Religion and Nationalism

LEYAKET ALI MOHAMED OMAR

History of Religion Part 2- Prof Bernard Adeney- Risakotta and Prof Margana
Readings are from : Deliar Noer- The Modernist Muslim Movement In Indonesia; Harry J. Benda- Indonesian Islam Under the Japanese Occupation.

The essay by Noer, Modern Muslim Movement in Indonesia is a thorough work of research in Indonesia and its movements it provides a realm of activities happening during those times, it gave me a great insight from the regions to its religions; it’s like a continuation from the first course study, History of Religion part 1; at least for a Singaporean like me that are new to this.

Embarking in this line some chapters are perhaps a little distinctive, but overall I find her work compared a nice balance between comprehensiveness and variety with elaborations and combining it with variety of linguistics, genetics, and archaeology, in what is effectively a condensed version of her highly, thorough research on the subject.

Javanese religion and society are Islamic because aspects of Islam’s doctrine have taken the place of those of Hinduism and Buddhism as the way of life to the Javanese culture. Furthermore, Sufi concepts of sainthood and the mystical path are employed in the formulation of an imperial cult.

Therefore, it can be said that Islam has penetrated so quickly and so deeply into the fabric of Javanese culture because it was embraced by the royal courts as the basis for a theocratic state. Hence, in this view I saw the same pattern arises in the early twentieth century where the fights for authority over other religion are over but more to the fragments of sects from Islamic perspective that remains and these are the main character of frictions between fellow Indonesians during those period in fact till today.

There are scholars whose main ideas are to eradicate traditions that are not Islamic and those of staunch traditionalist that still persist on the Hindus or other early traditions. Embedded in these two extremes there are also scholars that permits this acts. Muhammadiah was established in 1912 by KH Ahmad Dahlan, a Meccan graduate, with a clear aim to promote and protect the “purest” and the “truest” version of Islam and to abandon the “polluted” or “contaminated” version of Islam by referring directly only to the Qur’an and the Hadith (Prophet Traditions). For this everyone is expected to conduct ijtihad. In my humble opinion with respect to his initiative of the organisation, this means that all the conditions to be Mujtahid (a person who performs ijtihad) will be held collectively by jurists acting together; not just a single jurist. He then performs it together with other jurists, who have expertise in other areas and this takes a community to perform not as an individual but together.

This is parallel to the sayings of the Prophet: ‘I (‘Ali bin Abi Talib) said to the Prophet, ‘O, Prophet, (what if) there is a case among us, while neither revelation comes, nor the Sunnah exists.’ The Prophet replied, ‘(you should) have meetings with the scholars – or in another version: the pious servants – and consult with them. Do not make a decision only by a single opinion.