Sayyid ‘Uthman was an Arab religious teacher and author resident in Batavia in the late nineteenth century, cited by Snouck Hurgronje in Vol. I of The Achehnese as the composer of a fatwa (verdict of a religious judge) which preserves important evidence on the ta’liqat Batavia — the customary marriage-contract of Batavia and its distinctive conditions of divorce.
Snouck Hurgronje’s principal notice of Sayyid ‘Uthman occurs in his long discussion of the ta’liq or conditional separation, in the chapter on Achehnese marriage law. The discussion turns on the question whether the wife of a husband who has deserted her, or failed to maintain her, may obtain a dissolution of the marriage on her own declaration. Van den Berg, in his essay on the Afwijkingen (“Divergences [from Mohammedan law]”), had denied that any such special custom existed in the Indies. Snouck Hurgronje, who had been told of its existence by many Javanese at Mecca, maintained his ground and proved its existence at Batavia “by referring to an allusion to it in an application for fatwa composed by Sayyid ‘Uthman.” The Sayyid’s fatwa, in other words, supplied the documentary evidence by which the existence of the ta’liqat Batavia could be established against Van den Berg’s denial.
The reference to Sayyid ‘Uthman is not confined to this single notice. Snouck Hurgronje, in a later passage of the same discussion, remarks that Van den Berg “might have collected better data from any Batavian; or else — as he chose to form his ideas of the adat in the East Indies from printed works which he studied in Holland — he might, in place of consulting Sayyid ‘Uthman’s tabular treatise, have referred to the fatwa pronounced by the authorities at Mecca on the application of that writer, and especially the wording of the application itself to which this fatwa conveys the reply, and which is printed under the title [of a work in Arabic].” The “tabular treatise” of Sayyid ‘Uthman is thus named as one of the principal printed sources on the law of the Indies; and the fatwa obtained by him from the authorities at Mecca is recommended as a more authoritative document than the treatise itself.
The content of the ta’liqat Batavia, as elicited from Sayyid ‘Uthman’s application, is summarised by Snouck Hurgronje in the same passage. “In Batavia it is a year in each case, and the following condition is added to the other two: failure to maintain the wife for one month or serious ill-treatment.” The three recognised grounds of conditional separation in Batavia are thus desertion for a year, failure to maintain for a month, and serious ill-treatment; the wife, on the occurrence of any of these, may obtain separation by her own declaration, without being bound to prove her husband’s incapacity to maintain her. The ta’liqat Batavia, though unknown in Acheh itself, was the principal model on which the marital law of the Residency of Batavia was administered.
The figure of Sayyid ‘Uthman is one of the clearest examples in The Achehnese of the role played by Arab religious scholars — themselves resident in the Indies, but in constant communication with the learned authorities of Mecca — in the codification and transmission of the religious law of the archipelago. The fatwa he obtained from Mecca is a document of the first importance for the history of Islamic jurisprudence in the Indian Archipelago, and his own treatises — printed at Batavia for the use of the Malay- and Arabic-speaking faithful — were among the standard works of the late nineteenth-century Muslim revival in Java.
See Also
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.
Sayyid ‘Uthman was an Arab religious teacher and author resident in Batavia in the late nineteenth century, cited by Snouck Hurgronje in Vol. I of The Achehnese as the composer of a fatwa (verdict of a religious judge) which preserves important evidence on the ta’liqat Batavia — the customary marriage-contract of Batavia and its distinctive conditions of divorce.
Snouck Hurgronje’s principal notice of Sayyid ‘Uthman occurs in his long discussion of the ta’liq or conditional separation, in the chapter on Achehnese marriage law. The discussion turns on the question whether the wife of a husband who has deserted her, or failed to maintain her, may obtain a dissolution of the marriage on her own declaration. Van den Berg, in his essay on the Afwijkingen (“Divergences [from Mohammedan law]”), had denied that any such special custom existed in the Indies. Snouck Hurgronje, who had been told of its existence by many Javanese at Mecca, maintained his ground and proved its existence at Batavia “by referring to an allusion to it in an application for fatwa composed by Sayyid ‘Uthman.” The Sayyid’s fatwa, in other words, supplied the documentary evidence by which the existence of the ta’liqat Batavia could be established against Van den Berg’s denial.
The reference to Sayyid ‘Uthman is not confined to this single notice. Snouck Hurgronje, in a later passage of the same discussion, remarks that Van den Berg “might have collected better data from any Batavian; or else — as he chose to form his ideas of the adat in the East Indies from printed works which he studied in Holland — he might, in place of consulting Sayyid ‘Uthman’s tabular treatise, have referred to the fatwa pronounced by the authorities at Mecca on the application of that writer, and especially the wording of the application itself to which this fatwa conveys the reply, and which is printed under the title [of a work in Arabic].” The “tabular treatise” of Sayyid ‘Uthman is thus named as one of the principal printed sources on the law of the Indies; and the fatwa obtained by him from the authorities at Mecca is recommended as a more authoritative document than the treatise itself.
The content of the ta’liqat Batavia, as elicited from Sayyid ‘Uthman’s application, is summarised by Snouck Hurgronje in the same passage. “In Batavia it is a year in each case, and the following condition is added to the other two: failure to maintain the wife for one month or serious ill-treatment.” The three recognised grounds of conditional separation in Batavia are thus desertion for a year, failure to maintain for a month, and serious ill-treatment; the wife, on the occurrence of any of these, may obtain separation by her own declaration, without being bound to prove her husband’s incapacity to maintain her. The ta’liqat Batavia, though unknown in Acheh itself, was the principal model on which the marital law of the Residency of Batavia was administered.
The figure of Sayyid ‘Uthman is one of the clearest examples in The Achehnese of the role played by Arab religious scholars — themselves resident in the Indies, but in constant communication with the learned authorities of Mecca — in the codification and transmission of the religious law of the archipelago. The fatwa he obtained from Mecca is a document of the first importance for the history of Islamic jurisprudence in the Indian Archipelago, and his own treatises — printed at Batavia for the use of the Malay- and Arabic-speaking faithful — were among the standard works of the late nineteenth-century Muslim revival in Java.
See Also
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.