disturb
the other sites. Therefore, the task of the Sultan of Yogyakarta is to maintain thesacred equilibrium, he has to make sure that the symbolic connection is not severed
to the degree that can disturb the equilibrium. In so doing, he must maintain a close
relationship with Ratu Kidul (Queen of the South), the ruler of the South Sea, and thespirits residing on Mt Merapi. Legend has it that in order to maintain a good relation
with the Ratu Kidul, the sultan must have regular sexual encounters with the mythicalfigure in addition to presenting offerings in annual ceremony held on the south coast.
To look a�er and communicate with Mt Merapi spirits, the sultan has appointed arespected, wise, and knowledgeable abdi dalem (court retainer). Mbah Maridjan wasassigned by the Sultan Hamengkubuwono IX to take the role as the guardian of MtMerapi, a crucial symbolic post to watch over and restore the balance of theimaginary line. If Mt Merapi behaves ‘out of control’, the cosmological equilibrium

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could be disturbed.
Mbah Maridjan acted as a mediator of the human and the nonhuman worlds. He
delivered messages from Mt Merapi spirit to the people (including to the sultan) andfrom the human to the Merapi spirit. He was a mediator and, at the same time, atranslator of divine and mundane messages. This supernatural role of Mbah Maridjan
was the focus of controversy and conflict between Mbah Maridjan’s circle against
geologists and disaster scientists, who disregarded Mbah Maridjan’s cultural role andblamed him for propagating ‘unscientific’ knowledge.
Local cosmology depicts Mt Merapi and its surrounding areas as an invincible town,
the mountain’s crater is the inner palace. A wall surrounds the ‘town’ with gateslocated in east, west, north, and south sides. Spirits live inside the wall, create a‘society’, and have normal activities such as going to a market, playing music, orhaving marriage ceremony. When the spirit holds an event, people notice the volcano
would ‘behave’ differently and Mbah Maridjan would interpret the ‘behavior’ for thepeople. What is more important in this local cosmology is not the volcano but what
the spirits do as reflected on the volcano, and Mbah Maridjan’s job is to make surethat what the spirits do stays within the limit of human capacity to bear. If the spirits
are preparing a big event, such as a wedding ceremony, it might affect the livingworld, then Mbah Maridjan’s task is to warn the people to move away.

Cosmology and Early Warning
Redi Merapi, menawi bade mbangun, sampun damel margi piyambak
When (the spirits of) Mt Merapi is building, it will create its own path
Just like what happens in the living world, the palace on Mt Merapi also needs regular
repair or maintenance, and sometimes it requires new buildings to be built. When thespirits of Merapi are at work, the volcano shows signs people can observe. From time
to time, Mbah Maridjan had to find out what was going on inside the ‘palace’, then hewould give instruction to local villagers whether or not they need to evacuate thevillages. In performing the duty, the guardian of Merapi closely monitored the ‘gates’(regol) especially those located in the south side of the volcano. If the regol opens alittle, the situation remains safe, no big work taking place inside the palace, maybe
small constructions here and there. But if the regol has been widely opened, people
living on the mountain slope should be cautious and ready to leave. It means Merapi
is preparing a major construction work or a big wedding ceremony. In the situation
when the regol has been widely opened, Mbah Maridjan had only two options. He
could hold a ritual to appeal the spirits to lessen the scale of the work or should tellthe villagers to evacuate their villages as soon as possible.
Prior to the 2010 eruption, Mbah Maridjan had successfully carried his duty to guard
the mountain and the people. During previous eruptions, he communicated with thespirits and managed to ask them to minimize their work, or he had been able toinform people to leave affected areas right on time. However, in the 2010 eruption he
was unable to do both. His ritual failed to appease the spirits, therefore he failed to062

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warn villagers to save their properties in time. Pyroclastic cloud descended rapidly andburn livestock and people’s belongings, including Mbah Maridjan’s house (Figure 1).
The guardian was killed inside the small mosque next to the house.
Mbah Maridjan’s decision to stay despite the impending danger incites conflicting
interpretations on the reason why he chose such a deadly option. Scientists point out
Mbah Maridjan’s ‘traditional’ approach has in fact been ineffective to mitigate thedisaster. His death adds to strengthen the scientists’ claim that it is very risky todepend on illogical knowledge or mythical belief in responding to the risk. On thecontrary, people in Kinahrejo village (Mbah Maridjan’s village), his family, and culturalactivists interpret his decision to reflect a guilty feeling for failing to perform his mostimportant and sacred duty to maintain the balance between the human world and thenonhuman world. In other words, Mbah Maridjan was not a victim of the disaster as
the scientists assert, he could escape if he wanted. Instead, he has deliberately
sacrificed his life to redeem the failure.

Figure 1Kinahrejo village. (Source: F. I. Thufail)

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The Ontology of Intangible Heritage
The Javanese cosmology of Mt Merapi is an ontological world constituting human andnonhuman beings. The ontology links the past, the present, and the future ofJavanese aristocratic cultural heritage and blurs nature-culture boundary. Whensomeone like Mbah Maridjan or the Sultan of Yogyakarta is capable to maintain aharmonious relationship between the human and the nonhuman worlds, theontological knowledge continues to exist and it becomes heritage knowledge. The
cosmology locates hazard within the ontological proper, embedded in communicative,
semiotic exchanges between the human and the nonhuman beings. Mbah Maridjan’s
continuous interactions with Merapi spirits turn the categories of culture and nature
into events. In the moment when the communicative exchange fails, the event would
turn hazard into disaster.
Scientists relate to nature from an asymmetrical position, they want to dominate andcontrol the nature. Science always talks about human-nature, or culture-nature
difference and the scientists exercise a mission to rationalize the difference byapplying scientific rule and standard to set the human apart from the nature. This is
how geologists and seismologists learn the knowledge on how the nature behaves
and, whenever possible, find ways on how to control it. On the contrary, Javanese
cosmological knowledge stresses the importance of maintaining an equal position ofhuman and nonhuman – animals, spirit, earthly materials. Many Javanese rituals arecommunicative practices between the human and the nonhuman, but these are
nonverbal communications based on the ability and promise of sharing and decoding
signs. If scientists with their scientific tools and formulas impose their interpretationon the nature, Javanese actors (such as Mbah Maridjan) are mediators and translatorsof signs of nature/nonhuman. The Javanese actors use different sets of tool tointerpret the signs without privileging their interpretation. The open-ended, some will
say precarious, mode of interpreting stands in stark contrast with scientific certainty
required by the scientists.
In this brief writing, I suggest that intangible heritage goes beyond cultural form. It isa cultural practice and in the context of disaster and hazard mitigation, it is a practice
to talk to nature, learning how it communicates signs of danger. As the controversy
over Mbah Maridjan’s death shows, communicating with Mt Merapi means ge�ng
deeper into the Javanese ontological cosmology. Intangible heritage as practicalknowledge teaches one to listen to what the nature says about impending danger tothe living world. As Mt Merapi says:‘Aku ora ngalahan, tur yo ora pengen dikalahke. Nanging mesti tekan janjine,mung nyuwun pangapuro nek ono sing ketabrak, keseret, lan kegowo kintir,kebanjiran, lan kleleb mergo ngalang-ngalangi dalan sing bakal tak liwati
I don’t want to dominate, but don’t want to be dominated either. When the timearrives, I apologize if someone got hit, dragged, flooded, and drowned, should
they stand on my way.

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