Javanese people who practice Kejawen have various types of fasting. They believe that by carrying out concerned the forms of fasting, if they are successful in implementing them, they will gain spiritual or magical energy.
There are various forms of magical powers. Depending on what they want, what prayers are said and what type of fasting they are doing. There are those who want to have supernatural powers, immunity, authority, compassion, success and various other desires.
According to belief, in order to obtain certain occult or mystical knowledge, one has to redeem it with special caring practices, including fasting while reciting incantations during rituals. There are several types of fasting that are often carried out as a ransom to obtain supernatural knowledge.
Mutih fasting is carried out by those who want to have magical knowledge and gain success in trying. As the name suggests, in this ritual someone who undergoes it is forbidden to consume anything foods with colors, other than white. Usually, the perpetrators will only eat rice and water.
Mutih are usually included in one part of a long ritual. The goals themselves vary. In general, to master certain occult sciences. There are also those who do it for the purpose of success.
This fast is not bound by time, it can be only 3 days or even 40 days. Usually when undergoing white fasting accompanied by a spiritual teacher.
In addition, there is Ngebleng to strengthen the soul and grant wishes. If in general the duration of fasting is only from Morning (Before sunrise) to Maghrib (After Sunset), this is not the case with Ngebleng.
1 day of Ngebleng has duration full day or 24 hours. So, if someone is fasting for 3 days, that means he doesn’t eat or drink for 3 full days.
With such a full fast, it is hoped that the lust for worldly things will disappear. Hence, this fast itself is often accompanied by meditation.
Another fasting of Kejawen is Patigeni. It is said that Patigeni is effective for the fulfillment of extraordinarily large wishes. Technically, Patigeni and Ngebleng are almost the same.
The difference is in Patigeni, the practitioner stays in a closed room without sunlight or lights. They are not allowed to leave the room, even to urinate. They must stay in the room and continue to recite prayers or incantations.
More extreme is Ngeluwang fasting. This fasting can be considered quite unique. Not only fasting as usual — at this rituals, a certain part of the body of practitioner must be buried down.
Fasting is believed to bring great things. One of them is being able to mastery certain types of occult arts. This fasting said to have its test. When buried, the practitioner usually will visited by supernatural beings, and then scare them.
Weton Fasting (day of birth according to the Javanese calendar). The goal is to protect yourself against bad luck.This fasting is one of the most popular of Javanese fastings.
Once every 35 days, Javanese people do this fasting. For example, if the Weton of Practitioner is Sunday Pon. So, he/she will do Weton fasting on Saturday Pahing, Sunday Pon and Monday Wage.
Beside that, there are still several types of fasting that are familiar to the Javanese, including Ngelowong (forbidden to eat for a certain period of time and only sleep 3 hours in 24 hours), Ngrowot (eating only vegetables in the start and end of fasting), Nganyep (eating only tasteless food) and many other types of fasting practiced by traditional Javanese people. (ICEMS)
