Penilaian Muqaddimah fi Intizam al-Waza‘if al-Mulk sebagai Sumber Pembentukan Perlembagaan Johor 1895

Evaluation of Muqaddimah fi Intizam al-Waza‘if al-Mulk as the Source of the Formation of the Constitution of Johor 1895

Abstract

Muqaddimah fi Intizam al-Waza‘if al-Mulk, karya Raja Ali Haji dari tradisi keilmuan Riau abad ke-19, sering dirujuk sebagai teks nasihat politik berteraskan Islam dan dikaitkan dengan wacana ketatanegaraan Melayu. Dalam historiografi pembentukan Undang-Undang Tubuh Kerajaan Johor 1312H (1895) (UTKJ), sebahagian sarjana mengemukakan dakwaan bahawa Muqaddimah tersebut—bersama karya Raja Ali Haji yang lain—telah mempengaruhi penggubalan perlembagaan Johor 1895. Namun, dakwaan ini lazimnya bersandar pada naratif hubungan Johor–Riau serta kesamaan nilai umum, tanpa pembuktian tekstual yang terperinci dan setara dari segi genre serta fungsi teks. Sehubungan itu, kajian ini bertujuan menilai secara kritis kewajaran Muqaddimah fi Intizam al-Waza‘if al-Mulk sebagai sumber pembentukan UTKJ melalui perbandingan tekstual yang sistematik, khususnya dari segi persamaan dan perbezaan antara kedua-dua teks. Kajian ini menggunakan reka bentuk kualitatif berasaskan analisis kandungan dan pendekatan sejarah dengan kaedah komparatif tekstual. Data primer diperoleh daripada teks UTKJ simpanan Arkib Negara Malaysia serta Muqaddimah fi Intizam al-Waza‘if al-Mulk cetakan Ofis Cop Government Lingga, 1304H. Analisis komparatif dilaksanakan melalui lima dimensi: tujuan penulisan, bentuk, gaya bahasa, kandungan utama, dan fungsi. Dapatan kajian menunjukkan bahawa kedua-dua teks beroperasi dalam kerangka yang berbeza: Muqaddimah bersifat risalah nasihat moral-politik (adab al-mulūk) yang peribadi, manakala UTKJ ialah dokumen perlembagaan formal yang terinstitusi dan mengikat. Walaupun terdapat kesamaan konsep normatif seperti keadilan dan tanggungjawab, kesamaan tersebut bersifat umum dalam tradisi Islam-Melayu dan tidak memadai untuk membuktikan pengaruh langsung Muqaddimah terhadap UTKJ. Kesimpulannya, kajian ini mendapati dakwaan bahawa Muqaddimah fi Intizam al-Waza‘if al-Mulk menjadi sumber pembentukan UTKJ tidak dapat disokong melalui perbandingan tekstual antara kedua-dua teks. Kajian lanjut dicadangkan untuk menilai karya Raja Ali Haji yang lain—terutama al-Thamarat al-Muhimmah—serta menelusuri bukti arkib berkaitan jaringan intelektual, peminjaman naskhah, dan saluran pemindahan idea antara Johor dan Riau bagi memperincikan mekanisme pengaruh yang lebih tepat.

Muqaddimah fi Intizam al-Waza‘if al-Mulk, authored by Raja Ali Haji within the nineteenth-century Riau Islamic scholarly tradition, is frequently invoked as a seminal political-ethical treatise that informs Malay-Islamic conceptions of governance. Within the historiography of the Johor State Constitution 1312H (1895) (Undang-Undang Tubuh Kerajaan Johor, UTKJ), a recurrent scholarly claim posits that this Muqaddimah—alongside Raja Ali Haji’s other legal and political writings—exerted a formative influence on Johor’s constitutional drafting. Yet such assertions have often been advanced on the basis of Johor–Riau historical proximity and broad normative convergences, rather than on sustained, genre-sensitive textual substantiation. Accordingly, this study critically evaluates the plausibility of Muqaddimah fi Intizam al-Waza‘if al-Mulk as a direct source for the formation of the UTKJ by undertaking a systematic textual comparison of the two works. Employing a qualitative design grounded in content analysis and historical inquiry, the study draws on primary documents: the UTKJ text held by the National Archives of Malaysia and Muqaddimah fi Intizam al-Waza‘if al-Mulk published by the Ofis Cop Government Lingga in 1304H. The comparative analysis proceeds across five analytical dimensions—authorial purpose, textual form, linguistic register, substantive content, and institutional function. The findings demonstrate a decisive divergence in textual orientation and operative intent: the Muqaddimah functions as a personalised moral-political counsel (adab al-mulūk) addressed to a specific ruler, whereas the UTKJ constitutes a formal, institutionalised, and legally binding constitutional instrument. Although both texts share certain normative concepts—such as justice and moral accountability—these parallels are best understood as general expressions of the wider Malay-Islamic ethical universe rather than evidence of direct textual dependency. The study concludes that the claim of Muqaddimah fi Intizam al-Waza‘if al-Mulk serving as a source for the UTKJ cannot be sustained on the basis of textual comparison. Future research is recommended to extend the comparative framework to Raja Ali Haji’s al-Thamarat al-Muhimmah and to pursue archival corroboration concerning manuscript circulation, intellectual networks, and specific channels of idea transmission between Johor and Riau.