Islam in Thailand

Popular opinion seems to hold that a vast majority of the country's Muslims are found in Thailand's four southernmost provinces of Satun, Yala, Pattani and Narathiwat, where they make up majority of the population.{{cite web|title=Muslim in Thailand|url=http://www.thaiembassy.org/riyadh/en/organize|access-date=2 November 2012}} However, the Thai Ministry of Foreign Affairs' research indicates that only 18 percent of Thai Muslims live in those four provinces. There are also significant minority of Muslims in other southern provinces such as Songkhla, Krabi, Trang, Phatthalung and Phuket. In Bangkok, large Muslim populations are found in districts such as Nong Chok, Min Buri and Bang Rak.

According to the National Statistics Office, in 2015 census, Muslims in Southern Thailand made up 24 percent of the total population,{{cite web|url=http://web.nso.go.th/en/survey/popchan/data/2015-2016-Statistical%20tables%20PDF.pdf|title=Population by religion, region and area, 2015|publisher=NSO|access-date=10 January 2018|archive-date=10 December 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171210020110/http://web.nso.go.th/en/survey/popchan/data/2015-2016-Statistical%20tables%20PDF.pdf|url-status=dead}} while less than three percent in other parts of the country.{{cite web|url=http://service.nso.go.th/nso/nsopublish/service/survey/cult48.pdf |title=สรุปผลการสํารวจการเข??ารวมก ?? จกรรมทางว ิ ัฒนธรรม พ.ศ. 2548 |publisher=Service.nso.go.th |access-date=2 December 2013}}

{{expand section|date=July 2022}}

Muslim merchant communities resided in Thailand as early as the 9th century.Aphornsuvan, Thanet (2003). [https://ecommons.cornell.edu/bitstream/handle/1813/69880/MuslimThailand.pdf?sequence=2&isAllowed=y History and Politics of the Muslims in Thailand]. Thammasat University. p. 7Scupin, Raymond (1980). [https://www.islamawareness.net/Asia/Thailand/thailand_article0002.pdf Islam in Thailand Before the Bangkok Period].

In early modern Thailand, Muslims from the Coromandel Coast served as eunuchs in the Thai palace and court.Peletz (2009), p. 73 {{Google books|BFXpi5ZKKF8C|Gender Pluralism: Southeast Asia Since Early Modern Times|page=73}}Peletz (2009), p. 73 {{Google books|-YnQJXxspJUC|Gender Pluralism: Southeast Asia Since Early Modern Times|page=73}} Thailand, as Siam, was known for religious tolerance, and there were Muslims working for the Siamese Royal Governments throughout the eras. This culture of tolerance in Siam and later Thailand resulted in the great diversity of Islam in Thailand.{{citation needed|date= September 2022}}

Malay separatism in South Thailand is mostly a war based on ethnicity, as Malays in the region have sought to separate from Thailand, although irredentist Muslim groups are involved in the conflict.{{Cite web|title=The Muslim Insurgency in Southern Thailand|url=https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/muslim-insurgency-southern-thailand|access-date=2021-01-25|website=Council on Foreign Relations|language=en}}

File:Baan Haw Mosque 4-6-09.jpg of the Chin Haw.]]

Thailand's Muslim population is diverse, with ethnic groups having migrated from as far as China, Pakistan, Cambodia, Bangladesh, Malaysia, and Indonesia, as well as including ethnic Thais, while about two-thirds of Muslims in Thailand are Thai Malays.{{cite web|url=http://lcweb2.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/r?frd/cstdy:@field(DOCID+th0052) |title=Thailand |publisher=Lcweb2.loc.gov |access-date=2 December 2013}}

Many Thai Muslims are ethnically and linguistically Thai, who are either hereditary Muslims, Muslims by intermarriage, or recent converts to the faith. Ethnic Thai Muslims live mainly in the central and southern provinces - varying from entire Muslim communities to mixed settlements.{{cite book| last = Gilquin| first = Michel| title = The Muslims of Thailand| publisher = IRASEC (Silkworm Books)| year = 2002| isbn = 974-9575-85-7}}

Former Commander-in-Chief of the Royal Thai Army General Sonthi Boonyaratglin is an example of an indigenous Thai Muslim. Sonthi is of remote Persian ancestry. His ancestor, Sheikh Ahmad of Qom,{{cite web|url=http://tnews.teenee.com/politic/15433.html |title=ŕ¸Šŕ¸ľŕ¸§ŕ¸´ŕ¸•ŕš ŕ¸Ľŕ¸°ŕ¸œŕ¸Ľŕ¸‡ŕ¸˛ŕ¸™ŕ¸šŕ¸´ŕšŠŕ¸ ŕ¸šŕ¸ąŕ¸‡ : ŕ¸'ŕšˆŕ¸˛ŕ¸§ŕ¸ ŕ¸˛ŕ¸Łŕš€ŕ¸Ąŕ¸ˇŕ¸ŕ¸‡ |publisher=Tnews.teenee.com |access-date=2 December 2013}}{{cite web |url=http://siammedia.org/news/thailand/20070913_01.php |title=Siam Media News - ÊÂÒÁÁÕà´Õ ¹ÔÇÊì |publisher=Siammedia.org |access-date=2 December 2013 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131203011621/http://siammedia.org/news/thailand/20070913_01.php |archive-date=3 December 2013 |df=dmy-all }} was an Iranian expatriate trader who lived in the Ayutthaya Kingdom for 26 years. Many Thais, including those of the Bunnag{{cite journal |last=Woodhouse |first= Leslie |date=Spring 2012 |title= Concubines with Cameras: Royal Siamese Consorts Picturing Femininity and Ethnic Difference in Early 20th Century Siam |url=http://quod.lib.umich.edu/t/tap/7977573.0002.202/--concubines-with-cameras-royal-siamese-consorts-picturing?rgn=main;view=fulltext |journal=Women's Camera Work: Asia |volume= 2|issue=2 |access-date=8 July 2015}} and Ahmadchula families trace their ancestry back to him. Sri Sulalai was a princess of the royal family of the Sultanate of Singora. Rama II of Siam took her as a concubine.

In 1946 Prince Bhumibol Adulyadej and Ananda Mahidol, Rama VIII, toured the Tonson Mosque.{{cite book|author=Pamela Hamburger|title=Klongs-Thai Waterways & Reflections of Her People|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0qjZIvLtlFEC&pg=PA119|publisher=Booksmango|isbn=978-616-245-033-4|pages=119–|date=9 March 2017}}

{{further|Thai Malays}}

File:นายกรัฐมนตรี มอบบ้านตามโครงการแก้ไขปัญหาความเดือดร้อนท - Flickr - Abhisit Vejjajiva (10).jpg]]

In the three southernmost border provinces, the vast majority of the local Muslim population is predominantly Malay, amounting to about 80 percent of the region's population. Thai Malays speak Kelantan-Pattani Malay, which is different from the Malay language.{{cite web|url=http://www.bangkokpost.com/220708_News/22Jul2008_news006.php|archive-url=http://arquivo.pt/wayback/20091005204302/http://www.bangkokpost.com/220708_News/22Jul2008_news006.php|url-status=dead|archive-date=5 October 2009|title=Bangkok Post - General news - Yawi-Thai dictionary brings ray of hope|website=arquivo.pt|access-date=12 April 2018}}

The high number of Malay origin inhabitants in the southern region is due to the historical nature of the area, which contains parts of the Patani Kingdom, an Islamic Malay kingdom established in the 19th century, but later annexed to Siam since the early Ayutthaya Kingdom.[http://www.ihrc.org.uk/show.php?id=1292] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150429015231/http://www.ihrc.org.uk/show.php?id=1292|date=29 April 2015}} Similarly, there is an ethnic Thai minority in northern Malaysia.{{citation needed|date= September 2022}}

Image:Pai Mosque.jpg walking inside a mosque in Pai District, Northern Thailand]]

File:Khao soi nuea Fueng Fah.jpg at a Chin Haw restaurant in Chiang Mai]]

In the far north, as well as in select central and southern urban areas, there are pockets of Thai Muslims of Hui (ethnic Chinese Muslim) origin.[http://khondoi.com/thai/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=73&Itemid=87] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120220130034/http://khondoi.com/thai/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=73&Itemid=87|date=20 February 2012}}{{cite book|author1=Melvin Ember|author2=Carol R. Ember|author3=Ian Skoggard|title=Encyclopedia of Diasporas: Immigrant and Refugee Cultures Around the World. Volume I: Overviews and Topics; Volume II: Diaspora Communities|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=7QEjPVyd9YMC&pg=PA121|date=30 November 2004|publisher=Springer Science & Business Media|isbn=978-0-306-48321-9|pages=121–}} Most Chinese Muslims belong to a group of people called Chin Haw in Thai, although most Chin Haw are not Muslims. Some historians believe that the name Chin Haw can be explained to be a combination of "Chin" (China) and "Ho" (Hui). The Chin Haw thus can be seen as traders and émigrés who carried with them Hui traditions from China. One of the best known Chinese mosques is Ban Ho Mosque in Chiang Mai Province.{{citation needed|date= September 2022}}

{{Main|Chams in Thailand}}

Most of the Cham people live in Bangkok, the capital of Thailand, also on the coast near the border with Cambodia, and a small part in southern Thailand near Malaysia where they have assimilated with local Thai Malays. Like most Chams in Cambodia, they follow Sunni Islam. They trace their origins to the fall of the Champa city-state in central and southern Vietnam and later fled to the Kingdom of Ayutthaya in the 15th to 16th centuries and the 19th century. Also recent migration in the 1970s following the fall of the Cambodian government to the Khmer Rouge by Pol Pot and the subsequent Cambodian genocide.

Ethnic groups including the Rohingya are found in Thailand's refugee camps, rural fishing villages, as well as in many small towns and cities close to the Myanmar border.{{Cite news|date=2014-02-13|title=Thailand sends Rohingya Muslims back to Burma|language=en-GB|work=BBC News|url=https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-26167676|access-date=2021-01-25}}

As well as being home to many Chinese Muslims, Northern Thailand is home to many Burmese and mixed Chinese-Burmese or Pakistani-Burmese peoples. The Burmese Muslim community lives along the border of Thailand with Myanmar and are known as 'Bamroon' who speak the Burmese language.{{cite web | url=https://rcsd.soc.cmu.ac.th/publications/cpri-06-burmese-muslim-social-networks-in-the-borderland-a-case-study-of-islam-bamroon-muslim-community-in-mae-sot-thailand/ | title=CPRI 06: Burmese-Muslim Social Networks in the Borderland – RCSD : The Regional Center for Social Science and Sustainable Development }}

{{See also|Pakistanis in Thailand}}

Other represented groups include Muslim Chams, originally from Vietnam since 15th century, who can be found between the mutual border and Bangkok as well as the deep south. In the 1700s and 1800s Vietnam and Cambodia-based Chams settled in Bangkok.{{cite book|last=Brown|first=Rajeswary Ampalavanar|title=Islam in Modern Thailand: Faith, Philanthropy and Politics|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=OQkiAQAAQBAJ&pg=PA19|year=2013|publisher=Routledge|isbn=978-1-134-58389-8|page=19}}

Other groups include West Asians such as Arabs and South Asians (especially Indians, Pakistanis and Bangladeshis) and Indonesian Muslims, especially Bugis, Javanese and Minangkabau.{{citation needed|date= September 2022}}

According to a 1685 account of a Persian diplomat as well as notes of the French traveller Guy Tachard, there was a substantial Persian Shi'i community in Thailand at the time, with ritual ta'zieh performances subsidised by the king.{{usurped|1=[https://web.archive.org/web/20090514084119/http://www.iranica.com/newsite/articles/unicode/sup/Safine_ye_Solaymani.html]}} There are Muslims of Persian origin that reside in the Bangkok area.{{Cite book|last=Woodward|first=Mark|url=http://oxfordhandbooks.com/view/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780195137989.001.0001/oxfordhb-9780195137989-e-47|title=Islamic Societies in Southeast Asia|date=2006-10-26|publisher=Oxford Handbooks Online|doi=10.1093/oxfordhb/9780195137989.003.0047}}

Generally believers of the Islamic faith in Thailand follow certain customs and traditions associated with traditional Islam influenced by Sufism.

For Thai Muslims, like their co-religionists in Southeast Asia's other Buddhist-majority countries, Mawlid is a symbolic reminder of the historical presence of Islam in the country. It also represents an annual opportunity to reaffirm Muslims' status as Thai citizens and their allegiance to the monarchy.{{cite web|url=http://www.nationmultimedia.com/opinion/Celebrating-the-Prophet-Muhammads-birthday-in-Thai-30255466.html|title=Celebrating the Prophet Muhammad's birthday in Thailand - The Nation|website=nationmultimedia.com|access-date=12 April 2018|archive-date=12 April 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180412211745/http://www.nationmultimedia.com/opinion/Celebrating-the-Prophet-Muhammads-birthday-in-Thai-30255466.html|url-status=dead}}

The Islamic faith in Thailand, often reflects Sufi beliefs and practices, as in other Asian countries like Bangladesh, India, Pakistan, Indonesia and Malaysia. The Ministry of Culture's Islamic Department gives awards to Muslims who have contributed to the promotion and development of Thai life in their roles as citizens, as educators and as social workers. In Bangkok, the Ngarn Mawlid Klang main festival is a vibrant showcase for the Thai Muslim community and their lifestyles.{{cite web |url=http://malaysiandigest.com/opinion/484043-celebrating-mawlid-maulidur-rasul.html |url-status=usurped |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140114015136/http://www.malaysiandigest.com/opinion/484043-celebrating-mawlid-maulidur-rasul.html |archive-date=14 January 2014 |title=Celebrating Mawlid (Maulidur Rasul)}}

{{main|List of mosques in Thailand}}

According to the National Statistics Office of Thailand in 2007, the country had 3494 mosques, with the largest number, 636, in Pattani Province.{{cite web|url=http://www.iqraforum.com/forum2/index.php?topic=30.0 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190727225031/http://www.iqraforum.com/forum2/index.php%3Ftopic%3D30.0 |url-status=dead |archive-date=27 July 2019 |access-date=10 March 2009|title=Mosques }} According to the Religious Affairs Department (RAD), 99 percent of the mosques are associated with Sunni Islam with the remaining one percent Shi'i Islam.{{citation needed|date=August 2021}}

File:Chiang Rai Mosque1.jpg.]]

{{anchor|Chularatchamontri}}Chularatchamontri (จุฬาราชมนตรี) is the title of Shaykh al-Islām (Head of Islam) in Thailand.{{Cite journal |last=Yusuf |first=Imtiyaz |date=1998 |title=Islam and Democracy in Thailand: Reforming the Office of the Chularajamontri/Shaikh al-Islam of Thailand |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/26198065 |access-date=16 November 2023 |website=JSTOR|jstor=26198065 }} The title was first used in the Ayutthaya Kingdom when King Songtham (1611–1628) appointed Sheikh Ahmad to the office. Pursuant to the current Islamic Organ Administration Act, BE 2540 (1997), the Chularatchamontri is appointed by the King upon advice of the Prime Minister. He has the authority to administer all Islamic affairs in the nation and to provide advice on Islamic affairs to governmental agencies. The Chularatchamontri vacates his office at his death, resignation, or removal by the King on the advice of the Prime Minister.{{citation needed|date= September 2022}} Islamic law is implemented in the four southern provinces with Muslim majorities, where it applies only to Muslims in cases concerning the family and inheritance.{{Cite web |title=The Application of Islamic Law in Thailand |url=https://www.ide.go.jp/English/Publish/Reports/Dp/660.html |access-date=2022-10-30 |website=Institute of Developing Economies |language=en}}

Under and headed by the Chularatchamontri is the Central Islamic Council of Thailand (คณะกรรมการกลางอิสลามแห่งประเทศไทย) (CICOT) (กอท.), consisting of at least five councillors appointed by the King. The CICOT advises the Minister of Education and the Minister of Interior on Islamic matters. Provincial Islamic Councils (คณะกรรมการอิสลามประจำจังหวัด) exist in provinces with substantial Muslim minorities. There are other links between the government and the Muslim community, including funding for Islamic educational institutions, the construction of larger mosques, and aid to Thai Muslims on pilgrimage to Mecca, with Bangkok and Hat Yai being key gateways.{{citation needed|date= September 2022}}

Thailand maintains several hundred Islamic schools at the primary and secondary levels, as well as Islamic banks such as the Islamic Bank of Thailand, shops, and other institutions. Much of packaged food in the country is also tested and certified halal if applicable.{{citation needed|date= September 2022}}

• South Thailand insurgency
• Islam by country
• List of mosques in Thailand
• Pattani Kingdom
• Hidayatuddeneyah Mosque

{{Reflist}}

• {{Country study}}

• {{Cite book |last=Putthongchai |first=Songsiri |title=What is it Like to be Muslim in Thailand? A case study of Thailand through Muslim professionals' perspectives |format=PhD thesis |publisher=University of Exeter |url=https://ore.exeter.ac.uk/repository/bitstream/handle/10871/9321/PutthongchaiS.pdf?sequence=2|year=2013}}

{{commons category|Islam in Thailand}}

• [https://www.sataban.com/thailand-schools/categories/muslim-schools-of-thailand Islamic Schools in Thailand]
• [http://www.muslimthai.com/ The First Islamic Website in Thailand]
• {{in lang|th}} [http://www.islaminthailand.org/ Islam in Thailand]
• [http://www.talesofasia.com/rs-163-phangnga.htm "The Muslim Fishermen of Phang Nga" by Antonio Graceffo]
• [http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/war/thailand2.htm Global Security - Thailand]
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20091002081019/http://www.islam.in.th/ islam.in.th]
• [http://www.masjidhidayah.com/en/ Hidayatuddeneyah Mosque]
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20110719134345/http://assumptionuniv.academia.edu/IYusuf/Papers Papers on Islam in Thailand by Imtiyaz Yusuf]

{{Asia in topic|Islam in}}

{{Religion in Thailand}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Islam In Thailand}}

Thailand