Mind, Body, Spirit, and Soul: A Filipino Epistemology of Adeptness in Musical Performance

In the Tiruray highlands of southwestern Mindanao in the Philippines live the T'boli, a shifting agricultural and hunter-gatherer society of some 80,000 people. While the T'boli are increasingly living on the margins of the dominant, lowland Philippines economy (see Mora 1996), many still adhere to the "lifeways" of their ancestors. Skilled practitioners of traditional medicine, spirit-mediumship, weaving, brass casting, jewelry making, embroidery, musical instrument manufacture, and music are referred to as "adepts."

This study describes the processes by which the T'boli adept acquires musical knowledge. Central to this process is the link between knowledge and spirituality, and to this end the adept is guided by specific T'boli concepts that concern the nature of knowledge and being. These concepts are further imbedded in a recognition of resemblances with the natural world. These concepts, in addition to their connection to the natural world through the process of imitation (d'nalang), have informed the structuring of the social world, and importantly, embody the values concerned with the origin and power of music in the ritualized and everyday lives of the T'boli.

Resemblances arise through the reliance of adepts on spirit-guides, which abound in the natural world. In a relationship where reciprocity is paramount, spirit-guides teach adepts their music and performing techniques, and they encourage the formation of a relationship not unlike that between parent and child or husband and wife. Based on these observations, in which the relationship between imitation, magic, contact, and spirituality in music and musical performance is described, the article will draw on the T'boli's notion of resemblances to explain how the system of duality and exchange between adept and spirit-guide operates in the natural world, especially in as far as this concept is related to the belief systems and cultures of South and Southeast Asia.

An adept, for the T'boli, is an individual who has acquired knowledge through personal revelation and has been ritually ordained. Knowledge and skill, of whatever variety, are fundamentally linked to divine inspiration and magico-religious experience. Underpinning the link between knowledge and spirituality is a set of concepts called utek ("head") and nawa ("breath"), tulus ("spirit") and loyof ("soul"). In contrast to any Western notions of an essential separation between mind and body, reason and sensation, the T'boli concepts embrace relations of complementarity and interdependence. T'boli thought on the nature of being and knowledge is distinguished by notions of resemblance, of resonance between self and other, of basic identity with the world rather than fundamental difference and separation. The concepts head, breath, spirit, and soul have profound implications not only for the way the T'boli see themselves in the world, but for the way they think about music, where it comes from, and the nature of its power.

The following dream narrative and the prosaic events connected to it are not untypical of how the neophyte, initiated into adeptness and spirit-mediumship, experiences a connection between knowledge, spiritual and social empowerment, and musical performance. It concerns Lendungan Tawal's calling as an adept and her relationship with her spirit guide (see Mora 1997).

The dream narrative

The spirit never disclosed his name but the shaman (tau meton bu) said that he is Lemugot Mangay, the celestial deity, the messenger of God (Dwata).He revealed the composition (utom) to me when I was still small. He was "the spirit-owner of the bamboo" (Fu Afus). At first, I tried to play the bamboo zither by myself but then he came and began to guide my fingers. The spirit came near me when I was still small and he took care of me and still often comes to me. We are married and have two children, a boy and a girl. The children are with him and they come to me in my dreams. He comes anytime, but especially when I'm sleepy. When he is with me I sleep soundly and he will just lie down beside me. But when my sleep is disturbed I do not see...