Sunan Gunungjati
Sunan Gunungjati (1448-1580) was a Javanese wali who founded the city of Cirebon and the Banten Sultanate. Born as Syarif Hidayatullah in AD 1448, he was the son of Nyai Rara Santang, who was the daughter of Prabu Siliwangi (the ruler of Sunda kingdom). His father was Syarif Abdullah Maulana Huda, a leader in Egypt of Hashimite descendant from Palestine.
Sunan Gunungjati worked at Demak and Banten, and was the founder of Banten Sultanate. Many stories say that he was originally from Pasai in Aceh, others say that he was from Pajajaran (the capital of Sunda Kingdom) in West Java. He married the sister of Sultan Trenggono of Demak, and led military expeditions for Demak against Banten, a port of Sunda Kingdom (which was still Hindu at that time). As "Fatahillah" he defeated the Portuguese when they tried to take Sunda Kelapa (now Jakarta) in 1527.
Some stories have Sunan Gunungjati active around the 1470s and 1480s, under the name "Hidayatullah". Other stories have him active around the 1520s, and associate him with the name "Fatahillah". In the 1480s he would have been the grandson of the king of Sunda Kingdom from Pajajaran. In the late 1520s he would have fought the Portuguese near what is today Jakarta. The problem is that some stories say that he died in 1568, by which time he would have been as old as 120 years! Some scholars think that there may have been more than one Gunungjati.
Education
Syarif Hidayatullah studied Islam through venerated scholars in Egypt during his fourteen years of living and travelled to many countries including Indonesia. Egypt is not his only place of learning, as naturally he must have done his pilgrimage to Mecca and Medina and at the same time, met and studied under the various scholars which must have included Sufis.Leadership
During the dawn of the Kingdom of Bintoro in Demak, he, under the patronage of the ulama established the kingdom of Cirebon known as Kingdom of Pakungwati. He was the only Sunan to have become a king. Gunungjati fully utilizes his kingship to propagate Islam along the coastal area of Cirebon to the most remote area of Pasundan or Priangan.
Da'wah
In his da'wah he upheld the strict methodology propagated by the sheikhs in the middle east but still remained close to the local people by developing basic infrastructures for them and built road connecting the isolated provinces.He and his prince Maulana Hasanuddin went into several expeditions particularly in Banten. The leader there then voluntarily submit the leadership to him but eventually was appointed as the new leader of the province which later became the kingdom of Banten.
During his 89 year old age he started to focus on dawah and began appointing a new successor. Pangeran Pasarean later became the new king.
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