Nidal (not verified) — Sat, 10/18/2008 - 11:12am

"Unity in Hypocrisy"

In the course of seeking and destine to the real truth, people's minds are changing. Then as time goes by, after all the years of various disasters that hit the nation, along with the never-ending financial hardship, more and more Muslims in Indonesia contemplated, learned, and got enlightened then realize that all this time they have not been wholly observing Islamic guidance in their life. In other words, they do not live the way Islam guides and teaches them to live; they do not put Islamic sharia (the system of religious laws that Muslims follow) into practice. It is because their country tends to adopt secularism. Deep in their hearts indeed they know it. Through their conscience they begin to realize that the disasters, the hardship that continually hitting their country are not just a common natural disaster that can be taken for granted.

There must be messages behind those disasters and the financial hardship. Indeed, sometimes wisdoms come only after severe sufferings. And deep inside, their conscience keep whispering and asking if there’s something wrong with the way they live, their life paradigms. Life is too short; this fragile world is not everything. Sooner or later human beings will die and leave all their temporal belongings. And for Muslims, one of the precious things that will glorify and save their souls from the eternal hell when they die is the quality of their religious faith during the course of their life on earth.

Hence, observing and practicing Islamic sharia surely are the crucial parts of maintaining, preserving the religious faith. But all this time they have been neglecting the Islamic sharia thus undermining their religious faith. They have been sacrificing their religious faith for things which are superficial, mortal, and profane. And those things are pluralism, uud-45, NKRI, cultural heritage, and so on. Then because of their negligence they have to pay and suffer - even when they are still alive in this world – in the form of natural disasters, or a nationally financial hardship that seems to last forever.

In fact, some people in the parliament had also voiced this concern. The idea had already been mentioned by some Islamic preachers in this country. But some people including parliament members who still believe in secularism keep debating the idea of Islamic sharia by saying that Indonesia is not an Islamic nation but a nation of pluralism, of multi ethnic, multi cultural society, etc. Of course it is understandable why they have different perception. This is the problem of a country with plural society, though surely not without solution. Although Islam is the religion of the major population, the ideas of NKRI, unity in diversity, pluralism, are taken as big issues and seem to be taken for granted as being sacred things for Indonesians particularly those who consider themselves as belong to the so-called nationalist group.

If we look at other countries where Islamic sharia is observed and put into the government system we will learn that the population typology of each of these countries is a lot different from that of Indonesia. Moreover, these Islamic countries are geographically different from Indonesia which is archipelago. More importantly, unlike Indonesia, the populations of these countries have no history of adhering to different religious beliefs such as Hindu, Buddha, and animism, long before Islam came here. This background is crucial since the coming of Islam to Indonesia can be regarded as ‘late’. Islam came to Indonesia after most of the populations have been adhering to Hindu and Buddha through the reign of various kingdoms around the archipelago. That’s why in certain areas like Java, for instance, the influence of Hindu up to now still exist and even being preserved or mixed with the practice of Islam. The review of this complex background is necessary in viewing the problem faced by Indonesia concerning the dispute related with RUU pornography, sharia, pluralism, etc.

So, having such complexities, no wonder it is likely impossible for the plural society of Indonesia to meet an agreement concerning the issues above. Indonesia consists of people from different ethnics, cultures, religions and beliefs. We often read or heard that although Indonesia consists of plural society, religious tolerance is successfully maintained. Somehow, what looks as religious tolerance is actually no more than a mask.

Put it this way, Indonesia is like a big house. Inside the house is a married couple who each has a different religious belief and neither the husband nor the wife would give up his/her belief to follow just one belief. Consequently they always involves in a quarrel. To each of them a belief or faith is a serious matter since it deals with living on the right path in God’s favor and afterlife business where each person will have to account for the deeds done during his/her life. But the pluralist and secularist may view such problem trivially.

The pluralist or secularist may think that there are no such things as afterlife, judgment day, and the like. They may advise the couple to put aside their problem concerning different beliefs and live under the pluralism paradigm and try to relax them by saying that all beliefs and religions are just the same all over the world, that religions are no more than just vehicles to the universal god, etc, etc. In other words, the secular pluralists view that faith or religion is not important in one’s life since it is only a vehicle to the destination. And that destination is god. They want to say that whatever vehicle you take does not matter for after all you will arrive at the same destination. To some extent this analogy is logical if we put it in the context of transportation means in the everyday life, though in certain cases it may not be appropriate. But using such analogy in the context of religion is ridiculous and misleading. Religion is not the same with vehicle. It is more than just a vehicle. The Muslims regard their religion, Islam, as a life guidance issued by Allah and made known through Muhammad, His messenger.

So then, like the case of the married couple above the best solution is separation since the dispute is on a serious matter. They have to choose which one is the most important. Do we prefer to preserve the unity but at the same time we betray our religious faith, sharia, etc. If we choose to unite for the sake of NKRI, pluralism, founding fathers, nationalism, uud-45, then we favor things that are profane and mortal. We’re not going to live forever on this transient planet. We all bound to die. When we die we won’t bring along those profane things called NKRI, pluralism, uud-45, unity in diversity, etc. But we will surely bring our religious faith with us. Moreover, in the afterlife we won’t be asked if obey uud-45, or do we observe pluralism and favor to preserve the so-called NKRI during our life on the earth. But for sure we will be asked if we preserve our religious faith, observe and practice the Islamic guidance, sharia, in our everyday life.

Then why do we bother about profane things that will surely mislead us, make us go astray, and make us deviate from the divine path. Of course, if all this time we seem to preserve ‘a unity in diversity’ and seem to live peacefully, observing the so called ‘pluralism’ – that because we deceive ourselves, and betray our religious faith. What the whole nation hails as ‘unity in diversity’ is actually ‘unity in hypocrisy’. The motto ‘unity in diversity’ itself is paradoxical. How can people of diverse interests be united to form a state? It is fine if they are united for the sake of playing football (e.g. like Manchester United). But Indonesia is not a football club. It is a nation, a state, which is an organized political community under one government.

Then as the dispute goes on, we learn that it is not merely people who are being united but also people with diverse political interest, people with diverse religious interest, and the like. Now we see that it is not a simple thing to do, not to mention impossible. We are grateful that Indonesia doesn’t end up like India where violent conflicts between followers of different religions occur quite often, though there is no guarantee that in the coming future such conflict won’t breakout here. It’s like setting up a time bomb.

:-)
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Iain (not verified) — Fri, 10/17/2008 - 9:57am

Edt, I have lived in Jakarta for 4 years and I have a church 3 blocks away and 3 mosques 1 block, 3 blocks and 4 blocks respectively away from my house. I have never heard a church bell either.

Also, I have been asked by my town chief to keep my Christmas decorations inside my house and I asked my town chief if he could tell me who the other Christians and Catholics were in the complex as I planned to organise a joint Christmas BBQ at my house. Refused. His quote "Sorry, but religion is a sensitive issue in Indonesia".

I can't be that sensitiveIf it is so sensitive, then why does the RT/RW constantly knock on my door trying to collect money for building a 4th mosque? Why are there days of public celebrations in my complex for Islamic events? (That's a rhetoric question) The point is, my town cheif actually meant "Sorry, but different religions to Islam are a sensitive issue in Indonesia"

Edt, what tolerance are you referring to?

Just read the stories in the Jakarta Post to see the intolerance that exists and the lack of help from the police and government officials.

Andy W (not verified) — Thu, 10/16/2008 - 7:06pm

Pluralism? I lived in Indonesia, aka 'the democracy of hypocrisy' for 10 years and not once did I ever hear church bells ring. THAT is how tolerant of other religions the Muslim majority really is.

R.Astari (not verified) — Tue, 10/14/2008 - 2:54pm

Good point, Sf. I'm also utterly sick of these so-called holy saints. We are sexual creatures. Why do we want to deny that fact?

If a guy thinks that my eyes are alluring (although I'm well-dressed in long sleeves!), then does that mean I have two cover my eyes with something? I think that's just stupid. I could easily bump into anything.

Let's just not kid ourselves, ok? The (So-Called) House of Representatives are just practicing another method of corruption & extortion. They are just hypocrites wanting to look like holy saints. Do me a favor, don't fool yourselves.

Ketti (not verified) — Mon, 10/13/2008 - 11:34am

I can find two issues of the existence of porn bill in this article, it could control our freedom to wear the traditional clothes and it could help us to avoid moral damaged. These two issues should be the consideration for making porn bill be received by our society as the good guidance in our social life. Socialization of porn bill would be good solution for government to give its people's feeling of peace and secure. This socialization could also help our society more open-minded but under the control of our faith to each religion. The important thing is how we could get freedom to wear traditional clothes and also how we could keep and maintain our moral forever good.