Hikum (also hukom; from Arabic ḥukm, “judgment” or “decree”) was the Acehnese term for Islamic law — the body of rules derived from the Quran and the traditions of the Prophet Mohammed, as interpreted through the Shafi’ite school of jurisprudence dominant in Acheh and throughout the Malay-Indonesian world.
Relationship to Adat
The hikum coexisted in tension with the customary law (adat) of the Acehnese. The upholding of the hikum was the special province of the teungku, while the adat was primarily the concern of the keuchi’ and uleebalang. C. Snouck Hurgronje emphasised that the introduction of Islam into Acheh had overlaid the indigenous adat in certain domains without replacing it — the Acehnese courts applied a mixture of both systems.
Criminal Punishments
The punishments imposed by Mohammedan law for serious offences — including stoning (rajam) for adultery where both parties had previously had lawful intercourse, and 100 lashes followed by banishment for at least a year where they had not — were of exceptional occurrence in Acheh. The application of such punishments was extremely rare, “undoubtedly due to some extent to the great difficulty of proving illicit intercourse according to the requirements of the Mohammedan law of evidence.” One noted example was Habib Abdurrahman, who enforced the stoning punishment, causing the news to spread throughout the whole country.
Shafi’ite School
C. Snouck Hurgronje notes that the “ruling” Shafi’ite doctrine held that paying off of prayer obligations (çalāts) was superfluous or even impossible in certain interpretations — a point of religious and economic significance for the Acehnese population in connection with prayers and death customs.
Hukom and the Aceh War
The dogmas of Islam on the subject of religious war (jihad) — so fanatical in their terms — supplied the principal stimulus to the obstinate Acehnese rebellion against the Dutch. The ulamas consistently argued that the war ordained of Allah must be waged in conformity with His decree, giving them a powerful tool to maintain popular resistance.
Account from De Buitenbezittingen (1917) — Hoeköm
Hoeköm is the Islamic law — the shari’a as interpreted in the Shafi’ite school that prevailed in Atjeh — that, alongside the adat (customary law), constituted one of the two constitutive legal orders of Atjehsche society and that the Dutch colonial administration, in its policy of preserving native institutions, undertook to leave in the hands of the teungkoes and imeums who were its traditional custodians. De Buitenbezittingen treats hoeköm as the religious counterpart to the territorial adat, the two together forming the dual legal personality of the gampong and the moekim.
Adat and hoeköm
The relationship of adat and hoeköm is the foundational legal polarity of Atjehsche society. In the gampong administration the Keutjhï embodies adat and the Teungkoe embodies hoeköm: “Gelijk de keutjhï’ meer in het bijzonder de adat heeft te handhaven, zoo is den teungkoe het gebied der hoeköm (godsdienstige wet) opgedragen” — As the keutjhï has more particularly to maintain the adat, so the teungkoe is charged with the domain of hoeköm (religious law). De Buitenbezittingen, following C. Snouck Hurgronje|Snouck Hurgronje’s De Atjehers, records that “hoewel adat en hoeköm onafscheidelijk van elkaar heeten” — although adat and hoeköm are called inseparable — “heeft de eerste toch steeds de overhand” — the first, however, always prevails. The same polarity is replicated at the level of the moekim, where the imeum — originally a religious functionary — became in time an adat chief, the oelèëbalang tjoet.
The Sjafiïtische school
The hoeköm of Atjeh, De Buitenbezittingen records, followed the Sjafiïtische school — the Shafi’ite school of Sunni Islamic jurisprudence — that prevailed throughout the Malay-Indonesian archipelago. The Friday service (Vrijdagsdienst), which the Shafi’ite school required the presence of at least forty (modified in Atjeh to forty-four) male, free, adult moekims (communicants), was the institutional foundation of the moekim: heads who sought the support of the clergy and pious wealthy men “hebben, nadat de Islam in Atjeh wortel begon te schieten, er voor zorg gedragen, dat voor eenige (oorspronkelijk als regel vier) gampongs dicht bij elkander gelegen op een centraalpunt een meuseugit (moskee) gebouwd werd” — ensured, after Islam began to take root in Atjeh, that for some (originally as a rule four) gampongs lying close together, a meuseugit (mosque) was built at a central point.
The colonial legal order
In the colonial legal order of the Gouvernement, the hoeköm — like the adat — was preserved in the hands of the native chiefs and the moesapat (native court), which included, as an advisor, a Mohamedaansch schriftgeleerde — a Mohammedan scriptural scholar. Godsoordeelen (ordeal) and mutileerende straffen (mutilating punishments) were wholly forbidden; in other respects, De Buitenbezittingen records, “zuiver de adat gevolgd” — purely the adat was followed — in civil cases, while in criminal cases the hoeköm informed the deliberations of the moesapat alongside the adat and the Dutch penal code. The kadhi — the Islamic judge — was not, in Atjeh, a separate office; his functions were absorbed into those of the teungkoe and the imeum.
Sources
Wat Indië Ontving en Schonk, onder leiding van Dr. C. W. Wormser (Amsterdam: Wereldbibliotheek N.V., 1946), pp. 101–102 (chapter De invloed van den Islam door Prof. Dr. W. J. A. Kernkamp).
See Also
- Adat
- Teungku
- Habib Abdurrahman
- Aceh War
- Great Acheh
- Gampong
- Keutjhï
- Teungkoe
- Imeum
- Moekim
- Meuseugit
- Moesapat
- Christiaan Snouck Hurgronje
- Sjafiïtische school
- Adat and Hokm Atjeh proverb
- Adat Meukuta Alam
- Adat Meureuhom
- Atjeh Adatrecht (ter Haar account)
- C. Snouck Hurgronje
- J. Kreemer
- Acheh
- Wat Indië Ontving en Schonk
- W. J. A. Kernkamp
Source
The Achehnese, Vol. I, by Dr. C. Snouck Hurgronje, translated by A.W.S. O’Sullivan, indexed by R.J. Wilkinson. Leyden: E.J. Brill, 1906. Chapter I, §§ 5, 8–9, throughout.
De Buitenbezittingen, Deel II, Aflevering 2: Atjeh en Onderhoorigheden, bewerkt door het Encyclopaedisch Bureau, Mededeelingen van het Bureau voor de Bestuurszaken der Buitenbezittingen (Weltevreden: Landsdrukkerij, 1917), pp. 41–44, 126–128. Citing C. Snouck Hurgronje, De Atjehers, Vol. I, pp. 74, 84 e.v., 106 e.v.