Kapwa - The Self in the Other

Kapwa - The Self in the Other

I do not want to go into a lengthy review of this book because there are some great reflections at the Babaylan Files and written by Barbara Jane Reyes who eloquently do so.

My personal notes about this book is that it is an essential collection of vignettes, stories, photos and history that must be explored to understand Kapwa - "togetherness", which is the philosophy of Filipino psychology.

I would strongly advise that any book listed above $$20 is a scam. The intention of the author was to provide an affordable book to all. Unfortunately, I learned this after the fact and was robbed blind!!! (darn it!)

Kapwa: The Self in the Other
Katrin de Guia, PhD

Honoring and Evoking the Babaylan Spirit

Truthfully, when I told my dear friend I was interested in organizing the Babaylan Conference April of 2010 I failed to realize that it much more than planning a phenomenal event. I have walked into a the epicenter of understanding the role of self in the community and the world at large but how to embrace the essence of babaylan and its spirit.

Babaylan Conference of 2010
April 17 – 18, 2010 at the
Sonoma State University, CA

What is Babaylan?

Babaylan is a term identifying an indigenous Filipino religious leader, who functions as a healer, a shaman, a seer and a community "miracle-worker" (or a combination of any of those). Although the role and function of a babaylan is open to both sexes, most babaylans from the pre-hispanic era are female.

"The babaylan in Filipino indigenous tradition is a person who is gifted to heal the spirit and the body; a woman who serves the community through her role as a folk therapist, wisdom-keeper and philosopher; a woman who provides stability to the community’s social structure; a woman who can access the spirit realm and other states of consciousness and traffic easily in and out of these worlds; a woman who has vast knowledge of healing therapies".^[1] In addition to this, a babaylan is someone who "intercedes for the community and individuals" and is also someone who "serves." Any study of the babaylan must take into consideration the suppression of the babaylan's practices since the onset of European and American colonialism in the Philippines.

Prior to, during and after the Philippine Revolution of 1896-1898, the babaylans of Dios Buhawi and Papa Isio of Negros Occidental participated in the struggle to throw off the Spanish yoke. Their primary agenda was religious freedom and agrarian reform; most followers of the babaylan tradition were dispossessed land owners thrown off their property by the Spanish hacienderos and in some cases by Spanish friars bent on acquiring land.

More to come.......