The Indonesian archipelago is a beautiful collection of more than 17,000 islands stretching over 5,000 kilometers from east to west. The islands were uninhabited when the first Muslims arrived in the 1300s. How did Muslim traders and missionaries reach these islands and begin to spread Islam?
The earliest known Muslim traveler to reach the Indonesian archipelago was an Arab named Sunan Kalijaga. He is said to have arrived in the early 1300s, before the heyday of the spice trade. At …