Islam
In the Terengganu state, Jeram and Tepoh were two of the traditional Chinese-Muslim villages; their forefathers arrived together with Zheng He or much earlier. Dato' Haji Mustapha Ma Qi is among the well-known Malaysian Chinese-Muslims. He is the president of the Chinese Muslim Association (MACMA - Persatuan Cina Muslim Malaysia). According to the official census, there were about 40,000 Chinese Muslims in Malaysia as of 2000, mostly converts by request of Malay Muslim family-in-law.
The Chinese acceptance of Islam as a religion can be traced back as early as the 7th century, from the Chinese Muslims' annals and the history of Islam in China. Guangzhou city has one of the earliest mosques, Huaisheng Mosque. Today in China, there are about over 20 million Muslims. They can be identified by their surnames, especially Ma, Li, Chang, Zhang, Lan, Wu, Mi, Yang, etc. The famous Ma Shan Bao (Zheng He) was a friend of Parameswara, the ruler of Melaka in 1402.
Read more about this topic: Malaysian Chinese Religion
Famous quotes containing the word islam:
“The exact objectives of Islam Inc. are obscure. Needless to say everyone involved has a different angle, and they all intend to cross each other up somewhere along the line.”
—William Burroughs (b. 1914)
“Awareness of the stars and their light pervades the Koran, which reflects the brightness of the heavenly bodies in many verses. The blossoming of mathematics and astronomy was a natural consequence of this awareness. Understanding the cosmos and the movements of the stars means understanding the marvels created by Allah. There would be no persecuted Galileo in Islam, because Islam, unlike Christianity, did not force people to believe in a “fixed” heaven.”
—Fatima Mernissi, Moroccan sociologist. Islam and Democracy, ch. 9, Addison-Wesley Publishing Co. (Trans. 1992)
“Sooner or later we must absorb Islam if our own culture is not to die of anemia.”
—Basil Bunting (1900–1985)