Tulak Bala as an Outbreak Prevention Within Sharia-based Community

The Practice and Views

DOI

10.2991/assehr.k.210909.034How to use a DOI?

Keywords

tulak bala in Aceh, historical and societal views on outbreaks, cultural traditions, preventions of pandemic, COVID-19 in Aceh

Abstract

The ritual of Tulak Bala (warding off calamities) has been carried out by Acehnese people from generation to generation to prevent bad lucks or disasters upon their life. The objective of this qualitative study is to discover the practice as the existence of COVID-19 considered one of the disasters. By combining library and field research, the data for this study were retrieved by applying in-depth interviews. The data analysis technique was accomplished by reducing, displaying and drawing conclusion of the data. Tulak Bala ritual is conducted in two ways. First, Acehnese people organize the ritual annually at the end of the second month in Islamic calendar, Safar, called as Rabu Habeh or Mano Safa (taking bath in a river of sea). Second, they apply the rituals when certain disasters occur, which in this case, COVID-19, having risk to their life. Its practical process is varied, namely having prayers and sending feast in mosques or houses, even having torch parade around the village. Besides, special amulets are sometimes hung on the back of house, on the roof and even in every corner of the house to avert the disease. The societal responses evidently agreed to apply the ritual, although many refused to believe Tulak Bala by reasoning that all the diseases are from Allah. They argued that focusing to increase faith in praying while keeping precautions is the only way to keep away the disease.

Copyright

© 2021, the Authors. Published by Atlantis Press.

Open Access

This is an open access article distributed under the CC BY-NC license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/).

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TY  - CONF
AU  - Abdul Manan
AU  - Kamarullah
AU  - Rahmad Syah Putra
AU  - Saprizal
AU  - Cut Intan Salasiyah
AU  - Muhammad Arif Fadhilah
PY  - 2021
DA  - 2021/09/11
TI  - Tulak Bala as an Outbreak Prevention Within Sharia-based Community
BT  - Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference on Science, Technology, and Modern Society (ICSTMS 2020)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 145
EP  - 150
SN  - 2352-5398
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/assehr.k.210909.034
DO  - 10.2991/assehr.k.210909.034
ID  - Manan2021
ER  -