How precious is Your unfailing love, O God! You know, Theophron, what a host of ridiculous contradictions and blasphemies were imputed to him, as for example that, according to his system, God had to do all the evil as well as the good in the world; that He had to commit all follies, think all errors, to fight against Himself, and in the person of Spinoza, to blaspheme and deny Himself, and so on. Joseph persevered as a model prisoner until the Lord brought him to a position of power and used his brothers’ evil plans to bring about an awe-inspiring outcome. Wait ’til you see how they depict the ACLU lawyers as basely motivated by notoriety, power politics and publicity. Islam was popular in Southeast Asia because it, unlike previous belief systems, could be used to validate a ruler’s power through the divine. Islam in Southeast Asia has been adapted into varying local norms across Southeast Asia. The adaptation of Islam to local traditions is seen as a positive thing by Muslims in Southeast Asia. The first Muslim communities arose in Aceh in Northern Sumatra, with the establishment of the Peureulak Sultanate in the 9th century which is considered to be the oldest Islamic sultanate in Southeast Asia.

As one of the early centers of Islamic development in this region, the Peureulak Sultanate became the gateway for Islam to enter through trade routes involving Arab, Persian, and Indian traders. In the 12th century, the Indian Chola navy crossed the ocean and attacked the Srivijaya kingdom of Sangrama Vijayatunga Varman in Kadaram (Kedah). Along with Kadaram, Pannai in present-day Sumatra and Malaiyur and the Malayan peninsula were attacked. Ibn Abd-al-Wahhab attacked a “perceived moral decline and political weakness” in the Arabian Peninsula and condemned what he perceived as idolatry, the popular cult of saints, and shrine and tomb visitation. Over time these ports attracted Muslims from India, China, and the Arabian peninsula. If after this amount of time you haven’t heard back, call the customer service department. Call it my thirteenth and final labor. Established around 840 AD, the Peureulak Sultanate played an important role in the history of Islam in the archipelago, even before the emergence of other Islamic kingdoms such as the Samudera Pasai and Malacca Sultanates. Soon after, Phra Ong Mahawangsa, the King of Kedah, became the first ruler to abandon the traditional Hindu faith and converted to Islam with the Sultanate of Kedah established in year 1136. Samudera Pasai converted to Islam in the year 1267. In the early 15th century, Parameswara, the first Sultan of Malacca, married the princess of Pasai, and their son converted to Islam.

The religion was then further spread by Sufi orders and finally consolidated by the expansion of the territories of converted rulers and their communities. The introduction of Islam throughout Southeast Asia and the Indonesian archipelago was an uneven, gradual and relatively pacific process that was heavily influenced by trade and interactions with merchants and sufi missionaries. In 1380, Sufi orders carried Islam from here on to Mindanao. Mystic forms of Islam fit in well with already established traditions. These communities surpassed their utilitarian functions for trade and were integrated into the global network of Islam. Muslim merchants dominated trade in Southeast Asia by the 9th century or earlier. Indeed, the faith introduced by some of the religious merchants was Sufism, a mystical version of Islam that is rejected by more conservative Muslims. In 2010 a religious group which had begun as a Catholic movement under a priest, Andrés de Jesús Girón (died 2014, also known as Andrew Giron), was received into the Eastern Orthodox Church by the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople and placed under the Greek Orthodox Metropolis of Mexico. This religious economy already played a role in periods of imperial China, plays a significant role in modern Taiwan, and is seen as a driving force in the rapid economic development in parts of rural China, especially the southern and eastern coasts.

Another driving force for the change of the ruling class in the region was the concept among the increasing Muslim communities of the region when ruling dynasties to attempt to forge such ties of kinship by marriage. Southeast Asia is the global region with the highest number of Muslims in the world, surpassing the Middle East and North Africa. Islam in Southeast Asia is neglected in Western study of Islam which centers around the Middle East. Southeast Asian identity varies by regions that include Brunei, Cambodia, East Timor, Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam. The first written sources of Islam in Southeast Asia in 916 AD came from a merchant describing his experience in 1851 on the Island of Sumatra. This made it play a major role in the spread of Islam in Southeast Asia. Muslim traders along the main trade-route between Western Asia and the Far East are thought to have been responsible for the introduction of Islam to Southeast and East Asia. Females are slightly smaller and weigh in at between 21 and 35 pounds (9.6 and 16 kilograms). According to Edward H. Schafer, there are several passages in Chinese chronicles compiled during the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period (907-979 CE) mention some Islamic activities in the Champa Kingdom during the 10th century CE.