The tombs of Muhammad Yamin and his father Usman, whose title was Bagindo Khatip, are seen in Talawi district, Sawahlunto, West Sumatra, on Friday (24/2). The tombs are well maintained and have become a tourist and pilgrimage destination for people from various regions. The local administration has paid attention to the tomb complex and has carried out renovations.24-02-2017
Learning from Majapahit and Sriwijaya, Muhammad Yamin, a native of Talawi, a small district in the mining town of Sawahlunto, West Sumatra, strived to realize his dream for a great and independent nation called Indonesia. Yamin had a huge role in reviving the self-image and fighting spirit among Indonesians, after hundreds of years of being trampled on by colonialism.
Two roadside graves near a market in Talawi, some 17 kilometers from downtown Sawahlunto, are markers in the local area. The massive graveyard with a library, beside the Talawi district office, is also a major tourism site. Every day, many travelers visit the location.
The bodies in the two graves belonged to Muhammad Yamin and his father, Usman Gelar Bagindo Khatib. The graves are protected from the sun by a Minangkabau-style wooden spire roof and surrounded by a neat metal fence. Yamin’s grave is well managed and the West Sumatra administration pays extra attention to it as is evident by the existing renovation plans. Born on August 23, 1903, Yamin got the best education locals could afford back in the day. Coffee plantations contributed to the region’s economic progress. Yamin’s father was a coffee storehouse keeper, which was one of the most lucrative jobs during the colonial era.
In her book Asal-Usul Elite Minangkabau Modern (The Origins of Modern Minangkabau Elites), Elizabeth E. Graves categorized coffee storehouse keepers in the educated class with good reading, writing and math skills. Other groups of people in this class included prosecutors and the pangrehpraja (local rulers).
Yamin was lucky as he grew up in an environment that supported education. After moving between elementary schools (HIS) in Talawi, Sawahlunto, Solok and Padang Panjang, Yamin pursued further education at the Algemene Middelbare School (AMS) in Surakarta. Afterwards, Yamin went to Jakarta and enrolled at the Recths Hooge School (college of law).
In 1928, the 25-year-old Yamin was involved in formulating the Youth Pledge. He served as secretary during the Second Youth Congress in Jakarta that gave birth to the Youth Pledge. The statements of having one land, one nation and one unifying language were the peak of Yamin’s and others’ dream of a united Indonesia.
Yamin believed in the presence of a nation’s heart and soul, including in unifying elements, such as language. Ever since a Jong Sumatranen Bond meeting was held in 1923, debates on the usage of the Indonesian language as a unifying language became fierce. Yamin’s biographer Sutrisno Kutoyo said that Yamin headed the Jong Sumatranen Bond back then. Yamin offered his idea of an Indonesian language as a unifier sourced from the Malay language. “Yamin had already seen the emergence of the Indonesian language sourced from the Malay language,” he said.
Yamin’s departure point in formulating his nationhood concept was evident from the rationale in his speech at the Second Youth Congress in 1928. Yamin used Ernest Renan’s theory of nationhood.
Yamin said that a nation is essentially a spiritual foundation comprising two elements. The first is memories of the past. The second is that the language will contain an expectation for coexistence and an appreciation for the legacies of previous generations.
New nationhood
Yamin’s two main ideas during his Second Youth Congress speech also served as the basis for his interest in Indonesian history and its grandeur and legacies from the past as well as for developing new ideas based on his reflections from the nation’s past. Yamin created new images of nationhood that were deemed unique during the independence movement era.
Syafii Maarif said that Yamin was the first person to propose using Bhinneka Tunggal Ika (“Unity in Diversity”) as Indonesia’s national motto. On the sidelines of Indonesian Independence Preparation Investigative Assembly (BPUPKI) sessions in May and June of 1945, Yamin first mentioned the motto. His colleague from Buleleng, Bali, I Gusti Bagus Sugriwa, responded with “tan hana dharma mangrwa” (“there is no duality in truth”).
The incident was a fond memory for Yamin, as it proved his belief that even if the Book of Sutasoma was written by a Buddhist, its values thrived among the Hindu people in Bali. A few years later, when designing the national emblem of Garuda Pancasila, the motto Bhinneka Tunggal Ika was included.
Yamin also studied Majapahit legacies. He wrote a book on the Majapahit state administration titled Tata Negara Majapahit Sapta Parwa. The book wrote about the structure of Majapahit government and its prevailing laws. Yamin talked about the history of Majapahit and its meaning and proposed the foundations of archipelagic unity based on Gajah Mada’s work in the Majapahit era.
“It can be said that Yamin revived the images of the archipelago’s greatness. He talked about Gajah Mada. If you look at the popular image of Gajah Mada, it looks a bit like Yamin. A colleague of his once protested Yamin’s image of Gajah Mada. However, due to the lack of alternatives, that image became popular and was the basis for how the people pictured the real Gajah Mada,” said Padang State University historian Mestika Zed in late February.
Transcending his time
Yamin’s diligence in studying Majapahit and Javanese history was a feature of his independent thinking and notion of a nation. Independence was taken away from Indonesians by the Dutch and reclaimed in 1945.
Yamin was also known as a law expert. Andalasa University state administration law professor Saldi Isra said that Yamin was the first person to submit a judicial review against the Constitution.
Yamin proposed the ideas of a Supreme Hall and a High Court. “The court will be of the highest level and it can review regulations. The Supreme Hall will determine the congruity of adat law, religious law and the 1945 Constitution,” Saldi said.
The mechanism of reviewing regulations was then adopted in the 1970 Judicial Power Law that established the Supreme Court. Decades later, the Constitutional Court was established to review regulations’ congruity with the 1945 Constitution. Saldi said that Yamin’s idea for judicial review of prevailing regulations over higher regulations was legal thinking that transcended his time.
