HISTORY OF ISLAM IN THE PHILIPPINES
There are numerous theories about how Islam came to Southeast Asia and the Philippines. One theory is that Muslim traders established trading centers in Southeast Asia as commercial stopovers to China and intermarried daughters of village chiefs. There was a need for Muslim education in these trade centers, which brought about Muslim teachers and missionaries coming from Arabic regions. Another theory is conversion leaders of communities came to local superiors and forced the population to become Muslim. Another theory is that local people were automatically attracted to Islam, belonging to a larger community as a group of equal people in Muslim brotherhood, and the religion had respect for local culture and religion. Islam spread in the Philippines from the 13th century through the 1500's. The people combined Islam with their own practices and beliefs. Muslims founded communities (called sultunates) with the chief of each community (sultans). Muslim sultans in the Southern Philippines went with a fleet to northern islands for slaves to bring back to Sulu province. Once the slaves were integrated into the community, they were encouraged to marry Muslim Moros of the south so children could acquire freedom. During Spanish colonization for over 300 years, the Spanish took over the economy, politics, and brought their culture and religion (Catholicism) to the people. They wanted to make people Christian instead of native religions and Muslim. The Spanish sent fleets and armies of converted Christian Filipinos to sultunates to fight the Moros. The Spaniards wanted to annex sultunates to their Spanish colonies. Moro people weakened delivery of resistance due to a lack of modern equipment. Increased recognition of the Spanish as rulers lead to Christian settlers. The United States colonization period imposed beliefs through education of the Muslim people. The United States encouraged Christian people from Northern Philippines to integrate to Sulu and Mindanao. They gave Southern people the chance to study in Manilla to be taught modern Western ways, which allowed the United States to get a grip over the Southern Philippines and Islamic people. After the Second World War (post-1941) the Philippines became independent, and now, the predominant religion is Christianity. The Muslims, congregating in the south, are politically inferior to the predominantly Christian north. From the 1950’s onward, Muslims from all over the world have tried to make the Islamic community stronger in the Southern Philippines and they have supported them through money and other aids. Now, Moro nationalism is encouraged from other Muslim countries, and so has the idea of the Moros separating from the Republic of the Philippines. In recent years, various news sources have described the Southern Philippines as a site for violent terrorist groups.
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