The performer, who uses the channel name Widhi Sastra, had uploaded a video chanting verses from the Bhagavad Gita, with a melodic macapat meter and an interlinear explanation in Indonesian. The performance is simple and sincere, sung from the heart quietly as an act of devotion.

In the comment section, a viewer writes:

Bhagawad Gita adalah sabda Sri Krisna kepada Arjuna...Hare Krishna (HK) tidak dinaungi di Hindu Indonesia.... bagaimana pendapat anda tentang hal ini Rahayu semoga kita semua tercerahkan oleh chenal ini.

Translation:

‘The Bhagavad Gita is the word of Sri Krishna to Arjuna ... Hare Krishna (HK) is not included in Hindu Indonesia... what is your opinion on this?  Peace (upon you), may we all be enlightened by this channel.’

This comment does several things at once. It acknowledges the sacredness of the text, affirms Krishna’s authority, and simultaneously questions the place of the Hare Krishna movement (ISKCON) in the context of Indonesian Hinduism. The mention of tidak dinaungi di Hindu Indonesia implies an institutional exclusion, possibly referring to the fact that ISKCON is not officially recognized by Parisada Hindu Dharma Indonesia (PHDI), the primary Hindu organization in the country. The tone, however, is not confrontational—it ends with a Balinese blessing, Rahayu, and a hope for collective enlightenment. This suggests a desire for clarification or agreement, not condemnation.

Widhi Sastra responds:

rahayu... saya tidak bisa menanggapi hal terkait hk... dsni saya hanya menyalurkan hoby saya me-gita (nyanyian), karena bukan hanya menyanyikan sastra ini saja yg dapat karma baik. mendengarkan pun juga mendapat karma baik... mohon di-subscribe dan juga di-share... biar saya lebih semangat lagi upload sloka demi sloka.²

Translation:

‘Peace (upon you)... I can’t comment on anything related to HK... here I’m just sharing my hobby of the Gita (singing), because it’s not just singing these scriptures that brings good karma, listening also brings good karma... please subscribe and share… so I can be even more motivated to upload verse by verse.’

This response is notable for its deliberate avoidance of diving into group identity politics. Rather than affirming or rejecting the Hare Krishna movement, the performer reframes the act as personal, devotional, and karma-generating—both for the singer and the listener. The emphasis on hobi ‘hobby’ is not merely casual; it distances the act from institutional authority and aligns it with individual spirituality.

A third commenter then interjects with a seemingly out-of-place remark:

Bacaan Al-Qur'an saja
‘Just read the Qur'an.’

This seems like a dismissive or provocative, particularly if read as a suggestion that Islamic scripture should be read or recited instead. However, the performer replies without defensiveness:

klo bisa saya baca alquran mungkin saya akan nyanyikan…
‘If I could read the Qur’an, maybe I’d sing it...’

This disarming reply shifts the conversation once from confrontation to framing the question as a problem with linguistic and musical ability, rather than religious boundaries. The tone is light, in order to defuse potential tension.

What can this brief but layered exchange tell us about religious identity and digital performance? First of all, YouTube comment sections are informal yet powerful spaces where religious boundaries are negotiated. While the Bhagavad Gita performance itself may seem apolitical or purely devotional, it becomes a springboard for viewers to discuss larger issues of who belongs in which religious group.

Additionally, Widhi Sastra’s position is delicate. As a performer, he is visible, yet he avoids assuming theological authority – maybe because he is uploading a video of himself singing in macapat meters, which is unusual and puts him in a contrasting position to the state’s authoritative pepaosan. His defense stating this is his hobby sidesteps doctrinal disputes and presents performance as inclusive. This aligns closely with what we might call a Devotional or Spiritual-Movement’s Performer identity, and thus it makes sense he is trying to avoid the question about ISKCON, who are not so well-liked in Bali.

An especially interesting moment in the reply is the equal valuation of listening and chanting. This shifts religious merit away from the performer of the practice toward the participation of the audience who gain merit from listening, including through media consumption, thus spreading bhakti through YouTube in the digital age. This continues a much older tradition in which audiences of public readings of manuscripts also gained merit from listening.

The Qur'an comment and the performer's response show how cross-religious engagement  - even attempts at provocation - is navigated with care in the performer’s hands. Although it is unclear whether his response is mocking gently or expressing reverence, he manages to avoid an argument about which holy book should be read aloud, and thus which religion is better.

This exchange was an example for how traditions, when placed online, encounter new audiences, new interpretations, and new frictions. Online pepaosan operates in a space where devotional intent must coexist with institutional politics, hobby-singers and performers, and interfaith discussions. This layering of voices in the comments mirrors the interlinear nature of pepaosan itself, where meaning emerges not from a single line, but from the dynamic interplay between recited text and translated response.

Thus, through the added meanings of the comments layer we learn that this performance generates karma, provokes discussion, and—importantly—reminds us that even in the pixelated corners of YouTube, identity remains in motion, verse by verse, comment by comment.

¹ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ti-9h2NPw68&t=400s

² All comments are cited as written online, including grammatical or spelling mistakes, capitalization, abbreviations, slang and so on.

One of the most prominent forms of interlinear translation in Bali is bebaosan, or pepaosan, where two practitioners—the pengwacen (reader) and peneges (translator)—perform sacred texts by singing and translating them in real-time. This unique oral tradition not only conveys the text’s meaning but also serves as a spiritual offering and an expression of devotion to the Goddess Dewi Saraswati (Reisnour 2018: 213). This method of line-by-line translation, often moving from a source language like Old Javanese or Sanskrit to a local vernacular such as Balinese or Indonesian, is not only a means of linguistic interpretation but a key to preserving cultural and religious identity. The manuscripts translated to modern-day languages orally include various traditional genres, such as Balinese Kidung and Geguritan, Old Javanese Kakawin, and Sanskrit Mantra and sloka, (Schumacher 1995: 497, 500; Creese 2014: 297). Today, bebaosan is practiced by three main groups: traditional village clubs (sekaa santi), Hindu reform schools and organizations, and new spiritual movements like ISKCON (The International Society for Krishna Consciousness) and Sai Baba (Reisnour 2018: 211-214).

In this blog post, I aim to offer an ethnographic perspective on bebaosan by sharing my conversation with a practitioner who associates himself with the sekaa santi group. Through his insights, I examine how bebaosan bridges communities and reveals complex intersections between tradition and modernity, highlighting the connections between traditional and reformist groups. By delving into both theoretical aspects of interlinear translation and the lived experiences of Balinese performers, this post explores bebaosan as a vital and evolving practice within Bali's spiritual landscape.

I met Bli (pseudonym) at a café not far from his university. He had just finished studying and left the university gates with his friends, chatting and laughing. After saying goodbye to them, he came into the café. We greeted each other and ordered drinks, and he suggested we sit outside so he could smoke. Bli is a friend and former classmate of my Balinese language teacher; they had known each other from their university days, and he was delighted to hear that I already knew some basic phrases in Balinese. He was even more intrigued by my interest in his hobby, bebaosan singing.

Bli explained that each village (desa) in Bali has a temple (pura), and each temple has a sekaa santi group that practices bebaosan. His group includes both men and women, though he, at 25, is the youngest among mostly older, male, members. Members either learn to sing the sacred texts or to translate them, so performances always require at least two people. The choice of text varies by ceremony—weddings, for instance, require different texts than cremations—and audiences can sometimes request specific texts, provided the group has learned them.

Regarding the text I was interested in, the Bhagavad Gita, Bli noted that it is sometimes performed in bebaosan, particularly during odalan (traditional village temple celebrations). In this context, the Old Javanese version is sung, featuring only a brief section in Sanskrit, while most of the text is in Old Javanese translated into Balinese. In these contexts, it is recited without meter and translated interlineally in a theatrical way.

Bli shared that he began with Balinese macapat, which is the traditional Javanese poetry and meters (Marrison 1987: 472-482) singing in primary school, discovering his passion for singing. He later learned to sing and translate kakawin poetry (classical epic poetry which was produced in the Indic courts of Java and Bali between the ninth and twentieth centuries) (Creese, 2001: par. 1). in middle school and started competing in performances throughout high school. After graduation, he continued his singing in his village’s sekaa santi group, as he liked the singing more than competing. Interestingly, he identified both the Hindu-reformist perspective of his schoolyears and the traditional Balinese bebaosan style in his village as the same group, referring to both as “traditional.”

It turned out Bli was a talented performer, and he demonstrated various melodies in the café, his enchanting voice resonating in the small courtyard. He explained that singing is quite complex, requiring attention to long and short syllables (guru laghu), vocal trembling, and the appropriate meter and melody. Even within the reformist schools’ melody, Hreng Sruti, there are various performance styles. However, he noted that Hreng Sruti is typically not performed in temples, where Sanskrit texts are reserved for priests (pendeta sebagai pedanda). If the sekaa santi group were to sing it, it might be seen as imitating the priest. They could perform in Sruti in the priest's absence, but this was quite uncommon.

We wrapped up our conversation and stepped into the warm sunlight and the bustling streets of Denpasar. Bli's insights illuminated the complexities of bebaosan and its cultural significance. Our discussion emphasized the importance of this renewing tradition in Bali and highlighted the perspectives of a traditional performer on the topic. Bli also pointed out an interesting connection between the traditional sekaa santi bebaosan and the institutional reformist bebaosan, showing how both are viewed nowadays as “tradition”. As we parted ways, I left with a feeling of new understanding of how bebaosan serves as a bridge connecting diverse communities in contemporary Bali.

References

Creese, H. (2001). ‘Images of Women and Embodiment in Kakawin Literature’, Intersections: Gender, History and Culture in the Asian Context 5.

Creese, H. (2014). ‘The Utsawa Dharma Gita Competition: The Contemporary Evolution of Hindu Textual Singing in Indonesia’, The Journal of Hindu Studies, 7(2), 296–322.

Marrison, G. E. (1987). ‘Modern Balinese — A Regional Literature of Indinesia. Bijdragen Tot de Taal-, Land- En Volkenkunde, 143(4), 468–498.

Ricci, R. (2016). ‘Reading between the Lines: A World of Interlinear Translation’, Journal of World Literature, 1(1), pp. 68–80.

Reisnour, N. J. (2018). Voicing Selves: Ethics, Mediation, and the Politics of Religion in Post-Authoritarian Bali (Doctoral dissertation, Cornell University).

Schumacher, R. (1995). ‘Musical Concepts in Oral Performance of Kakawin in Bali’. Bijdragen tot de Taal-, Land-en Volkenkunde, 151: 490-515.

Van der Meij, D. (2017). Indonesian Manuscripts from the Islands of Java, Madura, Bali and Lombok (Vol. 24). Brill.