
PENGHARGAAN SAHABAT BINTANG
4 February 2012Tak ada kata lain, selain ini adalah penghargaan yang fenomenal! Lekuk-lekuk gambarnya tidak menunjukkan apa-apa selain bahwa ia muncul karena wangsit dari langit. Dari sudut pandang apapun, tak akan ada yang menyangkal bahwa ia terwujud atas tuntunan keabadian. Bentuk-bentuk dan simbol-simbolnya memiliki makna tertentu yang hanya bisa dipahami oleh mereka yang hatinya bersih dari segala [...]
Read moreAnjuran Untuk Tahlilan 7 Hari Berturut-turut
28 January 2012Mengapa para ulama mengajarkan kepada umat Islam agar selalu mendoakan keluarganya yang telah meninggal dunia selama 7 hari berturut-turut ? Telah banyak beredar dari kalangan salafi wahhabi yang menyatakan bahwa tradisi tahlilan sampai tujuh hari diadopsi dari adat kepercayaan agama Hindu. Benarkah anggapan dan asumsi mereka ini? Sungguh anggapan mereka salah besar dan vonis yang tidak berdasar sama sekali. Justru ternyata tradisi tahlilan selama tujuh hari dengan menghidangkan makanan, merupakan tradisi para...
Read moreKritik Atas Fatwa al-Utsaimin Yang Melarang Maulid
28 January 2012Setiap bulan Rabiul Awal tiba, mayoritas umat Islam di seluruh dunia merayakan hari kelahiran Nabi SAW, manusia paling agung di dunia. Kelahiran Nabi SAW merupakan hari bersejarah bagi umat Islam, sehingga berdasarkan kecintaan kepada beliau, umat Islam merayakannya dengan gegap gempita, dengan cara membacakan kisah kelahiran dan perjuangan beliau, disertai dengan suguhan sedekah kepada sesama Muslim. Perayaan maulid Nabi SAW, meskipun berkembang di dunia Islam sejak abad kelima Hijriah,...
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A CUP OF JAVA: COFFEE AND CONSEQUENCES
26 January 2012The coffee plant, native to Ethiopia, was introduced to the mountainous southwestern region of the Arabian Peninsula around the fourteenth century. Coffee bushes and the habit of drinking coffee were not introduced into Indonesia by Arabs but by the VOC in 1696. Dutch men with personal interests in botany and agriculture and who owned private [...]
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SMALLPOX AND SLAVERY: CAUSES OF A FREELANCE INTELLECTUAL
26 January 2012Willem van Hogendorp was a founding member of the academy, a senior VOC official, and a successful businessman. He spent the years 1774 to 1784 in Java. The academy gave him a reason for pursuing his intellectual interests and a means of disseminating them through its journal. He drew on Batavia’s archives to write histories [...]
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PRINTING AND THINKING
26 January 2012Printing was an ancient invention of the Chinese. Europeans made the press a major tool of intellectual life with the advantages of a twenty-six-letter alphabet and a measure of freedom in some western European cities. Within four decades of printing the Gutenberg Bible in Mainz in 1455, printing was introduced into Islamic lands by Jews [...]
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DAYAK JOURNEYS
26 January 2012The term Dayak covers many distinct speech groups in Kalimantan. Today it has the meaning of people living away from the coast, and includes nomadic groups, shifting cultivators, and settled peoples. The term is associated with tribal warfare, male fertility cults, tattooing, head hunting, and long houses where several families live together. Dayak has a [...]
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JAVA CAREERS: THE STORY OF SLAMET
25 January 2012Slamet’s journey began in slavery. A Balinese slaver delivered him to Semarang where he became the employee of senior VOC merchant, Willem Dubbeldekop. In the port city world of north Java, the Hindu Balinese converted to Islam and took the Muslim Javanese name of Slamet. After Dubbeldekop emancipated him, Slamet set up in trade on [...]
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CHINESE TEMPLES, TOMBS, AND CEMETERIES
23 January 2012Chinese temples in Jakarta date from around 1650. Most are rectangular, multiroofed buildings set within a walled compound. Temples contain a main altar and image, and side annexes for subsidiary deities. Wall panels inscribed in Chinese characters preserve the name of the temple god, and the date and names of donors. Some temples were open [...]
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ABORTED JOURNEY: FROM MAREGE’ TO AUSTRALIA
23 January 2012Australia’s northern shores formed the southern boundary of Indonesian waters for sailors from Sulawesi. They were hunting ground and worksite for Makasar and Bugis men, who fished for trepang which was in demand in Chinese markets. They secured use rights from Aboriginal communities by giving titles and flags to local chiefs and gifts of tobacco [...]
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SURAPATI’S LEGACY: THE CONVERSION OF EAST JAVA
23 January 2012In 1743 Pakubuwono II (r. 1726–1749) rid himself of problems in Mataram’s eastern provinces by transferring Surapati’s former lands to the Dutch. Rebel bands used east Java as a place of retreat; Balinese princes still considered it as tributary territory to their kingdoms in Bali. The VOC could defeat Indonesian armies, but it could not [...]
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JAGO: PREDATOR OR LOCAL HERO
23 January 2012The Javanese word jago means fighting cock, but also designates the leader of a band of men. A jago was a man who depended on a forceful personality, who was not confined by domesticity, and who lived on the fringes of society spying, selling information, and hiring out his men as vigilantes. Jagos were distinguished [...]
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HENDRIK LUKASZOON CARDEEL, A.K.A. PANGERAN WIRAGUNA
21 January 2012Hendrik Lukaszoon Cardeel was born in Holland, raised as a Christian, employed by the VOC as a stonemason, and posted to Batavia around 1670. By 1675 Cardeel was a Muslim and employee of Sultan Ageng of Banten in charge of constructing a new fortified palace following the latest European design. His conversion to Islam was [...]
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SHAIKH YUSUF | DENOUNCER OF THE OCCIDENTAL OTHER
21 January 2012Shaikh Yusuf (c. 1624–1699) was a member of the Gowa royal family who was sent, in 1645, to study in Aceh. From there he moved to Yemen and then Mecca in a study career that stretched to thirty-three years. In 1678 he reentered Makasar with the Arabic title shaikh, which means leader. Makasar was a [...]
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MAKASAR AND ANTI-MACASSAR
21 January 2012Another name for Makasar is Ujung Pandang, which means Pandanus Cape, and derives from the profusion of pandanus palms growing there. In Makasar language it is Jumpandang, and was the name of the fort of the kings of Gowa. The Dutch renamed this fort Rotterdam Castle after their victories in 1669 against Sultan Hasanuddin, and [...]
Read moreKetentuan Pelaksanaan Ujian Akhir Madrasah Berstandar Nasional (UAMBN) 2012
21 January 2012KEPUTUSAN DIREKTUR JENDERAL PENDIDIKAN ISLAM TENTANG KETENTUAN PELAKSANAAN UJIAN AKHIR MADRASAH BERSTANDAR NASIONAL (UAMBN) MATA PELAJARAN AL-QUR’AN HADIS, AKIDAH AKHLAK, AKHLAK, FIKIH, SEJARAH KEBUDAYAAN ISLAM, BAHASA ARAB, DAN ILMU KALAM TINGKAT MADRASAH IBTIDAIYAH, MADRASAH TSANAWIYAH, DAN MADRASAH ALIYAH TAHUN PELAJARAN 2011/2012. SK Dirjen Pendis Tentang Pelaksanaan UAMBN 2012 Lampiran Pedoman Pelaksanaan UAMBN 2012 Kisi Kisi UAMBN Prog.Akidah Akhlak MA IPA-IPS-Bhs Kisi Kisi UAMBN Prog.Al Quran Hadis MA IPA-IPS-Bhs Kisi Kisi UAMBN Prog.Fikih MA IPA-IPS-Bhs Kisi Kisi UAMBN Prog.SKI MA IPA-IPS-Bhs Kisi Kisi UAMBN Prog.Bhs Arab MA IPA-IPS-Bhs Kisi Kisi UAMBN Prog.Akhlak...
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BANDA: MONOPOLY WITHOUT KINGS
18 January 2012Ten small islands forming the Banda group lie remote in the Banda Sea, but they were the object of sailors on account of the nutmeg trees which grew only on the islands of Lontor, Neira, Ai, Run, and Rosengain. When the Dutch first visited the Banda islands, they estimated a total indigenous population of around [...]
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POLYGA MY AND POLITICS: FEMALE PAWNS AND TOO M ANY SONS
18 January 2012The Koran requires a written contract of marriage and dowry for a wife, sets the number of wives at four, prescribes equality of status between the wives and their equal treatment by the common husband. Islam does not limit a man in the number of slave girls he may have in his household. The Koran [...]
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RIJKLOF VAN GOENS: DUTCH MAN, ASIAN CAREER
18 January 2012Rijklof van Goens experienced Mataram’s long 1629 siege on Batavia as a ten-year-old, having left Holland for Java with his parents the year before. Orphaned early, he was raised in the household of a VOC official in India and prepared for his own career within the company. He gained a wide knowledge of Asia’s palaces [...]
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SIVA, ARIF MUHA MM AD, AND INDONESIA’S MINISTRY OF TOURISM
18 January 2012Near Garut in West Java, pilgrims follow a road through a village, cross a lake by raft, then climb a small hill that is in the middle of a ring of mountains. On its summit is Candi Cangkuan, a temple dedicated to Siva and attributed to the eighth-century kingdom of Galuh. Alongside the temple is [...]
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