Thus, capitalizing on the social relations implicit in old shrines can be politically advantageous. Yet this case is only a vivid instance of a more general feature of Balinese temples and the locales they connect. Temples serve partially as catalogues of covert interlocal ties kept in ritual reserve until conditions warrant reactivating them for various advantages, sometimes political or economic. In particular pesimpingan pedestals enabled a group to maintain distant relations even under traditional conditions of warfare. The ritual-spatial connections persist when the social bonds are dormant. Because of such temple networks, new influences in Bali whether fresh political movements or modern consumer goods - leapfrog from towns to remote settings, as innovators bypass similar temple congregations to concentrate activity at the particular sacred sites which harbor their ancestral interests. Just as real as the cosmological and ritual significance of temples are the political ambitions and status concerns they mediate. In Bali, temple networks amalgamate goal-specific strategies and religious mystical beliefs into a single framework.

Village-area, land, and lore

The relation between the sociology of temples and space is most apparent in the famous kayangan tiga, the three-temple-clusters of the village-areas (desa). Balinese commoners, especially those not organized into ancestor groups, propitiate their origainatin. Brahmana forces (Dewa Penchipta) in an origin temple (Pura puseh), which memorializes the founding. of an adat territory. An origin temple is clustered with a death temple (pura dalem) for the propitiation of Sivaic forces (Dewa Pralina) and with a meeting-house temple (pura bale agung) for the Wisnuvaic forces (Dewa Pemilihara) of maintaining ritual order and purity . Such village-area temples were supported by rajas to extend Hindu courtly patterns over the social landscape. More.