Religion and History in Malaysia

Islam arrived in the Malay world through trade, and the conversion of the ruler of Malacca in the fifteenth century turned a port into the model for what followed: a Malay sultanate in which Islam, custom and kingship were fused, so that a sultan was head of religion in his state as well as its ruler. That model survived Portuguese, Dutch and British rule and was written into the constitution of the independent federation, which is why nine of the thirteen states still have a sultan who is the head of Islam there, and why the Yang di-Pertuan Agong is head of Islam in the remaining states. British administration governed the peninsula through indirect rule that reserved religion and Malay custom to the rulers while it managed everything else, and it imported Chinese and Indian labour on a scale that made the country permanently plural.

Chinese Malaysians brought Buddhism, Taoism and Chinese folk practice, Indian Malaysians brought Hinduism, and the Thaipusam procession to the Batu Caves is now among the largest Hindu gatherings outside India. Christianity is strongest in Sabah and Sarawak, which joined in 1963 with constitutional guarantees on religion that are frequently invoked, and where indigenous communities converted in large numbers in the twentieth century.