Ashura in the Malay-Indonesian World: The Ten Days of Muḥarram in Sumatra as Depicted by Nineteenth-Century Dutch Scholars

Abstract

There has been a dearth of studies in English on customs pertaining to the commemoration of the household of Muḥammad in Southeast Asia and the Malay-Indonesian world in the nineteenth century. This article aims to draw the attention of readers to an observation/report on the ten days of Muḥarram in Sumatra, Indonesia presented by nineteenth-century Dutch scholars. This work can be seen as a starting point for other researchers interested in investigating how Middle Eastern, South Asian, and Southeast Asian religious cultures and rituals are interlinked. In addition to describing the background and literature of the tābūt festival in Muḥarram and Dutch scholars’ observations, the English version of a Dutch article by Oscar Lewis Helfrich and his colleagues in 1888 is presented. It ends with a final word as well as a list of works on the tābūt in the Malay-Indonesian world.