Page 198 - Transformasi Masyarakat Indonesia dan Historiografi Indonesia Modern

Transformasi Masyarakat Indonesia...

former Indonesian local kingdom, which mostly were Muslim
states, broken down and their position as the political center
was decline. Similarly, the introduction of the Western capital-
ist economy caused the traditional economy was shaken and
shift to the colonial economic system, and all this changing in-
flicted a loss upon the rural people.
Therefore, the coming of the Western power to Indonesia
arose many opposition from the Indonesian people as indicated
by the many wars, rebellions and protest movements against
the Dutch colonial government had broken out in several areas
in Indonesia during the nineteenth century. Much of the leaders
of these oppositions were coming from the Muslim religious
elite groups whether those who coming from the nobility or
the rural religious leaders. The prominent figures such as
Pangeran Dipanegara, Teuku Imam Bonjol, and Teuku Umar,
who were appointed as a National Hero in the Indonesian Re-
public, were the upper religious leaders in Indonesian local com-
munities who led the opposition against the Dutch regime in
the Java War (1825 1830), the Padri War (1821 1837) and the
Aceh War (1873 1904). While, several Ulamas or Kyahis led
22
the peasants rebellion and peasant movements against the simi-
lar regimes, such as in the case of Peasant Rebellion in Banten
in 1888s and several rural protest in rural areas. 23
What I want to argue here is that during the nineteenth cen-
tury there was a shift of the political leadership for Indonesian
society from the court to the rural societies, or from the royal
aristocracy to the Muslim religious leaders which had a strong
base in the rural Pesantren communities (center for Islamic tradi-
tional education). In fact, Pesantren, as a center for religious educa-
tion and Islamic learning for the Santri (a student of the Islamic

22 Riddel, loc.cit., pp. 173-188.
23 See Sartono Kartodirdjo, Peasants’ Revolt of Banten in 1888. Its condi-
tions, Course and Sequel: A Case Study of Social Movement in Indonesia. VKI.
No. 50 (‘s-Graavenhage: Martinus Nijhoff, 1966).

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