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Islam in Vietnam is primarily the religion of the Cham people, a minority ethnic group related to Malays; however, roughly one-third of the Muslims in Vietnam are of other ethnic groups. There is also a community describing themselves of mixed ethnic origins (Cham, Khmer, Malay, Minang, Viet, Chinese and Arab), who practice Islam and are also known as Cham, or Cham Muslims, around the region of Chau Doc in the Southwest.
History of Muslim in Vietnam
Uthman ibn Affan, the third Caliph of Islam, the legends have it, sent the first official Muslim envoy to Vietnam and Tang Dynasty China in 650. Seafaring Muslim traders are known to have made stops at ports in the Champa Kingdom en route to China very early in the history of Islam; however, the earliest material evidence of the transmission of Islam consists of Song Dynasty-era documents from China which record that the Cham familiarized themselves with Islam in the late 10th and early 11th centuries. The number of followers began to increase as contacts with Sultanate of Malacca broadened in the wake of the 1.471 collapse of the Champa Kingdom, but Islam would not become widespread among the Cham until the mid-17th century. In the mid-19th century, many Muslim Chams emigrated from Cambodia and settled in the Mekong River Delta region, further bolstering the presence of Islam in Vietnam. Malayan Islam began to have an increasing influence on the Chams in the early 20th century; religions publications were imported from Malaya, Malay clerics gave khutba (sermons) in mosques in the Malay language, and some Cham people went to Malayan madrasah to further their studies of Islam.
After the 1976 establishment of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam, some of the 55,000 Muslim Chams emigrated to Malaysia. 1,750 were also accepted as immigrants by Yemen; most settled in Ta’izz. Those who remained did not suffer violent persecution, although some writers claim that their mosques were closed by the government. In 1981, foreign visitors to Vietnam were still permitted to speak to indigenous Muslims and pray alongside them, and a 1985 account described Ho Chi Minh City’s Muslim community as being especially ethnically diverse: aside from Cham people, there were also Indonesians, Malays, Pakistanis, Yemenis, Omanis, and North Africans; their total numbers were roughly 10,000 at the time. However, Vietnam’s Muslims remained relatively isolated from the mainstream of world Islam, and their isolation, combined with the lack of religious schools, caused the practice of Islam in Vietnam to become increasingly synergetic. Command of Arabic is not widespread even among religious leaders, and some Muslims are reported to pray to Ali and refer to him as the “Son of God”.
Vietnam’s largest mosque was opened in January 2006 in Xuan Loc, Dong Nai Province; its construction was partially funded by donations from Saudi Arabia.
Muslim in Saigon
Ho Chi Minh City – More than 1,000 years ago, the first Vietnamese embraced Islam and charted the religion’s unique path into this Indo Chinese country. Today Vietnamese Muslims claims that there are about 65,000 Muslims in Southern Vietnam, with at least 5,000 believers living in Ho Chi Minh City alone. There are about 15 mosques and Muslim places of worship in the capital city with at least 3 of them frequented by Muslims from Malaysia, Indonesia, India and Pakistan respectively.
Muslims are the minority in this predominately Buddhist and Socialist State. Islam was introduced to Vietnam by the merchants and travelers from the Middle East, Malaysia, Indonesia and Pakistan who sailed along the coastal lines and at the same time spread the teachings of Islam to the local people there. These foreign visitors married Vietnamese partners and naturally settled in this new land and very soon, a second generation of Muslims was already evolving in Vietnam.
Converts comprise the second largest grouping of Muslims found in Vietnam. These are local Vietnamese who were drawn to Islamic teachings and later on converted to Islam. One such example was the case where an entire community of Tan Bou village in Tan An province was converted to Islam.
But the Champa Muslims would be considered the biggest group of Muslims in Vietnam. They are also one of the biggest groupings of indigenous people of Vietnam
The history of the Champa kingdom and culture dates back to the 2nd century and had lasted until 17th century. The Cham people belong to the Malay Polynesian stock and most of them were initially Hindu devotees.
Islam made its greatest impact on the Cham people in the 17th century when the Champa King became a believer and influenced his people to convert to Islam. When his empire collapsed and was succeeded by a Vietnamese King, the Muslim Champa community was believed to have suffered severe persecution under the new ruler.
History records that the Muslim King then led his people out of this bondage by making their exodus to Malaysia where they could seek refuge with other fellow Muslims who could accept them there. Until today the Malaysian state of Terengganu is still the historical location of “Kampung Cham” where the First Champa Muslims established themselves in Malaysia.
For those who had remained in Vietnam, they lived in isolation and very soon found themselves blending the teachings of Islam with Buddhism and local practices. It was not until several centuries later that they began to rediscover their Islamic Faith from other Muslims in Ho Chi Minh City and Southern part of Vietnam. Malaysian Muslim traders who sailed through the Mekong River also influenced the relearning of Islam by the Cham Muslims then
Another well remembered exodus of Vietnamese Muslims was after the Vietnam War in 1975. A large number of Muslims migrated to other countries such as America, France, Malaysia, India, Canada and Australia because they had feared persecution from the newly installed socialist government.
Today Vietnamese Muslims are mainly found along the South Eastern coast facing the South China Sea, and in the south, especially in Ho Chi Minh City (formerly Saigon).
The Vietnamese Cham Muslims adhere to the Sunni Islamic school of thought, which is similar to their counterparts in Kampuchea, Malaysian and Indonesian. Even their lifestyles and customary practices reflect this common trend of Islamic belief.
For instance Muslim communities are all these places are called “kampongs”. Muslim men wear “batik lungi” tied in a knot at the waist. But while the “Songkok” (Black Muslim cap) is popular in Indonesia and Malaysia, the Cham of Vietnam and Kampuchea wear white skull caps called “Kapea” The elders among the Cham wear white robes and turbans “Sunnah”.
The Cham are economically very depressed and thus it is difficult for them to maintain their communities and even religious practises. In southern parts of Vietnam, The Cham Muslim communities are mainly involved in fishing, weaving and small trade unlike their counterparts in the north and central who are usually farmers. The Cham people are well known for their finely woven silk and “sarong” garments.
One such Cham Muslim community is located in the “Jamiul Muslimin Mosque” in Ho Chi Minh City. Most of the 15 or so Muslim families work in low-income jobs such as contract laborers, small vendors, cloth weavers and some temporary odd jobs workers in the city.
“We often depend on the financial support from Muslims in other countries just to build our “madrasah”, religious school or place of worship,” explained Haji Idris Ismael, community leader of Jamiul Muslimin Mosque.
Ismael further explained that although as Cham Muslims they have accepted the teachings of Islam, but they still try to maintain their traditional customs and practises.
“We live together as Muslims in the same community because we have different lifestyle and practises from the other Vietnamese,” declared Ismael. “We the older generation must also be careful not to lose our Cham cultural heritage,” he added.
300 years after the first migration of Vietnamese Muslims Malaysia, today a new wave of migration is happening among the Vietnamese Muslims. Vietnamese Muslim students are being sent to the International Islam University in Malaysia to take up Islamic studies, and also secular study programs such as computer science, forestry, food technology and engineering
“We used to get financial support from Muslim concerned groups and individuals in Malaysia, Indonesia and Saudi Arabia in the early 1990′s but now there is little help from abroad,” Ismael said.
He cited the example of the “madrasah” religious school in his community (a small brick walled room good for 40 odd children to study) that was finally completed after 4 years, mainly financed by concerned people from abroad.
Ismael explained that there is good integration and mutual respect between the Cham Muslims and the Vietnamese government and society in general. However the socialist state does not seem to have financial subsidy to support the Cham Muslim communities and their activities.
“We must be able to take care of our brothers and sisters in islam especially the poor and the orphans,” he said as he recited from memory the well-quoted verse from the Qu’ran.
“If we can get help from a Muslim neighbor, we would be able to gradually improve our lives and community one step at a time” he added.
Sept 8 2010
HO CHI MINH CITY — The call to prayer from the minaret reaches out over tightly-packed alleys in a Ho Chi Minh City neighbourhood as men in white knitted skullcaps and colourful sarongs walk to their local mosque.
The scene is more reminiscent of Malaysia, Indonesia or Brunei — not Vietnam and its Chinese-influenced culture where Muslims are a tiny fraction of the population.
This small community in an area known as District 8 says it is the largest enclave of Cham Muslims in the metropolis informally still known as Saigon.
It has more than 1,300 residents, halal restaurants, a large mosque and a madrassa that regularly sends students to Malaysia for further study.
These and other Cham communities in southern and central Vietnam are all that remain of the Champa kingdom that ruled for centuries.
There are more than 100,000 Chams in the Buddhist-dominated country of 86 million, the government says.
“The Cham fell and lost their country. I feel like I live in another country and it’s not my home,” says a noodle-seller who gave her name only as Hachot, 49.
The Cham were a Hindu people who ruled parts of south and central Vietnam for hundreds of years and gradually converted to Islam.
But by the late 15th century the Vietnamese had pushed south and Champa was in decline.
Today, the kingdom’s most visible legacy is the My Son temple ruin near Danang city. It is a UNESCO world heritage site and popular with tourists.
These days more than 80 percent of Cham are adherents of Islam, researchers say.
According to government data, Muslims are the smallest of six major religious groups in the country, with Buddhism the largest.
Religious activity remains under state control in communist Vietnam but worship among a variety of faiths is flourishing. However, Catholics have had a long-running dispute with the government over land, and some minority Buddhist groups have complained of persecution.
The Muslims have kept a lower profile.
“We just follow this religion. We don’t care about politics,” says Haji Mou-sa, 52, deputy manager of the local madrassa. He is fluent in Malay and knows some Arabic.
Mou-sa says Ho Chi Minh City has more than a dozen imams, all trained in Vietnam. Foreign imams also visit, especially from Malaysia, and the Koran has been translated into Vietnamese.
A slight man in a collarless shirt, sarong, and metal-rimmed glasses, he has lived in District 8 since the 1960s, when Chams first began moving to the area.
Many came from the Mekong Delta province of An Giang, where Chau Doc city is still home to a significant Cham Muslim population.
In the beginning, the District 8 Cham homes were made from wood and thatch. Electricity came to the area in 1990, and much later a bridge was built connecting the once-isolated area to downtown, leading to improved roads and rapid development of the surrounding area.
According to residents, there are 16 mosques in Ho Chi Minh City, some of them built with assistance from Muslim nations.
A plaque in the Cham neighbourhood’s Masjid Jamiul Anwar says it was rebuilt in 2006 with funds from the United Arab Emirates and the Red Crescent.
Although they get support from the Middle East, Cham relations remain strongest with Malaysia and Indonesia, thanks partly to shared cultural and religious values.
“Malaysians came here and supported schools and better jobs,” Hachot recalls. The ties started more than 20 years ago after Vietnam began a policy of gradual economic openness.
She says she does not feel a part of wider Vietnamese society, even though the government helped to rebuild her house some years ago.
Attitudes of the majority Kinh ethnic group towards the Cham vary, Hachot says.
“Some Kinh say the Cham are dirty,” she says, and they object to the Muslims’ shunning of pork. “Other people don’t care.”
Many older Muslim residents make pilgrimages to Mecca, and most Cham have Arabic names on their government-issued identity cards.
Mohamath Zukry, 22, moved from his small town in An Giang more than 18 months ago to study and live at the madrassa. He plans to go to Malaysia to finish his religious education, and to study information technology.
Less devout Mack Aly, 29, a real estate agent who lives outside the Cham neighbourhood, says he still enjoys an alcoholic drink with his friends, and dates a non-Muslim woman.
“In Vietnam religion is not so strong. I won’t eat pork. But I don’t pray five times a day. And I drink and smoke,” he explains at an upscale coffee shop.
Aly and his family have taken advantage of the opportunities offered by the Muslim diaspora. His brother works in Egypt and his sister in Indonesia.
Headscarves, long skirts and sleeves are common in Cham neighbourhoods but women leave their heads uncovered when they go to work, and may opt for jeans. They say this is partly out of a fear of discrimination by co-workers.
Ngo Van Dong, 50, is among a small number of Kinh who have converted, despite initial opposition from his family who thought the religion “weird.” The mechanic says he adopted Islam more out of love for his Cham wife than religious piety. Over time, he came to understand his adopted faith better.
Like their fellow Muslims around the world, the Cham in District 8 are marking the holy fasting month of Ramadan until about September 9.
They commonly also enjoy Vietnam’s biggest celebration, the Tet Lunar New Year in February, although they do not engage in the spiritual rituals that accompany it.
“But we still have fun,” says Dong.
