Beliefs of Sarawak Ethnics

Religious beliefs and behavior pervade every part of Iban life. 

In their interpretations of their world, nature, and society, they refer to remote inventor gods, who brought the elements and a structured order into subsistence; the bird-god Sengalang Burong, who directs their lives through messages borne by his seven sons-in-law; and the popular gods, who provide models for living.

Iban religion is a product of a holistic approach to life, in which attention is paid to all events in the waking and sleeping states.

The religion involves an extensive causality, born of the Iban conviction that "nothing happens without cause." The pervasiveness of their religion has sensitized them to every part of their world and created an elaborate otherworld (Sebayan), in which everything is vested with the potential for sensate thought and action. 

 In Iban beliefs and narratives trees talk, crotons walk, macaques become incubi, jars moan for lack of attention, and the sex of the human foetus is determined by a cricket, the metamorphized form of a god.

Though the gods live in Panggau Libau, a remote and godly realm, they are unseen, ubiquitous presences. 

In contrast to the exclusive categories of Judaism and Christianity, "supernaturals" and "mortals" interact in all activities of importance. In contrast to the gods who are more benevolently inclined towards mortals, Iban believe in and fear a host of malevolent spirits. 

These spirits are patent projections onto a cosmic screen of anxieties and stresses suffered by Iban: the menacing father figure, the vengeful mother, the freeloader, and becoming lost in the forest. Iban attempt to maintain good life and health by adherence to customary laws, avoidance of taboos, and the presentation of offerings and animal sacrifices.

Orang Bidayuh

Second largest Dayak ethnic group in Sarawak after the Iban. Bidayuhs are traditionally animist, and vestiges of these beliefs still remain. 

The British colonial times (known as the "Brooke family" era) saw the arrival of Christian missionaries, bringing education and modern medicine. 

The great majority of Bidayuh are now Christians, majority of them being Roman Catholic. However, since the establishment of Malaysia and the increasing political influence of the Malays, a small number of Bidayuh have converted to Islam.

                            

 

Most Bidayuh villages have either a Roman Catholic or Anglican church or a mosque -- rarely more than one or the village would tend to split. The Biatah people, who live in the Kuching area, are Anglican, while the people of the Bau area are Catholic. Muslims can be found in areas like Padawan ("Kampung Bisira" and "Kampung Darul Islam Belimbing") and Bau ("Kampung Segubang (50%)") but Muslim Bidayuh villages are extremely rare.

 

 

The Bidayuh of Bau have a unique tradition of hanging the bodies of the dead on trees and left to rot away. The skeletons are left on trees as a reminder of the dead. The tradition is rarely done nowadays. While they attribute spirits to many things in nature such as birds, animals, and plants, many who hold to the traditional religion today believe in a supreme god who comes to their assistance in the cycle of rice cultivation as well as major events in the cycle of life.