Amsterdam and Slavery: also in Asia

During the last months at least three important books have appeared on the history of Indonesia. I will later write some words on the comprehensive and rather literary works of Van Reybrouck and Bossenbroek. All three books under discussion start with (quite negative) judgments about the past. Of course, there is an opinion that academic study of history should explain how a development grew, how it must be explained against the background of its own time, not as seen by modern, critical observers some centuries later. That is value-free writing of history. It seems that there is a tendency, where ethical values of the 21 century may play a role as well. This is definitely true for this book on Slavery in East and West: the Amsterdam Research, published by Pepijn Bradon, Guno Jones, Nancy Jouwe and Matthias van Rossum in Amsterdam, Spectrum, 2020, 448pp. The book was ordered by the city council of Amsterdam, in preparation for  public apology to be expressed in 2021 for the active role people and institutions in Amsterdam had in support of the absolutely despicable institution and practice of slave-making, slave-trade and related matters. In 38 chapters here, besides introduction and conclusion, more than 40 authors write some kind of indictment of past aspects of Amsterdam history.

The book is part of the long process of growing consciousness about the global practice of slave-making and Dutch participation in it. Most studies in this field are related to the Dutch part of the trade in slaves in the Atlantic area: African people, taken slave by raids and wars in West Africa who were brought to the Caribbean and areas of North and South America, where the Dutch town on the island of Curacao and its colony of Surinam played their roles, where plantations after the 1670s until the early 1860s worked with slaves.

People are seldom absolutely free: they work for other people in order to receive salaries, they worked because they were in debt, but the most drastic loss of self-control and freedom is seen where not only labour can be asked and ordered, but where human bodies and persons are sold as if they are things: that is the ethical and philosophical anger behind this book. Pages 24-25 give all kind of definitions of slavery.

In the town of Amsterdam few real slaves were found, but institutions like the United East India Company (VOC) and the West India Company (WIC) were responsible for the practice of slavery. Matthias van Rossum (chapter 1: on the VOC) has a short review of the easy adaptation of the Dutch VOC traders in societies of Asia, where slaves were part of transport and trade. As early as 1603 Cornelis de Houtman published a Malay-Dutch dictionary with words like slave (hamba) and 'to catch people' (tawan orang), while the word mardeka was used for free persons, who were not slaves. The nutmeg culture on the Banda Islands was served by slaves, after Jan Pieterszoon Coen had killed nearly the full original population in a holocaust of 1621 (p. 58). Wim Manuhutu wrote about Amsterdam (called here Mokum) and the Moluccas, where the VOC defended a monopoly on the production and trade of cloves. In the 19th century in Java the cultuurstelsel was common, a system of obligation for villages to produce specific products (sugar, indigo,tea, coffee) for the world market and where some kind of slavery became part of the system (forced labour up to 200 days per year). There was for many time also a debate about freedom of human beings and the necessity to abolish slavery. Nowadays there is a plea for a society of memory, resulting in monuments, books like this, moral and even financial recompensation.

Multatuli as a Catholic (for some days? months?)

 Eduard Douwes Dekker, better known as Multatuli (1820-1887) is best for his novel Max Havelaar (1860) about a colonial official in the period 1840-1855 who was not corrupt, who defended the rights of poor people against the Dutch colonial system, but also against the native Javanese feudal rulers. He is generally considered as the most prominent Dutch author, at least for the 19th century. Besides the great novel about the basic evil of the colonial system, he wrote theatre plays, essays on many subjects (Ideas) and even more letters. The Complete Works/Volledige Werken count 25 volumes, each of some 800 pages! After being against colonialism, he also was the first famous, self-confident and aggressive atheist of the Netherlands, fighting religion in many of his pages. However, there was a development in this personality and even a short 'Roman Catholic period'. 

He was born in a Mennonite (anabaptist) family, where baptism of children was not the practice.To become member of the religious community was a personal choice. It was quite common to be baptised at the age of 18 or even later. Although Multatuli was educated in a pious Mennonite family, he never was baptised in this church. His father was a captain on a boat sailing to Indonesia and at the age of 18 he arrived in Batavia where he became a minor official at the finance ministry of the colony. The young man here fell in love with a Catholic girl, Caroline Versteegh, who probably was in a boarding school in the colonial capital. Her father worked in a plantation, 30 km south of Semarang. It would be impossible at that time to marry the Catholic girl, without converting to Catholicism and so we may understand that Eduard Douwes Dekker (later better known as Multatuli) was baptised on Saturday 28 August 1841 in the chapel of the government hospital of Batavia (by lack of a proper church or even Cathedral). The father of Caroline, however, did not take this conversion serious: Multatuli was fond of fighting and gambling, had serious financial debts and showed lack of discipline in some of his duties. The marriage never was effectuated.

There is an interesting article on the contacts of Multatuli with Prefect Apostolic Joannes Scholten (1797-1865). In mid-1841 Multatuli showed much sympathy for this 'gentle and nice person' who was already in bad health. During the time Scholten suffered of typhus, the young official Douwes Dekker took care for him, watched him at his bed. Also several letters of the correspondance between the two have been saved. As late as the early 1870s, thirty years after their meetings in Batavia, Multatuli wrote four nice and emotional pages in his Ideas (Volledige Werken VI:243-246), in which he praised Scholten as the brave and helping army chapain during the Java War. - There is a special journal Over Multatuli, where Wilfried Dierick wrote an interesting article 'Een 'roomsch' intermezzo' (vol 17:1986, 28-41). While reading this (also through the  summary in the biography of 2002 by Dick van der Meulen), I saw again that my three volumes on Catholics in Indonesia, 1808-2010 have very little information about the European and Eurasian Catholics in the colony. I concentrated on the start of the great Indonesian group of Catholics, although they were until 1920 still a minority! So,  this may be seen as a small correction to my earlier research on Catholics in Indonesia.

Indonesia: colonialism and decolonisation according to David Van Reybrouck

The Belgian historian, general journalist, and literator, David Van Reybrouck, is best known through his great book on Congo (2010). It was partly written on documentation, but for more than 50% based on interviews with living people: oral history, anecdotes and small personal stories picture the colonial history of the country which began in the 1880s. Van Reybrouck also was the co-author of the two books by Morocco-Belgian Mohamed El Bachiri, whose wife was killed by an attack by Muslim terrorists in Brussels on 22 March 2016 (A Jihad of Love; The Odyssee of Mohamed).
After five years of research he now has published a book of 600 pages which concentrates on the rise and development of the colonialism in Indonesia from 1600-1942 and the difficult process of the revolutionary war between 1945-1949 after which the Netherlands finally gave up its colonial rule. The period 1945-1949 fills about half the book. Reybrouck is quite rude about the Dutch personnel during the VOC period, during the colonial state, and also about the present opinions of Dutch people. Only six percent of the population now is negative about the colonial past and 26% would prefer to 'own' overseas parts in the country. This is much higher than found among citizens of France or the UK, the two largest former colonial states. The Dutch were crude, severe, had a wrong understanding of the Indonesians, especially their wish to follow the national aspirations of Sukarno and his movement since the 1920s. After the Japanese rule there were ample occasions for a smooth transition of power and end a war that cost about 200.000 lives on the side of the Indonesians, but the Dutch were obstinate and only American interventions and threat to stop economic cooperation made an end to their efforts in 1949.

Although the title of the book only refers to the period 1945-1949, it has a much broader picture of Indonesian history. About the subject of revolution, Van Reybrouck stresses that the global role of Indonesia was important, even leading. It was the first Asian country to claim and reach independence, even before India and Pakistan. In 1955 it became the leader (at the Bandung Conference) of the Third World Movement. As to the earlier history it is clear that the Dutch presence in the VOC never was a peaceful trading company: it brought an army with it, and used it. Through the genocide of the population of the Banda Islands and the implementation of the monopoly on spices in the hongi inspections, where all clove trees outside the island of Ambon were cut. After 1700 the cooking in France and many European countries changed: from pepper and other eastern spices to European ones and so the export of food changed to coffee, tea, cacao, sugar, while indigo became important for the colour of clothes. In this way economy and colonial policy changed too. I am still in the first chapters of the book, but this new presentation of colonialism and its end, extremely well written in a lively style, will be important for the general attitude towards Indonesian and Dutch colonial history.

The dubious abuse of blasphemy

On 16 October this year, a French teacher in a secondary school in Paris was killed by a young man of Chech offspring. The main reason was that he had showed a cartoon of an Arab man with a turban, with a bomb. Apparently it was thought that this was not just the image of an extremist, but of the Prophet Muhammad. There were many reactions in Europe, also in the Netherlands. Clearly, the victim of the killing was a defender of free speech. But among Dutch Muslims a protest started on the internet with a list asking that in the Netherlands a law should defend the Muslim prophet against blasphemy. More than 150.000 people signed this proposal and a debate in the media and also in the parliament was held pro and contra this movement. Who was the victim? The Prophet Muhammad for the showing of an angry and violent Arab man?  Or rather the teacher Pathy in France and victims of the man who killed some people in Austria, close to a Jewish Synagoge?

From the examples of Pakistan we know that aggressive defence of the honour of the Pophet and against any expression that can be labelled blasphemy may cause tension and also violence between religious communities. After the return of HRS, Habib Rizieq Shihab in Jakarta after 3,5 years of exile in Mecca, this issue has now began in Indonesia too.

After the return of Rizieq in Jakarta on 10 November, people apparently had problems to deal with the agenda of this 'firebrand' as he is labelled by some. The chiefs of police of Central and West Jakarta have been replaced because  HRS did not obey the rules for social distance due in the time of the corona epidemic. But Jakarta Governor Anies Baswedan paid a courtesy rule to this unruly citizen (because he needs his support in order to become president at the next elections of 2023?) Baswedan and the host were wearing the required masks here. During this courtesy call the rules were followed! HRS also went with a large following to the Puncak area on 12 November to open a new pesantren of his 'movement'. 14-15 November HRS celebrated maulid and the marriage of a son in Petamburan. For this marriage the mayorof Central Jakarta helped with some facilities and was thereupon dismissed from his function by governor Anies Baswedan.What else will follow? During this trip to Puncak there was a lady who expressed her negative opinion about Rizieq ans she was calleda 'whore'by the Imam besar of Jakarta and said: "If the police fail to process (the blasphemy against him), then don't blame the Muslims when a head is found in the streets..." (source: Jakarta Post, 26 November 2020). Apparently, accusation of blasphemy can create all kind of self-appointed victims and will never work as a healing or peace-creating factor.

A new Introduction to the Qur'an from Edinburgh

In the 1970s and 1980s there were two  basic books on the Qur'an in European academic studies: the reprint of the book by Theodor Nöldeke, Geschichte des Qorans and the English (published by Edinburg University Press) by William Montgomery Watt, Bell's Introduction to the Qur'an. The latter book has a strange title, because only a small part is the original work by Richard Bell, and most of it by his student, Montgomery Watt. The basic idea of Watt was about the changing society in Mecca: from a closed group, around powerful tribal leaders, to an open trading society of individuals. This new society was in need of new ethics: no longer the pride of people about their tribe, but the individual persons earning money, who should learn how to be benevolent towards the poor in a society, where no longer the tribal chief took responsibility for the poor and weak. The ethical renewal of Muhammad had to do with the call to the rich who should care for the poor.

Then we had the book by Patricia Crone on the Meccan trade as small and not important on the global scale. And the whole idea of the changing society in need of new ethics disappeared. This great vision of Watt even is no longer mentioned in this book. I also missed the Abraham-theory of Snouck Hurgonje: that only in the later Meccan (perhaps) and in de early Medina period Abraham was identified with Arab culture. although sura 2 receives ample discussion (97-104) and the new vision on Abraham is rightly seen as 'a climactic conclusion to the preceding polemic against Jews and Christians' (103)

Edinburg University Press has now published a new book on the Qur'an: the book by Bell and Watt is only mentioned once in a negative way. On p. 87 the two authors are quoted as champions for a fragmented Qur'an with many short passages and virtually never a whole sura as a literary unit. Sinai, educated in the literary tradition of Angelika Neuwirth, is a firm defender of the sura as a literary unit.  In the summary of the doctrine the new perspective of Meccan society as individual traders is also not mentioned. Now the eschatological symbols are related to the sermons of Ephrem and Jacob of Serugh: "Syriac homilies are redolent of the Qur'an in a considerable number of respects: they criticise man's excessive 'love' of material possessions, his miserliness, and his insatiable desire 'to have more'; they draw on themes of social criticism enshrined in the Hebrew Bible, such as the demand to protect orphans and the poor or the condemnation of false measures (Q 83:1-3); they follow Matthew 6:5-6 in censuring ostentious praying (Q 107:6); and they ascribe a special salvific significance to almsgiving. Furthermore, the early Qur'anic endorsement of vigils is highly reminiscent of the prayer regimen of Christan monks.' (166-7). Remains the question: is it necessary to write about similar, quite obvious ideas between the Christian Bible and the Qur'an in relation to preachers living 100 or even 300 years before Muhammad at a distance of some 2000 kilometer?

The revolutionary ideas of John Wansbrough in the 1970s are firmly rejected: the Qur'an was finished at least between 630-650, with the many manuscripts from San'a.  There is a Meccan period (even clearly discernable in three period, identical to Nöldeke's) and a Medina period, with many ritual and social rules, militancy, but no clear periods or temporal divisions. Problematic in Qur'an interpretation is the lack of local and personal data: as if it is all sermons, a literary style where also the informative parts are lacking, because the believers are considered as knowledgeable. Sinai does not talk about literary beauty of the text, after all it is an academic book. Definitely very readible and covering anything we would like to have it now.

I am now thinking about rewriting the small book from 2002: De Korte Hoofdstukken van de Koran, in fact a commentary on sura 78-114 of the Qur'an, known as Juz 'm Amma. It is interesting to read the new commentaries. Sinai is a fascinating and honest author, who can raise and feed respect for the Qur'an.

Islamophobia versus Freedom of Speech?

A turbulant war of words has been initiated in international politics. The French teacher Samuel Paty showed in a secondary school the Danish cartoons of the prophet Muhammad and was brutally killed, slaughtered with a knife, like a butcher killing a goat or cow. The crime was committed by an 18 years old man from Russia, of Chechanian offspring. He was shot dead immediately. A French organization active against Islamophobia had called for action against this teacher. This organization now is forbidden by President Macron, a mosque related to this call against the teacher has been closed for six months. Now Erdogan has called for doctors to psychologically investigate his French colleague, while Erdogan has also called the Dutch politican Wilders as a fascist (imitating Hitler and his hatred against Jews?). The French President called his ambassador in Ankara back to Paris. The Dutch Prime Minister has not yet taken measures against Erdogan, who now also calls for a ban on French products in Turkish shops (joining an Arab boycot of French products).

It is still a war of words, but is urges us to think about the abuse of words like Islamophobia. The difficult issue is that of application of the word 'Islam" to deeds of Muslims. Is 'pure' Islam the cause of hatred, violent actions? Is there any Holy War possible? In the name of Christianity religious leaders called for the crusades and the 'liberation of Jerusalem' from Muslim rule. Also in the colonial period, from the first charter of the VOC to the last periods there was some religious motivation in the actions against the Muslims of Indonesia and the division of the colony on the basis of race and religion (Europeans/Christians, Other Asians, native people =Muslims). I even think that the great role of religion in social life (and social divisions) in Indonesia has its roots in this colonial period, when (in contrast to the separation of religion and politics in the Netherlands), religion continued to play a role in social rules like marriage, inheritance, social position in Indonesia.

Daily Sabah is (after the Gülen newspaper Zaman Today was closed by Erdogan) the largest English Language newspaper of Turkey. It had another article: 'Turkey has after the UK the largest number of Starbucks branches of any European country, but why?' This shows the difficult position of modern Turkey in Europe (not in the Arab world, or in Middle Eastern Societies!). Some times one may hope that there should be less religion in our lives!

Pak Termors, the first Indonesian Years 1970-1974 (and much more)

After the 30 September 1965 coup, a 'normalization ' of relations between Indonesia and the Netherlands started soon thereafter. As Finance Minister between 1966-8 Frans Seda invited IMF and other international parties to join the plans for new relations. The Netherlands became chair of the IGGI, the International Government Group on Indonesian Affairs. One of the effects was that also academic contacts could start again. I remember that in the 1970s a report was written with the title Terug van Weggeweest: Hoe de Leidse Academie in het spoor van het kapitaal de weg naar Indonesië terugvond (or a title like: Back from some absence: How Leiden University found its way to Indonesia again, following the big capital). It is a general symptom that difficult international discussions can show as their result some cultural cooperation: cheap and good to show that there have been quick results. One of these was the start of contacts with the Universitas Indonesia in Jakarta on training about Dutch Language and literature. A project started in 1969 and Gerard Termorshuizen moved to Jakarta in early 1970 to become a second person (next to Jan de Vries)  to train Indonesians in Dutch language and literature. He stayed until late 1974. In 1975 the first group of five Indonesian continued this program in Leiden, six months later followed by a group of five more (in total 8 female and two male students). They graduated with a doctorandus degree (equivalent to MA) in 1975 and 1976. But they did not really return to Indonesia: they all came soon back again to the Netherlands, married Dutch partners and continued their career in this country instead of setting up courses in Dutch language and (colonial/post-colonial) Dutch literature at Indonesian universities, which was the initial goal of the program.

Gerard Termorshuizen (born 1935, now 85 years old) wrote about this project a fascinating, very personal book, published only as a private work, communicated in his large circle of friends. The first 40 pages are about his youth and early life until 1970, pages 171-206 are notes about his great project during 50 more years working on research and enjoyment of Dutch colonial literature (individual authors, the journalists and their newspapers).

I arrived only three months after Pak Termors, as he is commonly known, in Indonesia: seven years younger, at the age of 28 I began my research on pesantren in March 1970. From 1978-1988 I was involved in programs with the IAIN, the Institut Agama Islam Negeri, the State Academy of Islamic Studies. My field of work was already established: I was only an observer and later (1978-88) an exceptional external expert in large and established institutions. Out of the first group of nine students who came in the Netherlands 1978-9, all nine returned to their families and work in Indonesia. Five wrote a doctoral dissertation on Islamic subjects, with an Indonesian and a Dutch Professor as tutor. This number has been increasing since then continuously. The study of Dutch and Dutch colonial literature is of course a small subject compared to the vast institutions about Islamic Studies, at least in Indonesia.

In fact Termorshuizen wrote a very intriguing book about a Dutch scholar in Indonesian society, finding his way (of working and living). There are many naughty stories about his affairs with women, written down after so many years, as somewhat special sections in this book with its many subjects and variations. The greatest project was not the training of students, but the translation of the Max Havelaar book by H.B. Yassin, followed by the preparations for the movie on the book. There are nice portraits of individual people: Jacob Vredenbregt, Han Resink, Rob Nieuwenhuis and many others. I thank Gerard for this very personal gift to the broad circle of Indonesian and Dutch students of the changing Indonesian society and its cultures. It is a unique story that quite many of us will read and re-read with passion and surprise, recognizing their own and theirs friends' life stories.

Restaurant Garuda in The Hague closing: what about Indonesian heritage in The Netherlands?

 In Utrecht restaurant Paradise was for many years the most famous place for Indonesian food. It closed down two years ago to make place for a vegetarian rival. Now the iconic restaurant Garuda in The Hague has financial and managerial problems. Peter 't Mannetje, the owner of the last forty years is 73 years and looking for a successor, he can't find. He has financial problems as well. Garuda was a prominent place to be: ministers, ambassadors were eating here. But in general the Indonesian rstaurants, the most visible remnant of Indonesian connections in the Netherlands are lossing public. indeed there are some new places: in Utrecht we have since a few years Blauw, excellent food in a small building. Spekuk is another one, small, narrow seats with good food. But no longer so popular as Turkish Kebab of Japanese sushi.

It is not all in decline in the Netherlands. In my town of Utrecht the Moluccan Historical Museum was closed some ten years ago, but there is since last year another Indonesian Cultural Centre in The Hague Indonesische Herinneringscentrum, Sophiaweg 10. It is mostly a quite nostalgique 'Memorial Centre'! Still, I consider the closing down of restaurants with Indonesian food an example of the diminishing attenton for the colonial connections that the country had for a very long period. In fact, we can consider it as part of the cultural debate that is now very negative: debate on slavery, on cruelties and oppression from the time of Jan Pieterszoon Coen up to the last colonial war of 1945-1949. 

In the first chapter of my books on Catholics in Indonesia,  I wrote a comment, that can be repeated now also for the return impact on the Netherlands:

A popular novel about the effect of the colonial past for present Indo­nesia by the famous Dutch author Hella Haasse has as its title Krassen op een Rots, (Scratches on a Rock). It states that the effects of the 350 years of Dutch colonialism did not last long, because colonialism never touched the heart of Indonesian society. Perhaps one of the most lasting effects of the colonial presence are the lively Christian communities of Indonesia, now totalling about 10% of a population of more than 200 million.

Send it back! Dutch report on possible return of colonial theft of cultural heritage

On 7 October 2020 a report was handed over to the Dutch Government with the title Koloniale collecties en erkenning van onrecht (= Colonial collections and recognition of injustice). It concludes that thousands, perhaps about more than one hundred thousand cultural objects were stolen by the colonial government in Surinam, the Dutch Caribean Islands and Indonesia. If the objects were honestly paid for, or  given by free owners, there is no problem. But if they were stolen, and the former owners want it back (in fact the states of Indonesia, Surinam, Curacao and other islands) then it should seriously be considered to send these objects back. Examples were given such as the large diamond stolen from Banjarmasin during the war of 1859 and the precious objects in Lombok (Cakranegara) during the war of 1894 (only the manuscript of the Negarakertagama was once given back to Indonesia, during the visit of President Soeharto to the Netherlands in 1970).

Another example is the beautiful statue of Ganesha, taken in 1803 from the temple of Singasari in East Java and brought to the mansion of the Governor of the Northcoast of Java in Semarang at the request of Governor Engelman and later brought to the Netherlands. Now it is a masterpiece at the largest museum of the country, Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam. If the Indonesian government wants it back there should be no argument that the theft is already outdated because of lapse of time. It will probably a matter of some long deliberations and some time, but the director of the commision, Lilian Goncalves-Ho Kang You, responded that colonialism was a matter of nearly four hundred years (1600-1975) and that its restoration may take some time as well.

Meister Eckhart, Heidegger, and Syafaatun al-Mirzanah on detachment in/is Islam

Through a small book about the philosophy of Heidegger I came across his interest for Meister Eckhart (1260-1329) and his idea  of Gelassenheit, sometimes translated as detachment, releasement. And so I read in the book of the Ph.Thesis by Shafaatun the chapter on Detachment (pp. 121-157). Shafaatun takes another keyword of Eckhart, Abgescheidenheit, also translated as 'detachment'.

In the recent book on The Essential Caputo, a nice analysis of this concept of  Eckhart is given. There is a cool section of detachment: leaving things aside, making free from, like ascetism, which also may lead to indifference, lazyness. This is the negative side of the concept, like the Arab nafî, leading to some kind of purification, but not yet a final situation. But then isbât should of follow, as the fulfillment, realisation of union with God.

 

Caputo writes in this that after detachment a positive action must come: "As the soul transcends into the multiplicity of sensible things of the world to God himself." (61). Here Eckhart writes in a personal style about God, while Heidegger writes in an impersonal mood about Being itself. In fact, here is not only negative theology working (see Shafaatun pp 154-155) but also the positive side is coming in.

From this debate I thought again about the meaning of Islam. It is often translated as 'surrender to God's will and power', and so has the meaning of detachment, but it immediately must be given the positive meaning of sharing God's plan with the world, of a personal union. Entrustment could be a good translation of Islam too.

After 123 years: Ceremonial Dutch Golden Coach banned for reasons of discrimination

 In 1898 the Dutch Kingdom welcomed a new queen, Wilhelmina. The citizens of the capital, Amsterdam, gave her a new coach, commonly called 'the golden coach' for its rich decoration. Much of the wooden parts were made by cratfsmen from Jepara. Since 1903 the coach has been used every year at the third Tuesday of September to bring the royal family to parliament for its ceremonial opening and the King's speech. A few years ago it was decided that the coach should receive treatment for some deficiencies. Now it is finished and fine again and could be used for next Tuesday.

However, in relations to the demonstrations under the label of 'Black lives matter' there is a fierce criticism on colonialism again and especially the treatment of native population in the colonies who had to obey and to bow for colonial rulers, here represented by the former queen. Therefore it has now been decided by the government, no longer to use the Golden Coach for ceremonial purposes and to place in in a historical museum. Times are changing, although slowly!

CMR volume 16: Indonesia in the 19th century

 

CMR, the great series on the bibliographical history of Christan-Muslim Relations has now published volume 16: 825 pages on  North America (54 entries, 430 pages! Islam is a global religion!), interesting articles on China, Japan, some on Australia and 16 on Southeast Asia. - I wrote here five articles, one on L.W./C. van den Berg, further three on colonial conflicts with religious implications (Paderi wars, Aceh, Banjar 1859- and one on Ahmed Ripangi. I write here short remarks on more authors who were important for Indonesia.

1. Ismail Hakki Göksoy from Isparta, Turkey, found in the Ottoman archives in Istanbul a rich documentation of the correspondance between the sultanate of Aceh and the Ottomans in Mecca and Istanbul between 1849 and 1873. The Acehnese sultan wanted to put Aceh as part of the Ottoman empire and asked for protection, especially warships: 'For if we do not expell them from the Muslim lands, we fear all the people of the island will apostasise and leave Islam once and for all' (583). The Ottoman government did not act positively in favour of Aceh.

2.  Thomas Stamford Raffles wrote 1807 in private letters very positive about Islam: 'Mohamed's mission does not invalidate our Saviour's. One [= Islam] has secured happiness to the Eastern and one [= Christianity] to the Western world, and both deserve our veneration.' (526). But at the end of his career in Asia, in 1823, has was very negative about the role of Islam.

3. Nico Kaptein wrote about Sayyid Uthman, the most prominent Arab scholar in the Dutch East Indies between 1850 until his death in 1914.  He defended the position that the Dutch rule gave safety and protection to the Muslims and therefore it was illegal to steal from them or take their property in any means. (550). Kaptein adds that also 'traditional fiqh might provide arguments in favour of harmonious Christian-Muslim relations. (550). Kaptein also wrote about the mufti of Mecca, Ahmad ibn Zayni Dahlan (1816-1886), who issued several fatawa in the same line, that Muslims should obey the infidel colonial rulers in everything and that also the appoinments of mosque leaders are legal (565).

4. A very interesting person is Abdullah Abdulkadir, usually called Abdullah Munshi, of mixed Arab (Hadramaut) and Tamil ancestry. He was born in Malacca and fluent in languages, teacher of missionaries and colonial officials. Although he received his salary from the British and Americans, he remained critical and independent and in translating the gospels: he defended his Muslim confession, although he also admired the dedication of the colonial administration. Finally, through this contact 'Malay Islam became more defensive due to the mossionary presence.' (535).

The project has also some missing issues: the Java War of 1825-1830 and the position and writings of Prince Dipanagara are not discussed here, but in such a work always some deficiences are left to be corrected by others later.

The Indonesian roots of Prime Minster Rutte and his dilemma between 15-17 August

 For Dutch people a commemoration is held on 4 May each year of the people who died in World War II, while the new freedom in the country is celebrated on 5th of May. This year has a more elaborated celebration because of 75 years after 1945. On 15 August there is a special celebration in The Hague at the monument for the victims of Japanese rule in Indonesia, January 1942- 15 August 1945. This year the monument in The Hague was smeared with red paint by an Aliansi Merah Putih who claim that The Netherlands should not only mourn for the fate of their own citizens, but recognize that it made the wrong choice not to celebrate Indonesian Independence on 17 August. Instead the Dutch tried between 1945-1949 to renew their control in Indonesia.

This year prime minister Rutte was not only present in his official function, but talked about the fate of his family: his father (working in a Dutch firm in Indonesia) was imprisoned and had to work for the Japanese. his wife and two cildren were in separate camps and his wife died just before the end of WWII. Back in the Netherlands his father remarried and had four more children, among them Mark Rutte. In his speech he discussed the difficult and different choices and memories of Dutch citizens. They all have their own priorities: the largest group are the Eurasion or Indo people. They emphasize, together with the offspring from Dutch people who suffered in Japanese camps and from the bersiap violence, between September 1945 and early 1946, that Indonesian freedom fighters killed thousands of people, just coming out of the Japanese camps. But also the Moluccan and Papua people in the Netherlands have their own ideas about the past and the difficult divorce between the Dutch colonial power and the Indonesian nationalism under Soekarno. An academic research about the last colonial war of 1945-9 has not yet published its results, but the focus of research is already criticized by many people concerned. One should not forget that about 2 million out of the Dutch population of 17 million in the Netherlands in some way have 'Indonesian roots'. As an involved academic in this process I am still very happy that in the fight against the Dutch, the difference of  religion was not an important issue (it became a cause of civil war in various regions like West Java, South Kalimantan, Sulawesi). Anyway, this debate still proves that Indonesian-Dutch relations still are influenced by different interpretations of the past.

Martabat Tujuh and the three hares of Paderborn

 Last week, Paule and I were in Münsterland again, the German province with its many castles, churches, feudal memories and old buildings amidst quiet landscape. It was the first foreign trip after the corona crisis made life rather dull and monotonous. More on this trip in my Dutch blog.

We saw very special image in Paderborn of three hares running together with three ears seen only. It is found as a decoration in front of some houses, the oldest in the great mediaeval cathedral (Hoher Dom). It is also founrd in some twenty more churches of Europe, in Jewish synagogues and below we will also see an Indonesian Muslim equivalent.

 

 

On top we see the three hares of Paderborn in front of a common house, in the middle in the cloister of the great cathedral. Some people interprete it as a symbol of the unity within the trinity: the three animals sharing ears. But a friendly guide gave us the common poetic riddle in German: 3 Hasen und der Löffel 3,  und doch hat jeder Hase 2 ('Three hares and their three ears, and still each one has two!).

It reminded me of an image found in the dissertation of Rinkes on the doctrine of Martabat Tujuh, the seven emanations of the divinity, where the three first are still united: God's knowledge, God knowing, the object of divine knowledge: all three are still united in the divinity, because God's knowledge creates, not something outside the divine being, but still inside God. This is the way God creates the obnject of his knowledge and love. Remaining one God only!

Breaking the taboo on sexual abuse in the Catholic Church, also in Indonesia

The Jakarta Post had between 26 July and 7 August a series of articles, also an editorial on the difficult issue of the taboo on information about sexual abuse in the Catholic Church of Indonesia. The editorial of 4 August wrote: 'Last week The Jakarta Post published a series of articles addressing the issue of sexual abuse within the Catholic Church, which many may perceive as a “taboo” as it could undermine the Church’s authority. It was the second time that the Post collaborated with Tirto.id after our joint investigative report on sexual abuse on campuses last year. Our recent tandem effort followed a report published by a West Jakarta parish magazine last December about 56 cases of alleged sexual abuse within the Church community.' It turned  out that it is still difficult for Catholic leadership to acknowledge these cases. The priest Joseph Kristanto, secretary of the Catholic Commission on Seminary Education reported 56 cases in a confidential report, but archbishop  of Jakarta, Cardinal Suharyo denied that he knew any case. Confronted with the official report he stated that it was confidential, the same status as sins confessed to a priest and therefore should be silenced! 'Breaking the taboo' is quite difficult! The same I heard about several bishops who were dismissed from their office, cases like Bishop Belo of Dili and more recently the bishop of Ruteng. No reasons for their withdrawal from their function was given, but rumours had stories of sexual stories. In a very open series of statements missionary Dr. John Priori is quoted by Jakarta Post that it would be much better if these cases are openly acknowledged, so that the circuits of gossip can be cleared and rather an open debate about these cases should take place.

Above: father Joseph Kristanto, below Cardinal Suharyo

These cases are not from the last decades only. In my first volume on Catholics in Indonesia, pp. 270-274 as Document 19) I included one case of 1851 (in fact the only case for the whole period of 1808-1940 found in the archives). A Capuchin Friar Kooy had committed sexual acts with young military trainees in Surabaya, one of them a 14-year old son Pallandt, lieutenant colonel of the army. Through two high Catholic connections, Resident P.J.B. de Parez as Resident of Surabaya and Colonel Count Von Lütsow, as army commander of East Java, the case was silenced, and Father Kooy was sent back to the Netherlands before the case was brought before the court. The letter in Dutch and partly in Latin (where the kernel of his deeds, even in the church building, in the confessional room was told), was like all non-Malay/Indonesian documents not included in the Indonesian translation of this volume. Only in the third volume (with much less documents) translation of all documents was included.

Another case of sexual abuse in the 19th century was in West Java. Tom van den End skipped this case in his publications of documents about the Protestant mission in Sundanese regions, but Maryse Kruithof, who later worked on the same Protestant Mission in West-Java, told it with documentation (about missionary Simon van Eendenburg). I related this in the blog Relindonesia.blogspot.com of 28 December 2014.

For me it was also the first time I read the website Trito.id: a nice resource.

FPI still alive? Habib Rizieq Shihab grumbling from Mecca, threatening with 212

From early March until now, end of July 2020, the newspapers and media were absolutely occupied with the COVID-19 virus. Academic, social and political news most of the time was related to the disease, which was much more serious in Europe and most of all the USA and not so much in the Muslim countries of the Middle East and also not in Indonesia. However, during Ramadan all mosques had to be closed, minister of religion Fachrul Razi issued a ban on common meals from saur, early morning, up to the breaking of fast, iftar, together. Also khalwat or a seclusion of the ten last days of Ramadan in a mosque, celebration of nuzulul Qur'an, and, of course, also the most popular salat tarawih, the longer prayer after breaking the fast and maghrib prayer, should take place at home, not in the mosque and also not in larger groups than only the small family. Habib Rizieq Shihab, still in Mecca, protested against the 'negative prospects' of the Minister of Religion.
He was even more negative about a second issue, the proposal for a law on Pancasila, doctrine and practice, now known as RUU HIP, Rancangan Undang-undang Haluan Ideologi Pancasila. The most debated issue is about article 7:

(1) Ciri pokok Pancasila adalah keadilan dan kesejahteraan sosial dengan semangat kekeluargaan yang merupakan perpaduan prinsip ketuhanan, kemanusiaan, kesatuan, kerakyatan/ demokrasi politik dan ekonomi dalam satu kesatuan.

(2) Ciri Pokok Pancasila berupa trisila, yaitu: sosio-nasionalisme, sosio-demokrasi, serta ketuhanan yang berkebudayaan.

(3) Trisila sebagaimana dimaksud pada ayat (2) terkristalisasi dalam ekasila, yaitu gotong-royong.

In this article first the traditional five pillars of Pancasila are repeated in a short version: Divinity, humanism, unity of Indonesia, a democratic system of politics and economy for all. The second part makes it in three parts, no Communism included like in NASAKOM (Nationalism, religion, communism, from the last years of Sukarno), but nationalism, democracy and divinity in its (local?) culture. The third part of this article reduces the three to one issue alone: cooperation, gotong-royong.

Communism is not explicitly condemned in this debate of Pancasila and the religious values only vaguely mentioned in the first and second part. Rizieq Shihab asked that President Jokowi should step down because of this bad formulation. He threatened that 212 (after Two December 2016, when the great demonstrations against the Indo-Chinese candidate for governor of Jakarta, Ahok, was forced to step down) could become effective again!
Also the MUI, Majelis Ulama Indonesia, the Indonesian Council of Muslim Clerics, have protested against the bill, which entered the agenda of parliament in March 2020, in the early beginning in the Covid-19 period. It was not really debated in parliament and now maybe will be dropped for further public debate: 75 years after Suarno issued the idea of pancasila, the debate has not yet ended.