Bahasa Malaysia in History

I have often wondered: What did a student learn from his Malay text book one hundred years ago? Shall we review Bustanul-Katibin written by the Malay scholar, Raja Haji Ali?

It was as time before the existence of Bahasa Malaysia in history.English scholar William Marsden published his Malay dictionary in 1812 which came along with a great portion discussing Malay grammar. So Raja Haji Ali's Bustanul-Katibin of 1857, is strictly speaking not the first Malay grammar book. Rather, it is the first Malay grammar book written by a Malay scholar.

The full name of this book is Bustanul-Katibina Lis Subyanil Mutaalamin or, Kitab Perkebunan Jurutulis Bagi Kanak-kanak yang Hendak Menuntut Belajar Akan Dia. Here's another translation: Kitab yang Ringkas bagi Orang yang Hendak Mengenal segala Huruf Melayu dan Suratannya.

Out of a total of 31 chapters, the first 10 chapters are devoted to the Jawi spelling system. The author discusses Arabic letters that can, cannot or have been given new values in the Malay language. Then he explained the phonic system. Wow...there is one whole chapter devoted to only one letter, alif.

Next section is the classification of words in 4 chapters. Bear in mind that Raja Ali, well educated in the Arabic language, was using the Arabic grammar system to explain the Malay language. Here it goes briefly: words are classified into nouns, verbs and particles.

There are two types of nouns: nama am and nama khas , roughly translated common nouns and special nouns. Nama khas is subdivided into :

• proper nouns
• personal pronouns
• Malay catchwords such as ini, itu, di sini, di situ etc.
• yang
• possessive nouns

From what I can gather, there are many ways of classifying the verbs:

• transitives and intransitives
• tenses-past actions, future actions and imperatives
• verbs to indicate incomplete actions, verbs to denote almost, verbs to indicate condition of the heart etc.

The remaining 17 chapters dealt with analysis of sentences...I bet by now your would prefer me to discuss why Bahasa Malaysia history makes such a big fuss of this heavily pro-Arabic Malay language text book. A contemporary of Raja Haji Ali, the English-educated non-Malay Abdullah Munshi frowned upon Malay grammar books written by foreigners, implying the Dutch and English. He reasoned that these foreigners had actually modified the grammar of their own languages and tried to adapt them for the Malay language. However, Abdullah Munshi died before producing a grammar book and three years after his death, Raja Haji Ali published Bustanul-Katibin.

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