The Makings of Indonesian Islam Orientalism and the Narration of a Sufi Past By Michael Laffan (Princeton and Oxford, UK: Princeton University Press, 2011. 320 pages.)

Abstract

This rich, nuanced historical study effectively encourages (demands, perhaps)
a rereading of much of what has been written about Islam in Indonesia by
western observers. Focusing on a period during which the Indonesian nation
itself was being made – Dutch colonial times (c. 1800-1942) – Michael Laffan
sets out to investigate what makes Indonesian Islam and who has participated
in the processes by and through which it has been made (p. xi). Dipping also
into earlier times, he argues that the makings of Indonesian Islam lie in interactions
spanning centuries involving Southeast Asian Muslims, Muslims from
other places, and the Dutch (p. xi). He draws on a wealth of archival and scholarly
sources (especially Dutch material) to explore the role that Dutch Orientalist
advisors played in the history of Indonesian Islam and in its
(mis)representation in western writings (pp. xi-xii). Complicating understandings
of Sufism in the region, he also focuses on “disputes about the place of
tariqa praxis – the rituals of mystical reflection organized under the guidance
of a preceptor known as a shaykh – which represents but one aspect of Sufism
as a field of Islamic knowledge” (p. xii). With its exploration of the makings
of Indonesian Islam on multiple levels, this book would be of particular interest
to specialists (especially historians) of Indonesia, Southeast Asia more
broadly, Islam, and colonialism ...