HISTORY OF JAVA
The island of Java (Jawa Indonesian, Djawa until the orthographic reform of 1972) is part of the Republic of Indonesia.
Its name comes from Sanskrit Javadvipa, “Island of millet”. It was under this name that the island is actually named in the Indian epic Ramayana (written between the third century BC. and the third century AD).
The Austronesian ancestors of the Javanese have left the coastal alluvial plains of southern China around 3000 BC until C. At that time, they were already practicing the cultivation of millet.

It was only later that the rice was introduced to Java. The anthropologist Louis Berthe attributes the development of centralized kingdoms of Java in the eighth century to the development of irrigated rice. To date, archeology has yet been able to demonstrate for the passage of millet rice in Java and Indonesia in general.
The island stretches from east to west over 1000 km, an area of 138 800 km ² with the neighboring island of Madura and other small islands. Its climate is equatorial.
The capital of Indonesia, Jakarta, is located on the north coast of Java in its western part.
Surabaya (2nd largest city of Indonesia), Bandung (3rd city, seat of the Bandung Conference in 1955) and Semarang (5th) are also on the island of Java. Semarang and Surabaya are also located on the north coast.
Three Javanese cities are still the seat of royal and princely courts: in the west Cirebon, Surakarta (also known as Solo) and Yogyakarta in Central.
Java is the most populated island of Indonesia and account for nearly 60% of the total population. With an area of 138 800 km ² including the adjacent island of Madura, Java has 127 million inhabitants, a population density of about 962 inhabitants / km ².
To describe the traditional culture of Java, we must distinguish between different dimensions.

First is cutting “ethnic”: the Sundanese of West Java, Betawi of Jakarta and the Madurese of the neighboring island state a distinct identity based on particular language. But in the west of the island Sundanese language of Banten and Cirebon where people speak a dialect of Javanese and East Java also Javanese language, claimed as a distinct culture. In addition, we must distinguish the culture of Pasisir (the north coast of Java) to that of the interior represented mainly by the former royal capitals that are Surakarta and Yogyakarta. Finally, the regions “intermediate”, as the country of Banyumas, which marks the transition between the Sunda and Java country or region of Banyuwangi, heir to the ancient Hindu principality Blambangan and long influenced Balinese have their own character.

RELIGIONS AND BELIEFS
The majority of the Javanese ethnic sense are probably Muslims, but there are no reliable statistics on this issue. Other ethnic groups of Java Betawi (Jakartanais “indigenous”), Madurese and Sundanese are traditionally Muslim majority. There are still some enclaves of Hinduism to Java in the region of Banyuwangi, where a population known Using in the Tengger mountains around the Bromo volcano, and on the western flank of the volcano Lawu east of Solo. Among the Javanese “ethnic” Buddhism is marginal. Indonesians of Chinese origin are generally Christians or Confucians.

We do not yet know very well the circumstances which led to the introduction of concepts and models of Indian cultural and religious in Java. We can only see their presence at least since 450 AD, by an inscription in Sanskrit in Pallava script found east of Jakarta. The last princes of Java Hindus have converted to Islam in 1770. On the south coast of Java, in the village of Balekambang lies at 100 meters from the beach, an island on which we built a small Hindu temple on the model of Tanah Lot in Bali.
There was a Buddhist kingdom in Central Java, who built the temple of Borobudur. It coexisted with the kingdom of Mataram Shiva who built Prambanan.
It is impossible to date the arrival of Islam in Java. In Leran at a mausoleum near Surabaya, he is a Muslim stele dated 1082. On the site of the capital of the kingdom of Majapahit, south-west of Surabaya, one finds a series of Muslim graves in which the oldest is dated 1376 and is perhaps one member of the royal family. The rise of the Silk Road maritime, controlled by Muslim merchants, who passed through the Indonesian archipelago, these Muslim merchants brought to anchor in the ports of the north coast of Java. The princes of these ports were advantageous to convert to Islam, which allowed them to enter the merchant network. Tome Pires, an apothecary Lisbon staying in Malacca from 1512 to 1515 (just after taking the city by the Portuguese), note that all the kings of Sumatra are Muslims but this is not true of people.

When it comes to religion, we must bear in mind that it is observed by the rulers and their immediate surroundings. The population, especially in the countryside is steeped in beliefs and practice of rituals prior to the arrival of Buddhism, Hinduism and Islam. In the case of Islam, we see that between the date of 1082 for the stele and the Leran of 1770 for the conversion of the last Hindu prince Blambangan, its distribution is a long process, especially as is always present in Java populations remained Hindu.
It is the Dutchman who introduced Christianity in Java, in cities where they reside. The oldest church in Java is the Jakarta Gereja Sion, built in 1695. A mestizo, Laurens Coenrad Coolen, founded in 1827 in East Java a Christian village on the fringes of the Christian community in Surabaya. In 1855, a Javanese name Tulung wulung converted to Protestantism and travel across Java to evangelize against the advice of the missionaries and authorities in the Netherlands. The most famous is that of Sadrach, a disciple of Javanese Tulung wulung taking the head of a Christian community in 1876. These Javanese spread Christianity related to land clearing in a Java still covered with forests.
Finally, there is still a synagogue in Surabaya, around which is a tiny Jewish community of Iraqi origin.