How did Muslim and Muslim community in the USA respond to the 9/11 terrorist attack? What were the impacts of media’s framing that the terrorist are Muslims jihadis to the Muslim communities in the USA?

As part of our efforts to describe plurality of Islam and Muslim in the USA and their responses to and impacts of the 9/11 terrorist attack on them, I and a friend of mine, Samsul Maa’rif, did a fieldwork in 1995, profiling 10 mosques/islamic cenhtres in Miami South Florida. The research was funded by the Pluralism Project at Harvard University. Below is the snapshot of the project:

Further detail at:

http://www.pluralism.org/affiliates/student/maarifandmuttaqin/index.php

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Bellow is my opinion published  in the Jakarta Post, Saturday 23, 2010. It discusses current religious movie in Indonesia and moral lesson behind it.

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By Ahmad Muttaqin

Recently Indonesian people just enjoyed the Sang Pencerah (The Englightener) film, directed by Hanung Bramantyo. The story was about the founder of Muslim organization Muhammadiyah, Ahmad Dahlan (1868-1923). The plot is based on the dynamic of Dahlan’s efforts to establish the country’ second largest religious organization.

The film described the spirit, passion and persistence of Ahmad Dahlan to make better understanding of and beautiful practices of Islam. He got strong resistances from many Muslims, who even described him as infidel.

Other lessons from the story are Dahlan’s moderation, his wide range of interaction, and his willingness to learn from others that are considered as “un-Islamic”. For Dahlan, differences are not some thing to be shunned. He did not reluctant to take something better than his own from others. He, for example, created classroom with tables, chairs and blackboard as that did in Dutch and Christian schools for his Madrasah where public considered it as the alien and infidel system.

To learn about the organization, he also joined Budi Utomo, an organization of mostly Javanese aristocrats from which he blamed Kyai Kejawen (Javanese Kyai). The close relation between Ahmad Dahlan and Budi Utomo is interesting. It reflects his nationalist sense and asserts, as Ahmad Najib Burhani (2004) already noted, that Muhammadiyah was more appreciated to Javanese culture and identities in its early period than that thereafter.

Although, Dutch colonial archives also recorded a number of Javanese aristocrats, the priyayi, involved in Muhammadiyah activities. As if they want to combine “modernity” with local identity, Dahlan preferred to wear a formal suit with jarit or sarung and a batik turban for his head rather than Arabian robe as usually wore by Kyais in the era.

On Muslim-Christian relation, a sensitive issue frequently causes tension and conflict in contemporary Indonesia, Dahlan’s opposition to Christianity was not implemented in physical clash. He of course worried to massive activity of Christian mission.

Nevertheless, instead of running mass mobilization to burn churches, Dahlan built Islamic schools, orphanages, and hospitals — the methods he took from Christian missionaries — as a tool for restrain penetration of the mission.

Historical documents reported that Dahlan visited churches and made dialogues and debates with pastors a number of times. He can be accredited, therefore, as a pioneer of interreligious dialogue for this matter.

So far Muhammadyah is categorized as a Muslim modernist and to some extent puritan. In the sociology of religion discourse, it was commonly assumed that the puritan movement was religiously orthodox and less tolerant. But, the Sang Pencerah shows otherwise, presenting Dahlan’s and Muhammadiyah’s moderation, openness and progressiveness.

Nowadays, Muhammadiyah has grown up and developed as a giant civil Muslim society representing the “pseudo state” of the country. It manages thousands of mosques and religious gatherings, thousands of schools, hundred of universities, more than five hundreds hospitals and clinics, hundreds of orphanages, disaster management units and other microfinance institutions.

Structurally, Muhammadiyah has various departments and chambers in every province as well as representative offices almost in every district, subdistrict and even villages.

But these organizational bodies are now overwhelming Muhammadiyah’s missions. Critics said its routine programs’ lack of innovations now trap the Muhammadiyah. The trend of the growing rigidity in religion among its members criticizing to progressive and a pluralist point of view have restrained the dynamic of an intellectual journey among its members.

Learning from the spirits of the Sang Pencerah, my query is therefore, where are all Dahlan’s openness, progressive, and moderation legacies gone?

The movie is a actually a big critique of leaders, members and constituents of the Muhammadiyah who are now narrow minded, intolerant, have poor social respect, are rigid and allergic to progress. The movie is questioning Muhammadiyah’s readiness to enter in its second century.

The movie would say: “The first century Muhammadiyah was initiated by Dahlan’s reform trough openness, progress and moderation. In this second century, to be a pioneer of the reform, Muhammadiyah needs more than that because the locus and tempus as well as socio-cultural challenges are more complex than that of a century ago.”

In a broader landscape, the moderation and openness legacies of Dahlan are also applicable to quest current hatreds and violence affiliated to religion that currently frequently appear. The destroying of Ahmadiyah mosque, for example, just reminds me of the bitter experience when Dahlan’s first langgar was overthrown. The blame to progressive Muslim figures as sesat (astray) reminds me accusations and derision against Dahlan as Kyai Kafir.

The Sang Pencerah has provided valuable lessons: A figure with a progressive vision but moderate and tolerant of any differences, who was patient and humble to any critics.

The writer is a lecturer at Sunan Kalijaga State Islamic University’s Department of Comparative Religion, Yogyakarta. Currently he is fellow at the Training Indonesian Young Leader Program, Leiden University, the Netherlands.

The article can also be downloaded in: http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2010/10/23/spirit-progressive-and-moderation-‘sang-pencerah’.html

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“Why does Muhammadiyah enthusiastically release fatwas (religious verdicts) lately?” Ask a friend of mine in a milis responding the new fatwa of the Majelis Tarjih and Tajdid (MTT – Council of Legal Affair and Reform) on bank interest. The fatwa was one of Council National Meeting (Munas Tarjih) outcomes in Malang, East Java, 1-4 April 2010. Like previous Muhammadiyah fatwa on banning cigarette, the latest fatwa also stirred up pros and conts.

This brief posting will not address to the pro and cont issues about the fatwa. It rather would like to see beyond the fatwa from theory of modernity noting the phenomena as both the paradox of Muhammadiyah and, in a broader scope, the paradox of modernity.

It should be said that the fatwa reflects strong evident of the existence of Muhammadiyah’s religious scholars (keulamaan) among its members. As we have known, no fatwa is released from vacuum of locus and tempus. Every fatwa was initiated by a number of questions from Muslims to Islamic clerics about new case or phenomena to be clarified its religious legal status.  The cleric than studied the case from various perspectives in order to have broaden perspective before released the fatwa.

In sociology of religion studies, Muhammadiyah is so far known as modernist Muslims organization. Nevertheless, the fatwa reflects oppositely: Muhammadiyah members are not truly ‘modern’. Religiously, they are neither independent nor progressive.  Instead, they are still rely on cleric’s guidance, the trend that in opposite to modern society. Such strong influences of religious clerics among the member of modernist organization are paradox to Freud’s claim saying the more modern a society the farther it away from religious principals.

In the West, modernism and secularism are sides of a coin, where religions are separated from secular lives. A number of secular theories even blatantly note that modernity is a symptom of the death of religious institutions. In Indonesia, on the contrary, modernity and religions live side-by-side, secular institutions next to the religious ones. Religious teachings are even frequently invited to “judge” profane acts.  This is what I call the paradox of modernity where modernity as well as secularization do not means the demise of religions. Eisenstadt noted such a phenomena as “Multiple Modernity”, (2002, 2003) where modernity manifests in various shapes around the world and religious trajectories are so vivid accompanying modern and secular life.

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Ahmad Munjid’s article “Thick Islam and Deep Islam” (The Jakarta Post, Aug. 16, 2009) was responded to by Hilman Latief’s “Cosmopolitan Muslims: Urban vs. Rural Phenomenon” (the Post Aug. 29, 2009).

Although both Munjid and Hilman shared their ideas on the more obvious prevalence of Islamic identity among Indonesian Muslims, they differed in terms of categorization between urban and rural as well as “thick” and “deep” Islam.

Munjid noted that “Thick Islam” was an urban phenomenon, and that “Deep Islam” was a rural one, whereas Hilman argued that the thick and the deep could not be generalized based on urban and rural categories.

Although neither intended to stimulate classical binary opposition between the Muhammadiyah as an urban Muslim organization and the NU as a rural one, the “polemic” is nevertheless interesting if we reckon their backgrounds. Munjid, who is currently the president of the Nahdlatul Ulama Community in North America, would say that the rural tradition of the NU is better than the urban.

Hilman, meanwhile, as a lecturer at Muhammadiyah University’s School of Islamic Studies, in Yogyakarta, would answer that the urban Muslim of the Muhammadiyah are not identical with “Thick Islam”.

This discussion will not pretend to support either of them, but to emphasize the fact of religious change and its various trajectories in late modern era.

While to some extent modernity has interestingly provided trajectories of religions to be symbolically more prevalent concomitant with other secular institutions, it also provides another trend to the opposite, namely the bourgeoning of subjective life religiosity.

Like Munjid and Hilman, I do agree that Indonesia encounters the continuing significant appearance of religion in public. Religious revivals, mainly Islamic, continue to prevail, ranging from groups of liberals, modernists, moderates, charismatics, scriptural-puritans , to hard-line “fundamentals” . The global religious market flooding into this country embedded with socio-cultural background of Indonesians, known as bangsa yang religius (a religious country).

The government’s policies on religion also support the significant role of religion not only in people’s personal outlooks, but also in the public sphere. These have been manifested in, for example, the state formation of “delimitated religious plurality” to restrict the public into only five official religions: Islam, Catholicism, Protestantism, Hinduism and Buddhism.

The Pancasila (Five Principles) is the only ideology of the state in which its first principle is Ketuhanan Yang Maha Esa (Monotheism) ; the establishment of the Religious Affairs Ministry; and the government policy stating that every citizen should embrace one of the official religions on citizenship ID cards.

In addition, the government also officially maintains the definition of (religion) as being restricted to those that have a theological doctrine, prophets and scriptures, and are internationally spread.

The above notion underlines Hilman’s assertion of the interplay of state and market in determining forms of religious expression. The way of Islam is perceived and articulated, determined by the actor and the context.

A religious person proposes certain services that are absolutely consider targeted at “customers” who can afford the services.

As a “living organism”, Islam appears in various expressions, and sociologically we find multifaceted manifestation. Munjid and Hilman have provided thoughtful analyses on the “outer” symbolic expression of Islam, but they overlooked the “inner” one, the emergence of contemporary Islamic spirituality. In fact, as Howell (2006) noted, spiritual Islam is part of Indonesian Islamic revival.

To start this discussion, let me borrow Heelas and Woodhead’s notion from their subjectivization thesis. The subjective turn is “a turn away from life as to subjective life,” said Heelas and Woodhead (2005). They further state that “life as” means “life in accordance to” other external authorities – religion, community, state and many more – such as life as a dutiful wife, husband, father, teacher, etc. in order to conform. Subjective life means life in one’s own authenticity, “in deep connection with the unique experience of the self” and “with the inner depth of one’s unique life-in-relation” .

Implemented in the spiritual/religious field, then, one is categorized as life-as religion when his/her religiosity as well religious expression is drifted by following the duties and instruction of religious authorities (leaders, dogma/tenets, institutions and many others).

By contrast, one is said to be of subjective life spirituality when he/she lives in a deep connection with his/her own unique spirituality. The primary focus of life-as religion is congregation, whereas the primary focus of subjective life spirituality is holistic milieu.

Based on the above perspective, it is true that Islamic identity both culturally and politically is more prevalent in Indonesian public spaces as a representation of “life-as religion”, but there actually also prevails the development of “subjective life spirituality/ religiosity” in contemporary Indonesia.

We face a number of spiritual centers operating in urban arenas, such as the neo-Sufism groups, preprogrammed experimental spiritual trainings, yoga classes and reiki programs, alternative healing and many others.

These kinds of spiritual hybrid appear in newspapers, magazines, even TV programs promoting the efficacies of spirituality. Such spiritual centers have successfully invited a huge number of urban Muslims to participate.

The so-called Islamic spirituality is part of a global trend where religious and spiritual trajectories are flourishing in the contemporary era, both in modernized and modernizing cities. Contemporary expressions of religiosity include New Religious Movements (NRM) and the New Spiritual Movements that flourish in various forms. Some NRMs are revivals of indigenous religions; some are Christian charismatic movements such as Pentecostalism; some take the form of New Age, alternative healing, yoga, Holism, and Mind-Body-Spirit; and some constitute the practices like Human Potential Movement. All these movements emerged as responses to the perceived aridity of Western tradition, in ph

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Many people assume local culture is the symbol of backward, barriers for development and in contrast to modern culture. To be a modern (rational, engaged in secular institutions, and disenchanted of the world) one should drop all that connected to the local. Through their purified wings, world religions in fact involved in negating –or  even destroying– local cultures, blaming them as unauthentic and source of heresy.

But it was in twentieth century, when modernity was the dominant narrative of cultural explanations. The Coming of new millennium has been stumulating criticism to modernity and all derivative explanations about it. New perspectives, theories, paradigm or even ideology have been appearing such as post-modernism, multiple-modernities, and post-traditionalism, which are appreciative to local expressions. Having been tired by the aridity and linearity of modern life, people are now searching for alternatives that are softer, more spiritual, and more flexible than ever before. They find such things in local knowledge. For these purposes, local culture is now seen as source of wisdoms instead of obstacles.

This is the era of flash back, where localities are cheered in modern space concomitant with globalization. The notion that there are local wisdoms in every local culture stimulates local supporters to campaign that the local is able to co-exist with the global. But wait, who does actuality recognize the wisdom of the local? Are they insiders of the local or the outsiders? If they are the insiders, they are absolutely subject to any biases. If they are the outsiders, what are their motives in doing so? Clear answer of the questions is required in order to determine the quality of appreciation.

In reality, what insiders hold as the wisdom is different from that is seen by the outsider. The first would see holistically the wisdom in their local expressions as value systems, whereas the latter just impress it as the exotic expressions to be preserved. The exotic is a state when ones are enjoyed and amazed to a unique and antique expression but they do not want to be like such an enjoyable object. Behind the exotic is a consciousness of the subject that one’s is better than the object being watched. Consequently, it is also common that what is recognized local wisdom by some will be seen by the others oppositely, as local stupidity. This difference levels of appreciations could cause further cultural double standard, pobhia, and even racist point of views. In such a differ cultural context, we need a better multicultural perspevtive rather than just the melting pot and assimilation.

There are so many way to optimized you iPad, Jailbreak, Custom Theme, How To and Tutorial you can check it on iPad Story

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Although Marx, Freud, and Weber had predicted religions would progressively disappear from society for the expansion of modern institutions, we watch not only religions that reject to away from society but also see the emergence of novel sensibility of religions and spirituality in late modernity. ‘Why should this be?’ ask Giddens who then finds Durkheim’s affirmation that religion has ‘some thing eternal’ namely ‘symbol of collective unity’ (Giddens, 1992: 207).

Will religion truly disappear due to massive spread of modernity? Were the question directed to Hefner, he would answer that the absent of religion in modern time is just temporary. Every society needs ‘collective moral consciousnesses’. Durkheim, as noted by Hefner, “believed that this lost of religion was but a temporary dysfunction of early modernization (see also Beckford, 1989: 25). No society can survive without a collective moral consciousness. The lost of social power of certain religions will be followed by the emergence of a new ‘civil religion’ replacing social role of the earliest. Such a civil religion is able to “provide coherence and stability even in the absence of a theistic canopy” (Hefner in Heelas, 1998: 150). Berger (1992) and Cox (1990) also predicted that the availability of spirituality in modern and even post-modern time is clearly potential (Hefner in Heelas, 1998: 150).  This because, as Mellor says, “societies have a sui generis reality that is collectively represented in religion”. Furthermore, “Religion is more than the mere cement of social solidarity”, it “continues act as an emergent, dynamic and creative force in societies” (Beckford and Wallis, 2006: xv).

According to Simmel, “changes in religious forms are part and parcel of the shifts taking place in modern societies as life becomes increasingly segmentalized.  Specifically religious concerns are differentiated from other aspects of life and will be more individualized;” no longer does kinship or neighbourhood determine religious preference and affiliation (Davie, 2007: 31).  The self and other autonomy religious/spiritual expression will have a wider room to appear. Heelas and Wooadhead (2005) note such a situation as ‘Spiritual Revolution’ and Spickard (in Backford and Walis, 2006: 176-177) call it as ‘religious individualism’. The mushrooming of spirituality in Western-modern society clearly reflects this trend.

In contemporary sociology of religion debate, the growing of new spirituality in modern time can be read either “as evidence both for and against secularisation”. Some scholars regard the phenomena as a proof of secularization in which organized religions are in decline in favour to spirituality. Others, however would argue that the new spirituality and other new religious movement appearing in the West is vivid evident that religious life, although in more personal form, is not in decline (Howell 2005).

Heelas and Woodhead (2005) further describe that Western trend of ‘spiritual revolution’ is resulted from modernization and secularization process. Due to the massive development of spiritualities amid the decline of organized religions, Heelas and Wooadhead propose ‘subjectivization thesis’, a theory noting the decrease of ‘life-as forms of the sacred’ and the rise of the ‘subjective-life of the sacred’.  In the context of secularization debate Heelas and Woodhead used the theory to explain the trend of religion in decline and spirituality in growth in one parallel process, namely ‘the massive subjective turn of modern culture’ –to use Charles Tylor’s words (1991: 26). The subjective turn is “a turn away from life as to subjective life.”  Life as means life in accordance to other external authorities – religion, community, state, and many more— such as life as dutiful wife, husband, father, teacher, etc. in order to gain conformity. Subjective life means life in own authenticity, “in deep connection with the unique experience of the self” and “with the inner depth of one’s unique life-in-relation.”  Implemented in spiritual/religious field, then, one is categorized as life-as religion when his/her religiosity as well religious expression is drifted by following the duties and instruction of religious authorities (leaders, dogma/tenets, institutions, and many other). In contrast, one is said subjective life spirituality when he/she lived in a deep connection with his/her own unique spirituality. The primary focus of life as-religion is congregation whereas the primary focus of the subjective life spirituality is holistic milieu (Heelas and Woodhead 2005: 3-4)

For the significant growing number of spirituality in the West, Heelas and Woodhead then propose the “formulation of Spiritual Revolution” as follow: (1) Life-as forms of the sacred, which emphasize a transcendent source of significance and authority to which individuals must conform at the expense of the cultivation of their unique subjective-lives, are most likely to be decline. In the West, the power of religious institution to direct their followers in order to live in conformity with religious principles tends to decline. (2) Subjective-life form of the sacred, which emphasize inner sources of significance and authority and the cultivation or sacralisation of unique subjective-lives, are most likely to be growing. The power of spiritual manifestations such as ‘body, mind and spirit’, ‘New Age’, ‘alternative’ or ‘holistic’ spirituality, yoga, reiki, meditation, tai chi, aromatherapy, paganism, reflexology, and many more tend to grow “in helping people to lives in accordance with the deepest, sacred dimension of their own unique lives.” In sum, spiritual revolution “come abut when subjective-life spirituality overtake life-as religion”; “when ‘holistic’ activities having to do with subjective-life spirituality attract more people than do ‘congregational’ activities having to do with life-as religion” (2005: 6-7).

How about subjective-life of religiousity/spirituality in eastern context, lets say Indonesia? In my humble opinion, it is developing and spreading as well. The foregoing explanation emphasizes that the trajectory of both religion and spirituality happen not only in the modernized countries but also in those modernizing. Continuity and change are part and parcel of religions. What people of religions should aware is understanding those patterns of changes in order to provide appropriate religious services. If not, I bet people would away from religions, searching for other ways that fit to their spiritual thirstiness.

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…it would be a problematic to generalize the norm of Islamic Clerics among Indonesian Modernist Muslims. The ‘faces’ of modernist Muslims are changing just as other institutions where polarization is one of the characteristics. The clerical authority among reformist Muslim in Indonesia is now, especially after reformation era, more multi-polar and more plural than ever before.

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Muhammadiyah did played important and significant role in establishing and maintaining clerical authorities among the modernist in the Old Order and the New Order, especially in the urban area as well as national political landscape. Muhammadiyah had special “relationship” with the two Presidents of Indonesia, Soekarno and Soeharto. Both of them openly declared that they were Muhammadiyah cadres.

In the New Order era almost all the minister of religious affairs are from the modernist Muslims wing, such as Mukti Ali, Munawarir Sadzali, Tarmidzi Tahir, and Malik Fadjar. The leader of MUI at the New Order era were also mostly from Muhammadiyah background, such as Hamka, E.Z. Muttaqin and Hasan Basri. Muhammadiyah Bureucrat also dominated in the Department of Religious Affairs (DEPAG).

How did Muhammadiyah breed their religious cleric at that time? In my humble opinions, two institutions of religious education in Yogyakarta played important roles. The first is Madrasah Mualimim Muhamadiyah in jl. Patangpuluhan Yogyakarta. This is the first boarding school initiated by the founder of Muhammadiyah, K.H. Ahmad Dahlan. The students in the school represented nationally, coming from various region of the archipelago. After finishing six-years study, they were sent to various areas to do dakwah, spreading Muhammadiyah’s mission.

The second is PHIN (Pendidikan Hakim Islam Negeri – State Education for Islamic Judge) in Jl. C. Simanjutak Yogyakarta, near by Gadjah Mada University. Unlike Muallimin, PHIN is a public school, dedicated specifically to educate candidates of Islamic judges. Its students also came from various regions in Indonesia. In the middle and the end of New Order era, the alumni of the school dominated officers of Kantor Wilayah Departemen Agama and Pengadilan Agama. Although the PHIN is a public school, almost its teachers are Muhammadiyah activies. The way the teachers teach attract students to be like what the teachers said and did. The alumni of the school then are Muhammadiyah activists or if they are not, at least open-minded religious cleric that accept and support modernity.

In the early 1980s the role of Muallimin and PHIN as breeding arenas for modernist Muslims cleric reduces significantly. Mualimin changed their curricula just to follow the curricula of Madrasah Tsanawiyah and Madrasah Aliyah Negeri (Islamic Lower and Upper Secondary School administrated by the Department of Religious Affairs), and the duties of student to do one-year pengabdian (community development) were erased. The PHIN was then closed and replaced by Madrasah Aliyah Negeri (MAN) Yogyakarta I.

Following the success of Muallimin cadres prior 1980s, a number of regional Muhmmadiyah activists created Sekolah Kader (Cadre School) that mostly run in pesantren styles. The schools are called also as Pesantren Muhammadiyah, stressing on Quranic studies, Hadits, Arabic, Fiqh, plus the curricula of Madrasah Tsanawiyah and Madrasah Aliyah. Among the prominent and well know are Pesantren Darul Arqam Muhammadiyah in Garut, West Jawa; Pesantren Darul Arqam Muhamadiyah in Gombara, South Sulawesi; Pesantren Muhammadiyah in Paciran, Lamongan East Java; and many others.

In addition to Muhamadiyah pesantren for secondary students there are also higher degree pesantrens. These include Pondok Pesantren Hajjah Nurriyah Sabron in Solo that is under the auspice of Muhamadiyah  University of Surakarta and Pesantren Ulama Tarjih Muhammadiyah, a higher degree Muhammadiyah pesantren dedicated to train students in Islamic Legal Law, in Yogyakarta.

Organizationally, the breeding, maintaining, and disseminating of Muhamadiyah clerics are under the duties of Majelis Tarjih dan Tajdid (Department of Tarjih and Reform) and Majelis Tabligh dan Dakwah Khusus (Department of Propagation and Special Mission). The Majelis Tarjih dan Tajdid focuses on Islamic law, fatwas, rituals, and developing Islamic thought, whereas Majelis Tabligh dan Dakwah Khusus focuses on Islamic Missionary including training, administrating and supporting Muhammadiyah preachers who live in remote and hinterland areas.

It is worth to note here that most of the Majelis Tarjih dan Tajdid members at the Central Board Muhammadiyah (Pimpinan Pusat Muhammadiyah) are from the IAIN, Institute Agama Islam Negeri (now is UIN, Universitas Islam Negeri, State Islamic University) Sunan Kalijaga, Yogyakarta. They are either university professors or lecturers in Tafsir (Quranic exegesis), Hadits (Prophert Tradition), Fiqh & Ushul Fiqh (Islamic Jurisprudence), Falaq (Islamic Astronomy), Kalam (Islamic Theology) and Islamic Philosophy. Only few of them were graduated from Middle Eastern Universities, and the majorities are graduated from the IAIN Sunan Kalijaga.

After the reformation era, where state control on religious life is lessening, new urban Muslim groups appear. The groups that were previously associated to the Muhammadiyah in term of ritual and cultural dimension are vividly come into different sight. They created new institutions and identities, as well as point out their own cleric as an authoritative one to deliver Islamic point of view. The Tarbiyyah movement previously spread in University campuses and now manifested in Partai Keadilan Sejahtera (PKS), and Hizbut Tahrier Indonesia are example of such group. Each of the group is now has its own person or institution considered as their authoritative Islamic clerics. Some of them note as Majelis Syura, and some of them just call ustadz. Using multilevel structure, the Tarbiyyah activists also routinely have weekly meting (liqa) lead by a Murabbi (literarily means educator). In fact, the murabbi is the front line of Islamic cleric in the lowest level, whereas in the highest one is Majelis Syura.

Meanwhile, other Muslim organizations that are also associated to modernist groups such as Dewan Dakwah Islamiyah Indonesia, Persatuan Islam (Persis), and Al Irsyad, are seemed to be more confident to appear in their own. In the New Order Era, these organizations, as long as I concerned, tend to stand behind the Muhammadiyah in term of religious opinion. Some of DDII activist are also Muhammadiyah activist. 

For most Indonesians Muslims, alumni of Middle Eastern Universities have special place in term of religious knowledge but not in religious privileged and authorities. In Nahdhatul Ulama religious authorities are the privileges of kyais and in Muhammadiyah religious authorities is hold institutionally by the Majelis Tarjih dan Tajdid and Muhammadiyah figures known as Muslims inteccetuals. Interstingly enough, most of Muslim intellectuals in Muhammadiyah are graduated from Western Universities, such as Din Syamsuddin (UCLA), M. Amien Rais (Chicago), Syafi’i Maarif (Chicago). Out 13 figures of Central Board Muhammadiyah members, only 2 were graduated from Middle East Univerities.

Not all kyais in NU are the alumni of the Middle East Universities as well as only few members of Majelis Tarjih dan Tajdid Muhammadiyah are alumni of Middle East Universities. It seems to me that the alumni of Middle East Universities have special place and more religious authorities among the Tarbiyyah movements. The figures appear in various institutions such as schools, social foundations and magazine as dewan syariah (syariah council).

In urban area and university campuses, the “magnet” of Muhammadiyah preachers tends to decrease. Pengajian or Qur’anic studies forum in mosques and voluntarily houses used to be led by Muhammadiyah preachers are now “replaced” by those who are unified in IKADI (Ikatan Dai Indonesia – Indonesian Islamic Preachers Union), which is known for having alliance with PKS or at least the Tarbiyah connections. The competition of the two for gaining and maintaining jamaah some times lead to a tension and even psychological conflict.   

The decrease of Muhammadiyah magnets in urban area is in parallel with some critics noting Muhammadiyah are facing serious problem in breeding Ulama cadres. The notion of ”kelangkaan ulama’ in Muhammadiyah is one of alerts frequently sounded by the Muhammadiyah activists. My experience as a Muhammadiyah activist would say that even Muhammadiyah is now exhausted in fulfilling its internal ‘ulama’. Answering to such a bemoan and critics, the Majelis Tabligh dan Dakwah Khusus released new program on Higher Education for Muhammadiyah Preachers (Program Pendidikan Tinggi Mubaligh Muhammadiyah) last June 2008, in Yogyakarta.

In sum, I would like to say that it would be a problematic to generalize the norm of Islamic Clerics among Indonesian Modernist Muslims. The ‘faces’ of modernist Muslims are changing just as other institutions where polarization is one of the characteristics.

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…closing the department on the reason to save the budget is really an unwise decision. The argument that religion can be studied alone or attached to other departments, not in single body department reflecting inter-religious relationship, means the luck of comprehension on the important of mutual understanding among various religious backgrounds amid this rapid globalization. Since religion is one of humans’ ingredients that affect their economic, political, social, and cultural manifestations, studying religion needs a strong institution. 

Save FIU Religious Studies

Dear Sir/Madam,

FIU Board of Trustees, 

I am Ahmad Muttaqin, a faculty member of Comparative Religion Department at Sunan Kalijaga State Islamic University, Yogyakarta Indonesia. I was graduated from MA Program of FIU Religious Studies Department in 2005 where I was sponshored by Fulbright scholarship.  A week ago I heard from news that the religious studies department of FIU will be closed to cut university budget.

I thing closing the department on the reason to save the budget is really an unwise decision. The argument that religion can be studied alone or attached to other departments, not in single body department reflecting inter-religious relationship, means the luck of comprehension on the important of mutual understanding among various religious backgrounds amid this rapid globalization. Since religion is one of humans’ ingredients that affect their economic, political, social, and cultural manifestations, studying religion needs a strong institution. Therefore, as an alumnus of the religious studies department, I really could not understand the reason to shut down the department. I could not imagine the impact of eliminating the department toward university, regional and international life where mutual understanding among religions is highly in demand.

In sum, I just want to assert my disagreement to the closure of the department, and strongly support any efforts that students and faculties have done in order to save the department.  I do hope that all FIU board of trustees are guided by the Wisdom to choose the best decision and save the department.

Viva Religious Studies!

Best wishes,

Ahmad Muttaqin

____________

Surat di atas saya kirim kepada anggota Board of Trustee (semacam Majelis Wali Amanat) Florida International University pada akhir bulan Mei 2009. Selaku alumni saya punya tanggung jawab menyuarakan ketidaksetujuan terhadap rencana penutupan almamater saya tersebut hanya karena pihak universitas defisit anggaran. Saat dunia makin menglobal dan sekat ruang dan waktu tidak lagi menjadi hambatan perjumpaan antar orang dengan berbagai latar belakang, ide penutupan departemen yang selalu mendorong dialog antar agama tersebut jelas langkah yang kontra produktif. Krisis financial juga tidak tepat dijadikan alasan sebab selama ini departemen tersebut, menurut laporan beberapa staf pengajar di sana, mampu “self financed” dan justru bisa menyumbang income untuk universitas. Reaksi keras penolakan penutupan tidak hanya datang dari para dosen, staf dan mahasiswa di FIU tapi juga tokoh-tokoh American Academy of Religion (AAR). Dalai Lama bahkan rela menyumbang $100,000.00 untuk menyelamatkan departemen tersebut.  Beberapa aluni juga membuat penolakan melalui jejaring sosial yang ada di internet. Hasil dari penyuaran tersebut: Religious Studies di FIU tidak jadi ditutup. Viva Religious Studies

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1. Modernity, Religious Change and Spiritual Revolution

Some people are worry about the burgeoning of spiritual centers in urban areas. They question why do people living in a modern city drifted by rationalism, individualism and secular point of view participate in spiritual groups considered as irrational and backwards? Does not it reflect the ambiguity or even paradox of modern people? While, may be it is true that modern people are full of paradoxes, or they are even have lost their modern orientations, but the trend is indeed a sign of natural cultural process.

Human beings, wherever and whenever, cannot be reduced into just technical parts of society. Man and woman posses mind, body, and spirit (soul). To some extent modern cultures have successfully provide minds and body’s needs but unable to feed spiritual thirstiness. A huge number of modern people are now living in anxious and continuously searching for medium to balance their life. Spiritual centers appearing in neo-Sufism, yoga, meditation, holism, reiki, Human Potential Movement, and many others, are sort of urban institution to furnish modern people.

It seems, however, that current urban spiritual centres are not merely for balancing modern life. Due to high demand of spiritual markets and the ability of urban people to purchase whatever spiritual cost, the centres develop programs that are suitable for the modern: instant, systematically programmed, easily to be performed, and commodified. The result is spiritual hybrid form greater emphasis on practical efficacy rather than piety and morals for social control. Participating in spiritual centres is narrowed just for recreational and therapeutic purposes. Spirituality is seen as a panacea of exhausted modern culture.

For many people, involving in spiritual centre will be more interesting and enjoyable than performing religion. For them, religion only teaches restrictions and rules; forbids people doing this and that in order to follow certain tenet. Will religious values as social control lost out and be replaced by pragmatic spiritual efficacies? Will spirituality successfully take over religion (Carrette and King, 2005)? As long as religious elites neglect this socio-religious and cultural shifts and are failed to provide appropriate spiritual canals for urban people, the fate of religions are really in “danger.”

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3. Viva Religious Studies

“Hi there…,  another academicals slave.”  These cynical words are shouted by a PhD student, a friend of mine, when we meet each other. He is a very senior Australian, more than 60 years old. I and my Chinese friend always laugh hearing that “sarcastic” joke. Although it is just a joke, I think it reflects actual protest behind the words.

In Australian context, PhD students are doubting about government ability to provide job that suitable for Ph.D graduates. The amounts of scholarships are also questioned because they got scholarship, according to them, in relatively low. In fact, monthly stipend from Australian government for Australian students is twice times more than that is provided for non Australian. Let’s say Ausaid scholarship gives about $20 thousand AUD per non Australian students per year; its mean Australian students can receive about $40 thousand AUD a year. Nevertheless, they are still protesting because, as a comparison, a low level air conditioning technician can earn more than $50 thousand AUD a year! They are questioning why the government do not appreciate PhD students’ brain because they actually also work, developing new theories and inventories.

Let’s do another comparison and take a glance looking at scholarship from other institutions. A Brunei student told me that they got about $6 thousand AUD a month. Saudis students got scholarship including family allowance that I guess no less than $10 thousand AUD a month. A friend of mine who is studying in Uni of Wollongong reporten to me that Indonesian army who studying there receive $3,000.00 AUD a month. Comparing to other scholarships, then, who are the real ‘academicals slave’? Are I and many friends of mine who got only $1.5 thousands AUD a month, which is frequently coming late, are the real and low level of ‘academicals slave’?

For me, academicals slavery is not based on how much stipend we get every month, but it is based on how free we are to develop theory and knowledge in our project. We are not academics slave as along as we can access information we want freely. We are not academicals slave as long as we can determine our own intellectual trajectories. Otherwise, no matter how much one earns monthly stipend but his/her intellectual vision are banned and restricted by certain body, he or she is the real ‘academicals slave’.

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