islamic-jihad-legacy-of-forced-conversion-imperialism-slavery

Islamic Jihadpopulace. Following the trail of Muslim holy warriors, Islam spread from Sulu to Mindanao and reached theManila area by 1565.The local Filipinos organized into small Barangays—groups based on village or tribal community—offered sporadic and feeble resistance against well-organized Muslim incursions. The arrival of the Spanishcolonists in the Cebu Islands in 1521, from where they slowly expanded their control over the Philippines,eventually halted the further spread of Islam. By this time, a major section of the Animist population ofSouthern Philippines had been converted to Islam. When the Spaniards spread their political control overFilipino islands, the Animist population, threatened and brutalized by the Muslim warriors, did not offer muchresistance to the new imperialists. But the Muslim-held islands offered fierce, protracted resistance. 305 Thenative forces allied with the Spaniards tried to take control of Muslim-held islands but failed. The Spanishoccupiers, however, rolled back the rival Muslim invaders from some areas and sealed off the furtherterritorial expansion and spread of Islam. Mindanao and the Sulu Archipelago, which had been thoroughlyIslamized, remained under Muslim control and remain Islamic till today.Method of conversion in Southeast Asia: Indisputably, Muslims first came to Southeast Asia as traders andsettled down in the port-cities among the native people. Taking opportunities of the liberal and tolerant localculture, they freely intermarried with the infidel women, who bore Muslim children. In intermarriages, eventhe powerful King Parameswara could not retain his own religion and convert his concubine damsel: halfMuslim and half Indonesian. Since Muslims started settling down in Southeast Asia in the early tenth century,procreation through intermarriages, it appears, was the main tool for the growth of the Muslim population.There might have been conversion of some servants and employees engaged by Muslim merchants, which,given the repulsive attitude Muslims entertained against non-Muslims, facilitated a more harmoniousrelationship between the two parties. Furthermore, the Islamic sanction that Muslim men can have up to fourwives, engage in temporary marriages (mut’ah) 306 and keep unlimited concubines (sex-slaves) might havehelped the Muslim population grow faster.In this early period of the Muslim settlement in Southeast Asia, not many people converted to Islambecause of its superior message. In the 1290s—nearly four centuries after the Muslim settlement began—onlytwo small Muslim city-kingdoms were established in Northern Sumatra. After King Parameswara convertedand founded an Islamic Sultanate in Malacca, Islam spread quickly as conquest of the Malay Peninsula,Indonesian Archipelago, Philippines and Southern Thailand proceeded apace. The Malacca Sultanateremained in Muslim control for less than a century before the Portuguese ousted them. And within that shorttime, a large section of the population had been converted.What enabled the conversion of the otherwise resistant infidels of Southeast Asia to Islam so quickly afterMuslims gained political power?To historians like Richard Eaton and Anthony Johns among many others, it was now the turn of the Sufis,who came mainly from India, to spread Islam quickly among the until-now-resistant infidels through peacefulpersuasion. But even in Eaton’s testimony, there is absolutely no clear record or evidence to suggest that theSufis converted the infidels to Islam. Nor is there any indication of the method they might have used in theconversion. According to Eaton, there are only some fragmentary writings about "enormously influentialJavanese Sufis (kiyayi)" of the nature of "fantastic legends". 307 Based on these unsubstantiated evidence, thesescholars are quick to assert that the conversion was of peaceful nature and the credit goes to Sufis. In a wilfulassertion, Syed Naguib al-Attas notes: ‘I am inclined to believe that it was the Sufis who actually propagated305. Pipes (1983), p. 266306. It is said that the Pasai damsel, presented to Parameswara, was born of a mut’ah marriage.307. Eaton (2000), p. 39103