Encyclopedia of Islam

Further reading: Afshin Matin-Asgari, Iranian Student 

Opposition to the Shah (Costa Mesa, Calif.: Mazda Pub-

lishers, 2001); George Makdisi, The Rise of the Colleges

(Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1981); Selcuk 

Aksin Somel, The Modernization of Public Education in 

the Ottoman Empire 1839–1908: Islamization, Autocracy 

and Discipline (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 2001); Bill William-

son,  Education and Social Change in Egypt and Turkey

(London: Macmillan Press, 1986).

subha

  See 

prayer

 

beads

.

K  634  

Spain

---

Subud

 

(abbreviation for the Sanskrit 

phrase 

Susila Buddhi Dharma)

Subud is one of the more successful new Islamic-

inspired spiritual movements to emerge in i

ndo

-

nesia

 in the 20th century. It was founded by 

Muhammad Subuh Sumohadiwidjojo (1901–87), 

who began to receive messages from a spiritual 

source as a teenager. This culminated in 1925 

when he received a 

revelation

 concerning the 

latihan kejiwaan, the basic spiritual practice of 

Subud. During this initial period, he studied with 

various teachers, including some Sufi leaders. He 

worked with the latihan for the next few years and 

also went through a period of spiritual/mystical 

growth. It would be eight years later, however, 

before others began to practice the latihan. Thus 

1933 is generally accepted as the beginning date 

of the movement, which slowly spread through 

the country. Initially Bapak (as his followers came 

to call him) named the small group that was gath-

ering around him Ilma Kasunyatan.

The group’s spiritual practice, latihan, involves a 

gathering of members for about half an hour twice a 

week. Sitting with others of their own sex (men and 

Women

 practice separately), they wait for a sponta-

neous impulse to act. Some begin to move, others 

will utter sounds. These movements and utterances 

vary widely. Members go through the latihan as a 

catharsis-like experience, often accompanied with 

the reception of some personal guidance. Depend-

ing on their life situation at any given moment, the 

immediate impact may be positive or negative.

After more than a decade, Bapak introduced 

the term Subud to the movement, occasioned by 

the development of a more stable organization 

in 1947. The new name is derived from three 

Sanskrit words (Susila Buddhi Dharma) that carry 

the essence of the movement—following the will 

of God, or the power of the life force that works 

both within us and without. To outsiders, Subud 

appears to be a completely new religion; mem-

bers, however, do not see it as such, and Bapak 

noted that Subud lacks a holy book, formal teach-

ing, and sacred formula. Rather, it is a process of 

surrendering to God and receiving inspiration. 

Subud was limited to Indonesia until the 1950s, 

when some followers of Western spiritual teacher 

George Gurdjieff (d. 1949) identified Bapak as the 

person their teacher had described as the coming 

prophet of consciousness. They invited Bapak to 

England in 1956 and a number of Gurdjieff’s stu-

dents identified with him. In 1957, as she began 

to participate in the movement, actress Eva Bartok 

(d. 1998) experienced a much publicized physi-

cal healing. The Institute for the Comparative 

Study of History, Philosophy and the Sciences at 

Coombes Springs, England, founded by John G. 

Bennett (d. 1974), became the point from which 

Subud initially spread in the West.

Subud did not allow proselytizing or adver-

tising to assist the spread of the movement and 

Bapak also counseled against charging member-

ship fees. However, as the movement spread, a 

periodical,  Subud News, was launched in 1959, 

and a publishing house, Dharma Book Company, 

founded. Today, the movement is headed by the 

International Subud Committee, headquartered in 

the Indonesian island of Bali, with Western head-

quarters in the United States. Its charitable arm, 

Susila Dharma International, has NGO (nongov-

ernmental organization) status with the United 

Nations. Subud groups are now found in some 70 

countries on every continent.

See also h

indUism

 

and

 i

slam

; s

UFism

.

J. Gordon Melton

Further reading: Eva Bartok, Worth Living For (New 

York: University Books, 1959); John G. Bennett, Con-

cerning Subud (New York: University Books, 1959); 

Antoon Geels, Subud and the Javanese Mystical Tradi-

tion (Richmond, England: Curzon, 1997); Robert Lyle, 

Subud (Kent, England: Humanus, 1983); Matthew Barry 

Sullivan, Living Religion in Subud (London: Subud Pub-

lications International, 1990).