Ideas of Power in the Philippines: Amulets and Sacrifice

This article examines beliefs about men of supernatural power on the Philippine island of Bohol. As has been pointed out, these beliefs are quite parallel to what Benedict Anderson has described for Java, especially with regard to the requirements of ascetic practices for accumulating and retaining the supernatural powers. Particular for the Philippine case, however, is the way that this asceticism is understood through a notion of 'sacrifice', explicitly linked to Christian imagery and with strong moral overtones. This moral emphasis may be linked to another dimension where the Philippine material diverges from what Anderson describes, namely the question of legitimacy. In the Philippines, issues of legitimacy are more complex, and this means that political and supernatural forms of power while related must not be conflated.