Innocuous Religion - Roy Allan B Tolentino

Religion, despite its necessarily vague definition, has always been a dangerous idea. By providing a vision of reality that almost always competes with more mundane constructions of power and legitimacy, religion can provide a scathing critique of governance. That is, of course, unless the government is able to subvert the power of religion or make religion an accomplice. This is something that we have seen played out time and again; in the New Order period, much effort was expended in making religion innocuous.

One strategy that was employed was the rewriting of history. With the rise of Suharto, the consolidation of military power provided an opportunity to recast history in favour of the military. As David Bourchier notes:

"The official texts, predictably enough, hail the achievements of Suharto and the New Order and contrast them with the turbulence and strife of the 'Old Order.' What is most striking about their coverage of the period between the declaration of independence and 1965 is the prominence given to the exploits of the military. The central and unmistakable message of both the text and the photographs is that ever since 1945 the military have been the true guardians of the Indonesian State and ideology. They have stood by to provide leadership whenever the State has been threatened by regional revolts, religious fanaticism, communist subversion and the incompetence of self-interested civilian politicians." (Bourchier 1994:52)

Painting a picture of military heroism, the history that was propagated during the New Order subtly eroded the idea of stability and moral ascendancy that religion might have claimed. Official policy depoliticizing Islam effectively relegated religion to a compartment within Suharto’s governance that allowed him to mobilize religion according to his own agenda. Of course, the disorganization of the religious sector only helped to fence them in, as Bahtiar Effendy recounts:

"When the position of political Islam appeared to be worsening, particularly following the New Order's manoeuvre to restructure Indonesia's political format, many of [political Islam's] leaders became increasingly reactionary. In the view of some observers of Indonesian political Islam, this was a sign of the inability of Islamic political thinkers and activists to structure intelligent religious-political responses pertinent to these challenges." (Effendy 2003:67)

Even to the last years of Suharto, many religious leaders were still held on a tight leash: “In December 1992 Interior Minister Rudini lectured members of the Indonesian Muslim Intellectuals Association (ICMI) that any move to turn ICMI into a political party would revive the turmoil of the liberal 1950s.” (Bourchier 1994:59) The religious sector still seems to be recovering from this long-term restriction and disorganization. Am I suggesting, therefore, that religion ought to meddle in affairs of governance? Not necessarily. There is, however, a position that religion must necessarily take in order to become an ethical resource for criticizing governance, and religion cannot assume that position as long as government keeps religion innocuous.

Bourchier, David. "The 1950s in New Order Ideology and Politics" in Democracy in Indonesia: 1950s and 1990s. Ed. David Bourchier and John Legge. Victoria: CSEAS, Monash University, 1994.
Effendy, Bahtiar. Islam and the State in Indonesia. Athens, OH: Ohio University Press, 2003.