Education and the Creation of Christian Emigre Communities

CHAPTER II EDUCATION AND THE CREATION OF CHRISTIAN EMIGRE COMMUNITIES Education on a Western basis in the Ambonese islands began and remained associated with Christianity until the 20th century. The first schools in Christian negeri were established by the Portuguese. The number of schools operating when the Dutch assumed control is unclear, but the figures of 31 schools on Ambon and a further 26 in the Lease Islands have been men tioned.l It would appear from a story related by Rumphius of an exchange between the Ambonese raja and one of the VOC's servants, Cornelis Matelief, that the Ambonese had appreciated the education provided by the Portuguese and wished the Dutch to continue the practice. Matelief had asked the raja whether they had any complaints. The raja replied that they were pleased; the Dutch government was better than the Portuguese. However, they complained that they were not being educated. They had understood from the Dutch that the Portuguese religion was not good and accordingly they should be educated in better ways (cited in Van Wijk, MvO 1937:145-6). The VOC had assumed the Portuguese position for nearly two decades before they took much interest in the Ambonese Christian community. However, gradually an awareness developed that Christianity was a means of promoting the loyalty of the people to the new Christian rulers (Knaap 1987:85). The first clergyman to minister to the Ambonese arrived in 1614. In 1607, then more successfully in 1618, a school was established to educate Ambonese schoolmeesters (religious teachers; Malay: guru injil). By 1628 eighteen schools with more than 800 pupils had been created in negeri. At the end of the century there were 54 schools with 4,700 pupils. Knaap esti mates that 30 to 40% of Christian children were enrolled in schools (Knaap 1987:94-5). The schoolmeesters were the religious authorities in the negeri with responsibility for religious instruction, as well as being leaders of the congre- Kroeskamp 1974:9. The Portuguese 'schools' provided at best a haphazard teaching of the three R's and then mainly for the children of raja and kepala soa families. The fortress settlement was relatively well provided for with a 'seminary', a lazaret and an almshouse (Paramita Abdurachman, personal communication, 9-5-1985). 26 Nationalists, soldiers and separatists gation. They and their schools became the foundation of Ambonese Protes tantism. They usually taught in negeri other than the one in which they were born. As an outsider in the negeri and as a representative of the religious arm of the VOC, the schoolmeester frequently"came into conflict with the raja, the representative of the secular VOC. In the 17th century schoolmeesters were transferred from negeri to negeri regularly, assuming responsibility for larger schools as they became more experienced. Selection of the students for training was not only based on ability but also on family background. Knaap notes that in the second half of the 17th century many of the schoolmeesters appeared to be from raja families (Knaap 1987:86, 91-3). Instruction was rudimentary, with the main emphasis on religious teach ing. Reading, writing and singing were also taught, but what was read, writ ten and sung was of a religious character. Knaap estimates that the majority of pupils reached the highest level of instruction, that of the catechism, and could write and read reasonably. Literacy skills learnt at school may not have been retained long in a rural subsistence society such as 17th century Ambon, however. Another factor influencing the effectiveness of education was the language of instruction and teaching material. Much of the latter was in Dutch, then from the 1630's, in classical Malay. At the end of the cen tury the VOC decided that classical Malay was to be the language of instruc tion in schools. The indigenous language of the Christian community was a number of related bahasa tanah and not Malay. The degree of understanding of the curriculum must have been at least initially very limited - a matter of recitation rather than understanding. However, the schools were an import ant channel for the supplanting of bahasa tanah by Malay as the mother tongue for the Christian Ambonese (Knaap 1987:94-7). During the period between the collapse of the VOC and the return of the Dutch, the Ambonese church and its schools were almost totally neglected. Mter the Ambonese islands were returned by the British to the Dutch, the work of the church was continued by the Nederlandsch Zendelinggenoot schap (Dutch Missionary Society) in the person of Joseph Kam, with much the same organization and procedural pattern as had been established by the VOC. In education this involved training the Ambonese personnel, while the government appointed and paid them. In 1819 Kam established an 'Institute for training assistants' in his own house. He had from 10 to 16 students in a course lasting five years. The training differed little from that of his VOC predecessors, preparing the Ambonese schoolmeesters for their dual role of school teacher and leader of the congregation. The training of the teachers, and what they in turn taught in their negeri schools, consisted mainly of reading the Bible, copying Bible texts and singing psalms, with the objective of cultivating the virtues and knowledge of the Christian faith. Only secondly was a more general knowledge and 'civilization' promoted. It .

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