What Semar told Sahadeva (1)

"When news spread in the Wayang Universe that two giants, Kalantaka and Kalanjaya—actually two Gandarvas, the cursed Citrasena and Citrangganda—joined the Kauravas, Kuntidevi pleaded with Batari Durga to remove them. Kuntidevi's request would be granted on the condition that she must sacrifice Sahadeva. At first, Kuntidevi refused, but Kali—the ten-armed goddess and her tongue was lolling like the tongue and lips logo of band The Rolling Stones, at the behest of Batari Durga, entered her body, and agreed to the conditions," said Laluna after saying Ta'awudz, Basmalah and Salaam.

At Gandamayusethra, Sahadeva—described to be skilled in swordsmanship and astrology. He is the twin brother of Nakula, son of Pandu from Madri and during the Kurukshetra War, he slew many warriors including Shakuni.—was tied to a kapok tree. He was accompanied by a man of short stature, fat, potbellied, and big butt, named Lurah Janggan Smarasanta, also known as Kyai Semar. While waiting for what would happen next, Sahadewa asked him, 'Kyai, what is a Nation?' Kyai Semar—not from India and there is no trace of him in the original Mahabharata, he is the noble values inherited by Walisongo—a genius who knew thing before it happen and was feared in the wayang world because of his incredible farts, able to destroy a giant army, replied, 'Throughout history, humans have formed groups of various kinds around criteria that are used to distinguish ‘us’ from ‘them’.

One such group is the Nation. Evidence of humans forming large territorially distinct societies can be observed from the first written records. Writings from the Sumerian civilization of the area of the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers from approximately 2500 BCE record beliefs that distinguished the ‘brothers of the sons of Sumer’, those of Sumerian ‘seed’, from foreigners. During the 16th century BCE, Egyptians thought themselves to be distinct from both the ‘Asiatics’ to their east and the Nubians to their south. In the early Chinese writings from the period of the Warring States (481–221 BCE) to the Qin and Han Periods (221 BCE to 220 CE), distinctions were drawn between the self-described superior Chinese and those who were viewed by them to be less than human aliens, the Di and the Rohn. In the tenth chapter of the book of Genesis, there is recognition of territorial and linguistic divisions of humanity into what the ancient Israelites called gôyim. Plato and Aristotle divided humanity between Hellenes and bárbaroi, the barbarian peoples from Asia Minor.

Human beings exhibit another tendency, when they engage in activities in which it seems not to matter who were their parents, where they where born, or what language they speak. These activities, rather than asserting divisions within humanity, bring people together. For example, scientists are concerned with understanding the physical facts of the universe, such as the nature of light. Light itself is not English, French, or German; and there is no English, French, or German scientific method. There is only science. To speak of a supposedly racial or national scientific method, as when the Nazis insisted that there was an ‘Aryan science’, is to betray the character of science by introducing considerations that have no place in understanding the physical aspects of the universe. Other notable examples of activities and their corresponding conceptions that bring humans together are the monotheistic religions and commerce. Furthermore, throughout history, empires, such as the Roman and Ottoman, have sought to unify their peoples as a political alternative to nations. Thus, while an individual often understands himself or herself as a member of a particular nation, one may also recognize oneself as a part of Humanity.

Nations emerge over time as a result of numerous historical processes. As a consequence, it is a pointless undertaking to attempt to locate a precise moment when any particular nation came into existence, as if it were a manufactured product designed by an engineer. All nations have historical antecedents, whether tribe, city-state, or kingdom. These historically earlier societies are important components in the formation of nations. For example, the English nation emerged out of the historically earlier societies of the Saxons, Angles, and Normans. However, these historical antecedents are never merely just facts, because key to the existence of the nation are memories that are shared among each of those many individuals who are members of the nation about the past of their nation, including about those earlier societies.These memories also form a part of the conception that one has of oneself. As the mind of the individual develops within various contexts, such as the family or different educational institutions, it seeks out those various and fluctuating traditions that are ‘at hand’. The child learns, for example, to speak the language of his or her nation and what it means to be a member of that nation as expressed through its customs and laws. These traditions become incorporated into the individual’s understanding of the self. When those traditions that make up part of one’s self-conception are shared by other individuals as part of their self-conception, one is then both related to those other individuals, and aware of the relation. The relation itself, for example living in the same geographical area or speaking a common language, is what is meant by the term ‘collective consciousness.'

When those individuals not only participate in the same tradition but also understand themselves as being different from those who do not, then there exists a self-designating shared belief, which is called a ‘collective self-consciousness’, that is, a distinctive culture. Properties or qualities of a tradition are recognized which distinguish it from any other; they are the boundaries of the social relation that allow us to distinguish ‘us’ from ‘them’. Those who accept, and by doing so participate in, for example, the tradition of the Israelite exodus from Egypt distinguish themselves from those who do not. Those who worship the Japanese sun goddess Amaterasu distinguish themselves from those who do not. Those who speak one language understand themselves to be different from those who speak a different language. So, the NATION is a SOCIAL RELATION OF COLLECTIVE SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS.

The nation is formed around shared, self-designating beliefs that have such a structure. However, the nation is formed around shared traditions that are not merely about a distinctive past, but a spatially situated past. The nation is a social relation with both temporal depth and bounded territory. If one is an adherent to a monotheistic world religion such as Christianity or Islam, then one may understand oneself in terms of universal brotherhood. However, central to the existence of the nation is the tendency of humanity to form territorially distinct societies, each of which is formed around its own cultural traditions of continuity. The nation is a territorial relation of collective self-consciousness of actual and imagined duration.

The nation also is a community of kinship, specifically a bounded, territorially extensive, temporally deep community of nativity. Kinship refers to recognized traceable lines or relations of biological descent, for example a child is related to his or her parents because the child is recognized as being descended from them through birth. Broader relations of descent are also perceived, resulting in, for example, the acknowledgement of aunts, uncles, and cousins. The term ‘community’ refers to a level of self-consciousness of the individual such that one recognizes oneself to be necessarily and continually related to others, as occurs, for example, through birth.

Humans draw a distinction between their own children and those of another. One usually does not love another’s children as if they were one’s own. And one does not usually love another nation as if it were one’s own. Such a limitation on the recognition of, and the love for, what is understood to be one’s own is a consequence of the preoccupation with the continuation of the self, both its biological and cultural components. The love that one has for one’s nation is designated by the term ‘PATRIOTISM.'

The widely used term ‘love’ as an expression of the attachments that the individual has to his or her nation is not altogether satisfactory because we also employ the same term to describe the attachments one has to one’s paramour, children, friends, and god. Indeed, some individuals have genuinely loved all of humanity. What such a wide use of the term indicates is that, in each of these instances, the individual puts aside, or ‘transcends’, his or her own self-interest for the sake of others. However, understanding properly the character of such attachments should take into account not only the act of self-transcendence common to all of these attachments, but also the different objects of those attachments. Thus, it may be more helpful to distinguish the love for one’s paramour or children from the ‘love’ for one’s nation by understanding patriotism as signifying attachments of loyalty to a territorial community. There are often different aspects to the patriotic attachments that one forms to one’s nation, as a consequence of the different factors involved in the historical formation of a particular nation. One may, for example, be loyal to one’s nation because of its laws, or its customs, or its religion. There are usually many and differing, even conflicting, views of the nation that correspond to these different factors. However, inescapable is the fact that the individual often shows a preference for his or her fellow nationals.

This preference need not take the form of a prejudice against, or hatred of, those who are not members of one’s nation. Patriotism need not deny varying and different pursuits by the members of the nation. It need not reject differing conceptions of the nation held by members of the nation, as nationalism often does. Indeed, in so far as patriotism implies a commitment to the well-being of one’s country, it provides the basis for working out the differences, involving reasonable compromise, between the individual members of the nation and their differing conceptions of what the nation should be out of a concern for promoting that well-being. The process of working out these differences through compromise is politics. The concern for the well-being of the nation that includes the willingness to compromise is central to the civility between the members of the nation that makes politics possible.

When one divides the world into two irreconcilable and warring camps–one’s own nation in opposition to all other nations–where the latter are viewed as one’s implacable enemies, then, in contrast to patriotism, there is the ideology of nationalism. Nationalism repudiates civility and the differences that it tolerates by attempting to eliminate all differing views and interests for the sake of one vision of what the nation has been and should be. For example, a French nationalism might consist of the belief that to be a good member of the French nation, one must hate everything English and German; and anyone who does not, isn’t ‘truly’ French.

[Part 2]

Bahasa