Biography
Azis is a PhD researcher at the University of St Andrews, UK, exploring Islamic intellectual history, religious authority, and the role of mosques in contemporary Indonesia. He holds a Master’s in Interdisciplinary Islamic Studies and a Bachelor’s in History of Islamic Civilization from UIN Sunan Kalijaga, Yogyakarta. He has taught undergraduate courses in Islamic thought and history, published journal articles on Islamic history and society, authored two books, and translated academic works. His research interests include Islam and new media, religious authority, and the interplay between faith, culture, and society.
Paper Abstract
This paper explores how religious conversion reshapes ecological consciousness among the Baduy people of West Java, Indonesia. The Baduy—an indigenous Sundanese community—have long maintained a sacred relationship with their environment, rooted in ancestral cosmology that regards the forest as both spiritual home and moral teacher. Through strict customary laws (pikukuh karuhun), the inner Baduy (Baduy Dalam) sustain an ethic of restraint, protecting forests, rivers, and soil as integral to communal purity. However, conversion to Islam among some Baduy indigenous people in recent decades raises questions regarding ecological values among new Muslim converts. Based on a week of field research in the Baduy community, including interviews with converts and local authorities, this study shows that Islamization—while offering new spiritual meanings—has inadvertently distanced many converts from traditional environmental ethics. Although both Islam and Baduy customary law offer unique perspectives on ecology, population growth, economic necessity, and desires to engage with modern lifestyles have altered the community’s sense of ecological belonging, particularly among converts. By juxtaposing indigenous and Islamic worldviews, this paper argues that returning to “the roots” does not merely mean reclaiming ancestral customs, but reimagining how faith traditions can come together to nurture a renewed ecological ethos. The Baduy case thus provides a critical lens for rethinking religion’s role in sustaining—or eroding—the moral ecology of indigenous life in the modern era.