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Introduction
Islam arrived in South Africa in two major migratory waves launched by the Malays and the Indians who happen to hail from two distinct ethnic groups. Islam had come to these people from Arabia, the home of Islam, and they in turn brought Islam to South Africa from their respective homelands in the Indian subcontinent and the Malay peninsula. The Cape Muslims are also referred to as `Cape Malays' and sometimes as `Cape Coloreds'. They form the largest group of practicing Muslims in South Africa. The second largest group of Muslims are the Indians who arrived from the subcontinent in two distinct waves of their own. Finally, there is also a tiny minority of black and white Muslims, though most whites in South Africa are Christians.'
The Malays and their Origins
The Malays were the first group of Muslims to arrive in South Africa in the mid-seventeenth century-around 1667. They came mainly from the Indonesian Archipelago, Java, Bali, the Sunda Islands, and Madagascar. They were brought by their Dutch masters either as slaves, servants, refugees, or political exiles.' Others were convicts banished from the East Indies Islands for crimes other than political, for example, Tuan Said, who, apart from Tuan Guru, Shaikh Yusuf, and others, also kept Islam alive at the Cape. Still others came in as voluntary immigrants.'
Outstanding among the early Malay arrivals at the Cape was a political exile and influential religious leader, Shaikh Yusuf, who was the brother of the King of Goa. Born in 1626, Yusuf went to Java where he propagated Islam, after which he engaged himself in a political struggle with the Dutch European colonizers in an effort to promote local independence. He was incarcerated by the Dutch in Botavia and shipped to Ceylon. Fearing that Yusuf might reactivate his political agenda, the Dutch sent him to Cape Town where he arrived in 1694 accompanied by about 50 persons, including his two wives, several servants, friends and imams who could lead Islamic prayers in the mosques. He died in 1699 after only five years in the new community. Nevertheless, many South African Muslims consider him to be the founder of Islam in this country. He remained the spiritual guidepost for the South African Muslims and...