[Koran-Digital] Amika Wardana: The future of Islamic intellectualism in Indonesia

The future of Islamic intellectualism in Indonesia

Amika Wardana, Colchester, UK | Fri, 05/11/2012 9:49 AM





In a show of force, members of the Islam Defenders Front (FPI) broke up

a book launch and discussion featuring Canadian Muslim feminist Irshad

Manji at the Salihara Cultural Center in Jakarta on May 5. It was said

that the FPI accused Manji of violating a primary tenet of Islam by

promoting homosexuality.



Viewing the incident in a bigger picture, the unjustified action is

linked to a series of efforts initiated by Muslim hard-liners in the

last few decades to circumscribe and restrict the intellectual

activities focusing on Islamic matters.



It is not an atypical case that these vigilantes would exert physical

force and violence to intimidate or dissolve public discussions,

seminars, lectures and book launches. The situation is, of course,

unfriendly to any intellectual and academic activity.



The 2005 Indonesian Ulema Council's (MUI) edict prohibiting secularism,

liberalism and pluralism has been widely used by the hard-line groups to

justify unlawful actions.



Regardless of the diverse philosophical understandings and political

implications, the edict narrow-mindedly defined those "-isms" as

potentially corroding the holy and sacred essence of Islam. Put simply,

the edict itself epitomises this anti-intellectualism, which clearly

violates the freedom of religion and freedom of speech, the primary

features of a democratic society.



Surprisingly, these intolerant efforts seem to gain lots of sympathy

from the wider Indonesian Muslim community. The general but ahistorical

attitude embraced by the majority of Muslims to treat Islam

as a final, fixed and single entity since it was revealed to the Prophet

Muhammad 14 centuries ago is

considered the major cause of this predisposition.



It supposes that any action accounted for a violation of the basic

tenets of Islam should be automatically banned.



On the contrary, any action in the name of Islam, though convincingly

conducted against the law and/or violently attacking the rights of

others, is likely to be permitted.



It can be exemplified by the different fates of the FPI and the Liberal

Islamic Network (JIL). The two are now a binary icon depicting the

conservative and the progressive groups fighting against each other in

the contemporary Indonesian Muslim community.



The FPI has been blamed for numerous unlawful and violent attacks and

public intimidation against people or things defined as un-Islamic or

the enemy of Islam, while the JIL has been accused by the public as a

trouble-maker through its dissemination of controversial ideas

questioning Islam as the perfect way of life.



The fate of the two groups can be examined on the basis of two public

movements against them spread earlier this year, Indonesia Tanpa FPI

(Indonesia without FPI) and Indonesia Tanpa JIL (Indonesia without JIL).



The former was fading away as quickly as the latter emerged and gained

massive support from the majority of Indonesian Muslims. Despite the

fact that members of the JIL have never been charged with any crimes or

unlawful actions, numerous mass rallies and cyber campaigns were

launched against them.



It is suffice to say that the fact illustrates the recent domination of

religious conservatism, which undoubtedly would restrain the development

of Islamic intellectualism in Indonesia.



The attempts to reform and revitalize such obsolete Islamic doctrines in

accordance with the religious plurality and societal modernity of

Indonesia would easily be deemed as an act of heresy.



The efforts to repress religious intellectualism are not a new

phenomenon. Hinted in his 2011 book, Cosmopolitans and Heretics, Carool

Kersten examined the life and work of Nurcholish Madjid, popularly known

as Cak Nur, one of the most prominent progressive Muslim scholars ever

born in this country, who died in 2005.



Together with Egyptian Hasan Hanafi and French-Algerian Mohamed Arkoun,

Cak Nur embraced a cosmopolitan worldview and advocated religious

tolerance and pluralism in Indonesia. Without doubt, he re-interpreted

verses of the Koran and Hadith to be contextualised in the

unique-cum-pluralistic cultures of this country.



Unfortunately, this act saw him defined as a heretic by other Indonesian

Muslim scholars.



Related to the violent interruptions targeting Manji's public

discussion, the challenge against Islamic intellectualism seems to be

getting worse.



A witch-hunt-like operation perpetuated by FPI members has sent a clear

signal of a dark future for Islamic intellectual activities.



There are at least two major obstacles undermining Muslim

intellectualism: The lack of political will and the inability of public

officials to preserve the freedom of religion and free speech; and the

silence of the majority — moderate Muslims — toward intolerant and

violent actions perpetuated by Muslim thugs.



Aside from the impotency of the government to act against groups of

Islamic vigilantes, which is widely highlighted by printed and digital

media, the fact that the majority of Muslims were silent must be paid

more attention.



Here, Manji was correct. As she persuasively delineated in her first

book, the trouble with today's Muslim community is the unwillingness of

the majority, who are religiously moderate, to take action against

repressive, intolerant and violent activities in the name of the

holiness of their religion.



The majority of Muslims are the true owner of Islam and relatively free

from any political and economic motives embracing this peaceful

religion. But because adhering to a religion is always demanding

unreserved obedience to religious rules and leaders, their disagreement

with the unjustified actions carried out in the name of Islam could be

easily muted.



In short, while we may lose hope in the current regime tackling the

current intolerant and repressive actions campaigned by Muslim thugs, we

have to approach the majority of moderate Muslims to stand up against them.



Only by winning the hearts and minds of the majority will we envisage

religiously tolerant environment of exuberance for Islamic intellectualism.



The writer, a lecturer at Yogyakarta State University, is pursuing a

doctorate in sociology at the University of Essex, Colchester, UK



http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2012/05/11/the-future-islamic-intellectualism-indonesia.html



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