Islam first enteredhe Malabar Coast of India soon after the elevation of the Prophet Muhammad, in ~621 AD. The Malabar coast was one of the first areas to embrace Islam. It was brought by Arab traders from Yemen, Oman and the Hadramawt, an area of Southeast Yemen.
The Moplah Community of Malabar became central in spreading Sunni Islam to Malaya, Indonesia and Borneo. They were the link between Arabia and the archipelago.
The Moplahs trace their ancestry to an Arab community that settled on the Malabar coast in the 7th century. The Moplah are Indians who married Arabs. They later became an Indian Arab community in Kerala, a town located on the Southwest coast of India, hosting the Moplah community.
On Borneo, the Hadramaut Borneo connection (Shafi’i tradition) passed through Pontianak, Sambas and Sarawak. They spread the Shafi school of Islam, and it was the form of Islam that took root in Borneo by establishing courts and mosques. They followed the Sufi teachings, which combined both spirituality and daily life. They elevated the rulers to Sultan status. They established links between Hadramaut (Yemen) and the islands.
Indian traders have been sailing the Archipelago since the first century CE. They traded beads, cloth, metals and religious ideas. Islamic influences began to penetrate the area soon after the ascension of the Prophet Muhammad.
Before Islam, in Sambas, Indian traders were influenced by Hindu-Buddhist traditions long before the arrival of Islam. Islam reached Sambas between the 15th and 16th centuries. They included Indian traders from Malabar. These Indians intermarried within the local communities.
The Sultanate of Sambas arose during the late 1500s. It connected Brunei with Demak in Java. Samabas became an Islamic power ~1609 with the rise of Sultan Muhammad Saifuddin I, aka Raden Sulaiman. Islam blended strongly with the local customs known as adat. Mysticism played a major role, combined with the principles of Islam.
According to sources, the Sultanate of Brunei was established in 1368-1402 by Sultan Muhammad Shah. By the 15th century, Brunei was firmly established as a Sultanate.
Sarawak became linked with Brunei after the fall of the Islamic Sultanate at Santubong. Brunei became a leader in the spread of Islam after ~1512. Conversion along the coast was gradual, with local chiefs marrying into the Brunei aristocracy.
Travel between Sambas and Sarawak was always fluid. It was driven by trade, family ties, adat and Islam. It carried a shared cultural zone using the Sambas and Sarawak rivers as trade routes.
The Moplah Indians from the Malabar coast arrived in Sarawak in the early 1830s. The early sermons were in Tamil. They were shopkeepers, money lenders and merchants. They blended into the wider Muslim community. They married Malays and married into other Islamic families. They became a distinct but respected community, not fully Indian and not fully Malay, but a bridge between the two.
The Moplah Indians became business middlemen connecting Islamic Indian traders with Malay villagers and Dayak producers. They preserved Islam and played a vital role in trade.
The Indian mosque in Kuching was a humble hut in 1834. A prayer tent was erected in ~1830. It was later transformed into a Surau, and a larger structure was built in 1837 by Indian Muslim traders from South India.
The mosque originally was constructed of Nipah palms, which were replaced in 1876 by Ironwood. Many would berth their sampans next to the Gambier Street wet market and move to the Mosque to socialise and pray. The Malay Muslims, who were called the ‘orang laut’ (people of the sea) because they lived by the sea in Lundu, Santubong, Pusa and Beladin, also came to the mosque to pray and rest.
Lundu was originally inhabited by the Bidayuh and Iban communities. It later became a centre for Malay activities.
Santubong was an important ancient port city at the confluence of the Sarawak River.
Pusa sits near the Saribas River, a key waterway linking Dayak communities with the coast. It became a centre for Malay communities migrating inland.
Beladin occupied the mouth of the Saribas River, becoming a strong Malay Muslim settlement.
All four towns would become major trading points with the Indian Moplah traders.
Situated in a narrow lane between Gambier and India Streets in Kuching, the mosque became a resting place for Indian travellers as well as a cultural centre. Twenty-three adjacent shop lots, owned by the Moplah Indians, were responsible for the maintenance of the Mosque.
Many of the Indian shop houses of today, 2025, still sell the religious implements such as Qurans, songkots and various literature and pamphlets about the Islamic religion. They also sell bolts of cloth, whereby pieces could be cut to make various shirts and sarongs.
Talking to the Malay locals, they were not the Indians who came through the kampongs selling bread, cloth and beads. They said the barter system was in effect, whereby a piece of cloth could take several weeks or months to pay for.
Many of the Moplah Indians have become doctors, lawyers and other professionals, becoming valuable and contributing members of the Kuching community.
Compiled by Tom McLaughlin for BorneoHistory.net