Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Nasionalis-cum-Nahdliyin: a new identity for nominal Javanese Muslims

  • Published:
Contemporary Islam Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

This article discusses contemporary developments in Islam in Indonesia by specifically looking at Muslims living in rural Java. Whereas most studies examine urban Muslims and mostly define Islamization that leads to the emergence of the middle class and the so-called “conservative turn,” this article offers a brief discussion of the transformation of non-practicing Muslims or abangan. Through fieldwork in a remote village in Tulungagung, East Java, the article argues that the massive Islamization in contemporary Java has invited the abangan to construct their new identity of Nasionalis-cum-Nahdliyin. While the term “Nasionalis” refers to a modern ideological category, “Nahdliyin” represents a mode of religiosity that confirms local customs and traditions. Looking at their communal ceremonies, such as yasinan-tahlilan, this new identity has given the abangan a means to maintain their communal bond with their ancestral spirits on the one hand and community cohesion on the other. These communal activities are an amalgam of santri and abangan traditions with which the latter exercise their communal piety in the public space.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

Data availability

This declaration is “not applicable.”

Notes

  1. Hadrami is of historical and contemporary importance in Indonesia. Hadrami (Yemeni) Arab communities have been residing in Southeast Asia for centuries. Their type of Islamic practice resembles that of traditional Indonesian Muslims, especially Nahdlatul Ulama, such as the veneration of wali (pl. awliya’; saints) and visits to their tombs. Some seminal Hadrami figures lead social movements that draws on the religious capital of their sayyid genealogy, with which attracted a sheer number of followings. Many Indonesians revere Hadramis because of their assumedly descendants of the Prophet Muhammad. It is estimated that there are more than 1 million Indonesian Hadramis. They are prominent in business, politics, intellectual, and religious life in the country. It indicates the increasing significance of Hadrami sayyids in contemporary Indonesia (see Woodward et al., 2012; Ho 2006; Alatas 2021).

  2. None of the many Islamist parties that were founded in the Reform era has had a significant impact on elections. The PKS, for an instance, has abandoned much of its Islamist agenda (at least in public) due to lack of votes in elections. It turns out that the party has tried to embrace, rather than reject, local cultures (see Woodward et al., 2013), and now its leaders even participate in yasinan-tahlilan rituals which they once said were unacceptable and sinful un-Islamic innovations.

  3. Muslim/Christian violence in Ambon in eastern Indonesia lasted from 1999 until 2002 (see Hasan 2006; Al Qurtuby 2016; Lukens-Bull and Woodward 2021).

  4. For more discussion on the harmony between man, God, and nature, see Maarif (2014).

  5. Langgar is a site for holding prayers, usually small in size, while a masjid is a larger one in which the Friday prayers are regularly performed.

  6. As a local religious leader, a modin deals with the religious affairs of the community, leads religious rituals (see Arifin 2017:268–69), and serves as an informal marriage functionary at the village level (see Fauzi 2019:408).

  7. There is a similar story of the massacre that took place in Klaten, Central Java (see Wildan 2013:195).

  8. For a further discussion on the massacre of 1965 and its impacts, see McGregor et al. (2018).

  9. On the massacres in 1965 and the wiping out of the Communist remnants in South Blitar, East Java, in the following years, whereabouts Tanggunggunung locates, see Hearman (2010; 2012).

  10. On how the New Order regime constructed myths justifying politicide and legitimizing the military domination of Indonesian life, see Woodward (2011b).

  11. The Indonesian army assumedly encouraged, shaped, directed, and facilitated militia groups and death squads to kill PKI members (see Melvin 2017; Robinson 2017; and Melvin 2018).

  12. For a comparison with other killings in East Java, particularly in Kediri and Bangil, see Hearman (2018, 68–111).

  13. Similar events occurred in other parts of Indonesia (see Robinson 2018).

  14. On the New Order’s propaganda as a political tool through defaming the Communist Party of Indonesia, see Wieringa and Katjasungkana (2019).

  15. In the aftermath of the 1965 event, the rise of mosque attendance similarly occurred in other parts of Java (see Hefner 1987, 541).

  16. Priyayi are Javanese aristocrats; santri are practicing Muslims; and abangan are nominal or non-practicing Muslims.

  17. For a discussion on the proselytization of the Christian missionaries in the Dutch East Indies, currently Indonesia, see Kruithof (2014).

  18. Pak Marjono is the current lurah of Tanggunggunung.

  19. For polarization in Java, see Ricklefs (2007; 2008).

  20. A slametan is a communal meal usually with the aims to reach well-being, prosperity, and safety in life (see van den Boogert 2017). For further reading on slametan among Suriname Javanese, see Khusen (2005).

  21. The shift from slametan to yasinan-tahlilan ritual is in line with a new development in Java, in which the relation between culture and religion was conceptualized. Slametan underwent a significant shift. It was formerly known as part of agama (religion) and is currently referred to as belonging to kebudayaan (culture) (see Woodward 2011a, 2011b, 2011c).

  22. A similar characteristic persists in a community in Kotagede, a Javanese old city in Yogyakarta (see Sirait 2016).

  23. On information on a wide range of the massacre, see Robinson (2018).

  24. For further reading on NU and local traditions, see Feillard (2011).

  25. A number of Indonesians have experienced transcendental communication with ancestor spirits through pilgrimages to shrine and graves (see Hellman 2013). Indonesian Muslims have even invented saintly tombs, some of which are the graves of seven Muslim saints (Wali Pitu) in Bali (see Zuhri 2013a, 2013b; 2022) and several saintly tombs in Central Java (see Alatas 2020).

  26. For a general notion of nationalism, see Anderson (2006).

  27. A similar situation has appeared in the Muslim community of Madura, in which blater (abangan-like) and santri keep a harmonious life by avoiding attacking each other’s traditions (see Pribadi 2018, particularly chapter 4 and 7, and Pribadi 2014).

  28. It is also important to note that many Muslims strongly oppose aliran penghayat kepercayaan, or simply penghayat/kebatinan movements partly because it may cause contestation and challenge existing religious power (see Smith 2014). This is the case with Sapta Dharma which was regarded as heretical and considered to be “un-Islamic” by most Javanese Muslims and its headquarters was attacked in October of 2008 (see Woodward 2011a).

  29. Yatno is a member of Jawa Dipa.

  30. For more about the harrowing massacres, see Cribb (2002), Robinson (2018), and Pohlman (2017).

References

  • Afrianty, D. (2020). Rising public piety and the status of women in Indonesia two decades after Reformasi. TRaNS: Trans –Regional and –National Studies of Southeast Asia, 8(1), 65–80. https://doi.org/10.1017/trn.2019.14

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Alatas, I. F. (2011). Becoming Indonesians: The Ba ‘Alawi in the interstices of the nation. Die Welt Des Islams, 51(1), 45–74. https://doi.org/10.1163/157006011X556120

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Alatas, I. F. (2014). Pilgrimage and network formation in two contemporary Ba ‘Alawi Hawl in Central Java. Journal of Islamic Studies, 25(3), 298–324. https://doi.org/10.1093/jis/etu037

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Alatas, I. F. (2020). Dreaming saints: Exploratory authority and Islamic praxes of history in Central Java. Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, 26(1), 67–85. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9655.13177

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Alatas, I. F. (2021). What is religious authority?: Cultivating Islamic communities in Indonesia. Princeton University Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Anderson, B. (2006). Imagined communities: Reflections on the origin and spread of nationalism. Verso.

    Google Scholar 

  • Arifianto, A. R. (2019). Rising Islamism and the struggle for Islamic authority in post-Reformasi Indonesia. TRaNS: Trans –Regional and –National Studies of Southeast Asia, 8(1), 1–14. https://doi.org/10.1017/trn.2019.10

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Arifin, A. Z. (2017). Defending traditions, countering intolerant ideologies: Re-energizing the role of modin in Modern Java. Al-Jāmi‘ah: Journal of Islamic Studies, 55(2), 265–92. https://doi.org/10.14421/ajis.2017.552.265-292

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Azra, A. (2002). Islam Nusantara: Jaringan Global dan Lokal. Mizan.

  • Bachtiar, H. W. (2014). “Lampiran.” In Agama Jawa: Abangan, Santri, Priyayi dalam Kebudayaan Jawa, translated from Clifford Geertz's Religion of Java. Cetakan II, 569–600. Komunitas Bambu.

  • Barton, G. (2001). “The prospects for Islam.” In Indonesia today: Challenges of history, edited by Grayson J. Lloyd and Shannon L. Smith. ISEAS Publishing.

  • Beatty, A. (2004). Varieties of Javanese religion. Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Boogert, J van den. 2015. “Rethinking Javanese Islam. Towards New Descriptions of Javanese Traditions.” Ph.D. Dissertation--Leiden University. https://hdl.handle.net/1887/36400. Accessed 2 Sep 2022

  • Burhani, A. N. (2017). Geertz’s trichotomy of abangan, santri, and priyayi: Controversy and continuity. Journal of Indonesian Islam, 11(02), 329–50. https://doi.org/10.15642/JIIS.2017.11.2.329-350

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Burhani, A. N. (2020). Muslim televangelists in the making: Conversion narratives and the construction of religious authority. The Muslim World, 10 (Spring), 154–75. https://doi.org/10.1111/muwo.12327

  • Cribb, R. (2001). Genocide in Indonesia, 1965–1966. Journal of Genocide Research, 3(2), 219–239. https://doi.org/10.1080/713677655

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Cribb, R. (2002). Unresolved problems in the Indonesian killings of 1965–1966. Asian Survey, 42(4), 550–563. https://doi.org/10.1525/as.2002.42.4.550

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Cribb, R. (2009). The Indonesian massacres. In S. Totten & W. S. Parsons (Eds.), Century of genocide: Critical essays and eyewitness accounts (pp. 193–217). Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cruikshank, R. B. (1972). Abangan, santri, and prijaji: A critique. Journal of Southeast Asian Studies, 3(1), 39–43. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0022463400000758

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Eickhoff, M., Danardono, D., Rahardjo, T., & Sidabalok, H. (2017). The memory landscapes of ‘1965’ in Semarang. Journal of Genocide Research, 19(4), 530–550. https://doi.org/10.1080/14623528.2017.1393945

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Facal, G. (2019). Islamic Defenders Front Militia (Front Pembela Islam) and its impact on growing religious intolerance in Indonesia. TRaNS: Trans –Regional and –National Studies of Southeast Asia, 8(1), 1–22. https://doi.org/10.1017/trn.2018.15

  • Fakhruroji, M. (2018). Digitalizing Islamic lectures: Islamic apps and religious engagement in Contemporary Indonesia. Contemporary Islam, 13, 201–2015. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11562-018-0427-9

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Fauzi, M. L. (2019). Registering Muslim marriages: Penghulu, modin, and the struggles for influence. Al-Jāmi‘ah: Journal of Islamic Studies, 57(2), 397–424. https://doi.org/10.14421/ajis.2019.572.397-424.

  • Fealy, G. (2003). Divided majority: Limits of Indonesian political Islam. In S. Akbarzadeh & A. Saeed (Eds.), Islam and political legitimacy (pp. 150–168). RoutledgeCurzon.

    Google Scholar 

  • Feillard, A. (2011). The constrained place of local tradition: The discourse of Indonesian traditionalist ulama in the 1930s. In M. Picard & R. Madinier (Eds.), The Politics of Religion in Indonesia (pp. 47–70). Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Fuad, A. F. N. (2020). Da’wa and politics: Lived experiences of the female Islamists in Indonesia. Contemporary Islam, 14(1), 19–47. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11562-019-00442-x

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Geertz, C. (1976). The religion of Java. The University of Chicago Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Gottowik, V. (2018). Pilgrims, prostitutes, and ritual seks: Heterodox ritual practices in the context of the Islamic veneration of saints in Central Java. Bijdragen Tot De Taal-, Land- En Volkenkunde, 174(4), 393–421. https://doi.org/10.1163/22134379-17404001

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Gottowik, V. (2020). Ritual, sex and the body: Heterodox ritual practices at pilgrimage sites in Central Java. The Asia Pacific Journal of Anthropology, 21(4), 332–351. https://doi.org/10.1080/14442213.2020.1800811

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Halim, W. (2018). Young Islamic preachers on Facebook: Pesantren As’adiyah and its engagement with social media. Indonesia and the Malay World, 46(134), 44–60. https://doi.org/10.1080/13639811.2018.1416796

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hasan, N. (2006). Laskar Jihad: Islam, militancy, and the quest for identity in post-New Order Indonesia. SEAP Publications.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Hasan, N. (2008). The Salafi madrasas of Indonesia. In F. A. Noor, Y. Sikand, & M. van Bruinessen (Eds.), The Madrasa in Asia: Political Activism and Transnational Linkages (pp. 247–274). Amsterdam University Press.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Hasan, N. (2011). Salafi madrasas and Islamic radicalism in post-New Order Indonesia. In Islamic studies and Islamic education in Contemporary Southeast Asia, edited by Kamaruzzaman Bustaman-Ahmad and Patrick Jory. Yayasan Ilmuwan.

  • Hasan, N. (2012). Education, young Islamists and integrated Islamic schools in Indonesia. Studia Islamika, 19(1), 77–111. https://doi.org/10.15408/sdi.v19i1.370

  • Hasballah, M. (2000). Cultural presentation of the Muslim middle class in Contemporary Indonesia. Studia Islamika, 7(2), 1–58. https://doi.org/10.15408/sdi.v7i2.708

  • Hearman, V. (2017). Contesting victimhood in the Indonesian anti-communist violence and its implications for justice for the victims of the 1968 South Blitar Trisula Operation in East Java. Journal of Genocide Research, 19(4), 512–29. https://doi.org/10.1080/14623528.2017.1393943

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hearman, V. (2010). Guerrillas, guns, and knives? Debating insurgency in South Blitar, East Java, 1967–68. Indonesia, 89, 61–91. https://hdl.handle.net/1813/54511. Accessed 6 Sept 2022

  • Hearman, V. (2012). South Blitar and the PKI bases: Refuge, resistance and repression. In The contours of mass violence in Indonesia, 1965–68, edited by Douglas Kammen and Katharine McGregor, 182–207. NUS Press.

  • Hearman, V. (2018). Unmarked graves: Death and survival in the anti-communist violence in East Java, Indonesia. NUS Press.

  • Hefner, R. W. (1985). Hindu Javanese: Tengger, tradition and Islam. Princeton University Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Hefner, R. W. (1987). Islamizing Java? Religion and politics in rural East Java. The Journal of Asian Studies, 46(3), 533–554. https://doi.org/10.2307/2056898

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hefner, R. W. (2000). Civil Islam: Muslims and democratization in Indonesia. Princeton University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hefner, R. W. (2011). Where have all the abangan gone? Religionization and the decline of non-standard Islam in Contemporary Indonesia. In The Politics of Religion in Indonesia, edited by Michel Picard and Remy Madinier, 71–91. Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203817049

  • Hellman, J. (2013). Meeting with ancestors–Contesting borders in Indonesia religion and politics. Anthropological Forum, 23(2), 178–197. https://doi.org/10.1080/00664677.2013.780964

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hilmy, M. (2018). Towards a religiously hybrid identity? The changing face of Javanese Islam. Journal of Indonesian Islam, 12(01), 45–68. https://doi.org/10.15642/JIIS.2018.12.1.45-68

  • Ho, E. (2006). The graves of Tarim: Geneology and mobility across the Indian Ocean. University of California Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hodgson, M. G. S. (1974). The venture of Islam: The expansion of Islam in the Middle Periods (Vol. two). The University of Chicago Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Hosen, N. (2005). Religion and the Indonesian constitution: A recent debate. Journal of Southeast Asian Studies, 36(3), 419–440. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0022463405000238

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Howell, J. D. (2010). Indonesia’s Salafist Sufis. Modern Asian Studies, 44(5), 1029–1051. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0026749X09990278

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Jahroni, J. (2013). The political economy of knowledge: Sharia and Saudi scholarship in Indonesia. Didaktika: Journal of Educational Policy Analysis, 1(1), 48–62. https://doi.org/10.15642/JIIS.2013.7.1.165-186

  • Jones, C. (2007). Fashion and faith in urban Indonesia. Fashion Theory - Journal of Dress Body and Culture, 11(2–3), 211–232. https://doi.org/10.2752/136270407X202763

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kailani, N., & Slama, M. (2020). Accelerating Islamic charities in Indonesia: Zakat, sedekah and the immediacy of social media. South East Asia Research, 28(1), 70–86. https://doi.org/10.1080/0967828X.2019.1691939

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kasmadi, M. (2017). Interview.

  • Khusen, M. (2005). Contending Identity in the Islamic Ritual: The Slametan among Suriname Javanese Muslims in The Netherlands. Al-Jāmi‘ah: Journal of Islamic Studies, 43(283–308). https://doi.org/10.14421/ajis.2005.432.283-308.

  • Koentjaraningrat. 1985. Javanese Culture. Oxford University Press.

  • Kruithof, M. (2014). Shouting in a desert’: Dutch Missionary encounters with Javanese Islam, 1850–1910. Ph.D. Dissertation--Erasmus Universiteit Rotterdam. http://hdl.handle.net/1765/77293. Accessed 8 Sept 2022

  • Lameni. (2017). Interview with Lameni, July 12, 2017

  • Liddle, R. W. (1996). The Islamic turn in Indonesia: A political explanation. The Journal of Asian Studies, 55(3), 613–634. https://doi.org/10.2307/2646448

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lukens-Bull, R. A. (2001). Two sides of the same coin: Modernity and tradition in Islamic education in Indonesia. Anthropology & Education Quarterly, 32(3), 350–372. https://doi.org/10.1525/aeq.2001.32.3.350

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lukens-Bull, R. A., & Woodward, M. (2021). Variation of Muslim practice in Indonesia. In Handbook of Contemporary Islam and Muslim lives, edited by Ronald A. Lukens-Bull and Mark Woodward. Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-32626-5_78

  • Lukens-Bull, R. A. (2000). Teaching morality: Javanese Islamic education in a globalizing erA. Journal of Arabic and Islamic Studies, 3, 26–47. https://journals.uio.no/JAIS/article/view/4554. Accessed 8 Sept 2022

  • Lukens-Bull, R. A. (2010). Madrasa by any other name: Pondok, pesantren, and Islamic schools in Indonesia and larger Southeast Asian Region. Journal of Indonesian Islam, 4(1–21). https://doi.org/10.15642/JIIS.2010.4.1.1-21

  • Lukens-Bull, R. A. (2013). Islamic higher education in Indonesia: Continuity and conflict. Palgrave Macmillan. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137313416

  • Maarif, S. (2014). Being a Muslim in animistic ways. Al-Jāmi‘ah: Journal of Islamic Studies, 52(1), 149–74. https://doi.org/10.14421/ajis.2014.521.149-174

  • Machmudi, Y. (2006). Islamising Indonesia: The rise of Jemaah Tarbiyah and the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS). The Australian National University.

  • Makin, A. (2016). Unearthing Nusantara’s concept of religious pluralism: Harmonization and syncretism in Hindu-Buddhist and Islamic classical texts. Al-Jāmi‘ah: Journal of Islamic Studies, 54(1), 1–32. https://doi.org/10.14421/ajis.2016.541.1-30

  • Marjono, P. (2017). Interview with Marjono, July 22, 2017

  • McGregor, K., Melvin, J., & Pohlman, A. (Eds.). (2018). The Indonesian Genocide of 1965. Palgrave Macmillan.

    Google Scholar 

  • Melvin, J. (2017). Mechanics of mass murder: A case for understanding the Indonesian killings as genocide. Journal of Genocide Research, 19(4), 487–511. https://doi.org/10.1080/14623528.2017.1393942

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Melvin, J. (2018). The army and the Indonesian genocide: Mechanics of mass murder. Routledge.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Muhtadi, B. (2009). The quest for Hizbut Tahrir in Indonesia. Asian Journal of Social Science, 37(4), 623–645. https://doi.org/10.1163/156853109X460219

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Mulder, N. (1983). Abangan Javanese religious thought and practice. Bijdragen Tot De Taal-, Land- En Volkenkunde, 139(2/3), 260–267. https://doi.org/10.1163/22134379-90003444

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Munabari, F. (2018). The quest for Sharia in Indonesia: The mobilization strategy of the forum of Islamic Society. Contemporary Islam, 12(3), 229–249. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11562-018-0416-z

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Nashir, H., & Jinan, M. (2018). Re-islamisation: The conversion of subculture from abangan into santri in Surakarta. Indonesian Journal of Islam and Muslim Societies, 8(1), 1–28. https://doi.org/10.18326/ijims.v8i1.1-28

  • Nasir, M. A. (2019). Revisiting the Javanese Muslim slametan: Islam, local tradition, honor and symbolic communication. Al-Jāmi‘ah: Journal of Islamic Studies, 57(2), 329–58. https://doi.org/10.14421/ajis.2019.572.329-358

  • Nisa, E. F. (2012). Embodied faith: Agency and obedience among face-veiled university students in Indonesia. The Asia Pacific Journal of Anthropology, 13(4), 366–381. https://doi.org/10.1080/14442213.2012.697187

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Nisa, E. F. (2018). Social media and the birth of an Islamic social movement: ODOJ (One Day One Juz) in Contemporary Indonesia. Indonesia and the Malay World, 46(134), 24–43. https://doi.org/10.1080/13639811.2017.1416758

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Picard, M. (2011). “Introduction: ‘Agama’, ‘Adat’, and Pancasila. In The Politics of Religion in Indonesia, edited by Michel Picard and Remy Madinier, 1–20. Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203817049

  • Pohlman, A. (2017). Sexual violence as torture: Crimes against humanity during the 1965–66 killings in Indonesia. Journal of Genocide Research, 19(4), 574–593. https://doi.org/10.1080/14623528.2017.1393949

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Pribadi, Y. (2014). An abangan-like group in a Santri island: The religious identity of the blater. In B. Platzdasch & J. Saravanamuttu (Eds.), Religious diversity in Muslim-majority states in Southeast Asia: Areas of toleration and conflict (pp. 214–236). ISEAS Publishing.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pribadi, Y. (2018). Islam, state and society in Indonesia: Local politics in Madura. Routledge.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Qurtuby, S. A. (2016). Religious violence and conciliation in Indonesia: Christians and Muslims in the Moluccas. Routledge.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Ricklefs, M. C. (2006). The birth of the abangan. Bijdragen Tot De Taal-, Land- En Volkenkunde, 1(1964), 35–55. https://doi.org/10.1163/22134379-90003673

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ricklefs, M. C. (2003). Mystic synthesis in Java: A history of Islamization from the fourteenth to the early nineteenth centuries. East Bridge.

  • Ricklefs, M. C. (2007). Polarising Javanese society: Islamic and other visions, C. 1830–1930. NUS Press.

  • Ricklefs, M. C. (2008). Religious reform & polarization in Java. ISIM Review 21.

  • Ricklefs, M. C. (2012). Islamisation and its opponents in Java. NUS Press. https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctv1qv3fh

  • Rijal, S. (2020). Following Arab saints: Urban Muslim youth and traditional piety in Indonesia. Indonesia and the Malay World, 48(141), 145–168. https://doi.org/10.1080/13639811.2020.1729540

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Rijal, S. (2020). Performing Arab saints and marketing the prophet: Habaib and Islamic markets in Contemporary Indonesia. Archipel, 99, 189–213. https://doi.org/10.4000/archipel.1719

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Robinson, G. B. (2017). ‘Down to the very roots’: The Indonesian army’s role in the mass killings of 1965–66. Journal of Genocide Research, 19(4), 465–486. https://doi.org/10.1080/14623528.2017.1393935

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Robinson, G. B. (2018). The killing season: A history of the Indonesian massacres, 1965–66. Princeton University Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Saelan, M. (2017). Interview with Saelan, August 9, 2017

  • Siar, M. (2017). Interview with Mbah Siar, July 21, 2017

  • Sirait, S. (2016). Religious attitudes of theological tradisionalist in the Modern Muslim community: Study on tahlilan in Kotagede. Journal of Indonesian Islam 10(2), 237–60. https://doi.org/10.15642/JIIS.2016.10.2.237-260

  • Smith, B. J. (2014). When Wahyu comes through women: Female spiritual authority and divine revelation in mystical groups and Pesantren-Sui orders. In Gender and power in Indonesian Islam: Leaders, feminists, sufis and pesantren selves, edited by Bianca J. Smith and Mark Woodward. Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203797518

  • Smith-Hefner, N. J. (2007). Javanese women and the veil in post-Soeharto Indonesia. The Journal of Asian Studies, 66(2), 389–420. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0021911807000575

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Suharto, T. (2018). Transnational Islamic education in Indonesia: An ideological perspective. Contemporary Islam, 12(2), 101–122. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11562-017-0409-3

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Sukadi. (2017). Interview with Sukadi, June 24, 2017

  • Sunarwoto. (2013). Dakwah radio in Surakarta: A contest for Islamic identity. In Islam in Indonesia: Contrasting images and interpretations, edited by Jajat Burhanudin and Kees van Dijk, 195–214. Amsterdam University Press. https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctt46mwqt

  • Sunarwoto. (2016). Salafi Dakwah radio: A contest for religious authority. Archipel, 91, 203–30.https://doi.org/10.4000/archipel.314

  • Suseno, F. M. (1984). Etika Jawa: Sebuah Analisa Falsafi Tentang Kebijaksanaan Hidup Jawa. P.T. Gramedia.

  • Syafi’i, I. (2017). Interview with Imam Syafi'i, August 5, 2017

  • Tamba, I. (2017). Interview with Ibu Tamba, June 10, 2017

  • Tichelman, F. (1980). The social evolution of Indonesia: The Asiatic mode of production and its legacy. Martinus Nijhoff Publishers.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Utomo, A., Reimondos, A., McDonald, P., & Utomo, I. (2018). Who wears the hijab? Predictors of veiling in Greater Jakarta. Review of Religious Research, 60(4), 477–501. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13644-018-0345-6

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • van den Boogert, J. (2017). The role of slametan in the discourse on Javanese Islam. Indonesia and the Malay World, 45(133), 352–372. https://doi.org/10.1080/13639811.2017.1345166

  • van Bruinessen, M. (2002). Genealogies of Islamic radicalism in post-Suharto Indonesia. South East Asia Research, 10(2), 117–154. https://doi.org/10.5367/000000002101297035

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • van Bruinessen, M. (2008). Traditionalist and Islamist pesantrens in Contemporary Indonesia. In F. A. Noor, Y. Sikand, & M. van Bruinessen (Eds.), The Madrasa in Asia: Political Activism and Transnational Linkages (pp. 217–245). Amsterdam University Press.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • van Bruinessen, M. (2013). Introduction: Contemporary developments in Indonesian Islam and the ‘conservative turn’ of the early twenty-first century. In M. van Bruinessen (Ed.), Contemporary developments in Indonesian Islam: Explaining the “conservative turn” (pp. 1–20). ISEAS Publishing.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Wahid, D. (2014). Nurturing the Salafi Manhaj: A study of Salafi Pesantrens in Contemporary Indonesia. Ph.D. Dissertation--Utrecht University. http://dspace.library.uu.nl/handle/1874/288890. Accessed 10 Sept 2022

  • Watson, C. W. (2005). Islamic books and their publishers: Notes on the Contemporary Indonesian scene. Journal of Islamic Studies, 16(2), 177–210. https://doi.org/10.1093/jis/eti131

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Weng, H. W. (2018). The art of Dakwah: Social media, visual persuasion and the Islamist propagation of Felix Siauw. Indonesia and the Malay World, 46(134), 61–79. https://doi.org/10.1080/13639811.2018.1416757

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Wieringa, S. E., & Katjasungkana, N. (2019). Propaganda and the genocide in Indonesia: Imagined evil. Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wildan, M. (2013). Mapping radical Islam: A study of the proliferation of radical Islam in Solo, Central Java. In M. van Bruinessen (Ed.), Contemporary developments in Indonesian Islam: Explaining the “conservative turn” (pp. 190–223). ISEAS Publishing.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wildan, M. (2013b). The nature of radical Islamic groups in Solo. Journal of Indonesian Islam, 07(01): 49–70. https://doi.org/10.15642/JIIS.2013.7.1.49-70

  • Woodward, M. (2011). Java, Indonesia and Islam. Springer.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Woodward, M., Rohmaniyah, I., Amin, A., Ma’arif, S., Coleman, D. M., & Umar, M. S. (2012). Ordering what is right, forbidding what is wrong: Two faces of Hadhrami Dakwah in Contemporary Indonesia. Review of Indonesian and Malaysian Affairs, 46(2), 105–146. https://doi.org/10.3316/ielapa.492490619340360

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Woodward, M., Amin, A., Rohmaniyah, I., & Lundry, C. (2013). Getting culture: A new path for Indonesia’s Islamist justice and properity party? Contemporary Islam, 7(2), 173–189. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11562-012-0187-x

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Woodward, M. (1989). Islam in Java: Normative piety and mysticism in the Sultanate Yogyakarta. UMI.

  • Woodward, M. (2011b). Only now can we speak: Remembering politicide in Yogyakarta. Sojourn: Journal of Social Issues in Southeast Asia, 26(1), 36–57. https://doi.org/10.1355/sj26-1c

  • Woodward, M. (2011c). Reflections on Java and Islam 1979–2010. Al-Jāmi‘ah: Journal of Islamic Studies, 49(2), 281–94. https://doi.org/10.14421/ajis.2011.492.281-294

  • Woodward, M. (2017). Islam Nusantara: A semantic and symbolic analysis. Heritage of Nusantara: International Journal of Religious Literature and Heritage, 6(2), 181–99. https://doi.org/10.31291/hn.v6i2.398

  • Yatno. (2017). Interview with Yatno, July 14, 2017

  • Zuhri, S. (2013). Inventing Balinese Muslim sainthood. Indonesia and the Malay World, 41(119), 1–13. https://doi.org/10.1080/13639811.2012.750106

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Zuhri, S. (2013). Majlis Tafsir Al-Qur’an and its struggle for Islamic reformism. In J. Burhanudin & K. van Dijk (Eds.), Islam in Indonesia: Contrasting images and interpretations (pp. 227–240). Amsterdam University Press.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Zuhri, S. (2022). Wali Pitu and Muslim pilgrimage in Bali, Indonesia: Inventing a sacred tradition. Leiden University Press.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

I am grateful for the assistance of Akhol Firdaus, Maftukhin, and all researchers at the Institute for Javanese Islam Research (IJIR), among which are Khoirul Fata, Gedong Maulana Kabir, Candra Halim Perdana, Heru Setiawan, Dian Kurnia Sari, and Fatimatuz Zahro during the process of this research. I have benefited from and am indebted to the valuable comments on the draft of this article from Syaifudin Zuhri, Yanwar Pribadi, Ahmad Najib Burhani, Najib Kailani, Munir Ikhwan, Sunarwoto, Dick van der Meij, and two anonymous reviewers. Any errors are my own.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute for Javanese Islam Research, Universitas Islam Negeri Sayyid Ali Rahmatullah (UIN SATU) Tulungagung, Tulungagung, Jawa Timur, 66221, Indonesia

    Akhmad Rizqon Khamami

Authors
  1. Akhmad Rizqon Khamami
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Contributions

This declaration is “not applicable”.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Akhmad Rizqon Khamami.

Ethics declarations

Ethical approval

This declaration is “not applicable.”

Competing interests

The author declares no competing interests.

Additional information

Publisher's note

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Rights and permissions

Springer Nature or its licensor (e.g. a society or other partner) holds exclusive rights to this article under a publishing agreement with the author(s) or other rightsholder(s); author self-archiving of the accepted manuscript version of this article is solely governed by the terms of such publishing agreement and applicable law.

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Khamami, A.R. Nasionalis-cum-Nahdliyin: a new identity for nominal Javanese Muslims. Cont Islam 16, 507–527 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11562-022-00505-6

Download citation

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11562-022-00505-6

Keywords

Search

Navigation