Islam and Nationalism in Indonesian Context by Faqihuddin Abdul Kodir

Nationalism in wide meaning, I think, can be defined as loving the own country by uniting its people, championing for their prosperity, and fighting against its enemies. Having a common norm shared by members of the country, at most, also can be the first content of nationalism. As it is a new concept introduced contemporarily by Western civilization, before Indonesia was formed in 1945, the only social and ideological norm in which Indonesian people of diverse ethnics and social backgrounds can share their needs is religion. In this respect, I am in agreement with Deliar Noer that “Islam was the synonymous with nationality”. (p. 7).
Noer argues that being Muslim in colonial period “meant that the person concerned belonged to the indigenous population whether Malay, Javanese, or others”. Malay meant Muslim, and converting into Islam was also called as being Malay. It was also true for Javanese people, since they called all Bumiputera (literally sons of the earth/island) wong selam or Muslims vis a vis the Dutch as wong kape, the infidels which were the imperialists. He argues also that the most ideological norm that often used widely by Indonesian people to fight the imperialist is Islam and that any movement against Dutch in Indonesia was originally that of Muslims. He concludes accordingly that “It can be said that nationalism in Indonesia started with Muslim nationalism”. (P. 7).
What does the notion mean? Does it mean that Indonesia belongs to Muslims? Indonesian nationalism should be based on religion that is Islam? Indonesian state should be operated in accordance to Islam? Practically Indonesian Muslims have disputed about the notion from the beginning they founded Indonesian state when they prepared to its independence in 1945. Indonesian nationalism, in the next searching of a common geographic, linguistic, cultural, and historical identity for all of diverse ethnics and religions of members of the archipelago, have designated the dispute among the founders and the leaders. Practically, those who were educated and influenced by Western way of thought led the country and fashioned its fundamental constitution. In the next historical moments of Indonesia, “Ideological Islam” was marginalized by Soekarno and Soeharto.
However, if we are willing to bring back “Ideological Islam” into the account of “Indonesian nationalism” based on the fact that it played its important role in the very critical moment of Indonesia in pre-independence period, I think, we should be ready also to bring back “Ideological socialism and communism” in our debate as it played also the same important role in uniting Indonesia people to fight against imperialism. Indonesian nationalism is not a final notion, in which the state can monopolize its meaning against any different attempt to define it, whether form Islam, socialism, or communism, or other.