Goddess Saraswati Day In Bali

Saraswati Day is a day devoted to the Goddess Saraswati. She is the goddess of knowledge, creative arts, wisdom, language, learning and purity. Balinese believes this as a celebration of the descent of holy knowledge to mankind for prosperity, progress, and peace.

Goddess Saraswati. Bali, 2017. Acrylic on Paper, 19 x 19 cm.

Goddess Saraswati Day

She is depicted as a beautiful woman, four-armed and each holding sacred items. The Goddess is holding Veena in the middle of a pond, which is full of lotus flowers along with the sacred birds (swan and peacock).

This is a sacred symbol with the following meaning:
1. Beautiful Woman symbolizes the light, knowledge and truth;
2. Four Arms representing manas (mind, sense), buddhi (intellect, reasoning), citta (imagination, creativity) and ahamkāra (self consciousness, ego);
3. Swan (Hamsa) symbolizes the holy knowledge is able to discriminate between good and evil, and not drifted by the flow of life;
4. Peacock (Mayura) symbolizes colorful splendor, celebration of dance, and as the devourer of snakes (an ability to transmute the poison of self into the radiant plumage of enlightenment);
5. Lotus representing the holy knowledge (lotus) that grows and blooms beautifully despite living on dirty mud and water in the pond;
6. Musical Instruments (Veena) as a symbol of creative arts and sciences. The goddess holding it symbolizes expressing knowledge that creates harmony;
7. Scripture (Pustaka) as a symbol of universal, science and true knowledge as well as all forms of learning; and
8. Gnitri (Rosary) as a symbol of meditation, inner reflection and spirituality

So the Goddess Saraswati day is devoted to Ida Sang Hyang Widi Wasa in the manifestation of Goddess Saraswati, for the grace of holy knowledge so that human beings can be freed from avidya (foolishness) to everlasting peace and perfect soul (essence of one self).

The Saraswati day in Bali is celebrated every 210 days (six moth in Balinese Calendar) on Saturday or Saniscara Umanis Watugunung. In this day all the scriptures, lontar, books and stationery are arranged in such a way, complete with offerings.

This is an important day for Balinese, especially for teachers, devotees in education, as well as students.

The next day, Balinese celebrates Banyu Pinaruh, a day of purification or cleansing. Early in the morning Balinese will go to the beach, lake, river or waterfall to pray and rinse themselves in the water.

Reference

1. google.co.id
2. wikipedia.org _ Saraswati _ on July 1, 2017
   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saraswati
3. Image : Original Collection

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