M. C. Ricklefs

"Islam has struck deeper roots on the coast, and has tended to be at its most self- conscious among trading communities. There has often been tension, and sometimes devastating warfare, between the coast and the interior. Although it is attractive to think of Islam as a causative factor in this conflict, it would probably be more correct to think of it as deriving from primary economic and political differences, with a rather more self- conscious Islam providing from time to time a convenient rallying banner for the coastal states."

"It has sometimes been assumed, with extraordinary unconcern for the historical evidence, that the more self-conscious Muslims of the coast were the greatest enemies of the Dutch Protestants, while the less firm Muslims ruling the interior kingdom of Mataram more readily became the tools of the Europeans. But this is simply not so."

"In the course of the centuries, Islam spread throughout the Javanese population, until its adoption by the last large district, the “east hook,” was accomplished in the late eighteenth century. This process seems on the whole to have been peaceful, or as peaceful as it could have been in a period of Javanese history characterized by almost incessant warfare. Conversion by arms may have occurred when a Muslim dignitary defeated a non­ Muslim, whereupon the vanquished and his people would presumably have embraced Islam."