Jawi Temple

This temple is situated on the foot of Welirang Hill, Candi Wates town, Prigen Subdistrict, Pasuruan Regency, around 31 km in the city of Pasuruan. The temple is relatively still intact after frequent restorations. The second restoration of the Jawi Forehead was performed between 1938 and 1941 out of its ruined condition. The do the job, however, was discontinued because there are lots of missing stones, and was finished further between 1975 and 1980.

Verse 56 of Negarakertagama says that Jawi Temple was built by the last king of the Singasari Kingdom, Kertanegara, as a worship shrine for Shiva-Buddhist followers. King Kartanegara ended up being a Shiva-Buddhist follower. While to be a worship shrine, Jawi Temple can be a place where Kertanegara ashes tend to be kept. This is rather strange because Jawi Temple is found quite distant away from the center of the Singasari Kingdom. It is probably simply because the people in the area were so loyal to their king and many were Shiva-Buddhist followers. The assumption is founded on a reality that as Raden Wijaya, Kertanegara’s son-in-law, fled after Kertanegara was dethroned by California king Jayakatwang from Gelang-gelang (Kediri); he had once hidden in this area before taking refuge to Madura.

Jawi Temple occupies a huge area of approximately 40 x 60 m2. The temple is encircled by a ditch, which today has lotus plants. The temple stands around twenty-four. 5 meters high, 14. two m long and 9. 5 l wide. The temple is lean and high like Prambanan Forehead in Central Java, while the actual pointed, pyramidal roof is a compounding between stupa and cube.

Facing the East, Jawi Temple provides Pananggungan Mountain as its background, reinforcing the assumption of some experts that it temple is not a shrine or maybe pradaksina, because worship temple usually heads towards mountains where the gods dwell. Some other experts retain their particular beliefs that Jawi Temple can be a place of worship. The entrance position that does not face the mountain is accepted as resulting from Buddhist influence.

One of this temple’s unique characteristics is the application of two types of stone in its construction materials. From the camp to the veranda, the temple makes use of stones of dark colors; the entire body uses white stones, while the actual roof combines dark and light stones. This temple was probably built in two periods of construction. Negarakertagama mentions that inside the Javanese year of 1253 (chronogram: Fire Shooting Day) Jawi Temple ended up being struck by lighting. In the actual incident, the statue of Maha Aksobaya disappeared. The disappearance of the sculpture had made King Hayam Wuruk sad if the king visited the temple. Per year after the incident, Jawi Forehead was rebuilt. It is in this period that the white gems were presumably applied. The usage of white stones also stimulates issues, because there are only dark-colored gems in Welirang Mountain. The stones were probably taken from the north coasts of Capuccino or Madura.

The temple base sits over a shelf 2 m high personalized in relives that depicts a story of a meditating woman. The relatively narrow stairs are positioned right while watching the entrance to graba grha (room inside temple body). Detailed engravings decorate the left and right handrails of the stairs into the veranda, while the handrails of the stairs in the veranda into the temple floor are decorated with a couple of long-eared animal figures.

The temple person is encircled by wide enough verandas. It appears that there used to be a statue inside the temple. The door frame is actually plain without engravings, but reliefs of kalamakara with a couple of fangs, lower jaw, and decoration in its hair are engraved above the doorway to fill the space between the door top and roof starting. There is a niche on each one of the left and right-hand sides of the door to place a sculpture. Sills above each of the actual niches are decorated with engravings regarding fanged and horned creature heads.

The inner room of the temple person is currently in empty. Negarakertagama mentions that inside the temple’s niche there was some sort of statue of Shiva with Aksobaya in his crown. The book also mentions that there are numerous of god statues in the actual Shiva system of belief, for instance, Nandiswara, Durga, Ganesha, Nandi, and Brahma statues. None of the statues stop in their place. Reportedly the Durga statue has become kept in Empu Tantular Museum, Surabaya.

The outer walls of the temple body are decorated inside reliefs, which to this day time none can interpret. It is probably because of the excessively thin engravings, or because there is a lacking in supporting information for instance sculptured stone or scripts. Also, Negarakertagama, which tells this temple in greater detail, does not mention anything about the reliefs. According to the gatekeeper of the temple, the reliefs must end up being read using prasawiya technique (counter-clockwise reading), comparable to that used in reading Kidal Forehead reliefs. Still, according to the actual gatekeeper, reliefs engraved on the west side of the north wall describe the map of the temple compound and it is neighboring areas.

A narrow mode separates the temple’s backyard, which can be wide and orderly arranged, via the settlement area. On the south corner of the yard, there is a wrecked construction of red bricks, which probably was a gateway or maybe gopura. However, there is definitely not record available concerning its unique shape and function.