Rambut Siwi Temple
Posted by Bali Suta on 29 October 2015, last update 29 October 2018
The temple is located at the east of Yeh Embang Village, Mendoyo District, Jembrana Regency. It is about 10 km from Negara and can be reached by any cars. Between Air Satang and Yeh Embang, a short diversion off the main road leads to the beautiful coastal temple of Rambut Siwi Temple. For those more interested in tourist sights than beaches, there are several stops along the road west from Pulukan. About 4 miles west of Medewi, near the village of Yeh Hembang, a sign for Rambut Siwi Temle indicates a small road on the left near a popular truck stop.
The road leads to a shady grove less than half a mile away, where the temple sits on a bluff overlooking the ocean. there are number of temples throughout Bali commemorating miraculous event in the life of the 16th-century Javanese priest, Danghyang Nirartha. This one contain a relic, a lock of the sage's hair (rambut) that is venerated (siwi). The story goes that when Danghyang Nirartha first arrived from Java and was traveling in the western wilderness on his way to present himself to Bali's king in Gelgel, he heard of a terrible epidemic in the village of Gading Wani. Danghyang Nirartha went there and banished the disease. The grateful villagers begged him to stay and settle there, but Danghyang Nirartha felt called to Gelgel, and left them a lock of his hair as a protective token. It was here that Danghyang Nirartha was given the honorific "Pedanda Sakti Wawu Rawuh" which means 'the newly arrived powerful high priest'.
The temple is finely built of red brick with exquisite paras relief's depicting scenes from the ancient play "Arjuna Wiwaha". A particularly good sculpture of Rangda stands guard in the gateway facing the sea. Down on the beach there are several cave temples, one of the most important bearing a scared spring. The temple art here is modern and crude. At the Pura Segara, about 50 yards down the beach, a magical tiger is said to have found a place to live in peace. Picturesquely situated on cliff top overlooking a long, wide stretch of beach, this superb temple with his numerous shady frangipani trees is one of the important coastal temple of southern Bali. It is another of the temples established in the 16th century by the priest Danghyang Nirartha who had such a good eye for ocean scenery. Legend has it that when Nirartha first came to Rambut Siwi Temples, he donated some of his hair to the local villagers. The air is now kept in a box buried in this temple, the name of which means "Worship of the hair".
