Features

Travellers and traders: Muslims of Sri Lanka

Published

2 years ago

2021/10/23

By Uditha Devapriya
udakdev1@gmail.com

In 851 AD, an Arab merchant, called Soleyman, wrote an account of his travels to the island of Serendib. Impressionistic but insightful, it records the earliest known engagement of a Muslim with Sri Pada, also known as Samantukuta.

Soleyman does not refer to Sri Pada as “aadam malayi”, the name we see in later Muslim reconstructions of the peak. Instead he calls it “Al-Rohoun”, which is what the ninth century Indian poet Rajasekhara used in the Balaramanaya. “Rohoun” was a corruption of Ruhuna, to which the area around the mountain belonged. Literary sources inform us that this was the term used, and preferred, by Arabs and Indians from that time.

Around five centuries later, the scholar and traveller Ibn Batuta is reported to have climbed the peak. Patronised by the king of Jaffna, Batuta ascended the summit and came across a grotto bearing the name “Iskander.” Poets, travellers, and even historians would later posit this as evidence for the view, now largely debunked, that Alexander the Great climbed Sri Pada on his horse. Writing of his ascent, Batuta also noted that a Muslim Imam called Abu Abdallah, said to have died in 953 AD, was the first Muslim to make the climb. What we can speculate about from Batuta’s travels, other than the identity of “Iskander”, is that Muslim engagement with the summit dates to the 9th centuries.

Muslim engagement with Sri Lanka, of course, precedes these pilgrimages, while Arab engagement with the island predates even the coming of Islam. From the Mahavamsa we know that Pandukabhaya, after emerging triumphant from his war with his uncles, settled a community of “yonas” at the Western gate of his capital, Anuradhapura. “Yona”, we know well enough, was the term the Portuguese and the Dutch later used on Arabs.

We can’t really confirm whether the community Mahanama Thera referred to were the ancestors of the traders and settlers European colonisers encountered many centuries later. Yet, the coincidence is striking: it suggests that European colonisers considered the Arabs as alien to the country as the yonas of yore. Of course, the truth was more complex than such colonialist perceptions would suggest: by the 15th century, Arabs had become active participants in Sri Lanka’s economic, cultural, and political life.

We come across extensive references to Arabs in the country no earlier than in the sixth century AD. The literary sources we have tell us that merchants, from this period, made their way to Sri Lanka through three trade routes: the Indian to the North, the Chinese to the East, and the Arab to the West. Braudel writes that by the seventh century, trade in the Far East was dominated by these three economies. Sri Lanka’s receptivity to all three had a great deal to do with its emergence as a distinct geographic entity, separated but not cut off from the Indian subcontinent. It is from this vantage point that we should delve into the Arab origins of the Muslims, specifically Moors, of Sri Lanka.

Where did Arab traders settle in Sri Lanka? One school of thought argues that they first settled in localities in the north. Another school contends that they moved southwest, with records showing that a landing was made in Barberyn in 1024 AD. It must be noted that two of the oldest mosques were built in the latter region: the construction of the oldest of them, Al Abrar, dates to the 10th century, and that of the other, Kechchimalai, to the 12th.

Regardless of where they settled, we know what role they played in Sri Lankan society: they were, first and foremost, traders and merchants. In this, they became intermediaries between the island and the world. Enmeshing themselves in the commercial fabric of the country, they introduced practices that may not have been familiar to locals before their arrival. To say this is certainly not to deny the vitality of Sinhala civilisation; merely to note that the assimilation of other groups to that civilisation reinforced that vitality.

These encounters were hardly limited to the southwest, or even the north. Wherever they settled, Muslim traders wielded much influence, serving not just as merchants but also patrons of society. Encountering Colombo, for instance, Ibn Batuta wrote of a vizier called Jalasti, who had with him a retinue of 500 Abyssinians. Tennent suggested that his presence showed the Sinhalese were indifferent to commerce. Tennent’s view is, in one sense, a generalisation in line with colonialist readings of Sinhala culture, but it belies the reality of Muslim involvement of the island’s trade after the 10th century.

Their sense of privilege and proportion was significantly enlarged by a concession they won from Sinhala rulers: the ability to be tried by their own laws. This was an expedient necessitated by commerce: according to Lorna Dewaraja, whenever a dispute arose in any of the ports where they traded, it had to be settled “by a tribunal consisting of Muslim priests, merchants, and mariners.” Such privileges were crucial, because like any trade-based community Arab Muslims required a body of laws they could apply to their kind, wherever and in whatever part of the world they operated from. Their importance in this regard was not lost on local rulers: part of the reason why Arya Cakravari patronised Ibn Batuta so well was his desire to tap into Arab trade in the region.

Unlike European colonisers, even Muslims from other parts of the region, Arab traders formed one of the more peaceful communities in the island. Their pacifist nature, a stark contrast to the fanaticism of their compatriots in India, the Maldives, and South-East Asia, encouraged Sinhala kings to grant them settlements of their own. Eventually they became not just a part, but a fact, of life in the country.

In his account of Portuguese rule in Sri Lanka, Paul E. Pieris recounts an incident where, upon their first arrival in the island, the colonialists managed to anger locals by attempts to slaughter their cattle. What is fascinating about this episode is that Muslim settlements in Sri Lanka preceded the Portuguese by nine centuries, and even more fascinating, the fact that cattle slaughter was one of the few crimes for which a refugee could not escape the brunt of the law if he or she escaped to a viharagam (where cattle were held in high regard). It was, to borrow the parlance of modern law, a non-bailable offence.

Based on such fragmentary evidence, the conclusion we can reach is that cattle slaughter would have been tolerated as a practice of a community, in this case Muslims, assimilated to the country’s society. When committed by a foreign group, on the other hand, it would have constituted an act of disrespect, or even aggression.

There is, of course, no doubt that Muslim settlers and local communities faced a common enemy in the European coloniser. In their attempts to convince the king of the perfidious nature of the Portuguese, for example, Buddhist monks actively took the side of Muslim traders, warning the Sinhalese court of the dangers of allowing the Westerners too many privileges. By this point the reputation of Muslims had transcended their position as mere traders; they had entered other fields, as diverse as medicine and the crafts, flourishing in whatever domain they settled in. In incorporating them into the court, as physicians or members of the military, the Sinhala polity thus absorbed them into its social structure. It is this that explains the high regard Buddhist monks had for them. Historians who tend to play with categories of race, without noting the role caste played in Sinhala society, fail to appreciate fully the implications of such developments.

We see these processes continue in the Kandyan kingdom. For a social structure that was so rigid and fixed, it is astonishing that it absorbed outside communities so well. Muslims not surprisingly figured in its scheme of things: they were decreed a place in the Sinhala caste system, banded together with the karavas or the fisher folk. They were also allowed their own headmen for the villages they settled in. This gave them a twin advantage: while maintaining amicable relations with the king, they continued with their cultural practices that set them apart from other social and caste groups. Readily genuflecting before rulers and nobles, they played a role as merchants, physicians, and envoys.

The fact that we do not come across records of tensions between them and other groups, particularly those such as the Buddhist clergy, indicates that, for all its limitations, Kandyan feudalism did a better job than British colonialism in maintaining inter-group relations. To say this is by no means to romanticise the caste system; only to suggest, as historians like Lorna Dewaraja have, that colonialism brought an end to a period of symbiotic harmony between groups who were, with the advent of Western rule, to see themselves in ethnic rather than caste terms. This, however, is an entirely new domain of research, one which most contemporary scholars, barring the likes of Asiff Hussein, have not explored. That it should be explored is implied in the unfortunate, though hardly inevitable, conflagrations of ethnic tension which crop up from time to time today. As Regi Siriwardena suggested a long time ago, what needs to be emphasised is not imagined unity, but actual diversity: a diversity that remained a force for unity for so long.

All News Advertisement

Features

From a ‘Clash of Civilizations’ to a ‘Dialogue among Civilizations’

Published

14 hours ago

2023/11/30

Sahan Weerasooriya

A meeting of BRICS leaders

As the world continues to reel from the ‘aftershocks’ as it were of the October 7th Gaza Strip-centred savagery, what it should guard against most is a mood of pessimism and hopelessness. Hopefully, the international community would pull itself together before long and give of its best to further the cause of a political solution in the Middle East.

It is plain to see that what needs to be done most urgently at present is the prolongation of the current ceasefire, besides facilitating a steady exchange of hostages but given the present state of hostilities between the warring sides this would not prove an easy challenge.

Considering that there are no iron-clad guarantees by either side that there would be a longstanding ceasefire followed by a cessation of hostilities, what we have at present in the Middle East is a highly fraught ‘breather’ from the fighting. There are no easy answers to the currently compounded Middle East conflict but the external backers of the warring sides could alleviate the present suffering of the peoples concerned to a degree by bringing steady pressure on the principal antagonists to drastically scale down their hostilities.

If they mean well by the communities concerned, these external backers, such as the US, as regards Israel, and those major Middle Eastern states backing Hamas and other militant groups, would set about creating a conducive climate for a negotiated settlement to the conflict.

De-escalating the supply of lethal military hardware to the warring sides is a vital first step towards this end. External military backing is a key element in the prolongation of the war and a decrease in such support would go some distance in curtailing the agony of the peoples concerned. The onus is on these external parties to prove their good intentions, if they have any.

Meanwhile, major states of the South in increasing numbers are making their voices heard on the principal issues to the conflict. One such grouping is BRICS, which is now featuring among its prospective membership, countries such as Egypt, Ethiopia, Argentina, Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Iran. That is, in the foreseeable future BRICS would emerge as a greatly expanded global grouping, which would come to be seen as principally representative of the South.

Since the majority of countries within the BRICS fold are emerging economies, the bloc could be expected to wield tremendous economic and military clout in the present world order. With China and Russia counting among the foremost powers in the grouping, BRICS would be in a position to project itself as an effective counterweight to the West and the G7 bloc.

However, the major challenge before the likes of BRICS is to prove that they will be a boon and not a bane to the poorer countries of the South. They would be challenged to earnestly champion the cause of a just and equitable world political and economic order. Would BRICS, for instance, be equal to such challenges? Hopefully, the commentator would be able to answer this question in the affirmative, going ahead.

The current issues in the Middle East pose a major challenge to BRICS. One of the foremost tasks for BRICS in relation to the Middle East is the formulation of a policy position that is equitable and fair to all the parties to the conflict. The wellbeing of both the Palestinians and the Israelis needs to be staunchly championed.

Thus, BRICS is challenged to be even-handed in its managing of Middle Eastern questions. If the grouping does not do this, it risks turning the Gaza bloodletting, for example, into yet another proxy war front between the East and West.

Nothing constructive would be achieved by BRICS, in that the wellbeing of the peoples concerned would not be served and proxy wars have unerringly been destructive rather constructive in any way. The South could do without any more of these proxy wars and BRICS would need to prove its skeptics wrong on this score.

Accordingly, formations, such as BRICS, that are genuine counterweights to the West are most welcome but their presence in the world system should prove to be of a positive rather than of a negative nature. They need to keep the West in check in the UN system, for example, but they should steer clear of committing the West’s excesses and irregularities.

More specifically, the expanding BRICS should be in a position to curtail the proliferation of identity politics in the present world order. The West has, thus far, failed to achieve this. The seismic convulsions in the Gaza re-establish the pervasive and pernicious presence of identity politics in the world’s war zones, so much so, one could say that US political scientist Samuel Huntingdon is being proved absolutely right in his theorization that world politics over the past 30 years has been essentially a ‘Clash of Civilizations’.

After all, current developments in the Middle East could be construed by the more simple-minded observer as a pitting of Islam against Judaism, although there are many more convoluted strands to the Middle East conflict than a violent clash of these religious identities. More so why the influence of identity politics needs to blunted and eliminated by the right-thinking.

One way in which this could be achieved is the through the steady espousal and practise of former Iranian President Mohammad Khatami’s ‘Dialogue of Civilizations’ theory. While the existence of a ‘Clash of Civilizations’ cannot be denied on account of the pervasive presence of identity politics the world over, the negative effects of this brand of politics could be neutralized through the initiation and speeding-up of a robust dialogue among civilizations or identity groups.

Such an exchange of views or dialogue could prove instrumental in facilitating mutual understanding among cultural and civilizational groups. The consequence could be a reduction in tensions among mutually hostile social groups. Needless to say, the Middle East is rife with destructive politics of this kind.

Accordingly, there needs to be a paradigm shift in the way cultural groups interact with each other. The commonalities among these groups could be enhanced through a constant dialogue process and the Middle East of today opens out these possibilities.

Features

Their love story in song…

Published

14 hours ago

2023/11/30

Sahan Weerasooriya

The duo in the company of Dinesh Hemantha and Jananga

It’s certainly encouraging to see Sri Lankan artistes now trying to be creative…where songs are concerned.

Over the past few weeks, we have seen some interesting originals surfacing, with legendary singer/entertainer Sohan Weerasinghe’s ‘Sansare,’ taking the spotlight.

Rubeena Shabnam, Sri Lankan based in Qatar, and Yohan Dole, living in Australia, have teamed up to produce a song about their love life.

‘Adare Sulagin’ is the title of the song and it’s the couple’s very first duet.

Says Rubeena: “This song is all about our love story and is a symbol of our love. It feels like a dream singing with my fiancé.”

Elaborating further, especially as to how they fell in love, Rubeena went on to say that they met via social media, through a common friend of theirs.

The song and video was done in Sri Lanka.

Rubeena and Yohan with lyricist Jananga Vishawajith

“We both travelled to Sri Lanka, in August this year, where we recorded the song and did the video, as well.

‘Adare Sulagin’ was composed by Dinesh Hemantha (DH Wave Studio, in Galle), while the lyrics were penned by Jananga Vishwajith, and the video was handled by Pathmila Ravishan.

It is Dinesh Hemantha’s second composition for Rubeena – the first being ‘Surali.’

“It was an amazing project and it was done beautifully. Talking about the music video, we decided to keep it more simple, and natural, so we decided to capture it at the studio. It was a lot of fun working with them.”

: Rubeena Shabnam and Yohan Dole doing it with ‘Adare Sulagin

: Social media brought them together

‘Adare Sulagin,’ says Rubeena, is for social media only. “We have not given it for release to any radio or TV station in Sri Lanka.”

However, you could check it out on YouTube: Adare Sulagin – Rubeena Shabnam, ft. Yohan Dole.

Rubeena lives and works in Qatar and she has been in the music industry for almost five years. She has done a few originals but this one, with Yohan, is very special to her, she says.

Yohan Dole resides in Australia and is a guitarist and vocalist.

He has a band called Rhythmix, in Australia, where they play at various events.

He has been doing music for quite a while now but doing an original song was one of his dreams, he says

Rubeena and Yohan plan to get married, in December, and do more music together, in different genres.

Features

Mathematics examinations or mathematics curriculum?

Published

14 hours ago

2023/11/30

Sahan Weerasooriya

Some people say that it is not necessary for a Grade 10 student to buy an ordinary scientific calculator because they have smartphones with built-in calculators. If not, it is easy to install a calculator app on mobile phones. A smartphone should not be used as a calculator during a mathematics test or a mathematics exam because it can be used for cheating. In the UK and other developed countries students have to keep their smartphones in their school bags or in their lockers outside the classroom during mathematics tests and exams.

by Anton Peiris
anton25ps@gmail.com

R. N.A. De Silva has, in a recent article, provided some useful tips to students as regards preparation for mathematics examinations. Trained teachers and graduates with professional qualifications are familiar with this topic. All mathematics teachers have a duty to help the students with revision.

The more important task is to salvage the Sri Lankan O/Level mathematics students from the abyss that they have fallen into, viz. the implications and the retarding effect of the use of obsolete Log Tables. The Minister of Education, Senior Ministry Officials and the NIA are oblivious to the important and interesting things that have happened in Grades 10 and 11 mathematics in the UK, other parts of Europe, Japan, Canada, China and elsewhere. They have been like frogs in a well for almost half a century. Here are two important facts:

1. O/Level mathematics students in Sri Lanka are 46 years behind their counterparts in the UK and in other developed countries. Ordinary Scientific calculators were introduced to the O/Level mathematics classrooms in the UK way back in 1977. Prior to that those students used Slide Rules to facilitate their mathematical calculations. Ordinary scientific calculators give the values of Sine, Cos, Tan and their Inverses, Log, LN, exponential powers, square roots, squares, reciprocals, factorials, etc., at the press of a button, in addition to performing arithmetic functions. There is no memory to store mathematical formulae, etc. It is an invaluable tool for solving sophisticated and interesting mathematical problems and also problems in ordinary statistics. It has paved the way for achieving high standards in O/Level Mathematics in those countries.

Just compare the maths questions in the Cambridge IGCSE or the London O/Level Maths Exam with the questions in the Sri Lankan O/Level maths exam and you will see how far our students have fallen behind.

The Cambridge O/Level examination was replaced by the GCSE and the IGCSE (International General Certificate of Secondary Education) a few decades ago.

I am not referring to Programmable Calculators and Graphic Display Calculators (GDC), meaning devices with a small screen that can display graphs, perform statistical calculations like the Z- Score for large samples, show Matrix calculations, provide solutions to algebraic equations, etc., at the press of a few buttons. GDC is a compulsory item for A/Level mathematics students in the UK and in all developed countries.

Some teachers say that by using ordinary scientific calculators in Grades 10 and 11, students will not acquire the ability to carry out mental arithmetic calculations. This is not true because

(i). Calculators are introduced in Grade 10. Maths teachers have five years of Primary School and three years of Middle school (Grades 7, 8 and 9) i.e. a total of eight years to inculcate sufficient mental arithmetic skills in their students before the calculators are introduced in Grade 10!

(ii). In the IGCSE and in the London O/Level Mathematics Exams calculators are not allowed for Paper 1. Preparation for Paper 1 requires the acquisition of mental arithmetic skills, e.g., one lesson per week in class in Grades 10 and 11 in which calculators are not allowed. Sri Lanka could follow suit.

An ordinary scientific calculator costs less than 10 % of the price of a smartphone.

Sri Lankan students in International Schools sit the IGCSE or the London O/Level mathematics exams where ordinary scientific calculators are allowed. These students have made big strides in learning mathematics by using the calculators. Only the rich can send their children to International Schools in Sri Lanka. Millions of poor Sri Lankan students do not have calculators.

Our Minister of Education has announced that the government was planning to transform the country’s education system by introducing ‘’STEAM’ (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Mathematics). Maintaining high standards in O/Level Mathematics is the key to a successful implementation of STEAM programme. Unfortunately, the Education Minister and top education official are not aware of the fact that the only way to improve the standard of O/Level Mathematics is to do what the developed countries have done, i. e., revamping the O/Level mathematics syllabus and to introducing the ordinary scientific calculator in Grades 10 & 11. If they do it, it will be an important piece of curriculum development.

Bear in mind that the UK and other developed countries have taken another important step during the last 20 years; they have introduced the Graphic Display Calculator (GDC) to the O/Level Mathematics class and by providing a Core Exam and an Extended Exam. In the Cambridge IGCSE Mathematics Exams, Papers 1, 3, and 5 constitute the Core Exam. Papers 2 ,4 and 6 constitute the Extended Exam. Calculators are not allowed in Papers 1 and 2.

The Core Exam is a boon to students who have very little or no mathematical ability. More on this in my next article.

By using Log Tables, our Sri Lankan O/Level students have to spend a lot of time to solve an IGCSE (Extended Syllabus) exam problem or a London O/Level mathematics exam problem because the use of Log Tables takes a long time to work out the Squares, Square Roots, exponential powers, reciprocals , LN , factorials, etc., and that is tedious work while their counterparts in developed countries do that in a few seconds by pressing a couple of buttons in an ordinary scientific calculator.

The Calculator has given them more motivation to learn mathematics.

O/Level students in the UK have graduated from the ordinary scientific calculator to the Graphic Display Calculator (GDC) thereby improving their ability to solve more sophisticated, more important and more interesting problems in mathematics, statistics and physics. Sri Lankan O/Level students are compelled to use obsolete Log Tables.

Hats off to that Minister of Education who introduced the ordinary scientific calculator to the Sri Lankan A/ Level Mathematics classroom and to the A/Level Mathematics Exam a few years ago. That was a small step in the right direction. Minister Susil Premjayantha, please revamp the O/Level mathematics syllabus and introduce the ordinary scientific calculator to Grades 10 and 11 now. That will ensure a big boost for your STEAM programme and yield benefits for the Sri Lankan economy.

(To be continued. Topic 2: The necessity for introducing an O/Level Mathematics Core Exam and an Extended Exam. The writer has taught O/Level and A/Level Mathematics and Physics for 45 years in Asia, Africa and Europe and is an Emeritus Coordinator for International Baccalaureate, Geneva.)