The diversion of the zakaat as an underground war-chest by the oelama’s of Atjeh during the Atjehoorlog, as described by R. L. Mellema in De Islaam in Indonesië (in het bijzonder op Java) (Amsterdam, 1947), is the canonical-Muslim alms-tax’s practical conversion, by the oelama’s of Atjeh — whom Mellema glosses as “godsdienstleiders (eigenlijk: wetgeleerden)” (religious leaders, properly legal scholars) — into a private war-chest (particuliere krijgskas) from which they paid their followers during the Atjehoorlog against the Dutch. By acting as zakaatinner (zakaat-collectors), Mellema writes, the oelama’s built up a personal ascendancy over the population greater than that of the official chiefs; and when, in addition, they could assume the title of Haddji, the prestige they enjoyed in the eyes of the people was only increased. The account is the Mellema-source version of the institution treated, from the Snouckian side, under sabil contributions.
The canonical category
Mellema introduces the diversion in the course of his treatment of the zakaat — the third pillar of the Muslim law, the alms-tax. After describing the canonical distribution of the zakaat among the eight classes of recipients, he notes that one of those classes consists of the volunteers who fight, on their own account, for the defence or extension of the faith, and who therefore do not belong to the regular troops that draw pay from the government. He compares them to the underground resistance workers in the Netherlands during the German occupation — “We zouden ze kunnen vergelijken met de ondergrondse werkers in Nederland gedurende de Duitse bezetting” — a comparison that, in a work published in 1947, carries the immediate force of a recent and lived analogy.
This canonical category — the ḥaqq al-sabīl, “the portion due for the path [of God]” — is the same head of distribution that, in the Snouckian account treated under sabil contributions, furnishes the theological foundation for the Achehnese lui sabi collections.
The Atjehnese diversion
It is in connection with this canonical category that Mellema records the Atjehnese diversion:
“In Atjeh is gedurende de Atjehoorlog voor zulk ondergronds werk tegen Nederland de zakaat wel gebruikt door de oelama’s of godsdienstleiders (eigenlijk: wetgeleerden). Daardoor gelukte het hun door als zakaatinner op te treden, en op deze wijze een particuliere krijgskas te vormen, waarmee ze hun volgelingen betaalden, een persoonlijk overwicht op de bevolking te krijgen en groter invloed te verwerven dan de officiele hoofden bezaten.”
That is: in Atjeh, during the Atjehoorlog, the zakaat was used for such underground work against the Netherlands by the oelama’s — the religious leaders, properly the legal scholars. By this means it succeeded for them, by acting as zakaat-collectors and so forming a private war-chest with which they paid their followers, to gain a personal ascendancy over the population and to acquire greater influence than the official chiefs possessed.
The oelama as zakaat-collector
The institutional mechanism Mellema describes is the assumption, by the oelama’s, of the office of zakaatinner — the collector of the zakaat. In strict canon, the zakaat is to be distributed among the eight classes of recipients, of which the volunteers fighting in the path of God are one; the oelama’s, by presenting themselves as the collectors and channeling the proceeds into a “particuliere krijgskas” — a private war-chest — from which they paid their own followers, converted the canonical alms into the material base of a personal military following. The result, Mellema emphasises, was a political consequence: the oelama’s acquired “een persoonlijk overwicht op de bevolking” (a personal ascendancy over the population) and “groter invloed … dan de officiele hoofden bezaten” (greater influence than the official chiefs possessed). The diversion thus shifted the balance of authority in Atjehnese society from the official, territorial chiefs — the uleebalangs — toward the religious, legal-scholarly class of the oelama’s.
The Haddji title
The ascendancy of the oelama’s was further strengthened, Mellema continues, when they could in addition assume the title of Haddji — a title open to those who had completed the pilgrimage to Mekka. “Wanneer zij dan daarenboven nog de titel van Haddji konden aannemen, omdat zij een tocht naar Mekka hadden volbracht, kon dit slechts het aanzien, dat zij in de ogen van het volk genoten, verhogen” — when, in addition, they could assume the title of Haddji, because they had accomplished a journey to Mekka, this could only enhance the prestige they enjoyed in the eyes of the people. The Haddji title is thus, in Mellema’s account, the religious-cultural complement to the fiscal-military base supplied by the zakaat: together, the two made the oelama’s the effective rivals of the official chiefs. The Haddji title is treated separately in Haddji title prestige in Atjeh (Mellema 1947).
Relation to the Snouckian account
Mellema’s account is the brief, comparative counterpart to the much fuller Snouckian treatment of the same institution under the name lui sabi (from Arabic ḥaqq al-sabīl), preserved in the corpus as sabil contributions. Where Snouck Hurgronje, in De Atjehers, gives the detailed anatomy of the collection — naming Teungku Tiro as the most celebrated collector, and tracing the continuation of the work by his sons Teungku Beb and Teungku Mahidin and his kinsman Teungku Chot Plieng — Mellema gives only the comparative-institutional frame: the canonical category, the diversion, the private war-chest, the political consequence, and the reinforcing effect of the Haddji title. The two accounts are complementary: Snouck gives the persons and the narrative, Mellema gives the canonical-genetic framing and the comparative point that the same canonical category was, in Atjeh, put to underground use against the Dutch. Mellema’s German-occupation analogy — the comparison of the Atjehnese zakaat-funded volunteers to the Dutch underground of the Second World War — is a distinctive contribution of the 1947 survey, and one that could only have been made by an author writing in the immediate aftermath of that occupation.
Significance
For AcehWiki, Mellema’s account is significant as an independent comparative source for the institution of sabil contributions, and as the source that most explicitly frames the diversion of the zakaat as a shift of authority from the official chiefs to the religious leaders. The account also furnishes the contemporary German-occupation analogy that gives the Atjehnese institution its mid-twentieth-century resonance: the zakaat-funded oelama of the Atjehoorlog is, in Mellema’s framing, the Atjehnese counterpart of the Dutch underground resister of 1940–1945. The entry thus complements the fuller Snouckian account of sabil contributions and of the holy war against the Dutch, and it furnishes a mid-twentieth-century colonial confirmation of the fiscal-military base of the Atjehnese religious resistance.
See Also
- De Islaam in Indonesië (Mellema, 1947)
- R. L. Mellema
- Sabil Contributions
- Haddji title prestige in Atjeh (Mellema 1947)
- Aceh War
- Holy war against the Dutch
- Oelama
- Uleebalang
- Teungku Tiro
- Teungku Beb
- Teungku Mahidin
- Teungku Chot Plieng
- Teungku Kutakarang
- Zakaat
- Pitrah
- C. Snouck Hurgronje
- Snouck Hurgronje’s De Atjehers (1893-94)
- Acheh
- Holland
- 1947
Source
De Islaam in Indonesië (in het bijzonder op Java), by Drs. R. L. Mellema. Mededeling No. LXXVII, Afd. Volkenkunde No. 25. Amsterdam: Koninklijke Vereniging “Indisch Instituut,” 1947. “De zakaat, de 3e zuil van de wet,” pp. 34–36; and Register, s.v. oelama “(wetgeleerden in Atjeh).”