The Matter of the Hati
An interesting discussion about an interesting article over at Language Hat today included this little gem from Ben Zimmer, who blogs over at Language Log:
The words I gave in Malay, etc. for “two”, “eat”, and “(figurative) heart” are pure Austronesian. My apologies about sama — didn’t realize that one had a Sanskrit root. Live and learn.
What I want to focus on here is “(figurative) heart.” Ben is quite right to qualify heart with figurative, because the Malay word hati does mean heart but only in a figurative sense.
What the heck am I going on about? OK, bear with me here. In popular music in Malaysia, when one refers to the heart, the word that is almost invariably used is hati. However, I was surprised to discover a few years back that the Malay word for heart is not hati at all but jantung. Hati actually refers to the liver. As you might well imagine, I was quite confused by this initially. Why would all of these people be singing about their livers? The list of terms in which hati is used instead of jantung goes on and on. For example, if someone is your boyfriend/girlfriend, that person is said to be your buah hati (buah means fruit….fruit of your liver?!). If someone finds you annoying or is otherwise frustrated by your words or actions, they might bang on their chest and say sakit hati (sakit, which sounds a lot like suck it, means it hurts, which reminds me of one day when Leen and I were sitting in a laundry place in Halifax and she held up her middle finger to me and said—quite loudly—”Baby! Sakit!” But that’s another story).
To find an explanation for all of this, we have to take a good look at Malay culture:
Malays commonly underscore that it is humans’ possession of “reason” that separates them from other animals, but they also point out that “reason” and hati (liver, the seat of the emotions) “work together” within all humans. Some Malays refer to the liver as the “ruler” (raja ) of the human body and note that it “governs” or “regulates” (merintah ) the rest of the body, much like a ruler or commander governs his army.
Also this:
Various (corporeal) body parts and waste products are also viewed as essential parts of the person. For example, the liver, which, as noted earlier, is viewed as the seat of emotion, is an essential part of the person that must be safeguarded through prayer and other forms of pious and socially valued behavior.
The article I got this from contains many more interesting tidbits about Malay culture, which I’ll be exploring more (particularly the bits about teknonyms, birth-order names, and avoidance of first-person singular pronouns, something I’ve touched on before).
Anyway, now there are two things I’m still wondering about:
1) If hati means liver, and if the liver does indeed occupy such an important place in traditional Malay beliefs, why is it that when many people mention their hati they physically indicate their heart? I can understand why hati would be translated as heart when used to describe emotions (because that’s how it’s used), but why do many Malays actually indicate the heart is the hati? I guess I can understand this. I mean, how sexy would Siti Nurhaliza be if she kept putting her hand over her liver in her music videos? Wait, maybe that should remain a rhetorical question.
2) I wonder…since sakit jantung means someone has a heart problem, how do we say someone has a problem with their liver if sakit hati already means something else?
January 14th, 2006 at 6:42 am
i never quite saw it that way. u made it interesgting.
January 15th, 2006 at 1:54 pm
did you know there was something in the quran about ‘the piece of meat’ which was said to be the heart of all emotions? –pun intended– and we literally take that the piece of meat is the liver. another malay word for heart is kalbu, which is what ‘the piece of meat’ was called in the quran. interestingly in malay, kalbu does not mean liver. so there, in my theory, that is why in malay liver = hati, and hati = heart. i guess it all came from the interpretation that ‘the piece of meat’ mentioned in the quran is an organ called liver. wallahualam.
January 15th, 2006 at 2:12 pm
reading back my comment, maybe the quran didnt excatly say the meat thing was the ‘heart of all emotions’. but that wasnt what i was trying to point out. just to clarify.
haha me and my 3 comments.
January 15th, 2006 at 6:48 pm
Hmm…well, three comments in a row are OK, as long as they’re intereting. The part about the kalbu is particularly interesting. I wonder if the notion of the liver as the seat of emotions predates Islam in Southeast Asia? I’m assuming so, and based on what you’ve mentioned, I’m assuming the two ideas (liver as seat of emotions and heart as seat of emotions) ended up co-existing, until the distinction between them became blurry. Thanks for the interesting comment. :)
March 13th, 2006 at 6:03 pm
Well, Jordan. I also asked the same thing, from my perception, of course… “Why in English they use jantung instead of hati, you’re in my heart… kau di jantungku…?”
March 18th, 2006 at 12:45 pm
[...] Jordan F. MacVay –seorang penulis blog dari Malaysia– menjelaskan bahwa hal ini berhubungan dengan adat istiadat orang Melayu: [...]
March 24th, 2006 at 3:44 pm
Three points for further consideration. One, the ancient Greeks (and perhaps many other cultures?), at least in Homeric times, had a similar notion about the liver (HEPAR - as in ‘hepatitis’) being the seat of the emotions (or instincts?) - often contrasted with the heart being the seat of reason.
Two, I wonder what reason there can be for such associations arising? The liver is an anonymous organ, its location and purpose a mystery to most people, even today. Emotional distress, however, is quite clearly experienced in or around the heart! And the ‘internal voice’ of reasoning naturally seems to be located within the head - although perhaps only because it is so closely linked to the visual field (I wonder if the self-image of the seat of reason is different in people who have been blind from birth?). And you would think it an easy enough observation that the reason (but less so the emotions) are impaired by a head injury, but not by a chest injury. There must be a reason for these identifications of the various organs, but I can’t guess what it is.
Third, some years ago I read a doctoral thesis on the phenomenon of ‘amok’, which mentioned that the berserking episode of bloody revenge is typically preceded by a long period of eccentric and depressed behaviour, often involving retiring from the community, squatting at the edge of the jungle in total silence (or howling, gibbering incoherently) for hours or days on end. This behaviour is known as ’sakit hati’ - a special use of the term.
September 25th, 2006 at 1:46 pm
This article should refer to both the Malays as well as the Indonesians.
Let me first disqualify myself, as I am no expert in the Malay Language. I am a Eurasian of Portuguese, Chinese and of highly probable Indian & Malay decent. I took Malay as a Second Language in School and had actually failed at it.
Does ‘Hati’ mean ‘Heart’ or ‘Liver’? Here’s my take on this topic.
I read an article in the Straits Times (Singapore) some years ago (maybe in 1987) that the Malays actually feel with their ‘Liver’. It was written by a Malay whose name I can’t remember. He said that it was only translated to ‘Heart’ in English so that English speakers will be able to understand better what was meant. However, this method does not explain accurately how the Malays actually think. Moreover, a lot of Malays now, especially those who are English Educated, believe that ‘Hati = Heart’ thus losing their own heritage by adopting the western thinking… this is sad. Although the English feel with their heart, when they want to express deep feeling, they say ‘from the bottom of my heart’ which the Malays are actually doing when they say ‘from my liver’. I hope this will be corrected so as not to lose our eastern heritage to the west.
There is a old Malay saying which goes ‘Bagai hempedu lekat di hati’ which refers to ‘Deep affection’. The literal translation is ‘As the spleen sticks to the liver.’ This saying alone tells us that ‘Hati = Liver’ because the spleen definitely does not adhere to the ‘Heart’ but to the ‘Liver’.
I am still looking for articles on ‘Hati = Heart or Liver’ so please send it to if you come across it. Thanks. ~ Pereira G A
February 24th, 2008 at 8:51 pm
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