This awareness has coloured the thoughts of Nusantara scholars since the Wali Songo era till Today; Thus giving birth to attitudes and constructions of political views, which we later know as Islam Nusantara politics.
Islamic Political Genealogy of the Archipelago
The political genealogy of Islam Nusantara is rooted in the Wali Songo political movement, which continues to develop to this day. At least, there are four main phases of the Islam Nusantara political movement.
The first phase is Wali Songo. In this phase, Wali Songo started his political campaign by influencing the Majapahit rulers to accept Islam. This effort was successful, so the Majapahit government formed the Raja Pandita institution managing Islam. Previously, there were Dhamadyaksa Kasogatan institutions for Buddhism and Dharmadysksa Kasaiwan for Hinduism.
Although the Wali Songo succeeded in forming the Demak kingdom, they still use the non-symbolic-formal cultural-political strategy;
We can find this in the model, government format, and technical management, which still uses Javanese customs and traditions (Nusantara), even though Demak is an Islamic kingdom.
Non-symbolic political movements are also depicted in the Demak state law, which uses the book of Salokantara, the text of law by Raden Patah; This is a combination of Islamic Shari’a law with local wisdom sourced from previous law books such as Kalinga Dharmashastra, Utharamanawa, etc., which are not contradictory with Islamic teachings. With a political strategy like this, Islam was successfully accepted by the archipelago people with joy.
The second phase is the era of the Sultanates of the Archipelago and the Hijaz Ulama. During this phase, the politics of Islam Nusantara was able to form several Islamic sultanates that spread throughout the Archipelago, starting from the Raja Ampat Sultanate in Papua, Ternate Tidore at the east end to the Aceh sultanate at the west end. During the colonial era, it managed to defend itself from various pressures so that Islam could survive in the Archipelago, even though it destroyed the country’s structural-format form.
In addition, to giving birth to several Islamic Sultanates, Islamic politics also gave birth to various Islamic thoughts, as reflected in the book Anger-anger Suryo Ngalam which is the constitution of the Islamic Mataram Sultanate Serat Wedhatama by Mangku Ngeoro IV, Serat Hidayat Jati by Ronggowarsito. All of which contain strategies politics to realize the implementation of Islamic teachings in the Archipelago, although with a more spiritual-Sufistic approach. Also Nusantara scholars such as Syech Nawawi al-Bantani, Abdussamad al-Falembangi, Syceh Arsyah al-Banjari, Abdul Rauf Singkel, Katib al-Minangkabowi, and so on whose works are still used as references to this day.