THE HISTORY OF ISLAM IN THE MALAY ARCHIPELAGO: AN ANALYTICAL STUDY OF ABDULLAH BIN NUH'S WORKS

Abstract

The topic on the coming of Islam to the Malay world has become an intellectual debate among scholars around the world for both Muslim and Western scholars. There are at least four elements of debate on these issues, in particular, on the originality of Islamic doctrines in the Malay world, the theory of the coming of Islam to the Malay world, the times of the coming of Islam as well as the spreading of Islam in the Nusantara. This research will be on attempt in explicating Abdullah bin Nuh’s works particularly in his discourses of the coming of Islam to the Nusantara. It focuses on three works by Abdullah bin Nuh, entitled Sejarah Islam di Jawa Barat hingga Zaman Keemasan Banten, Ringkasan Sejarah Wali Songo, al-Islām Fi Indūnīsiyyā, and his articles delivered in the Seminar on The Advent of Islam in Indonesia held in Medan in 1963. The approach of this study is based on textual analysis, using descriptive, analytical methods from various works of the subject under study, comparison and contrast in order to get additional information from the other ulama’ in the same era as Abdullah bin Nuh. This study concludes that Abdullah bin Nuh believes that Islam came to Nusantara in particular to Indonesia since 7^th century CE even though there is a claim that says Islam came much earlier from the Arab Peninsula plus encounters the theory most of Western scholars who view that Islam came in 12^th century CE.