Page 29 - THE MELANESIA DIASPORA FILE CETAK ISI 10022017

that Malaka was a city where people were talking in “one thousand languages”. In other
words, the trading port was one of the main doors for cultural communication to take
place. When a port had been able to survive then a city had also been born. The society
which was “mixed up” in nature had also realized itself. Once it happened then a door to
a more open cross-cultural communication also started. Therefore, should we wonder if
in the port cities there was a mixed Malay language which could also be a communication
language? Was it a strange thing if under such a situation the influence of a new religion
could also enter the awareness of the local people? This was what happened when Ternate,
Tidore and others got acquainted with islam and also in this situation the Malay language
started to enter the life of the local people. When the two kingdoms expanded their trading
and political influences then we could tell that they did enjoy spreading out what they had
got in the process of cultural interactions.
The cases in Ambon and Ternate were quite unique too. Sultan Zainal Abidin left for Giri
to master the knowledge of religion. Here he met a great figure from Tanah Hitu (Ambon).
When Sultan Zainal Abidin returned to Ternate, he made his kingdom into a power for
Islam and succeeded in attracting the small kings around Ternate, which among others
was Gorontalo-Limbotto. The ally became the channel of Islam distribution in North
Sulawesi. In the meantime, it was said (like told in Hikayat Tanah Hitu) “when the Prime
Minister of Pati, Tuban, came from the land of Java, then Hitu embraced the belief in Allah
and Mohammad as well as the religion of Rasulu’llah ‘allahi wa sallam”.
This case was an example of how trading and sailing as well as the growth of coastal
cities brought about the arrival of the desire to visit other regions. In this situation, there
were two things to happen consecutively—which were the spread of Islam and the use of
Malay language. The pairing of Islam and the Malay language had become very ordinary
in the Eastern part of Indonesian islands since the drawback of the two big powers—
Majapahit and Malaka. Then it could be said that the trading relationship was the bond
between Islam and the Malay language. However, was it something unique?
Well, in the period of what Schrieke told as “the race with Christianity”, the same thing
also happened with Christianity—the Malay language became the channel of spreading out
and understanding the religion. When Fransiscus Xaverius spread out Christian in Ambon
island—in a region next to Tanah Hitu—he had used the Bible in the Malay language, the
translated version done in Malaka, which after having been ruled by the Portuguese since
1511 fell to the Dutch in 1640 but was always under the threat of trading power and local
military in the waters of Malaka Bay and the Java Sea. Allegedly because of the ability of

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