The Intellectual Origins of Islam Nusantara

A Study on a Globalising Indonesian Islam and Reform of Hegemonic Reason

Ahmad Baso

Pustaka Afid Jakarta

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@ 2017 by Ahmad Baso

The Intellectual Origins of Islam Nusantara:

A Study on a Globalising Indonesian Islam and Reform of Hegemonic Reason

All rigths reserved

first impression: March, 2017

published by:
Pustaka Afid Jakarta

Komplek Arya Graha Kedaung

Tangerang Selatan, Banten, Indonesia
Mobile/WhatsApp (+62)858 1411 8611

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In memoriam KH. A. Hasyim Muzadi (1944-2017) …

Our model Guru of promoting Nahdlatul Ulama and Islam Nusantara to the world …

Di dalam mathba’ah dimasukkan dia

Supaya berhamburan seluruh dunia

(So it’s coming to be printed at the printing house

So as to be widespread globally to every corner of the world)

--- Perjalanan Sultan Lingga 1894 (The Peregrinations of Sultan Lingga-Riau)

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Contents

A Note on Translation

Preface: From the Discourse of Islam Nusantara to the Islam Nusantara Studies

1. The Origins of the Discourse of “Islam Nusantara”: Islamization of Nusantara, A Passive and
Peripheral Object?

2. Empowering Islam and Nusantara ... Equally and Simultaneously: The Pioneer Role of Syekh
Jamaluddin al-Akbar al-Husaini (alias Syekh Jumadil Kubro)

3. “Din Arab Jawi” and the Wali Songo’s Idea of Unity: Islam in a New Civilisational Body

4. Finding Ourself, Finding Our World: Jawi Epistemology and its Subjectivity

5. Islam Nusantara and its Dual Methodology, al-Muhafazhah and al-Akhdzu

6. Ahlu Jawi and the Argument for Islam Nusantara: Nusantara as One Center of Excellence

7. Islam Nusantara, The Epistemological Break with the Hegemonic Reason: Concluding Remarks

Bibliography

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A Note on Transliteration

Relying upon the familiarity of Nusantara people with oral practices in dealing with Arabic texs, this book
use a technic of transliteration of Arabic letters by reproducing the sound of the words according to the
orthography rules of the target language. For instance kitab Ihya Ulumuddin, not Ihya Ulum al-Din.

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Preface:
From the Discourse of Islam Nusantara to the Islam Nusantara Studies

Wujud buda, nanging rasa Islam.

(Although non-Islamic are that old traditions in its forms, but its essence is Islamic)

--- Sunan Kalijaga, from the 19th century Surakarta kraton-based Babad Sekaten.1

Many questions are asked about Islam Nusantara recently; nevertheless hardly any is
answered with quite adequat about it. This humble book tries to clarify and clear up
doubts and confusions about this intellectual discourse, such as a claim that Islam
Nusantara is anti Arab or just a local Islam in nature, and not a universal one. One even
says further that Islam Nusantara is another project of Nahdlatul Ulama (NU) in a kind
of political expediency of kiais or ulama during the present-day Indonesian Joko Widodo
presidency!
By considering the circumstances as well as the significance of Islam Nusantara
intellectual discourses, this book wants to trace back in time to Wali Songo tradition in
14-16 centuries, to the seventeenth to nineteenth century networks of Jawi ulama in
Arabia, to the founding of Nahdlatul Ulama organization in 1926 which upheld Islam
rahmatan lilalamin, as a grace for all mankind, up to the contemporary ijtihads of Gus
Dur, KH. Sahal Mahfudh and other kiais. As intellectual project, contemporary in its
immediate concerns, yet passionately historical with its engagement of the past, Islam
Nusantara is actually not a matter of intellectual exercises, sort of easy come easy go –
as one may say it to a fashion fabrication. It is more deeper than imagined, something
intellectual in nature, epistemological in vision, historical in function.
This impressive legacy of Islam since many centuries in Southeast Asia, and in Indonesia
in particular, has been useful in mapping out the broad theoretical and ideological
terrain within which Islam Nusantara emerged and first articulated as Din Arab Jawi by
Sunan Giri of Gresik, as mentioned in Serat Suryo Rojo of A.J. 1700/A.D. 1774 from
Kraton Jogjakarta. Since then it has functioned as a critical discourse, as a way of
investigating and projecting the inner experiences of the Nusantara communities as one
body, one soul, as expressed in the Malaccan Sultan Manshur’s letter of 1468.
Although Nusantara remains the victim of Islamic studies as developed in postwar
Europe and North America, which colonized its own history and degraded its culture as
local, parochialistic, traditionalist and chauvinistic, and not universal in its nature, Islam
Nusantara or Jawi epistemology represents an epistemological break with the
hegemonic reason of Eurocentrism such as a claim to universalism. At the same time it
brings in a critical Nusantara perspective to the reading of a wide range of historical-
cultural texts, effectively extending the intellectual boundaries of a new discursive
terrain for a new Islamic studies discipline, as one step forward to uphold Islam as
rahmatan lil alamin to the world which is now being hit by crises and conflicts based on
religious and sectarian ideologies as well.
At this point, we should understand that to perceive and understand Islam Nusantara
one must take in account the whole picture of Islam as elaborated epistemologically and
practiced ideological-culturally by Muslims of Indonesia in many generations. In this

1 Quoted in Noto Soeroto, “Wat is Sekaten?”. Indonesië, vol. 5, 1951-1952, p. 248.

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regard, I believe, it is useless for any kind of intellectual discussions on Islam Nusantara,
without incorporating the totality of Nusantara culturally, economically, socially and
politically.
I would like emphasize from the outset that a major feature of Nusantara intellectual
discourse is the concern with place and displacement. It is here that “Islam Nusantara”
comes into being: the concern with the development or recovery of an effective
relationship between self and place. For the proponents of Islam Nusantara studies, a
valid and active of Nusantara self may have been eroded by dislocation, resulting from
migration, transportation or ‘voluntary’ removal for indentured labor. Or it may have
been destroyed by cultural denigration, the conscious and unconscious oppression of
the indigenous personality and culture by a supposedly superior racial or cultural
model.
That displacement or dislocation happened for instance when the language used to
express the self has been alineated. When Nusantara is expressed in modern language
as “local” or “provincial”, it’s a negation of the self of Nusantara which is in its history
came as one of the centers of the world economy. When Islam in Nusantara is projected
in orientalist eyes as “syncretic” and “impure”, then it’s ahistorical prejudice that went
against the fact that Jawi ulama and their texts once became the point of reference in
Islamic learning in the Holy lands, Mecca and Madina, as well in Cairo during the past
centuries.
This gap which opens between the experience of place and the language available to
describe it forms one of main concerns of Islam Nusantara studies as one concerning
Islamic studies and the fate of its Indonesian studies.
A typical example of Islamic studies and the Indonesian studies where this alienation
happened can be found in the case of Nurcholish Madjid’s (Cak Nur) study at the
University of Chicago, USA, late 1970s and early 1980s. Nurcholish initially pursued the
study of Javanese manuscript written in pegon script by one Islam Nusantara scholar or
ulama, Kyai Mojo, hero of Java war (1825-1830) alongside with Prince Diponegoro.
Nurcholish was able to complete the transcript of the 24-pages manuscript along with
its English translation.2
But, unfortunately, in a couple of years later, the object of Nurcholish’s study began to
change when his teachers in Chicago, Fazlur Rahman and Leonard Binder, were
suggesting a theme of "renewal of Islam" or “modernization of Islam” for his future
dissertation. He was then preoccupied with the study of Ibn Taymiyya, a “new hero” for
him who later became the focal point of his doctoral dissertation in 1983 under the title
Ibn Taimiah on Kalam and Falsafa. When he returned to Indonesia, Ibn Taymiyah was
starting to become unsurprisingly a new hero for Nusantara!
Such alienation within the discipline of Islamic studies or Indonesian studies is shared
by Indonesians studying in the centers of metropolitan Europe or North America who
begin to feel alienated within its practice once its vocabulary, categories and codes are
felt to be inadequate or inappropriate to describe the fauna, the physical and
geographical conditions, or the cultural practices they have developed in Indonesia.
This gap or alientaion occured for those whose language seems inadequate to describe
their own place, for thoses whose language is systematically destroyed or rendered
unpriveleged by the imposition of the language of a colonizing power. In each case a
condition of alienation in inevitable until the colonizing language has been

2 See information about Cak Nur’s study on Kiai Maja in Tim Babcock, "Muslim Minahasans with Roots in
Java: The People of Kampung Jawa Tondano". Indonesia, vol. 32, October 1981, pp. 76-7 in the footnotes.

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deconstructed, replaced or appropriated in a decolonising language practices.3 That is
why Islam Nusantara studies comes into being.
Its contemporary strategy begins with transforming the language which is used against
Islam Nusantara, then try to use it in a different way in its new context and so,
borrowing what Chinua Achebe says, to make it “bear the burden” of Nusantara
experience. It has to overcome an imposed gap resulting from the linguistic
displacement of Nusantara pre-colonial languages by English and other metropolitan
languages.
The task of this book is twofold: first, to identify the range and nature of the discourse of
Islam Nusantara as it developed in the period of second trajectory of Islamization as
initiated by Wali Songo; and, secondly, to describe the emergence of Islam Nusantara
studies or Jawi epistemology beginning from Sunan Giri up to the 19th century Jawi
ulamas.
One of the major purpose of this book is to explain the nature of existing Islam
Nusantara studies as promoted by kiais of pesantren and the way in which it interacts
with, and dismantles, some of the assumptions of European theory as practiced within
the wall of Islamic studies, hoping in the future we can make a new Islamic studies:
“Wujud Eropa lan Barat, nanging rasa Islam Nusantara” (although European and
Western is its existence, but its essence is Islam Nusantara).***

3See Bill Ashcroft, Gareth Griffiths & Helen Tiffin, The Empire Writes Back: Theory and Practice in Post-
Colonial Literatures (London & New York: Routledge,2002), second edition, pp. 9-10.

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1

The Origins of the Discourse of “Islam Nusantara”:

Islamisation of Nusantara, A Passive and Peripheral Object?

[Dhandhanggula]

Mêmanise tyas rêsêp migati; ing pangulah mring rèh kasarjanan; anêtêpi ing ugêre; jênêngirèng
tumuwuh; sinung têngran budi mumpuni; dera sang amurwèngrat; ngumala sumunu; tumraping
jagad lir surya; nyênyunari niskara sèsining bumi; kang nyata lan kang samar.

(It is sweet when the heart finds pleasure in succeeding; in the practice of all forms of learning and
scholarship of Islam Nusantara [rèh kasarjanan]; confirming the props; of created life; when one is
vouchsafed the signs of a mastering reason [budi mumpuni]; by the Holy Creator of all that is; one is
like a red jewel radiating; over the earth like the sun; illuminating all that is in the world; that
which is manifest and physical [nyata] and that which is hidden and spiritual [ghaib]).

--- Kiai Yosodipuro I of the eighteenth century Surakarta, Babad Giyanti.4

To begin with, I would like to mention one of the renowned Dutch scholars, G.W.J.
Drewes, in his remark on Islamisation in Indonesia: “[Indonesia] conversion to Islam set
in when this religion had already achieved its definitive form ... Indonesia has shown
great receptivity and an amazing faculty for adapting newly acquired ideas to her old
basic pattern of thinking, but she has not displayed any creative impulse”.5
What he had in his mind in saying that Indonesia “has not displayed any creative
impulse” in the process of Islamisation? While the book in which he along with other
orientalists wrote their remarks had in a passionate spirit dealt with other Muslim
countries such as Turks, Persians and even Arabs of the Nejed Wahhabi: they are to be
allowed to speak each within their localities something of their ijtihad (creative
thinking) about Islam. Did people of Nusantara have no right to do the same ijtihad?!
This kind of orientalistic views on Nusantara, as one Indonesian storage of maritime
civilisation,6 I by stereotyping it as mere carrier of a culture coming from outside, has
characterized our culture as a thing, displaced it as human and put in his place the
Orient orientalized as specimen. Many who write about the Islamization of the

4 Babad Giyanti anggitanipun Radèn Ngabèi Yasadipura I ing Surakarta (Batawi Sèntrêm: Bale Pustaka,
1937-1939), 21 vols., vol. 1, p. 4.
5 See G.W.J. Drewes, “Indonesia: Mysticism and Activism”, in Gustave E. von Grunebaum(editor), Unity and

Variety in Muslim Civilisation (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1955), p. 284.

6 Nusantara is a term used to describe the vast Indonesian archipelago that stretches across the tropics

from Sumatra in the west to Papua in the east. It is a region characterized by immense geographic,
biological, ethnic, linguistic and cultural diversity. The word “nusantara” first appeared in Javanese
literature in the 14th century, and referred to the enormous chain of islands that constituted the Hindu-
Buddhist Majapahit Empire. Nusantara is a compound noun derived from ancient Javanese: nusa
("islands") and antara (“opposite” or “across from”). In his book “Negarakertagama,” written circa 1365,
the author and Buddhist monk Mpu Prapanca described the territory that comprised Nusantara, which
included most of modern Indonesia (Sumatra, Java, Bali, the Lesser Sunda Islands, Kalimantan, Sulawesi,
part of the Malukus and West Papua), plus a substantial portion of the territories that now comprise
Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei and the southern Philippines. As of 2010, this region was inhabited by
approximately 1,340 distinct ethnic groups speaking nearly 2,500 different languages and dialects,
according to Indonesia’s Central Bureau of Statistics.

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Archipelago has typified Nusantara within the framework of “Oriental” culture in which
the dominant picture represents Islam in Indonesia as marginal to the centers of
genuine, authentic Islam. Even, for some pupils of orientalists, Islamization of Nusantara
is considered not perfect wherever they found the traces of Wali Songo (nine saints) in
local traditions.7 If they found something new, creative or ijtihad of any kind in their
institutions or their texts, they narrowed it down to a pejorative tone of “un-Islamic” or
“anti-Islam”!8
The main point in this case is that Nusantara is not simply a representation held up by
orientalists as the display case in a museum. “When you display something, you wrench
it out of the context of living life and put it before an (in this case, European) audience”,
writes Edward Said on the orientalist representation of the Orient which depends upon
the silence of the Other.9 We realize that each human culture, like each language, is a
whole, capable of accomodating within it the wide varieties of human temperament, and
that learning another culture, as Islamization process, is like learning a second language.
As people build their current culture out of pieces of the old and live out their material
conditions in new ways, so their world takes on new configurations. The configurations
give the appearance of stability and timelessness, but they are only momentary as
people realign and force movement. The forces prompting realignments come from
people learning and choosing and, perhaps more often, struggling to learn and choose
over time. From this understanding of culture in the making, there is some creative free
will and wilful courage on the part of the Indonesian people to constitute, on the instant,
the meaning of the situation of Islamisation of Nusantara.
Let’s take a closer look at the 14th century Hikayat Raja-raja Pasai, then quoted in the
16th century Sajarah Melayu, to put into question the argument of the passivity of
Nusantara in the context of Islamisation:
It is related in the hadis [saying] of the Prophet Muhammed, that he said to his companions, “In the
latter times men shall hear of an island under the wind (negeri bawah angin), named Samutra; as
soon as this shall happen, go and convert it to Islam, for the island shall produce many Waliyullah,
or persons of gifted piety.”10

This text refers to a new more creative trajectory of Islamisation as localities of

Nusantara (negeri bawah angin) at the time became integrated to the cosmopolitan

7 See for instance Ensiklopedi Islam Indonesia (Jakarta: Institut Agama Islam Negeri Syarif Hidayatullah &
Djambatan, 1992), 3 vols. edited by Harun Nasution and others.
8 See among others Michael Laffan, Islamic Nationhood and Colonial Indonesia: The Umma below the Winds

(London: Routledge, 2002), p. 259, that characterizes KH. Abdoel Wahab Chasbullah’s Tashūwirul Afkar
of 1911 as “unIslamic”; and the works of French philologist, Henri Chambert-Loir, on Indonesian
manuscripts where he has labelled some of Islam Nusantara texts produced in pesantrens or by santris
communities as “anti-santri”, “anti-Islam” or “anti-haji”. See for example Henri Chambert-Loir (ed.),
Hikayat Nakhoda Asik oleh Sapirin bin Usman dan Hikayat Merpati Mas oleh Muhammad Bakir (Jakarta:
Masup, 2009); Naik Haji di Masa Silam: Kisah-kisah Orang Indonesia Naik Haji 1482-1964 (Jakarta: KPG,
EFEO, Forum Jakarta-Paris, Perpustakaan Nasional Republik Indonesia, 2013), 3 vols, vol. 1, ch. 1; and,
“Ruang Politik dalam Hikayat Hang Tuah”, in Sultan, Pahlawan dan Hakim (Jakarta: KPG, EFEO, PPIM UIN
Jakarta, & Manassa, 2011).

9 Gauri Viswanathan (ed.), Power, Politics and Culture: Interviews with Edward W. Said (New York:
Pantheon Books, 2001), p. 41.
10 See Malay Annals (transl. John Leyden) (London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, and Brown, 1821), p. 66 – with

few modifications. The same redaction is to be found in Hikayat Raja-raja Pasai. See A.H. Hill, “Hikayat
Raja-raja Pasai: a revised romanised version of Raffles MS 67, together with an English translation”.
JMBRAS, vol. 33, no. 2, 1960.

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Islam in an unprecedented genuine cultural construct. Unlike the preceding centuries of
Islamisazion which took place through the culturally-unrecorded trade contact of
indigenous people with Arab and Persian merchants in their way between India and
China from around 9th century,11 the new trajectory commenced when Semutra – not
Samudra as many claim12 – discovered by Merah Silu, then became famous, came to the
fore as its name reached Mecca. It subsequently turned out to be the object of the
Prophet Muhammed prophecy. In fulfillment of a command made by the Prophet, the
Governor (Syarif) of Mecca dispatched a ship’s captain named Syekh Ismail to bring Raja
Muhammad from Mengiri – its identity will be discussed next – to Islamisize Semutra.
From then Samutra – along with Pasai13 – was to be called Darul Islam, the Abode of
Islam.
Two points can be deduced from this brilliant text for new trajectory of Islamisation to
take shape. Firstly, it’s for the first time that Nusantara is to be upheld as part of the
centers of Islam, and not a pheriperal, marginalized one, in the context of Islamization
during the periode between the 10th and 12th centuries. It is indicated in the
construction of Semutra as the object of the Prophet Muhammed prophecy and, as its
repercussions, the mission sent directly on his command from the holy land Mecca to
convert Semutra to Islam; and from it emerged Darul Islam. The latter epithet signified
at that time the strategical position Semutra Pasai have had as it became an emerging
important center of Islam in the fourteenth century, religiously, culturally and
intellectually which is equal to other centers of Islam in Arab countries. This will be
discussed in the next chapter.

11 This old trajectory, mostly in the period of eighteenth-to-eleventh century Sriwijaya emporium, did not
eventually make any impact upon indigenous society culturally and politically as the Arab merchants who
propagated Islam did not pay attention to seizing or mastering strategic ports of Nusantara to bring
change significantly. A case in point here is a curious story mentioned by Buzurg, a 10th century Persian
writer, in his famous book, Ajaibu-l-Hindi (the Wonders of India). The story tells of an Arab merchant,
Ishaq, when reached the port of Sarirah or Sarboza – Arabic-Persian term for Sumatran Sriwijaya
kingdom – was demanded by its ruler to pay 20,000 gold dinars to grant safe passage to China. But Ishaq
refused to pay and was murdered that night. His ship with all its cargo was seized. And no action was
taken afterwards on the part of Arab-Persians against this injustice. See Buzurg, Ajaibu-l-Hindi, pp. 107-
13; Wonders, pp. 62-6.
Few centuries later, especially since early 15th century Majapahit on the wake of Sriwijaya, the nine
saints (Wali Songo) began to think to master Javanese north coast ports, first Tuban, and then Gresik, the
two main significant ports of Majapahit in East Java, from which came a new trajectory of Islamization. It
began with the appointment of Arya Teja or Tumenggung Wilatikta – the father-in-law of Sunan Ampel –
by the king of Majapahit as earlier as 1420s as harbor-master in Tuban. See H.J. de Graaf & Th. G. Th.
Pigeaud, Chinese Muslims in Java in the 15th and 16th centuries: The Malay Annals of Semarang and Cerbon
(Monash papers on Southeast Asia, 1984), pp. 15-6, 58, 158; and Brandes, Pararaton (Ken Arok) of het
Boek der Koningen van Tumapěl en van Majapahit: Uitgegeven en toegelicht (VBG vol. 49) (Batavia:
Albrecht; 's Hage: Nijhoff, 1896), p. 184.
It then followed by the designation of Patih Samboja or Koja Maksum, husband of Nyai Gede Pinatih, in
later decades as harbor-master in Gresik. After the passing of her husband Nyai Gede Pinatih became the
foster mother of Raden Paku or Sunan Giri, Syekh Maulana Ishak’s son. See in Antoine Cabaton, “Raden
Paku, Sunan de Giri (Legende Musulmane Javanaise): Texte Malais, Traduction Française et Notes”. Revue
de l’Histoire des Religions, vol. 54, 1906, pp. 395-7.
12 As our text indicates, Semutra originated from the name semut raya, big ant, not from samudra, big

ocean. Over many centuries the name transformed to be the name of the whole island where Semutra
Pasai located.
13 Semutra and Pasai are two names for the same object. Syekh Abddurra’uf Singkel (d. 1693) for instance

in one of his books translates “bi lisani-l-jawiyati-s-samatraiyati” with “dengan bahasa Jawi yang
dibangsakan kepada bahasa Pase” (with Malay-Jawi language attributed to the Pasai language). See his
Mir’atu-t-Thullab, MS. Code Or. 16035 in British Library, p. 3.

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If the world of Nusantara, one may say, had become immediately accessible to an Arab
Muslim citizen living in the 13-14 century global age of commerce, Semutra Pasai as
Darul Islam make it too drawn nearer to the inner center of Islam. This first point has
placed Nusantara as one of the potentially undisputed centers of original Islam, and put
aside in terms of cultural creativity the peripheral position it has geographically.
The second point refers to the cultural creativity of Nusantara in terms of the religious
authenticity of Semutra’s Islam which, in the above-mentioned prophecy of Prophet
Muhammed, “shall produce many Waliyullah”, as it established the crucial role of the
town Mengiri as a basis of Islamisation to Nusantara. Where is exactly this town? what
is its significance? why is it crucial for this new trajectory of Islamisation to take shape
as a nesting-ground for Islam Nusantara?
In a text edited and translated by Hill, Hikayat Raja-raja Pasai mentions Mengiri. While
others state erroneously ma’bir, ma’bar or mu’tabar.14 Prof. Fatimi says in his book,
Islam Comes to Malaysia,15 that present-day Munger, the Anglo-Indian Monghyr
(Mengiri) is a flourishing town with sizeable Muslim population and has many ancient
Muslim shrines and tombs. al-Biruni (d. 1048) spelled this town Mangir whose location
is a present day Monghyr, located in the Munger district, one of the thirty-eight districts
of Bihar state in eastern India, laying in the Ganges-Padma river bank leading to the
Indian Ocean.16 Previously an Arab historian al-Mas’udi (d. 956) in his well-known
book, Muruju-dz-Dzahab wa Ma’adini-l-Jawhar, has pointed to the town he called Mangir
(then comes to Malay by the name Mangiri as our hikayats name it). He reported that in
the earlier 10th century there were more than 10.000 Arabs of pure Quraysh lineage,
descendents of companions of the Holy Prophet, among them were “sayyidan minal
Arab”, lords of the Arabs or the descendants of the Holy Prophet (sayids).17
As pointed out by Ibnu Khurdladlbih in his Kitab al-Masalik wal-l-Mamalik (c. 850),
Mengiri leading to the mouth of Ganges river in the Indian Ocean at that time have had a
position as one entreport or transit point linking the very interior of India to the global
searoutes from Persian Gulf to China. It begins round coast Arabia, and then from India
coming to Sirandib (Ceylon), to the north of Sumatra, through the Straits of Malacca, to
Kedah, Champa, and finally on to Canton in China.18 al-Mas’udi also tells us that in the
early 9th century Muslim ships from Basra, Siraf, Oman, India, the Malay Archipelago,
and Champa used to sail to the mouth of the river of Canton in China with their
merchandise and their cargo.19
So far we can argue at this point that Mengiri henceforth, as Hikayat Raja-raja Pasai
points out, depicts the new trajectory of Islamisation of Pasai out of which sprung up
the waliyullah whose ancestors originated from ahlul-bait of the Prophet Muhammad.
From Mengiri came the first establishment of Semutra-Pasai as the Muslim kingdom in

14 See the text of Hikayat Raja-raja Pasai in Muhammad Gade Ismail, Pasai dalam Perjalanan Sejarah: Abad
ke-13 sampai Awal Abad ke-16 (Jakarta: Departemen Pendidikan dan Kebudayaan, 1993); also in Sedjarah
Melaju (Menurut Terbitan Abdullah ibn Abdulkadir Munsji) (ed. T.D. Situmorang & A. Teeuw) (Jakarta &
Amsterdam: Djambatan, 1952). Cf. A. Marre (ed.), Histoire des rois de Pasey, traduite du malay et annotée
(Paris: Maisonneuve, 1874), p. 30, where Mengiri is mentioned.
15 S.Q. Fatimi, Islam Comes to Malaysia (Singapore, 1963).
16 Syed Muhamamd Naquib al-Attas, Historical Fact and Fiction (Kuala Lumpur: Penerbit UTM, 2011), p.

20.
17 al-Mas’udi, Muruju-dz-Dzahab wa Ma’adini-l-Jawhar, 4 vols., vol. 1, pp. 99, 167-9.
18 Ibn Khurdadzbih, Kitab al-Masalik wal-l-Mamalik, quoted in Naquib al-Attas, Historical Fact and Fiction,

p. 20.
19 al-Mas’udi, Muruju-dz-Dzahab, vol. 1, p. 138.

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Nusantara around 11th century from which did Islamisation spread to the whole island
of Indonesia.20
These waliyullah set up for himself as a channel through which a well-authenticated
Nusantara traditions going back to the Prophet and his Companions have been
guaranteed. The study of an old-established silsilah (genealogical line of ulama and
walis linking the Prophet ahlul bait till the present descendants of the Prophet) and
sanad or isnad (the chain of uniterrupted transmission of Islamic knowledges from
teacher to his disciples through the media of kitab) which legitimate that prophetic
tradition is of most significance in the context of Islam Nusantara, especially the silsilah
and sanad of Nusantara’s ulama. Through this silsilah and sanad every voice and ijtihad
(legal opinions) raised from the Indonesians’ side must be taken into account as part of
broader cosmopolitan Islam.
For this mission a new generation of sayyids or asyrafs (descendants of the the Holy
Prophet) taking as their base the land of Champa (or Cambodja in Javanese version,
located at the present-day Vietnam) after their migration from India to the Southeast
Asia from around 10-11 century. The central figure in this new trajectory of
Islamisation was Syekh Jamaluddin al-Akbar al-Husaini. The following is his story.***

20That is what Prof. Naquib al-Attas points out in his Historical Fact and Fiction, pp. 25-6. Consequently,
based on the hikayat mentioned above, Naquib al-Attas also argues that Malik ash-Saleh (d. 1296) could
not have been the first Muslim king of Semutra Pasai. “I’m inclined to propose that the person installed as
the first Muslim king of Samudra Pasai was Sultan Muhammad [of Mengiri or Mangir] who in the Hikayat
was described as a fakir ,” argued al-Attas. Ibid., p. 17.

13
2
Empowering Islam and Nusantara ... Equally and Simultaneously:
The Pioneer Role of Syekh Jamaluddin al-Akbar al-Husaini (alias Syekh Jumadil
Kubro)

We are Muslims, but we are Indonesian Muslims. In other words, we are Indonesians who believe in
Islam; therefore we are not only concerned with Islam ...

--- KH. Abdul Wahab Chasbullah, chairman of Nahdlatul Ulama (1955).21

Syekh Jamaluddin al-Akbar al-Husaini came from the line of Syarif Alawi bin Imam
Muhammad Sahib Mirbat through his son Al-Amir Abdul Malik Khan who flourished
first in India and then in Indo-China. In India they became known as the Family of
Azamat Khan and many came from Tarim in the Hadlramawt to settle in the Deccan,
especially in Mengir, Bijapur and Bilgram on the mouth of the River Ganges, which are
noted for its tradition of learned sayyids (the offsprings of the Prophet Muhammad).22
Members of the Family proliferated also in Southeast Asia. Most important among them
with respect to our discourse was the Imam Jamaluddin al-Husain, whose father, Al-
Amir Ahmad Syah Jalal, was born in Nasarabad, Isfahan (the present-day Iranian
town).23 Jamaluddin al-Husain was born in Champa and was the proximate ancestors of
the great missionaries of Sumatera, Java and the neighbouring islands of Nusantara.24
Syekh Jamaluddin and his brothers are said to have swarmed across the whole of
Southeast Asia. In Java he was known to the Javanese under a misnomer as Syekh

21 Quoted in Mochtar Naim, “Nahdlatul-Ulama Party (1952-1955): An Inquiry into the Origin of its
Electoral Success” (A Thesis, McGill University, Montreal, 1960), p. 97.
22 On the sayyids of Bilgram, see the entry “Bilgram” in The Encyclopaedia of Islam (New Edition) (Leiden:

E.J. Brill, 1986), v. 1, p. 1218-9.

23 See Naquib al-Attas, Historical Fact and Fiction, p. 90.
24 See al-Haddad 1403/1983:6-7; al-Baqir 1986:42. An 19th century Babad Cerbon, for instance, mentions

Syekh Jamaluddin a-Akbar or Jumadil Kubro as the first wali who came to Nusantara from the line of the
Prophet Muhammed:
“Kacapa kandi asal mula; para wali Jawa kabeh; ingkang dhihin Sunan Bonang; iku kamulanira; panceran
tedhaking Rasul; saking Syekh Jumadilkubra.
Jumadilkubra sisiwi; lanang ika kang peparab; Syekh Molana Samsu Tamres [Tabarez];
jumeneng pandhita Cempa; akrama putra Cempa; ing kanane wus amasyhur;
pandhita Mustaqim Akbar.
paputra jalu kakalih; kang nama Tubagus Rakhmat; ya hiku Susunan Ampel; kalih Tubagus Aliman; sakalih
angejawa; ngajak Islam ming sang ratu; Majapahit datan karsa."
(It is told of the origins of Wali Songo in the land of Java; it begins with Sunan Bonang; his ancestors came
from the Holy Prophet’s family through Syekh Jumadil Kubro who was the first to preaching Islam [from
this line of family]. Syekh Jumadil Kubro begot a son whose name is Syekh Maulana Syamsu Tabarez,
known popularly as Pandita Champa [ulama of Champa] or Pandita Mustaqim Akbar, who married the
daughter of the king of Champa (known as putri Champa) and begot two sons: Raden Rahmat or Sunan
Ampel [who begot Sunan Bonang] and Raden Aliman [Syekh Maulana Ishak]. Both went to Java to
propagate Islam before king of Majapahit but the latter refused).
Brandes, Babad Tjerbon, pp. 69-70.
Raffles has preserved another legend from Gresik of Syekh Jumadil Kubro as a preceptor of the first wali,
Raden Rahmat, the future Sunan Ampel, born of the union of an Arab scholar and a princess of Champa,
Raden Rahmat arrived first in Palembang and from there traveled on to Majapahit. He landed at Gresik,
'where he visited one ascetic called Syekh Molana Jomadil Kobra, a devotee who had established himself
on Gunung Jali, and who declared to him that his arrival at that particular period had been predicted by
the Holy Prophet; that the fall of Hindu-Budhinese Majapahit was at hand, and that he was elected to
preach the doctrine of Mahomet in the eastern ports of Java. See Raffles, History of Java, v. 2, p. 117.

14
Maulana Jumadil Kubro when he first came to Majapahit. He came to Java together with
his family and left his son, Syekh Ibrahim Zain al-Akbar as-Samarqandi (d. + 1387), in
Pasai to spread Islam in Sumatra, sailing on to Semarang, spending many years in
Javanese capital of Majapahit. He later left Java and went to settle in the land of Buginese
kingdom Tosora propagating Islam there. He was the earliest propagator of Islam in
South Sulawesi, died there in the first half of 14th century and popularly known as
Imam Towajok [the religious leader of Wajonese people, not Tuwajuk or Tuwejo as
Naquib al-Attas writes25].
His son, Syekh Ibrahim as-Samarqandi (known also as Ibrahim Makdum Asmoro or
Syamsu Tabarez), married a Cambodian princess and begot two sons, Syekh Maulana
Ishaq (the future father of Sunan Giri) and Syekh Rahmatullah or Sunan Ampel. Through
another son, Ali Nurul Alam, Jamaluddin became the great-grandfather of Sunan Gunung
Jati (founder of early 16th century Bantenese and Cirebonese sultanate), and through a
third son, Zainal Alim, the grandfather of yet another wali, Maulana Malik Ibrahim (d.
1419). Syekh Ibrahim Asmoro is said to having propagated Islam in Sumatera, including
Pasai and Palembang, first ruler of Malaka sultanate, the north coast of Borneo, Sulu
islands and the land of Mindanao, southern Philiphine. He then came to Java and buried
in Tuban.
The importance of Syekh Jamaluddin and his son in this new trajectory, according many
local traditions, in Malay and Javanese, lies at their attempts to make Islam of
mainstream Ahlussunnah Waljamaah (the Sunnis) more integrated as essential part of
cultural-civilizational forces of Nusantara. With their skillfully crafted deliberations
Islam was represented not merely as formal creeds and doctrines to which people
subscribe or formal structure of the religious institutions in which they are enrolled.
But, more importantly, Islam was presented as an active components of religious life
exerting a powerful influence in the minds, feelings and aspirations of the people, and
the whole of their lives, which goes deeply into the inner world of their culture, being
one of their identity and personality, while at the same time it constitutes one of the
best examples demonstrating the dynamism and the potentiality of Nusantara
civilization in the world, providing them with the strength and resilience to build the
nation in freedom, dignity and security.
That is in particular what the 19th Cirebonese Carub Kandha vividly describes
regarding their mission to Nusantara (beginning from Campa as a vantage point of
departure26):

[Sinom]

Berkahe sang Waliyullah; ingkang lenyep lampahneki; sarira tinam tunir; ing Cempa
wus padha mati; seger maning manah iki; klawan tur kan kirang banyu; wareg sarwa
pinangan; tineka sarwa kumelip; sarupaning kekewan tur padha manak.

Saking paulatane gampang; wong dagang padha dum bathi; suka maring kang pinuja;
pan ya akeh ing nemahi; ing sagrenjeting ati; karomat Batara Agung; Sang Samsu
Tambres ika; gesang kawarasan iki; tan katekan sasalad lan pancabaya.

25Naquib al-Attas, Historical Fact and Fiction, p. 90. al-Haddad 1403/1983:8-11).

26 Regarding Champa as a strategic basis of Alawiyyin (sayyid or asyraf communities) for Islamization of
Nusantara in the 13th century, see Muhammad ad-Dimasyqi (Syekh Rabwah), Kitab Nukhbatu-d-Dahri fi
Ajaibi-Barri wa-l-Bahri (ed. Fuat Sezgin) (Frankfurt am Main: Institute for the History of Arabic-Islamic
Science, 1994), pp. 168-9. My thanks are due to Prof. Naquib al-Attas for pointing out this important text
in his Historical Fact and Fiction, pp. 4, 13.

15
 Wis suci sajrone desa; Ki Juragan desa muslim; tur slamet sami sentosa; tipang taun
sinungsung iki; isine Cempa sami; anderek darusing [darwish] iku; lawan
amantubillah.

Panggonane para Ahli; Sunah lan Jamah masjid agung gumawang ...27
(With the blessings [barakah] of waliyullah Syekh Jumadil Kubro and his son, old established
practices, even crops, died out and perished in the land of Champa. And, then, after the
coming of Waliyullah, everything came to life again. They had plenty of water. Anything
planted grew well. Food is tasty and everyone eat well. All cheerfullness comes in to
everyone life. So as are wildlife and animal; they are easy to breed.

That is a good place to live in. Its people are happy to be traders and make good fortune. They
are all keen to pray and observe religious duties thanks to their piety and devotion to the
Almighty God.

As for Syekh Samsu Tabarez, he has received the blessing (karamah) of God, being well and
looking great, and has no difficulties or all sorts of danger.

All this village became a blessed, Muslim one. Thanks are due to the effort of the Master-Wali
[Kiai Juragan, i.e. Syekh Jumadil Kubro] who brings in security and prosperity to the country.
Three years had passed since the people of Champa followed the teachings of this ulama-
waliyullah (darwish, sufi master), with their sincere devotion to Almighty God, in carrying on
the tradition of Islam of mainstream Ahlussunnah Waljamaah. Mosques stood proudly in the
country).

There is one key as our text indicates to demonstrate the dynamism and the
potentiality of Nusantara civilization during the second, later phase of Islamization:
the concept of barakah (blessing, grace). Barakah (Ar.) or berkah (Ml, Jv.) literally
means in Arabic ziyadah fil-khair, increase in goodness. When you confer on
someone or something barakah, that he/she or it has barakah, you give it the
added qualities he/she or it already has but more specific, even powerful in terms
of its spiritual or religious significance. Where Nusantara is said to be endowed
with the qualities of barakah, there are two points in case. Firstly, the people of
Nusantara have already attached to Islam along with all its tenets and
organizations of mainstream Ahlussunnah Waljamaah from which flows the
barakah of the Holy Prophet’s descendants; Secondly, Islam – or, more specifically,
the identity of being Moslem – at the same time helps them to empower the
dynamism and their civilization and to enrich their cultural resources as well so as
to bring out the best of what they can do to contribute positively to tne world by
promoting Islamic norms and values of universal humanity, i.e. Islam rahmatan lil-
alamin (Islam as blessings for all).

This is the main argument the Waliyulah have set up as to the question of why
Islam Nusantara has now come to the fore. Yes, on one side, we Indonesian people
are Moslems; however, on the other side, Islam assists us to demonstrate the
dynamism and the potentiality of our culture and civilization.

Syekh Jumadil Kubro was well aware of the greatness of Javanese kingdom at the
time when they – under the leadership of Raden Wijaya (d. 1309), first ruler of
Majapahit – succesfully wiped the Mongols military expeditions out of Nusantara in

27 Carub Kandha Carang Seket, pp. 13-4. This text, compiled and rewritten from the old material by one
Cirebonese santri named Muhammad Nur, identifies Syekh Jumadil Kubro’s son as Syamsu Tabarez,
father of Sunan Ampel and Syekh Maulana Ishaq.

16
1297. This is in contrast to what happened to the Arabs after the collapse of the
glorious city of Baghdad at the hands of the Mongols in 1258 that led to the decline
of the Arab civilisation. Library was destroyed. Schools dispersed. Even worstly:
the mentality of inferiority was widespread in every corner of society.28 “After the
disaster of the Mongol conquest, the irrigational canals and the dykes fell into
disrepair and the whole area gradually went over from the ideology of settled
agriculture to the ways of a nomad society,” writes Indian historian K.N. Chaudhuri
in his Asia before Europe.29

After the fall of Baghdad many Arabs began to turn their eyes to eastern parts of
the globe, i.e. India, Southeast Asia, and China, looking for human societies with a
high level of cultural and technological development; while Islam in Arab countries
experienced decline and decadence. On this wake did florish a puritanical religious
propagandists such as Ibn Taymiyah (died 1328) and his colleagues of literalist
religious ideology (nashshi zhahiri). The tombs of saints were destroyed, religious
organization such as tariqat or mystic congregation disbanded, freedom of
madzhab curtailed, and Islamic learning fell into stagnation and inertia. Madzhab
followers had been blamed for the widespread of taqlid (blind following) and
ignorance: it was to justify, as propagated by Ibn Taymiyah, the return to the
simple, original Islam without reason and madzhab.

Syekh Jumadil Kubra were absolutely disappointed with the situation. He was shocked
by the appearance of puritan religious propagandists of Ibn Taymiyyah kind who
propagated as a compensation of today’s defeat the return to the pristine Islam devoid
of all its madzhab, rational and tasawuf streams. He felt that it was not an alternative
model of religiosity nor is the bright future of Islamic civilisation. Instead, Syekh Jumadil
Kubro paid a respectful attention to Jawi or Nusantara as a global option for Islam to be
revived once again with pride and dignity among the human civilisation. “Seger maning
manah iki” (everything came to life again), as Carub Kandha quoted above testifies to
the revival of Islam in the fourteenth century Tanah Jawi or Nusantara owing essentially
to its barakah, i.e. as one center of excellence which is occupied with the greatness and
qualities of world civilisation.
Hikayat Banjar, an 17th century Malay text from South Kalimantan, under the
influence of Sunan Giri,30 makes this Nusantara’s barakah more explicit in such a
way that Jawi is sen as abode of barakah where everyone from abroad come to live
in and make good fortune:
Baik kamu lari dari nagri Kaling [India] ini mancari tampat lain. Adapun lamun kamu
hendak bardiam pada tempat lain dari sini, cari tanah itu maka tabuk kira-kira
sapancaluk di tengah malam itu.

28 See Muhammad Shalih Dawud al-Qazzaz, al-Hayatu-s-Siyasiyah fi-l-Iraq fi Ahdi-s-Saytharati-l-

Mughuliyah (Baghdad: University of Baghdad, 1970), pp. 111-20.
29 K.N. Chaudhuri, Asia before Europe, p. 80.
30 The founder of Banjarese dynasty, Suryanata, the hikayat said, was converted to Islam by “an Arab who

came from overseas”, explicitly known in one version as Syekh Madiun from Pasai (presumably Syekh
Makdum Ibrahim whose name is already mentioned above as Syekh Jumadil Kubro’s son). See J.J. Ras,
Hikajat Bandjar: A Study in Malay Historiography (KITLV Bibliotheca Indonesica No. 1) (The Hague:
Nijhoff, 1968), pp. 35, 155. Sunan Giri is the great- grandchildren of Syekh Jumadil Kubro. So we can
safely say from this moment that this text is heavily in line with the framework Syekh Jumadil Kubro and
his son have outlined in this new trajectory of Islamization, that is empowering both Islam and Nusantara
inseparably.

17
 Ambil sekepal tanah itu: lamun rasanya hangat serta bau harum, itu baik tempat
berdiam, banyak barkatnya pada bumi itu: barang ditanam menjadi, penyakit pun
jauh, orang dagang banyak yang datang, sateru pun jauh, sukar ia mengira-ngirakan
manyarang, barkat tuah tanah itu; banyak makmur, sedikit yang sukar.

(It is better for you to flee from India and find yourself another home. Now if you
wish to go and live elsewhere, in your search for such a country, at midnight while
arriving at that country you must dig a hole, only deep enough for you to be able to
touch the bottom with your hand. Take a clod of earth, and if feels warm and smells
sweet, that is a good place to live in. It will be a blessed country, and anything
planted will grow well. Disease will also be rare, foreign traders will come in great
numbers and enemies will keep their distance; they will find it hard to contrive an
attack owing to the country’s good barakah. Most thing will flourish and few will
prove difficult).31

The expression “banyak barkatnya pada bumi itu” (a blessed country) describes
considerably one striking feature of this second generation of Muslim
propagandists in Nusantara heralded by Syekh Jumadil Kubro. That is their strong
attachment to the land of Jawi, strengthened as abode of barakah, land of peace and
prosperity, on whose name they fought relentlessly against enemies from within
and without (as in the case of Sunan Gunung Jati against the early 16th century
Portugese power), in which they eventually died and buried. Although they are
from the undisputed Arabic origins of Holy Prophet descendants, they help develop
a religious backdrop on which the argument for Nusantara stands. For their part,
the best way to understand and practice Islam as rahmatan lil-alamin ougth to be
conducted from our civilisational storage, using our rich cultural resources of
different local languages, in such a way that they are part of us, being one with our
people, in identity, solidarity and personality.32

We need Islam, as much as we need air and water to live. When we become
Muslims, we are effectively endowed with the qualities of barakah: we prospered,
our economy moving around, foundation of our nation established and we know
universal ethics. Islamization means to a greater degree an essential condition
allowing the realization of our supreme ideals and promoting the perfection of all.

That was what Syekh Jumadil Kubro and his son had to do when presenting Islam to the
population. As the first ruler of Malaka, Parameswara, was converted to Islam by Syekh
Ibrahim Asmoro or Ibrahim Makhdum around 1376 or 1391,33 the first thing to do was
how to mobilize Malaka’s resources to be one of centers of the world economy. The idea
was later implemented by his son, Sultan Iskandar Syah (r. 1414-1423), by making
political and economic contact with the Caisar of China, with two goals in mind: first to
maintain the trading networks connecting Malacca Straits to China, and, secondly, to

31 Ras, Hikajat Bandjar, pp. 231, 237 – translation modified slightly.

32 This is reflected for example in the inscription at the tombstone in Gresik of Syekh Maulana Malik
Ibrahim bin Zaynal Alam Barakat. The inscription mentions a local name like a second identity ascribed to
him (al-ma’ruf bi) by Javanese people for this grandson of Syekh Jumadil Kubro. Unfortunately, till today
the identity of this local name is still unknown precisely to the archeologists and historians. See
discussion on this in N.A. Baloch, Advent of Islam in Indonesia (Area Center Study, Pakistan, 1979), pp. 36-
40.
33 See Naquib al-Attas, Historical Fact and Fiction, pp. 67.

18
seek permission from the Caisar to coin small money of pewter replicating Chinese picis
and he gave the name kati (Caezis in Portugese report).34

The introduction of coinage was one of strategic missions by the Walis to further the
development of Nusantara, so as to awaken all its energies, to lead its fellow citizens to
overcome their propensity to indolence, and encourages them to strive for economic
eminence among other nations. The Ternatans in Moluccas, for instance, according to
the Portugese voyager Galvao’s report of 1544, attributed their coinage, writing,
religion, music, laws, and all the other good things they had to Javanese Muslim
missionaris who converted them to Islam around 1470.35 Antonio Pigafetta, Venetian
voyager who visited Moluccas in 1521, including one of the oldest clove-producing
islands, Tidore, had learned in his diaries that until Muslims began coming to Ternate
and Tidore, which he estimated to be about 1470, the Moluccans did not care for the
cloves (Sono forse cinquanta anni che questi Mori abitano in Maluco: prima li abitavano
Gentili e non apprezzavano li garofoli).36

As for the establishment of the foundation of our nation, the Walis helped our fellow
citizens to build and uphold the unity of Nusantaranese kingdoms alongside with
Islamization. Take for example one political lesson Karaeng Matoaya (d. 1632), the first
Macassarese ruler who was converted in 1600 at the hand of Sunan Giri Prapen’s
disciples, had learnt from early Walis :37
Nanakana todong Karaenga Matoaya: se’reji ata naruwa karaeng; nibunoi
tumasso’naya angkanaya sisalai Gowa Talloq.38

(Karaeng Matoaya said: In the time of this king [of Tallo] it was said that there was
only one subject [i.e. one national unity or one Nusantaranese subject exactly39],
although there are two kings. People who dreamed of dividing Gowa and Tallo were
put to death).

As will be discussed in following chapter, the idea of national unity (se’reji ata) was
already promoted by Sunan Giri at the ideologico-epistemological level after its
introduction by Sunan Ampel from his father and the latter from his father (Syekh

34 See Walter de Gray Birch (ed.), The Commentaries of the Great Afonso Dalboqurque, Second Viceroy of
India (London: Hakluyt Society, 1880), vol. 3, pp. 77-8.
35 Quoted in Anthony Reid, Southeast Asia in the Age of Commerce, 1450-1680 (Vol. 2: Expansion and Crisis)

(New Haven & London: Yale University Press [edition of Silkworms Books], 1993), p. 6.
36 See in Alessandro Bausani (ed.), L’Indonesia nella Relazione di Viaggio di Antonio Pigafetta (Roma:

Istituto Italiano per il Medio ed Estremo Oriente & Centro Italiano di Cultura-Jakarta, 1972), p. 51.

37For the Islamizaton of Macassarese from Giri, see in Lalu Wacana (ed.), Babad Lombok (Jakarta: Proyek
Penerbitan Buku Bacaan dan Sastra Indonesia dan Daerah Departemen Pendidikan dan Kebudayaan,
1979), p. 99.

38 In William Cummings (ed.), A Chain of Kings: The Makassarese Chronicles of Gowa and Talloq (Leiden:
KITLV Press, 2007), p. 98.
39 See discussion on this post-Wali Songo reconstruction of Nusantaranese political reason regarding “one

subject”, in my Pesantren Studies 4A (Tangerang Selatan: Pustaka Afid, 2013).

19
Jumadil Kubro) at the practical level during the periode of new trajectory of
Islamization.
The lesson of national unity as one culturally unified package with Islamization is also
told in the 17th century Buginese chronicle, Lontara’ Sukku’na Wajo, concerning an
Islamisation of Buginese kingdoms at the hand of the same Tallo ruler Karaeng Matoaya
mentioned above:
Amaseangngi Karaengnge mualai ce’de’na muarola sada’ ri Gowa, mupada
makkasiwiang ri Dewata seuae.
Na to Appamole baliwi ada Karaengnge Matoae:
[Ma]Sada’na, Karaeng, tapada makkassiwiang ri Dewata seuae. Naia kuellau
temmare’du’e wesseku ten ritimpa sarewokku tenrisesse’ balawo ritampu’ku. Naiana
arolakku ri Gowa dekko llaoi rimusu’, sitinro’ni pada to Gowa, lima wajukkumua kuattaroi
bokong sewali ppalattu’ka’ sewali pparewe’ka’. Napabeta mammusu’ Gowa, napada
pabeta Wajo. Naia dekko mallopio, tessitinro’ni’, apa’ tekkuisseng mallopie. Ttudammua’
ribola tudangekku mamanasako pabeta, napabeta bare’ Gowa, napada pabeta Wajo’.
Naiappa nassarang Gowa Wajo, Dewataeppa ppassarangngi.
Nakkeda Karaengnge:
Kukadoiritu adammu to Wajo. Ella upo kuwerekko, mupekulleiwi alemu makkasiwiang ri
Allah Ta’ala marola ri Na’bi Mohamma’ shallallahualaihiwasallam.40

(“Do me the favor of accepting a small token from me, that you follow Gowa kingdom
into Islam and that you all offer homage to the one God,” asked Karaeng Matoaya.
To Appamole [the Wajo leader] replied to King Matoaya:
“We have made the profession of faith, Your Majesty, and we all offer homage to the one
God. I request that my rice be not torn out, my mats not opened, and the mice not cut
out from the folds of my sarong.
So I will follow Gowa. When Gowa goes to war we will follow as Gowanese, and I will
bring my victuals in my sleeves, one for the journey out and one for the journey home.
When Gowa is victorious in war, so is Wajo is victorious. If you go by ship, the we will
not follow, for I cannot sail. I will then sit my house hoping that you win, and if Gowa
wins then Wajo wins also. Gowa and Wajo cannot be divided, and if they are divided
then only God can separate them.”41

40 See in Jacobus Noorduyn, Een Achttiende-eeuwse Kroniek van Wadjo: Buginese Historiografie (‘s-
Gravenhage, 1955), p. 266 – with slight difference redaction. Sada’ or massada’ in verb is from Arabic
syahadat, that is, proclamation of Islamic faith by pronouncing “asyhaduanlailahaillallah, waasyhadu anna
muhammadan rasulullah” by which someone become Muslim.
41 I translate “Naia ppa nassarang Gowa Wajo, Dewataeppa ppassarangngi” ([Gowa and Wajo cannot be

divided forever]; if one day they are divided, then only God can separate them by His will). Noorduyn
translates it with “Dan pas scheiden Goa en Wadjo, als God hen scheidt” (When Gowa and Wajo have
separated, then it is the will of God to divide them), while Anthony Reid’s translation is “Only then Goa
and Wajo be divided, since God has divided them”. See Noorduyn, Een Achttiende-eeuwse Kroniek van
Wadjo, p. 267; Anthony Reid, Charting the Shape of Early Modern Southeast Asia (Chiang Mai: Silkworm
Books, 1999), p. 142. Both Noorduyn and Reid presumed that God has made Gowa and Wajo divided and
separated, not united. Actually they did not capture fully the sense of Buginese “naia ppa nassarang ...
Dewataeppa ppassarangngi”. It is likely if you say to a newly-wed couple that both of you “naia ppa
nassarang ... Dewataeppa ppassarangngi”, you clearly say a prayer or a wish for them that may both of you
are bounded in unity for the whole of your life, not separated; if you are separated, then it is only the will
of God. This is in contrast when you say to them as follows: “Only then both of you be divided, since God
has divided you”, then you wish them to divorce soon!

20
 Karaeng Matoaya replied: “I agree with what you have said. Wajorese, I grant what you
request, as you make an effort to offer homage to Allah ta’ala and to follow the Prophet
Mohammad – may the grace be upon him.”)

In another text, it is said that when Karaeng Matoaya did the early 16th century “Islam
war” (bundu masallanga) for Islamization of Wajo, Bone and Soppeng kingdoms,

he did not plunder, he did not levy any indemnity or impose any tribute, he did not want
to do so. Tumenanga r Bonto Biraeng [Matoaya’s son Karaeng Pattingalloang] used to say,
“Karaeng Matoaya said to me, when I defeated the Tellungpoccoe [the Buginese alliance of
Bone-Wajo-Soppeng] I did not even pluck the leaves of trees; I did not want to do so; I
distributed about three hundred kati [one coinage that prevailed at that time from
Malacca to eastern Indonesian seas], I gave it in the form of presents of porcelain.42

This passage points out another lesson, ethical one, to be learnt by the people of
Nusantara, that is, a universal ethics in time of war and peace which is part of an old
Indonesian statecraft. This ethics is partly excavated from pra-Islamic traditions, as one
finds in a contractual pact known by Buginese between the king and his subjects,
between the victors and their subjugateds after the war,43
or in the Javanese ethics of justice and rule of law known from the 7th century great
queen Ratu Sima to the period of Majapahit.44 These traditions were later revived by the
Wali Songo and integrated as part of Islam Nusantara brilliant ijtihad in the field of law,
constitution and political ethics (fiqih siyasah) for which they took many lessons from
Imam al-Ghazali’s books, especially at-Tibrul Masbuk fi Nashihatil Muluk and Ihya
Ulumiddin.45 The argument for this integration was exemplified by one of disciples of
Sunan Bonang implements this ideologico-epistemological reconstruction in dealing
with actual case of his time:

The 1934 composed-Surakarta Serat Babad Sekaten (MS KS 182.6/398 Ra/SMP 118/6).
It is told that in a conference between the Wali Songo and the Sultan of Demak, Raden

42 Quoted in Reid, Charting the Shape of Early Modern Southeast Asia, p. 143 – with slight different
redaction.
43 See Mattulada, Latoa: Satu Lukisan Analitis terhadap Antropologi Politik Orang Bugis (Yogyakarta:

Gadjah Mada University Press, 1985); and Andi Zainal Abidin, Wajo pada abad XV-XVI: Suatu Penggalian
Sejarah Terpendam Sulawesi Selatan dari Lontaraʾ (Jakarta: Alumni, 1985).
44 On the ethics of justice of Ratu Sima see W.P. Groeneveldt, “Notes on the Malay Archipelago and

Malacca, compiled from Chinese resources” (VBG, vol. 39) (Batavia: Albrecht & Co., 1880), p. 14; and
Slamet Muljana, Undang-undang Majapahit (Jakarta: Tintamas, 1968).
45 See my discussion on this in Pesantren Studies 4A, ch. 8. The 19th century Cirebonese Carub Kandha

mentions this integration as part of Wali Songo in building anew our civilization after the fall of
Majapahit: “padha tiru Majapait; den tiwa-tiwa; lan den arani Jawi” (Cirebonese people emulate Majapahit
for their statecraft, till they are one of Javanese). See Carub Kandha,, p. 347.

A compendia of jurisprudence of Old Javanese origin such as the Jugul Mudha, Surya Ngalam, Praniti Raja
Kapa-Kapa, and Serat Raja Kapa-Kapa, were also incorporated into the Javanese law court of the 16th
century Demak. See the Demak-originated Javanese Kitab Toehpah, in T. Roorda (ed.), Kitab Toehpah: een
Javaansch Handboek voor het Mohammedaansche Recht (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1895).

21
Patah Sultan Syah Alam Akbar, the Walis reported that the fortunes of the people of Java
began to declne with the fall of the Hindu kingdom of Majapahit. The land was plagued
by many mishaps; crops failed consecutively, people live in poverty and as result, Islam
had no chance to take root and develop. The Sultan then asked the counsel of saints for
ideas that would solve the problems and bring good fortune back.
Sunan Kalijogo, a young wali amongst the nine saints in tbe Wali Songo, then asked
permission to speak:

“Milords, give permission to speak. For a long while, i have been pondering upon the
problems we are facing and I have attempted to do my utmost to pray for Allah’s
guidance. One night in my meditations, I heard a voice say: ‘My son, Kalijogo. If you want
the good fortune of the country to return, restore the old traditions [buda]. Choose
elements from the old culture that can be used to enrich the new.’
Milords, these were the very words I heard. With your wisdom, explain for all of us to hear
its meaning”.

On hearing those words, the saints fell silent. Although Sunan Kalijogo was the youngest
amongst them, they felt that he had proven himself to be highly knowledgeable
especially in matters concerning Islam and culture. The message he put forward to them
was not easy to read. To return to the old traditions would mean a return to Hinduism
and Buddhism. Furthermore, the worship of idols inherent in them constitutes a great
sin in Islam. The saints could not find an answer and only shook their heads. What did it
means to choose elements from the old to enrich the new?
Sunan Kalijogo spoke again, very cautiously:

“Milords, again I ask your indulgence for my misbehaviour. We have to admit that so far
the drum (bedhug) in our mosque has only made the people deaf (budheg) towards the
teachings of Islam. Can we not place the gamelan beside the drum?”

Most of the saints shook their heads in disapproval. Put musical instruments in mosque?
Impossible! Sunan Kali continued spiritedly:

“Milords, Buddhists and Hindus have helped us build the mosque [of Demak] in many
ways, by cutting down trees and transporting the wood from forest to the city. Is that not
taking elements of the old to build the new?
If gamelan is regarded as an old element of our culture, could we not read the name of
Allah upon it to make it righful for us, since we can make cooked meat rightful to eat by
pronouncing the basmalah [Bismillahirrahmanirrahim] upon it? Could we not make other
things rightful in same way?
If teh drum cannot open the people’s ears to listen to the teachings of our religion, why
can’t we play the gamelan and allow the people to dance and sing to glorify Allah The
Almighty?
Furthermore, since it is a requirement to say a mantra before entering the courtyard of a
temple, is it not possible to pronounce the kalimah syahadah before entering the precinct
of a mosque in order to listen to the gamelan? If the gamelan, which we have already
made righful cannot be placed in the mosque, why can’orang-orang we build a special
place for it in the mosque compound? When people are in the mosque and enjoying the
sounds of gamelan music, we have the opportunity to tell them more about our religion.
Isn’orang-orang it so that since they have already pronounced the creed, they have the
right to receive more teachings?

22
 Besides, if our ancestors the kings and the queens of Majapahit made shraddha,46 why
can’t the Sultan make the same offering and call it hajat dalem, that is the king’s
ceremonial sacrifice to pray for Allah’s blessings and mercy? Wouldn’t all these
encompass borrowing elements from the old culture to empower and enrich the new? Let
the old customs become the container and the elements of faith the contents (wujud buda
nanging rasa Islam). What we have to do is to make the container fit the contents”.47

This is our point in this chapter as suggested by Sunan Kalijaga: “borrowing elements
from the old culture to empower and enrich the new; let the old customs become the
container and the elements of faith the contents (wujud buda nanging rasa Islam).”
As conclusion, Islamization process that was set in motion by the new generation of
Muslim missionaries from Champa and Pasai – identified as Walis of the Prophet’s
descendants – have contributed much to maintain the continuity of religious and
scientific basis of the tradition of Islam Ahlussunnah Waljamaah, while, simultaneously,
it have stimulated and developed a new tradition of knowledge and culture with its
distinct roots in the Archipelago. This new tradition did surely activate the whole
energies and potentialities of our nation to constitute a new Nusantara-based body of
Islamic civilisation which is subsequently called Islam Nusantara or Din Arab Jawi as
coined by Sunan Giri. And from this new substance comes an ideologico-epistemological
reconstruction of Islam as rahmatan lil lamin.***

46 Shraddha are offerings made to the souls of ancestors. This practice is known among the Hindus
adherents, and still performed today for instance by the East Java Tengger Hindu communities.
47 See Noto Soeroto, “Wat is Sekaten?”, pp. 248-9; Soewito Santoso, “Introduction”, in The Centhini Story:

The Javanese Journey of Life (Singapore: Marshall Cavendish, 2006), pp. 15-6.

23
3
“Din Arab Jawi” and the Wali Songo’s Idea of Unity:
Islam in a New Civilisational Body

Les penseurs du XVIIIe siècleont done cherché à introduire unité et continuité dans l’histoire de la
philosophie ...

----- Émile Bréhier, Histoire de la philosophie, vol. 1, p. 20.

Wali Songo – means literally the nine saints or the council of nine saints48 – is the most
misperceived figure in the history of Nusantara. Many books have been written about
this subject; but very few of them have ever clarified the intellectual fallacies
surrounding these men of earlier propagators of Islam in Java. Most of the writings still
regard Wali Songo as fictitious, half-truth or just figures shrouded in the web of myths
and legends.
Although there is an appreciation, but categories alien to Nusantara culture, like
“syncretism” (on the part of orientalist from Pigeuad to Ricklefs, who prefer the term
“mystic synthesis” to syncretism but the essence is the same), “not-kaffah”, not genuine
and pristine Islam (on the part of puritan Muslim scholars), or “holders of violent
hegemony against religious opposition of Syekh Siti Jenar”49 are still used to be attached
to the Wali Songo legacy. Even the Indonesian Muslim intellectuals, like Azyumardi Azra
in his book, The Origins of Islamic Reformism, do not unreasonably pay enough attention
to the contributions the Walis made in the proces of Islamization or in the early
networkings of Indonesian ulama as well.
If we want to discuss Islam Nusantara in the absence of Wali Songo, it is like talking
about a son without his father, a forest in the absence of its trees. Wali Songo legacy is
the foundation on which Islam Nusantara rests. Sunan Ampel, Syekh Maulana Ishaq,
Sunan Bonang and Sunan Giri are the pioneers who related the Nusantara experiences
from the inside, and the first to chart Nusantara memory as far back as they could go.
We have seen in their tradition an activity called writing, in the form of invention of new
aksara or script. Sunan Bonang was the first to introduce Javanese script hanacaraka, as
known in the period of Majapahit, as a medium to articulate Islamic teachings.50 While

48 Wali Songo ia a collective term for a group of nine eminent Javanese saints who were responsible for
the inial spread of Islam in Nusantara in the 15th century. They are all called “sunan”, an honorific literally
translated as “the highly esteemed one”. Representing the first generations of walis in Java, they are:
Maulana Malik Ibrahim (d. 1419), Raden Rahmat Sunan Ampel (d. 1481), Sunan Bonang (d. 1525), Sunan
Drajat (d. 1533), Sunan Giri (d. 1506), Sunan Gunung Jati (d. 1569), Sunan Kalijogo (d. 1513), Sunan
Muria (d. 1551) and Sunan Kudus (d. 1550). See Nurcholis and H. Ahmad Mundzir, Menapak jejak
Sulatnul auliya Sunan Bonang (Tuban: Penerbit Mulai Abadi, 2013), p. 22, for the date of Wali Songo’s
passing.
49 The latest publication in this issue is Nancy K. Florida’s book, Writing the Past, Inscribing the Future:

History as Prophecy in Colonial Java (Durham & London: Duke University Press, 1995), who holds up the
authority of Walis against the so-called deviant marginalized opposition of Siti Jenar and his men of
pesantren!
50 See the works attributed to Sunan Bonang in G.W.J. Drewes, The Admonitions of Seh Bari, A 16th Century

Javanese Muslim text attributed to the Saint of Bonang, re-edited and translated with an introduction, (The
Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1969); and, Sri Harti Widyastuti, Suluk Wujil: Suntingan Teks dan Tinjauan
Semiotik (Semarang: Mekar, 2001). A Javanese text dated 1596 from Sidayu, Gresik, presumably written
by Sunan Bonang or one of his disciples, takes into account the lessons on the elementary religious duties

24
Sunan Giri was the pioneer in inventing pegon script (Arabic letters with Javanese
spoken language) to adapt Islamic texts more intimately to the Javanese communities,
and later adopted by his disciples from around Indonesia.51
Script, language and writing are the first step for crafting the creative genius of
Nusatara civilisation when used as a vehicle to investigating and projecting the inner
experiences of our communities as promoted by Syekh Jumadil Kubra and his son. As a
point of departure the latter helped define the greatness of Nusantara alongside with
the supremacy of Islam, preoccupied with building the egalitarian, ethical and non-
stratified society as their determination springs out of the very roots of their history
and their civilization. And, what Wali Songo tried to achieve immediately afterwards is
to identify on an ideologico-epistemological level the cultural elements of Nusantara’s
fundamentals on which to make Islam and Nusantara intermingled one with another to
produce a new body then named Islam Nusantara or Din Arab Jawi. These cultural
elements are featured as following: adaptive, flexible, tolerant, mutual respect, durable
in times of any type, collective or communal (guyub), consensus-oriented
(musyawarah), brotherhood and friendship as one big family (kekeluargaan) and
mutual aid or cooperation (gotong royong). That is what Sunan Giri Syekh Muhammad
Ainul Yaqin have to do when he first coin for this epistemological crafting the term Din
Arab Jawi.
The term insofar as I know emerged particularly in Serat Surya Raja, the late 18century
Jogjakarta kraton-based manuscript. The A.J. 1700/A.D. 1774-composed text is already
discussed at length by Merle Ricklefs in his Jogjakarta under Sultan Mangkubumi.52 But
one thing is lacking in Ricklefs’s account, which is the identity of Din Arab Jawi
mentioned in the text. One version of this text refers to the inauguration and crowning
of one Javanese king with the title “Kimudin Arab Jawi” 53 (the Upholder of the Ideology
Din Arab Jawi) by one waliyullah named Raja Pandita Giri, Sinuhun Giri or Panembahan
ing Giri (variations of Sunan Giri honorary titles in the text).
Kimudin consists of two Arabic words: kimu, used imperfectly in line with the
calculation of syllables in the context of Javanese tembang or song, from qaimun,
upholder; din means religion of Islam; while Jawi means Nusantara, not limited to Java.
So, it may safe to deduce from this that the term Din Arab Jawi used by Sunan Giri is
identical with Islam Nusantara.

by showing Javanese how to write Arabic spoken texts in their own hanacaraka script. The text had been
edited by J.G.H. Gunning and published in 1881. See his Een Javaansch Geschrift uit de 16de eeuw
Handelende over den Mohammedaanschen Godsdienst naar een Leidch Handschrift uitgegeven en met
Aanteekeningen voorzien (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1881).
51 As jawi script (Arabic letters with Malay spoken language) is already in use in Môalay culture as earlier

as the first part of the 14th century as found in the Trengganu inscription, serang script (Arabic letters
with Buginese-Macassarese spoken language) has been introduced in the earlier 17th century by one of
disciples of Sunan Giri Prapen, grandson of Sunan Giri, who propagated Islam in South Sulawesi. The text
attributed to Sunan Giri in pegon script was published with the title Babad Demak Pesisiran by Indonesian
Ministry of Education and Culture in 1984. See Penelitian Bahasa dan Sastra Babad Demak Pesisiran
(Jakarta: Pusat Pembinaan dan Pengembangan Bahasa Departemen Pendidikan dan Kebudayaan, 1984).
The same text with a slightly different redaction is found in the collection of Pesantren Tarbiyatut
Thalabah, Kranji, Lamongan, East Java, entitled Babad Tanah Jawi. See the complete text in
http://eap.bl.uk/database/overview_item.a4d?catId=163306;r=6617 (accessed 12 August 2016).
52 Merle C. Ricklefs, Jogjakarta under Sultan Mangkubumi 1749-1792: A History of the Division of Java

(London: Oxford University Press, 1974), ch. 7.

53 See Endah Susi Lantini, et. al., Refleksi Nilai-nilai Budaya Jawa dalam Serat Surya Raja (Jakarta:

Departemen Pendidikan dan Kebudayaan, 1996/1997), pp. 106, 283.

25
The following question is: where did this text by the Crown Prince of Jogjakarta kraton
(the future Hamengkubuwana II) flow with that ideology? What is its goal and
orientation? The text, as summarized by Ricklefs, prophesied the final solution of the
division of Javanese kingdom and of the Dutch colonialism problem: unity and victory
for the Javanese, made possible by the superior culture of Javanese Islam [i.e. Islam
Nusantara].54
Take a closer look at the way Serat Surya Raja elucidates brightly the main substance of
the Din Arab Jawi ideology as expounded by Sunan Giri: unity and victory for Nusantara
or Jawi thanks to the superior culture of Din Arab Jawi. Indeed, we have no
contemporary sources of how to interpret the term Din Arab Jawi and its ideologico-
epistemological significance. But Serat Surya Raja really gives us an important key to
understand very clearly the ideological substance of intermingling of Islam and
Nusantara by addressing one strategic methodological-epistemological issue: that of
unity to which Din Arab Jawi aspires unceasingly. From unity comes victory, then
superiority of Islam as professed by Indonesian Muslims.
The problem of unity is the focal, fundamental issue that concerned the Wali Songo
during the period of later Islamization. It is the backbone on which a new hybrid named
Islam Nusantara or Din Arab Jawi depends to strive forward, and from which Islam
Ahlussunnah Waljamaah comes forward – as Kiai Yosodipuro I testifies of it in Babad
Giyanti– “nyênyunari niskara sèsining bumi; kang nyata lan kang samar” (radiating over
the earth like the sun, illuminating all that is in the world; that which is manifest and
physical [nyata] and that which is hidden and spiritual [ghaib).55
It is our next discussion.***

54 Ricklefs, Jogjakarta under Sultan Mangkubumi, p. 189.

55 Babad Giyanti, v. 1, p. 4.

26
4
Finding Ourself, Finding Our World:

Jawi Epistemology and its Subjectivity

Given the nation or the people are one soul, when we think of static or dynamic basis for
the nation, we should not be looking for things outside the soul of the people themselves. If
we look for things beyond the soul of the people, we will fail. You can live it for one two,
one hundred and two hundred people, but you could not live it as one soul of its own. We
must live in our mental space. That’s our personality. Each nation has its own personality,
as a nation. It could not be opleggen [grafted and imposed] from the outside. It must be
something latent which is living in the soul of the people themselves.
---- Soekarno, "Belief in One God in Pancasila [Five Pillars of Indonesia National Ideology]"
(1958).

In the previous chapter, we have seen that the problematics of unity had been
articulated by the Wali Songo as a critical discourse, namely, a way of investigating and
projecting Din Arab Jawi or Islam Nusantara as one body, one soul of. In this chapter
that kind of investigation need to be clarified in more detail in order to get a clear
picture of this oneness. Discussion on this will lead us to what kind of epistemological
edifice that Wali Songo raised up to sharpen the intelligibility of the discourse of Islam
Nusantara.
First we need to look at what happened in Malaka after Islamization in early 15th
century. Babad Tanah Jawi points out that Syekh Maulana Ishaq (d. 1463), grandson of
Syekh Jumadil Kubro and brother of Sunan Ampel, took this great maritime emporium
as his basis to propagate Islam, while at the same time to empower Nusantara
massively. Of course propagating Islam always means in this context of new trajectory
of Islamization empowering Nusantara, as discussed in previous chapters. The problem
is: how to establish the rational reasoning behind it.
Babad Tanah Jawi did not give us the details of Syekh Maulana Ishaq activities in
Malaka, but really provided us with one story from which we can deduce a noteworthy
conclusion:

Lare kalih wau nuntên sumêja ngaos dhatêng Mêkah, lajêng sami mangkat, kèndêl wontên
ing Malaka, kêpanggih kalih Walilanang, sarta dipun guroni, antawis sataun laminipun,
lajêng badhe andumugèkakên kaniyatanipun ngaos dhatêng Mêkah.
Nanging Sèh Walilanang botên angrêmbagi, dipun purih mantuka dhatêng ing nagarinipun
piyambak, sarta sami dipun iring jungkat, kalih rasukan jubah, Santri Giri dipun juluki
Prabu Sètmata, Santri Bonang dipun jêjuluki Prabu Nyakrakusuma, anuntên sami mantuk
dhatêng ing Ngampèl Dênta malih.56

56See Babad Tanah Djawi in proza: Javaansche Geschiedenis Loopende tot het Jaar 1647 der Javaansche
Jaartelling met Aanteekeningen van J. J. Meinsma ('s Gravenhage: Martinus Nijhoff, 1874), vol. 1, p. 29-30.
The story has been coined by Chambert-Loir as local example of “anti-hajj” in his Naik Haji di Masa Silam,
vol. 1, ch. 1. This French orientalist should check out a local tradition from Giri whether or not Sunan Giri
or other Walis ever put an argument against hajj. See for instance in this book Giri-based: Moh. Erfan,
Sedjarah Kehidupan Sunan Giri (Gresik, 1959).

27
 (It is told that the young Sunan Bonang and junior Sunan Giri would go to Mecca to
pilgrimage and learning of Islamic knowlegde. In their journey both arrived at Malacca to
study and learn from Syekh Wali Lanang [Syekh Maulana Ishaq’s other name]. One year
later they expressed their intention to go study in Mecca.
However, Syekh Wali Lanang did not give them permission; instead they were instructed
to go back to Java (to advance their studies) and given the sufi robe of initiation (for
travellers on the mystic path). After initiation santri Sunan Giri acquired a name Prabu
Satmata, while santri Bonang Prabu Nyakrakusuma.
They then went back to Ampel Denta, Surabaya).

This wonderful, lively story do really signify how Wali Songo give us a lesson to
acknowledge our Nusantaranese intellectual resources and then to awaken them to
further the development of our storage of knowledge as best as we can. Syekh Maulana
Ishaq, father of Sunan Giri, had brought to fore the subjectivity of Nusantara, the holder
of excellent civilisation that Syekh Jumadil Kubro and his son had already known. If one
tries to explain the excellency of this civilisation, first he/she has to go its human beings:
who are they? what is inside of their mind? what is their inner expressions, imagination,
perception and intellligence? What kind of subjectivity Sunan Bonang has when he came
back to Ampel, then became a master in tasawuf or Islamic mystical knowledge – even if
he did not get his learning at the center of Islamic learning, i.e. Mecca?57 And what
constitutes this subjectivity?58
That is expressed more explicitly in one of presumably disciples of Syekh Maulana
Ishaq,59 the Malaccan Sultan Manshur’s (r. 1459-1477) letter send to King of Ryukyu
[Okinawa, Japan], 1 September 1468:

We have learned that to master the blue oceans people must engage in commerce and
trade if their countries are barren. ... All the lands within the seas are united in one body,
and all the living things are being nurtured in love. Life has never been so affluent in
preceding generations as it is today.60

There are two significant points need to be highlighted from this Syekh Maulana Ishaq-
inspired statement: The first one deals with the unity of body politic or the body of the
nation which is later to be called “wawasan ke-Nusantara-an” or the Conception of One
Archipelago (all the lands within the seas are united in one body), while the latter is
concerned with “the nation’s personality” or “national character” (all the living things
are being nurtured in love).

Concerning the first level of unity, the underlying basis of the conception of one
Archipelago is the oneness of Nusantara as a single integrated entity made up of

57 Sunan Bonang’s command of tasawuf, especially in works of Imam al-Ghazali, is shown in his Javanese
treaties (already mentioned in chapter 3), then reflected in his brilliant genius disciple, Sunan Kalijaga.
58 The theme of subjectivity in the study of epistemology has to be clarified from any misunderstanding.

What I mean by subjectivity? “By ‘subjective’ I mean not the popular understanding of the word. The
human soul is creative, by means of perception, imagination, and intelligence it participates in the
‘creation’ and interpretation of the worlds of sense and sensible experience, of images, and of intelligible
forms. ‘Subjective’ here is something not opposed to what is objective, but complementary to it,” writes
Syed Muhammad Naquib al-Attas, in his Prolegomena to the Metaphysics of Islam: An Exposition of the
Fundamental Elements of the Worldview of Islam (Kuala Lumpur: UTM Press, 2014), p. 3.
59 Although no reference indicating what I assume, but both are contemporaneous in one city and there is

a great possibility to meet each otber, especially in a teacher-student relationship.

60 See in Atsushi Kobata & Mitsugo Matsuda, Ryukyuan Relations with Korea and South Sea Countries

(Kyoto, 1969), p. 111.

28
territory, nationhood, goal and spirit of struggle, law, socio-cultural attributes, economy,
and defense and security. In this respect, the sea is not considered as dividing the
islands of Indonesia. On the contrary, the sea is believed to unite all the Indonesian
islands and the people living on them, commonly expressed as the glue of the
Indonesian archipelago or a bridge connecting all the islands and people of Indonesia.
This conception was articulated very cleary by Sultan Alauddin (r. 1601-1634), the first
Muslim ruler of Gowa, Macassar, who converted at the hand of 16th century Giri
students:
God has made the earth and the sea, has divided the earth among mankind and given
the sea in common. It is a thing unheard of that anyone should be forbidden to sail the
seas.61

Regarding the second level of unity, one of personality, French explorer and navigator
Francis Pyrard (d. 1623) wrote around 1600 of the essence of Nusantaranese
personality:
The islands are fertile in peculiar fruits and merchandise, such as spices and other drugs
that are found nowhere else; excepting Sumatra and Java which are fertile of all things;
the rest abound in only one particular thing and are sterile of all else. So this one product
wherewith they abound must furnish them with everything else.

This is why all kinds of food are very dear, save their own product, which is cheap, and
why these people are constrained to keep up continual intercourse with one another, the
one supplying what the other wants.62

What Pyrard said of Nusantaranese people “constrained to keep up continual

intercourse with one another, the one supplying what the other wants” amply captures
some cultural elements of Nusantara that we identified in previous chapter: collective
or communal (guyub), brotherhood and friendship as one big family (kekeluargaan) and
mutual aid or cooperation (gotong royong). These elements which are “nurtured in
love”, as Sultan Manshur said in his letter, subsequently constitute the basic foundation
of our national ideology as initiated by Soekarno in his renown lecture on Pancasila of
1945 two months before the Proclamation of Indonesian independence.
These two intertwined levels of a truly Nusantaranese totality of human subjectivity
represent the ontological basis of Islam Nusantara studies or Jawi epistemology on
whose basis Wali Songo tried to investigating and projecting the inner experiences of
the Nusantara.

Let me clarify this. Indeed, there is a popular saying in Islamic sufi doctrine: “Man arafa
nafsahu faqad arafa rabbahu” (Whosoever knows his/her self truly knows better
his/her God). The meaning of “nafsa” (the self) was subsequently at the Nusantarenese
common epistemological universe defined as “Nusantaranese subjectivity” and the
translation of the sufi saying goes as follows: “Whosoever knows his/her Nusantaranese
self truly knows better his/her God”. That is what Sunan Bonang and Sunan Giri had
learnt from his master, Syekh Maulana Ishaq of Malacca: If we have voice, perception, or

61 G.J. Resink, “The Law of the Nations in Early Macassar”, in Indonesia’s History between the Myths: Essays
in Legal History and Historical Theory (The Hague: W. van Hoeve, 1968), p. 45.
62 Quoted in Reid, Charting the Shape of Early Modern Southeast Asia, p. 42

29
intelligence of knowing God, then our subjectivity must come first in learning Islam and
its knowledges. That is why Sunan Bonang and Sunan Giri were ordered to go back Java
to investigate and sharpen their knowledge of Nusantaranese subjectivity.
How is it to begin this investigation? First by finding ourself: “kenali dirimu hai anak
alim” (find yourself o learned man). The poems of the 16th century Achehnese mystical
poet Hamzah Fansuri is going to assert “finding ourself” more concretely as follows:

Kenal dirimu hai anak alim

Supaya engkau nentiasa salim
Dengan dirimu yogya kau qa’im
Itulah hakikat shalat dan shaim

Dirimu itu bernama khalil

Tiada bercerai dengan Rabbun Jalil

Jika dapat ma’na dirimu akan dalil

Tiada berguna madzhab dan sabil

Kullu man alaiha fanin, ayat min Rabbihi

Menyatakan ma’na irji’i ila ashliki
Akan insan yang beroleh tawfiqihi
Supaya karam di dalam sirru sirrihi

Situlah wujud sekalian fanun

Tanggallah engkau daripada mal wa-l banun
Engkaulah ashiq terlalu junun
Inna lillahi wa inna ilahi raji’un

Hamzah gharib unggas Quddusi

Akan rumahnya Baitul Ma’muri
Kursinya sekalian kapuri
Minal asyjari di negeri Fansuri
…
Kenali dirimu hai anak dagang
Jadikan markab tempat berulang
Kemudi tinggal jangan kau goyang
Supaya dapat hampir kau pulang63

(Know yourself ... oh learned man/woman

So that you may be constantly secure from blame
Stand by virtue of your true self
This is the quintessence of worship and fasting

Your true self is what is called the faithful friend

Not distinct from the Exalted Lord
If you take your true self for a guide
Doctrine and way are without point

“Everyone upon it passes away” is a verse from the Lord

It explains the meaning of “Return to your origin”
As referring to a human who enjoyed His succour
So that he submerge in his deepest secret

63 In G.W.J. Drewes & F. Brakel (eds.), The Poems of Hamzah Fansuri, pp. 72-4, 112-3. My translation
differs slightly from Drewes & Brakel’s.

30
There lies the being of all those who passed away
Renounce property and progeny
And set your heart on mystical ecstasy
“We all belong to Allah and to Him we shall return”

Hamzah the stranger, a Kudus citizen

His house is the Baitul Ma’mur [the Frequented House on the 7th heaven]
His chair was all camphor
From the trees of the region of Fansur

Know yourself … oh stranger

Turn it into a vessel for your return
Steer a settled course without wavering
So that your return may be ahead)

Hamzah Fansuri is known as a great mystics and creative poet. His brilliant mind takes
him wherever he goes finding esoteric knowledges of diverse schools of mystical
thought in every Moslim countries. But his quest for the Ultimate Truth leads him
eventually to his Nusantaranese orgins, his Baitul Ba’mur composed of camphor made
from the tree of Fansur or Barus in western coast of Aceh. This is a truly significant
example of finding oneself: to return back to his/her origins (irji’i ila ashliki), to get
support to stand on his/her own feet, and then pull out the best he/she has to make the
world better. That is why did Hamzah Fansuri impress the world with his Malay poems
so plentiful of sufi metaphorical expressions pulled out from resources of his land, while
at the same time he empowered the riches of Islamic doctrines he had learnt from his
Nusantaranese fellow citizen.64 So it is misguided and, above all, missing the point when
someone discussing his poems in the restricted area of controversial Wujudiyah
(Oneness of Being). Actually the crucial point of attaining truth for him is his oneness
with his God and his oneness with his Nusantaranese origin as well.
That is the reason why Sunan Bonang and Sunan Giri must go back to Java to find the
Ultimate Truth. The issue then for them on the epistemological level is how to establish
a Jawi vision of reality based on ontological foundation of the oneness of Nusantara in
terms of one body and one soul (satu badan, satu jiwa). The point of departure is to
construct a body of knowledge based on dual-source of knowledge, soul (nafs) and
intellect (aql), which is capable of investigating the nature of Nusantara civilization and
its people. This concept of dual-source of knowledge stands in line with the ontological
basis of Nusantara that consists of two worlds, kang nyata (manifest and physical) lan
kang samar (hidden and spiritual), as Babad Giyanti prescribes. The first one is intended
to perceive and investigate things that are sensual (experimental, hissi, tajribi), rational
(aqli, burhani), and the things that have happened (waqi'i), while the second one is to
capture the spiritual nature (supernatural), to investigate human psychic (nafsi, bathini)
and the things that are unseen (ghaib) or things that have not yet happened.
In the philosophy of history put forward by Ibn Khaldun (d. 1406), this second source of
knowledge is used to understand the laws of nature and historical events, which is not

64In one of his poems mentioned above Hamzah Fansuri states that he is “gharib unggas quddusi”. Drewes
and Brakel translates it with “the stranger is a sacred bird’. It’s a strange translation of course which is
lacking the sense of Arabic form of nisbah (attribute). The last word perplexes everyone who studies his
poems: what is quddusi? If we take back the spirit of Hamzah’s poems to his Nusantaranese origin, it is
well-known city of Kudus in Central Java, one of the basis of Islamization in 16th century, where Sunan
Kudus, one of Wali Songo, was buried. And Hamzah was proudly to be nurtured in love with this city so he
made it his nisbah or his attribute.

31
capable to be captured by the senses and human reason, but could be perceived by the
inner soul or human spirituality.65 This spirit of Ibn Khaldunese epistemology was
already in practice in Islam Nusantara as one part of the Jawi epistemology without
which we cannot understand the substance of the letter of Sultan Manshur on the
collective consciousness “nurtured in love” or Soekarno’s lecture on Pancasila as “one
spirit’ in which “the nation or the people are one soul”.
This epistemology is constructed by both Sunan Bonang and Sunan Giri – each within
his own command of specific knowledge – as an instrument first to acquiring data,
detailed information, or scatteted knowledge, especially to excavate Nusantaranese
subjectivity, and then to produce a distinct body of knowledge developed into textual
resources the world have not yet known before in many fields of human knowledge.66
Unfortunately, we have no access as to method or mechanism that used by Sunan Giri or
Sunan Bonang in this construction owing the paucity of contemporary texts. However,
we have some texts, partly from Kiai Yosodiouro I’s Serat Lokapala of the eighteenth
century,67 that demonstrate how that reconstruction really works, including its method:

kang amarna sajarah ing Jawi; lan amarna sajarah ing Arab; datan pae safangate; samya
ngluri leluhur; ingkang sinung kamulyan sami.68

(Writing Jawi history, including writing Arab history, all are equally expecting the
intercession of the Holy Prophet in the Hereafter, that is to trace the ancestors who
contributed much to this nation; they are entitled to it, because they have been
awarded glory in history).

The point in case is the word “ngeluri leluhur”. What really it means?
Baoesastra Djawa or Javanese dictionary69 translates ngeluri as “niti-priksa asal-usul”
(to investigate, to record, to compile such an inventory), “nindakake padatan tatacaras

65 See discussion on this issue of duality on Ibn Khaldun’s thought, in Muhammad Abed al-Jabiri, Nahnu
wat-Turats, ch. 5 and 6.
66 Take for example the list of kitabs Imam Ahmad of Bacan (Moluccas) supplied to Snouck Hurgronje in

Arabia, October 1884 [now in Cod. Or. 7111] and became popularly among ahlu Jawi in the Middle East in
nineteenth century. The works he said were “read by the peoples below the winds’ (Ini nama-nama kitab
yang dibaca oleh orang yang di bawah angin). He specified these lands as ‘the lands of Ternate, Tidore,
and Bacan’ (yaitu negeri Ternate dan Tidore dan Bacan). The list as follows: “Pertama kitab usul yaitu
Matn Ummul-Barahin dan kitab Tilimsani dan kitab Dur ts-Tsamin dan kitab Mufid. Kedua kitab al-fiqh
yaitu kitab Sitin dan kitab Safina dan kitab Masa’il al-Muhtadi dan kitab Shira al-Mustaqim dan kitab
Hidayatu-s-Salikin dan kitab Sabilul-Muhtadin dan kitab al-Nikah Idah al-Lubab dan kitab Fara’id Ghayat
al-Taqrib, kitab Mir’atut-Tulab dan kitab Tuhfa dan kitab Muharar dan kitab Fath al-Mu’in dan kitab yang
lain seperti Ihya Ulumiddin tetapi nadir (rare).’ Some of the kitabs are produced in Nusantara with diverse
local languages by Jawi ulama, for example, kitab Shira al-Mustaqim, kitab Hidayatu-s-Salikin, kitab
Sabilul-Muhtadin, kitab al-Nikah, kitab Mir’atut-Tulab, kitab Tuhfa, Mufid and Tilimsani. Regarding the
latter two their identiy is unknown for some people, like Michael Laffan in his Islamic Nationhood and
Colonial Indonesia, pp. 21-2, 248.
67 On the intellectual genealogy of pujangga Kiai Yosodipuro I (1729-1803) tracing back to Wali Songo,

see my Pesantren Studies 2B (Pustaka Afid, 2012); and Lihat Sasrasumarta, et. al., Tus Pajang (Surakarta,
1939).
68 The passage is mentioned in MS L34-37, also in MS MSB/SW53 entitled Serat Ringgit Gedhog:

Lampahan Panji Among Subrata of 1829 and MS CP.65 Serat Rama Purubayan, all in Museum Sonobudoyo
Yogyakarta. See T. Behrend, Katalog Induk Naskah-naskah Nusantara (vol. 1: Museum Sonobudoyo
Yogyakarta) (Jakarta: Penerbit Djambatan, 1990).

32
kaya sing wis linakonan ing para lêluhur” (following the best examples of our
predecessors). Ngeluri also means ngelêstarèkake, that is, to maintain and to preserve
the continuity of tradition of our ancestors.
As suggested by our text, ngeluri is an effective method of critical elaboration on the
collective consciousness of what one really is, and it is part of “knowing yourself” as a
product of the historical process to date, which has deposited in our selfs and our
predecessors an infinity of traces, without leaving an inventory. The method of ngeluri
then translated by pesantren communities in succeeding centuries as “al-muhafazhah”
(maintaining and preserving tradition). And from it comes the popular methodological
axiom: “al-muhafazhah alal-qadimi-s-shalih wal-akdzu bil-jadidi-l-ashlah” (preserving
what is good in tradition and reforming it by taking a much better thing).
By this axiom we can establish a full investigation of historical information critically and
to distinguish truth and falsehood in it, to establish the truth and soundness of
information about factual happenings, that attach themselves to the essence of
Nusantara civilization as required by its very nature of one body and one soul.
There are five elements of al-muhafazhah presented as the outcome of this investigation
of Nusantara consciousness which is founded on Imam al-Ghazali’s method in his Kitab
al-Mustashfa min Ilmi-l-Ushul: hifzhu-d-din (maintenance and protection of religion and
belief); hifzhu-n-nafs (maintenance and protection of human life), hifzhu-l-'aql
(maintenance and protection of so-called budi or people’s minds), hifzhu-l-mal
(maintenance and protection of property rights ), and, last but not least, hifzhu-n-nasl
(maintenance and protection of the family lives as the continuity of human collectivity).
The following chapter is a discussion on this Islam Nusantara intelligent method.***

69See W.J.S. Poerwadarminta, Baoesastra Djawa (Groningen & Batavia: J.B. Wolters' Uitgevers, 1939), pp.
279-80.

33
5
Islam Nusantara and its Dual Methodology, al-Muhafazhah (Tradition) and al-
Akhdzu (Tajdid, Reform)

“Anna-l-fikra an-nazhari fi mujtama’ mu’ayyan wa ashr mu’ayyan yusyakkilu wahdatan

mutamayyizatan dzata kayanin khashshin tadzubu fihi … mukhtalafu-l-furuqi wa-l-ittijahat. Inna-l-
haqiqata hiya-l-kullu.70

(Theoritical thinking in a given society at a given time constitutes a particular unity endowed
with its own armature inside of which the different movements and tendencies blend in … it is
the whole which is true and significant).

--- Mohammed Abed al-Jabiri, Nahnu wat-Turats (1982).

Kullu ummatin laha ramzu izzin; waramzu izzina al-hamarau wal-baidlau

Ya Sukarno hayyaita fina sa’idan; bi-d-dawai minka zala anna-d-dau

(Every nation has its own symbol of their pride; and the symbol of our pride is red-white
[Indonesian national flag]; Long live Sukarno ... Verily you’re happy among us till the end; you
help bring sure cure for disease that plagues us).

---- Syekh Sayid Habib Idrus bin Salim al-Jufri (Guru Tua and founder of al-Khairat schools of
Palu, Central Sulawesi, d. 1969).

To consolidate Islam Nusantara studies or Jawi epistemology, Indonesian ulama have

created a methodology, “al-muhafazhah alal-qadimi-s-shalih wal-akdzu bil-jadidi-l-
ashlah” (preserving what is good in tradition and reforming it by taking a much better
new one) with its dual or twin pillar: al-muhafazhah and al-akhdzu. As we have seen in
previous chapter, this method is excavated from the epistemology “ngeluri leluhur”
outlined by Wali Songo and explained later by their succeeding generations. al-
Muhafazhah is sustaining the unity and continuity of Nusantara collective subjectivity,
while al-akhdzu aspires to reform and contextuality.
First we have al-muhafazhah. Because the problem of continuity in the context of al-
muhafazhah method has one Nusantaranese particular vision as point of departure, that
is unity as explained widely in preceeding chapters. Indeed, every method necessarily
proceeds from a vision. In order to validly implement a method, it is imperative to be
aware of the perspectives of the vision from which it proceeds. This is because vision
represents the framework of the method and defines its perspectives, in the same way
that the method contributes to enhancing and readjusting vision.
However, alongside with al-muhafazhah, stands al-akhdzu. Why al-akhdzu?
Nusantara subjects are not passive creature beings absorbed by tradition, yet to
assimilate tradition. al-Akhdzu methodolody is intended to transform us from beings
taken by tradition to those beings who have embraced their tradition, i.e. personalities
with a tradition that happens to make up one of their own components, which will
enable the person to find his/her membership inside a larger personality, that of the
nation which has inherited this tradition.

70Mohammed Abed al-Jabiri, Nahnu wa-t-Turats: Qira’ah Mu’ashirah fi Turatsina al-Falsafi (We and
Tradition: Contemporary Reading on Our Philosophical Tradition) (Casablanca: Markaz ats-Tsaqafi al-
Arabi, 1982), p. 27.

34
Tradition is part of our subjectifities. The methodological challenge to be noted as a
priority is therefore to find means to disjoin or de-link the subject from the object in
order to allow for the rebuilding of their relationship on a new basis, on a new
contextuality. The question of method is therefore, first and foremost, a question of
objectivity and historicity. That’s what al-akhdzu all about. Here, it is not only a question
of “objectivity” in the normal sense of the term, that is the absence of implication of the
subject, with its desires and its impulses into the object. It is also a question of
relationship that exists between the Nusantaranese self and its tradition.
This relationship need to be clarified because in the era of puritanisation of religion or
Wahabisation that brandished the banner of authenticity, of one’s attachment to the
roots and the defense of one’s identity, notions that must mean Islam itself: “the true
Islam”, not Islam as presently practiced by Muslims. This identity affirmation has taken
the form of a retreat to backward positions that would serve as ramparts and a defense
mechanism. As for present, it is not present, not only because we refuse it, but also
because the past is very much present to the point that it fringes upon the future and
absorbs it. Acting as the present, the past is conceived as a means to affirm and to
rehabilitate one’s identity. Everything the texts says is an absolut truth, disregarding the
contemporary conditions of Moslem lives. Their textualities has deprived them of
independence and freedom, make them out of date to catch up the day.
It is relevant here to demonstrate what KH. Makruf Amin, present-day Rais Am PBNU
(Chairman-in-Chief of Central Board of Nahdlatul Ulama), have said in many occassions
– quoting Imam al-Qarafi (d. 1285), one of Maliki jurist-ulama, al-Furuq – that being
rigid in sticking to textual understandings is certainly a miguided conduct in religion,
ignorant of the purpoeses of Moslem’s ulama and early generations of ulama (al-jumud
ala-manqulat abadan dlalalun fi-d-din wa jahlun bi maqashidil ulamai-l-muslimin wa-s
salaf al-madliyyin).71
For this reason al-akhdzu helps us to think through our texts and tradition that has
known a countinuous evolution into the present, a tradition of which the present is an
integral part, which has been continuously renewed, revised, and critiqued.
Indeed, it is another thing to think through a tradition whose evolution was interrupted
centuries ago, which is removed from the present by the deep gap between the past and
the present. Consequently, Moslem of this sort lives under the stress of the present. The
more his era escapes him, the more he seeks to reinforce the affirmation of his identity
and to seek magical solutions to his numerous problems. Some even make their case
with the slogan “syariah is solution to corruption”, “khilafah is solution for conflict, even
for the flood of Jakarta”!
So, to disjoin or distance the subject from his tradition is therefore a necessary
operation, as a first step towards an objectivity. The methodological achievements in
the field of modern linguistics can provide us with an objective method to distance
ourselves from the texts, that we could sum up through the following rule: “One must
avoid interpreting the meaning of the text before grasping its material (material as a
network of relationships between the units of isolated meanings)”.72 We must free

71 See http://www.malangtimes.com/baca/8004/4/20151227/141946/kh-maruf-amin-islam-
nusantara-yang-diusung-nu-untuk-mendamaikan-dunia/ (accessed 21 March 2017).
72 Compare what Michel Foucault says in this respect: “We must grasp the statemen in the exact specificity

of its occurrence; determine its conditions of existence, fix at least its limits, establish its correlations with
other statements that may be connected with it, and show what other forms of statement it excludes. … the
question proper to such an analysis might be formulated in this way: what is this specific existence that

35
ourselves of any understanding built upon biases derived from tradition or upon
present-day desiderata. We must put all of this between parentheses so as to devote
ourselves to the sole task of noting the significance of the text within the text itself, i.e.,
within the network of the relationships that are created among its elements.
This first step will enable the subject to regain its dynamism in order to rebuild the
object in a new perspective. The second step that we must take towards objectivity is
going back to al-muhafazhah, to ensure unity and continuity of our subjectivity. Why?
It is not enough to be objective in order to read our tradition which is part of ourselves.
It is not simply to get rid of it that we have just excluded this part from ourselves, nor is
it to enjoy as ethnologist would as a display in a museum nor is it to behold as an
abstract conceptual edifice as a philosopher do. But rather to re-join it to us – after
disjoining it in the context of objectivity – in a new form and under a new relationship,
so that we may make it contemporary and relevant to us. This is what mostly concerns
al-muhafazhah method: the problem of relinking and rejoining our tradition to us, one
of continuity. But, how we can do this effectively?
This can only be achieved through relinking our selves to the inventory of our ancestors
(i.e. ngeluri leluhur). The only thing capable of making tradition is to embrace the
subject, of making the former participate in the problematics and concerns of the latter
and of making it interested in its aspirations, in its contemporaneity. The subject will
seek to find itself inside the tradition, yet fully conserving the identity of the latter. This
way, the reading subject, on its own, will be able to entirely maintain its conscience and
its personality. This method provides an anticipated understanding in the course of a
dialogue between subject and object created on the basis of objective data that emanate
from the first one of our methodological concerns. We can only do this by deliberately
engaging in their problematics and in their intellectual pursuits, which enables us to
become their contemporaries and to make them contemporary to us on the level of
spirit aware of its historicity. It is through the inetraction between these two
contemporaneities that continuity can be achieved: continuity in the evolution of
consciousness through a quest for truth.73
In this respect it is significant to point out as to why such a Nusantara law book as the
16th century Undang-undang Malaka text – most probably on the direction of Syekh
Maulana Ishaq as the grand master of 15th century Malacca – preserved four kinds of
sources of law. Promulgated in the article 38 of Undang-undang Malaka: “Of the duties
of panghulu or tuah tuah of villages and campongs: these persons shall make
themselves well acquainted with the following subjects, otherwise their functions are
thrown away upon them: Hukum Syara’, Hukum Aqal, Hukum Fa’al and Hukum Adat”.74
These four pillars of Islam Nusantara tradition alse mentioned in Bo’ Sangaji Kai of Bima
(Nusa Tenggara), a 18th century notebook of law and ethics from Bima sultanate:
“Bermula hukum ini adalah setengahnya mufakat dengan syariat dan setengah dengan
makhluq karena perkataan ini mengikut adat, yaitu dihimpunkan atas empat bagi,
pertama-tama syariat, kedua adat, ketiga [dalil] aqli, keempat [hukum] rasmi [as hukum

emerges from what is said and nowhere else?”. See Michel Foucault, The Archaelogy of Knowledge (London:
Tavistock, 1972), p. 28.
73 The idea for this discussion on tradition and Moslem has been elaborated much by Muhammad Abed al-

Jabiri, one of enlightened Maghribi thinkers, in his Nahnu wa-t-Turats. Compare its less-satisfyingly
English version, Arab-Islamic Philosophy: A Contemporary Critique (tr. Aziz Abbass) (Austin: Center for
Middle Eastern Studies, The University of Texas, 1999).
74 T.J. Newbold, Political and Statistical Account of the British Settlements in the Straits of Malaca (London:

John Murray, 1839), vol. 2, pp. 275-6. The basis of Newbold text is the MS Code Farquhar 10 entitled
Undang-undang Raja Malaka preserved in Royal Asiatic Society, London.

36
fa’al in Undang-undang Malaka – AB] (This law begins conforming to syariah and to the
people by keeping customary tradition; the law consists of four pillars: syariat,
customary tradition, rational reasoning and yurisprudence).”75
The reason behind this construction of four sources of law is clearly the creative
balancing between al-muhafazhah and al-akhdzu as explicated above.***

75See Henri Chambert-Loir & Siti Maryam R. Salahuddin (penyunting), Bo’ Sangaji Kai: Catatan Kerajaan
Bima (Jakarta: EFEO, Institut Français Indonesia, Obor, 2012), p. 93.

37
6
Ahlu Jawi and the Argument for Islam Nusantara:
Nusantara as One Center of Excellence

Bahwa dijadikan segala negeri mereka itu bendaharanya ilmu dan perladungan kepandayan. Dan
membukakan segala mata anak jenis mereka itu kepada memandang cemerlang kebijakan dan
handalan supaya ada kemegahan bangsa Melayu antara segala alam, dan tertinggi nama mereka itu
antara Bani Adam. Dan bertambah-tambah kelebihan ulama mereka itu atas segala ulama. Dan
bertambah nyata agama mereka itu atas segala agama.

(May God give all the Malay countries [Nusantara, negeri bawah angin] the treasurer of knowledge
and the shelter of intellectuality; to open the eyes of its fellow citizens to the brilliant wisdom and
the excellencies of their country, so as to endow Malay nation with greatness among other nations
and with superiority of its name among all humankind.
May God bless Malay’s ulama and put them surpassing all ulama of other nations; and their religion
be the most distinguished among all religions).

--- Syekh Ahmad al-Fathani (d. 1908), Hadiqatu-l-Azhar wa-r-Rayahin, pp. 1-2.

Di dalam mathba’ah dimasukkan dia

Supaya berhamburan seluruh dunia

(So it’s coming to be printed in the publishing house

So as to widespread globally to the world)

--- Perjalanan Sultan Lingga 1894 (The Peregrinations of Sultan Lingga-Riau).76

In three preceding chapters we have dealt with the internal, epistemological

construction of Din Arab Jawi as constructed by Sunan Giri as reflection of unity and
continuity of oneness of Nusantara, now is the time to give it external justification: that
Din Arab Jawi is something the world need for a better human lives.
We begin from Imam asy-Syafi’i. In his magnum-opus, Kitab al-Umm, the founder of the
School (Mazhab) of Syafi’ite writes:

“Ma min biladil-muslimina baladun illa wa-fihi 'ilmun qad shara ahluhu ila 'ttiba'i qauli
rajulin min ahlihi fi aktsari aqawilihi” .77

(Every capital of Muslim countries is a seat of learning and has its own body of
knowledge whose people and scholars follow the opinion of one among them in most of
his teachings).

This passage in addition to bringing out the significance of geographical regions as far
as schools of law were concerned, also brings out the importance of each country’s

76 Quoted in Ian Proudfoot, Early Malay Printed Books: A Provisional Account of Materials Published in the
Singapore-Malaysia Area up to 1920, Noting Holdings in Major Public Collections (Kuala Lumpur: Academy
of Malay Studies & The Library University of Malaya, 1993), p. 52.
77 Kitab al-Umm (Kairo: Darul Ma’rifah, 1410 H/1990), 7 vols, v. 7, p. 280.

38
leadership in the knowledge of Islam and its disciplines, leadership which led to the
proliferation of the many schools of Islamic traditions. asy-Syafi'i mentions the
geography based authorities of Islamic knowledges such as the authority of Mecca,
Basra, Kufa, Syria. Elsewhere, he refers to the Iraqians and Medinese, the Basrians and
Kufians, the scholars of each place where knowledge of Prophet Muhammed’s traditions
and his companions is to be found. Imam asy-Syafi'i also has two different qawl or legal
opinions based on different regions, such as qawl qadim (Iraqi-based old legal opinions)
and qawl jadid (Cairo-based new legal opinions). In other disciplines, such as Arabic
grammar (nahwu), we find two distinct schools, the School of Basra and the School of
Kufa, regarding the origin of derivatives. While in Islamic philosopy we come across two
geographically designated mainstreams of thought: Mazhab Masyriqi (the school of the
followers of Ibnu Sina and Suhrawardi) and Mazhab Maghribi (the school of the
followers of Ibnu Rusyd).

Few centuries after asy-Syafi'i, geographical schools gave way to the consideration of
schools of nations. al-Jahiz (d. 868 or 869), writer of Arabic literature, for instance, saw
the divine intervention in the ability of particular nations to excel in areas of human
attainments. Thus, the Greeks, spared from manual toils by their political masters,
invented machines, tools, astrolabes, and musical instruments. They love science but
shrank from ist application. The Chinese were specialists in metallurgy and metal
casting; in weaving and drawing; in everything concerned with practical skills in
contrast to the Hellenic excellence in abstract thought. Indians, according to al-Jahiz, led
the world in science, mathematics, and philosophy.78 In 1068 Sa’id bin Ahmad al-
Andalusi (d. 1070), a judge from Toledo, Andalusia, wrote a book about the nations of
the world, arguing that eight peoples (including Indians, Persians, Greeks, Romans,
Arabs, and Jews) had contributed to the advancement of knowledge, while the Chinese
were worthy of respect for their craft skills and the Turks for the art of war.79 The text of
al-Jahiz and Sa’id bin Ahmad was a strong awareness of the comparative features of
Asian civilisation.
Imam al-Ghazali (d. 1111) afterwards followed suit, regarding the specific excellencies
of Persians lagacy in the political ethics and norms. In his magisterial, Persian-
originated work, at-Tibru-l-Masbuk fi Nashihati-l-Muluk, al-Ghazali recounts the ethics of
justice of one renown Persian king, Anusyarwan, and said it was barakah (blessing) –
even if he was non-Muslim, the king’s
ethics of justice should be emulated by all Muslims. This point need to be emphasized.
al-Ghazali could not have overlooked the fact that his own religion and society were of
diffusionist kind where Islam and local culture intermingled. Muslim thought reinforced
itself by the conscious adaptation of the material achievements of non-Islamic people –
as Wali Songo later had to do – so as to produce a new genuine contribution to the
world. In another words, al-Ghazali was really aware of the superiority of Persian
civilisation in the political ethics which is to be used as a vehicle to advance and enrich
Islamic doctrines of politics (known as fiqh siyasah) as rahmatan li-l-alamin.
However, Imam al-Ghazali did not explain adequately the reason for the inclusion of the
outstanding ethics of non-Muslims into religious arguments as much as he did for
manthiq (Aristotelian logics).80 He saw only the importance of the ethics of Persian

78 See al-Jahizh, The Life and Works of Jahiz: Translations of Selected Texts (comp. by Charles Pellat)
(London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1969), pp. 96-7, 197.
79 See his book, Thabaqatu-l-Umam (Beirut: Imprimerie Catholique, 1912).
80 See his book, al-Mustashfa min Ilmi-l-Ushul, 2 vols., v. 1.

39
justice – as he did for manthiq – in resolving the problem of affirming the rational
foundation on which the Islamic norms of politics is based. For his part, textual legalistic
method as found in qiyas (analogy) reasoning of fuqaha (Islamic jurists) is very limited
in dealing with the unceasingly cases in our life. Manthiq is for example introduced by
Imam al-Ghazali to overcome the deadlock of qiyas the Asy'arites and Syafi'ites scholars
have trapped in concerning the theological arguments.81
Only after the publication of Ibn Rushd’s (d. 1198) famous philosophical treatise,
Fashlu-l-Maqal fi ma baina-l-Hikmati wa-sy-Syari'ati mina-l-Ittishal, did the issue of
rational foundation appear to be solved. “The issue is precisely like the knife we use to
slaughter or sacrifice animal: there is no need to question whether the knife is made by
Muslims or infidels, but clearly it can be used to slaughter halal-originated animals by
reciting the name of God (Bismillah) upon slaughtering", states Ibn Rusyd.82
That’s what this rationalist philosopher did for the context of Maghribis: to set up a
religiously justified epistemological framework to the great human achievements the
Maghribis has from science to philosophy during 11-13 centuries. We do not question
whether science or philosophy comes from the West or the East, the emphasis is how
far that genius products help us in religion and to live a full mashlahah (goodness) in the
world and to survive in the next future. From here we can understand then: even if both
Imam al-Ghazali and Ibn Rusyd as a great philosophers the world has known had
incorporated Greek philosophy and logics into the lives of Muslims, but it does not make
them give away the great four Sunni madzhab traditions, Syafi’ite and Maliki
respectively. As much as Bismillah upon slaughtering in the absence of which animals
slaughtered is unlawful to eat, following the Sunnite madzhab is the intellectual force
that makes Muslims feel free to go making the great in the world. Even for desert Arabs,
by following madzhab they turned their keen minds and clear brains to achieve
perfection beyond the wildest dream.83
Well, as the question goes as to why al-Ghazali did what he did for the context of
Persians or what Ibn Rusyd did for the Maghribis, the greatness and long-term viability
of Muslims civilisation derived from its intellectually crafted flexibility of using and
adding together of the separate elements – like combination of knife and Bismillah – to
form a common set. That is “wujud buda nanging rasa Islam” (Although non-Islamic are
that old traditions in its forms, but its essence is Islamic) as Sunan Kalijaga affirms it, as
we see in the previous chapter, as the underlying principle of integration, excavated
from the depths of mental domain or social practices of Nusantara.
So far as the arguments goes, the next question is: what is the superiority of Nusantara
that could be learnt by people of other nations, that can be used as a vehicle to enrich
Islam and to advance human civilisation?
One passage from Sajarah Melayu of 16th century has something to say about the
excellency of Nusantara knowledge about Islam:

There was a Pandita or learned man, named Molana Abu ishak, extremely well versed in
the Sufi learning, who had gone in pilgrimage to the Ka’bah, and he performed religious

81 See the detailed discussion on this in Muhammad Abed al-Jabiri, Bunyah al-Aql al-Arabi: Dirasah
Tahliliyah Naqdiyah li Nuzhumi-l-Ma’rifah fi al-Tsaqafah al-Arabiyah (Beirut: Markaz Dirasah al-Wihdah
al-Arabiyah, 1986).
82 Ibn Rushd, Fashlu-l-Maqal fi Taqriri ma baina-l-Hikmati wa-sy-Syari'ati mina-l-Ittishal (ed. Muhammad

Abed al-Jabiri) (Beirut: Markaz Dirasah al-Wihdah al-Arabiyah, 1997), p. 91.

83 It is certainly misguided when in many cases of Islamic studies one teachs philosophy by discouraging

his/her Moslem students from following madzhab.

40
 ablutions beyond numbers ... He composed a book, a work in two discourses, the one on
Zat [Allah], or divine nature; the other on Sifat, or the divine attributes, and the name of it
was Durrul Manzhum. ...
When the work was completed, he called one of his disciples, named Moulana Abu bakar,
who had completed the study of that book, and said, “Go thou to the land of Malaca, and
instruct all the people who reside under the wind [Nusantara]”...
Then the disciple took his passage to Malaca, and was received in the most distinguished
manner, by Sultan Mansur, who appointed him his guru or instructor, and he also made
his compliments to the Prince. The Prince then transmitted this discourse to Pasai, and
requested the interpretation from makhdum Patakan, and the Makhdum (learned man)
explained the Durrul Manzhum, and sent it back to Malacca to the Prince, who was highly
delighted by the interpretation and showed it to Moulana Abu Bakar, and he highly
approved of it.84

Also stated in a 18th century Babad Tanah Jawi, but incorporating a much older
material from 15th and 16th century:

Wontên drêwis saking tanah ing Atasangin angajawi, anama Sèh Raidin, adêdunung wontên ing
Ngampèl Dênta, lami-lami kesah alêlampah malih, sarêng pêjah dipun pêtak wontên ing
Pamalang.”85

(It was told that there was a dervish [an expert on sufism or ascetic] from the lands above
wind [Arab-Persian countries] coming to Java, named Syekh Raidin, studying and living in
Pesantren Ampel Denta [the school of Sunan Ampel, Surabaya]. After that he wandered in
Java, until he died in Pemalang [Central Java])

The text indicates the great position Pesantren of Sunan Ampel Denta have had as the
center of learning and scholarship in 16th century Nusantara which attracted a great
deal of people, even from Arab-Persian countries, to study there. Furthermore, Sajarah
Banten Rante-rante and its Malay version, Hikajat Hasanuddin, from around 17th
century testified to that position as Pesantren of Sunan Ampel Dental became the object
of the Holy Prophet Muhammad
attention as the latter came into Syekh Nurullah’s (then Sunan Gunung Jati, one of Wali
Songo) dream while studying at Madina or Cairo:86

84 Malay Annals (transl. John Leyden), pp. 202-4 – with few modifications regarding the name of the kitab
and name of the ulama of Pasai mentioned in the text:
“Dan kitab Durrul Manzhum disuruh baginda arak lalu ke balairung. ... maka oleh Sultan [Malacca]
masalah itu [as one of the kitab contents] disuruh artikan ke Pasai pada machdum Patakan, maka oleh
machdum Patakan Durrul Manzhum itu diartikannya. Telah sudah maka dihantarkannya kembali ke
Malaka; maka terlalu suka cita Sultan Mansur Syah melihat Durrul Manzhum itu sudah bermakna; maka
makna Durrul Manzhum itu ditunjukkan baginda pada maulana Abu Bakar serta dipujinya tuan Patakan
itu.”
Sejarah Melayu (edition T.D Situmorang & A Teeuw) (Jakarta: Djambatan, 1958), pp. 168-9. Regarding
kitab Durrul Manzhum I identify it as one of al-Ghazali mystical works. See my Islam Nusantara: Ijtihad
Jenius dan Ijma Ulama Indonesia (Tangerang Selatan: Pustaka Afid, 2015), p. 13-4.
85 Babad Tanah Jawi (edition Meinsma), p. 30. See also Babad Tanah Jawi (edition Balai Pustaka), vol. 3, p.

14.
86 According to some local traditions, the saint who was born either in Pasai or in Egypt said to have first

studied with Syekh Najmuddin al-Kubra in Mecca, and then for twenty or twenty years with Ibnu
Athaillah al-Iskandari asy-Syadzili or his pupil in Medina and Cairo, where he was initiated into the
Syadziliyah, Syaththariyah and Naqsyabandiyah thariqahs (sufi orders). See Hikajat Hasanoeddin (ed. Jan
Edel) (Meppel: B. Ten Brink, 1938), pp. 13-9; and J.L.A. Brandes (editor), Babad Tjerbon: Uitvoerige
inhoudsopgave en noten (VBG vol. 59) (Batavia: Albrecht & Co., 1911), canto 13, pp. 66-9.

41
 Isun Nabi Muhammad lan sira anak putu nisun, lungaa sira ing Desa Pase, ana ingkana sawiji saking
umat isun, arane Datu Bahrul,lan angembil sira saking ilmune, darapon wuwuh ing sira, lan saking
Pase sira maringa Jawa, ingkana ana umat isun, minangka rowang ing sira anyalini agama kalawan
agama Islam, ingkana sira mukima.87

(One night the Prophet Muhammad came in his dream saying to him: “Nurullah, I’m The Prophet
Muhammad and you are my grandchildren [one of my descendents]. Go unto Pasai which is my
people where there is one learned scholar named Shaikh Datuk Bahrul from whom you shall gain
knowledge so as your learning will take predominance. From Pasai henceforth you should go to
Java [Ampel, Surabaya, at the time] where there are my people and my descendants with whom
you study and go propagate Islam among the [Javanese] people, and then you should take
residence there).

The same dream by one saint of Wali Songo is also expressed in the meetings of the
ulama in Kawatan, Surabaya, in 1925, prior to the establishment of Nahdlatul Ulama
(NU). As told by almaghfurlah KH. As'ad Syamsul Arifin (d. 1990) of Situbondo, one of
the founder of NU, in one religious gathering in the 1980s, there was a scholar who
expressed his opinion in the meeting saying: “I find the text of writing history from
Ampel which states: ‘When I [Sunan Ampel] resided in Medina, I dreamed of meeting
the Prophet, saying to me: “Bring this Islam to Indonesia [i.e. Nusantara]. Because in his
birthplace in Arab lands they are not capable of implementing the Islamic syariah. Bring
it to Indonesia!’”.88
Another masterfully crafted text is Seh Samsu Tabred which is a version of the mystical
story of Syekh Samsu Tabarez (at-Tabrizi in Arabic), derived from Persian sources.
Nevertheless, the story about Syekh Samsu Tabarez as a child who possesses ultimate
mystical knowledge and coming to teach mystics in Arabia, is constructed from original
Javanese sources. “The idea of Samsu Tabred appearing in the form of a child is
unprecedented elsewhere. And the ingsun [I] doctrine which is taught in the text is
characteristically Javanese, without direct links to the works of mystic ecstasy for which
Rumi is famous,” remarks M.C. Ricklefs on the Surakarta version of this story.89
On a Friday, as story goes from one manuscript in Radya Pustaka of Surakarta (RP MS
no. 263), Syekh Samsu Tabarez confronts the Maulana (ulama) of Rum and other
worshippers in a mosque in Arabia. He displays greater mystical insight than Maulana
Rumi, who submits to Syekh Samsu Tabarez, as do all pious people and the teachers
(para saleh para masaeh sadaya lan para ambiya)90. The text aspires to the supremacy
of Nusantara mystics – even if just a child! – in mystical knowledge over the Arab

87 Hikajat Hasanoeddin, p. 141.

88 Full text of the lecture given in Madurese language can be accessed on the following website address:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=NG7MZq6_iE8 (along with Indonesian translation).
89 See M.C. Ricklefs, The Seen and Unseen Worlds in Java (Honolulu: Allen & Unwin and University of

Hawai’i Press, 1998), p. 110.

90 Who’s “para ambiya” that the text describes as the disciples of Syekh Samsu Tabarez? I suspect that

they are the prophets of Syi’ite sect that aspire to thye supremacy of their irfan or gnosis. See Muhammad
Abed al-Jabiri, Takwinul and Bunyah, on the prevalence of the doctrin of irfan or gnosis among the Syi’ite
imams and their prophets-cum-propagandists. Henri Corbin writes in this tegard in his book, The History
of Islamic philosophy, of the unbroken links of the secret mystical teachings (nubuwwah) from the Prophet
Muhammad – peace be upon him – to other prophets of Syi’ih imams. Regarding the Nusantaranisation of
Syiih doctrines, we can see that in the festival of Asyura (10 Muharram) in Nusantara by making bubur
suro (Asyura rice porridge) and not to perform some kind of physical violence upon the body as practiced
in the centers of Syiih sect in Iran and Iraq. Bubur suro represents the spirit of communitarianism and
familialship (hifzhunnasl) of Islam Nusantara; while physical violence stands againts the maintenance of
society’s body.

42
mystical knowledge. The child then instructs them in what we may describe as
“mysticism of ingsun (I, we) Islam Nusantara”:

Sifatullah ingsun iki; pan ingsun afengalullah; pan ingsun kang Kalek reko; ingsun kang makeluk ika;
ingsun kan ngalif iku; lam-alif mapan ya ingsun.91

(The attrbutes of God am I; for I am the works of God; for I am the Creator; and I am the created; I
am alif; lam-alif am I).

This mysticism of “ingsun (I, we) Islam Nusantara” has been conceptualized from “man
arafa nafsahu faqad arafa rabbahu” as explained in preceeding chapter in positioning
ingsun as nafsahu, nafsa of the Nusantara subjectivity.***

91 Quoted in Ricklefs, The Seen and Unseen Worlds in Java, p. 109.

43
7
Islam Nusantara, The Epistemological Break with the Hegemonic Reason:
Concluding Remarks

Islamic studies as currently carried out in the West remains the victim of hegemonic reason.

--- Mohammed Arkoun, ““Islamic Studies: Methodologies” (1995).92

For the native, objectivity is always directed against him.

--- Frantz Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth, p. 77.

Since its impetus as Din Arab Jawi in 16-17 centuries, Islam Nusantara fulfilled a
number of important functions. Second only to the customs and practices of religious
life, Islam Nusantara was instrumental in firmly planting into the hearts of a large
number of Muslims the ideals and aspirations of Islam. Also at the same time it served
to keep alive the memory of the significance of their distinctive national heritage, their
communities, to play a recognizable role to a wider world.
Furthermore, Islam Nusantara always maintained a position from which it was able to
stimulate a certain interest in valuable aspects of cultural activity which are in danger of
being entirely eliminated from Nusantara life during colonial era. However, its never-
broken continuity of literary production was in itself a sort of intellectual life insurance.
Above all, in its close association with the inner experiences of Nusantara people, Islam
Nusantara was and still is the only effective vehicle Indonesian Moslems have for
concrete self-expression and for factual observation of life, as they are looking at life as
it was and for analyzing man and his aspirations as the sole source of cultural
development.
This is where the importance of the idea of ngeluri leluhur (inventory of our ancestors
tradition): Islam Nusantara was there to give a voice to the actors of the Archipelago, to
speak for themselves, and for their own interests, and then contribute to recent
epistemological questions. The hegemoni Eurocentric paradigm that has informed
Western philosophy and sciences in the modern-colonial capitalist, patriarchal world
system for the last 500 years assumes a universalistic, neutral, objective point of view.
European/Euro-American colonial expansion and domination was able to construct a
hierarchy of superior and inferior knowledge and, this, of superior and inferior people
around the world. These power relations not only mask contemporary forms of control,
subordination and exploitation in the manner of neocolonialism, but more important,
indicate that globalization wileds the potential to maintain hegemonic forms of
cooptation and rule on an unprecedented scale.
Yet globalization also offers new opportunity for the forces of resistance to develop
political organization of global flows and exchanges reflective of postcolonial structures
and practices aimed toward more egalitairan ends. That is how to reorganize and
redirect them as the basis for an alternative global society based on coexistence,
cooperation and partnership. We need to begin a paradigmatic shift away from the

92The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Modern Islamic World (Oxford University Press, 1995), 4 vol., vol. 2, pp.
332-40.

44
hegemony of Islamic studies that had hitherto dominated academic thinking on Islam in
Western academia to a new and radical perspectives. That is what Islam Nusantara is all
about. And this book is part of global movements to restore to the world its dignity for
human lifes, raising up people’s wisdom excavated from their respected civilisation
such as Islam Nusantara to make the world better in the future.***

45
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Cavendish, 2006).

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Sedjarah Melaju (Menurut Terbitan Abdullah ibn Abdulkadir Munsji) (ed. T.D. Situmorang & A. Teeuw)
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