Mbojo

Before the arrival of Islam, the small kingdoms of the Bima region were under the influence of the Javanese empire of Majapahit, one of the archipelago's great Hindu-Buddhist empires. Over time, Bima built close cultural and political ties with the kingdom of Gowa, in Sulawesi, and it was through this connection that the Muslim faith arrived in force in the region.

In the 17th century, under the influence of the Sultanate of Gowa, the Sultanate of Bima was formed, which established Islam as the people's religion and gave Mbojo identity the shape it still carries today: a lowland agricultural culture, strongly marked by the Islamic faith, but one that preserved beneath it much older beliefs and practices.

The life of the Mbojo people revolves around land and water. They grow rice in flooded fields using panggawa, their own irrigation system passed down from generation to generation, and are known as skilled horse breeders, animals that carry prestige and usefulness in the lowlands of Sumbawa. Women weave mats from bamboo and palm leaf and produce tembenggoli, a traditional fabric that carries the name and identity of the people.

Villages, called kampo, are led by a neuhi, a leader whose position usually passes from father to son, supported by respected elders who help settle disputes and safeguard customs. This structure of hereditary leadership gives stability to community life and keeps alive the memory of what it means to be Mbojo, even amid the changes brought by trade and urban life in Bima and Dompu.

The vast majority of the Mbojo profess Sunni Islam, and the Islamic faith is interwoven with the very definition of what it means to be Mbojo, shaping marriage, the raising of children, and community life. At the same time, especially in mountain communities, older practices remain alive beneath the surface of Islamic practice.

Many still revere spiritual figures such as Batara Gangga and Batara Guru, tied to traditions that predate Islam, and acknowledge the presence of spirits called bake and jin in daily life. This older layer of belief coexists, without much perceived conflict, alongside the Muslim identity that most publicly claim.

The New Testament in the Bima language was completed in the early 2000s, but the complete Bible does not yet exist in the people’s language. This means much of Scripture, the Psalms, the prophets, the very history of Israel that prepares the way for the coming of Christ, remains out of reach for those who only read or hear in Bima. For a people with a strong oral tradition, tied to poetry and spoken narrative, the absence of a complete Bible and of audio material in their heart language is a keenly felt gap.

Among the Mbojo, being Muslim is inseparable from being Mbojo: the faith shapes family identity, marriage, and the very name of the people. Following Jesus is seen as abandoning not only a religion but the community and the honor of the family, which exposes the convert to intense social pressure. Added to this is the isolation of mountain villages and smaller islands, where few outsiders come and direct contact with Christians is lacking.

Many Mbojo families, especially in mountain areas and on smaller islands, face geographic isolation, limited access to medical care, and difficulty improving the farming and fishing they depend on. These material needs go hand in hand with a spiritual need: the lack of an established Christian community and of discipleship for those who begin to seek Jesus.

There is also the need for the Scriptures to reach the Bima language in complete and understandable form, and for the few believers of Mbojo background to find support to live out and share their faith without becoming isolated from their own family and culture.

In the 1930s, hundreds of Mbojo from the mountain areas around Dompu heard the gospel and received it, a rare milestone in the history of this people. To this day there are mountain villages where the majority of the population identifies as Christian, a concrete sign that the gospel can take root among the Mbojo without erasing their identity.