Kinship, Islam, and Raiding in Maguindanao, c. 1760–1780The second-half of the eighteenth century saw increasing connections
between the southern Philippines and the broader Islamic world. Annabel
Gallop suggests that a number of extant Qur’ans from the region were
likely made or at least inspired by scholars and scribes from the Daghistan
region of northern Caucasus.^21 She reminds of the already conspicuous
presence of foreign Muslims serving as high-ranking religious officials
(qadi) in the courts of Sulu and Maguindanao. Sulu had seen an Arab,
Turk and Afghan qadi while in the nineteenth century Maguindanao had
a Bukharan (Uzbek) chief pandita (religious adviser).^22
Patchy evidence likewise points to the religious connection of
southern Philippines with Java. Banten in particular, seems to have been
an important node for these religious circulations. This is suggested by
the presence of a manuscript on Islamic mysticism (tasawwuf) written
by a Mindanao scholar (alim) named Syekh Ihsan al-Din that identifies
the well-known mystic Abdul Qahhar al-Bantani as inspiration.^23 The
half-Bugis (Soppéng), half-Tausug future sultan of Sulu, Azim ud-Din I
(r. 1735–48; 1764–74)^24 was initially educated in Islamic jurisprudence
by an intellectual (fakih), named Abdul Rahman, who came to Sulu via
Batavia and likely had a connection from Banten as well.^25 These ties
are not unexpected given the corresponding references, albeit fragmen-
- Annabel Teh Gallop, “From Caucasia to Southeast Asia: Daghistani Qur’ans
and the Islamic Manuscript Tradition in Brunei and the Southern Philippines I”,
Manuscripta Orientalia 14.1 (2008): 46; Annabel Teh Gallop, “From Caucasia
to Southeast Asia: Daghistani Qur’ans and the Islamic Manuscript Tradition in
Brunei and the Southern Philippines II”, Manuscripta Orientalia 14.2 (2008). - Gallop, “From Caucasia to Southeast Asia: Daghistani Qur’ans and the Islamic
Manuscript Tradition in Brunei and the Southern Philippines I”, Manuscripta
Orientalia 14.1 (2008): 46. - See Oman Fathurahman, Shaṭṭārīyah silsilah in Aceh, Java and the Lanao area of
Mindanao (Tokyo: Research Institute for Languages and Cultures of Asia and
Africa (ILCAA), Tokyo University of Foreign Studies (TUFS), 2016); Oman
Fathurahman, “Aceh, Banten, dan Mindanao”, Republika (Indonesia) (9 March
2012) [Online]. Abdul Qahhar al-Bantani enjoyed patronage from the Bantenese
sultan Abun Nazr Zainul Asikin (1753–1777). Atsushi Ota, “Imagined Link,
Domesticated Religion: The State and the Outside Islamic Network in Banten,
West Java, c. 1520-1813”, in Nagazumi Yoko (ed.), Large and Broad: The Dutch
Impact on Early Modern Asia (Essays in Honor of Leonard Blusse) (Tokyo: The Toyo
Bunko, 2010): 15–16. - Majul, Muslims in the Philippines: 21.
- NA, VOC 8087, Letter of the Sultan of Sulu to Governor-General Mattheus de
Haan in Batavia, received 2 July 1727, fol. 9.