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Date: Sun, 11 Jan 1998 11:18:51 -0700 (MST)
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Subject: [INDONESIA-L] SMH - Islam's New Bastion
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Saturday, January 10, 1998, Sydney Morning Herald
Islam's new bastion
As Indonesia wrestles with its worst economic crisis in
30 years, a wave of religious fervour is fuelling anti-Christian,
anti-Chineese and anti-Western sentiment. DAVID JENKINS reports on
the likely fallout.
Article 18: Whosoever commits adultery shall be punished by being:
1) Stoned to death.
2) Given 100 lashes.
Article 21 (1) He who commits robbery [shall be punished by]:
1) Death by crucifixion.
2) Death in the normal fashion.
3) Cutting off the right hand and left foot.
WHEN Muslim fundamentalists met in the mountains of West Java in
1948 to proclaim an "Islamic State of Indonesia", they introduced
a penal code that drew heavily on Koranic law and left no doubt
about their religious and social orientation.
Indonesia was to be a negara Islam (Islamic State) in which all
senior civilian and military positions would be reserved for
devout Muslims. A jihad (holy war) was to be carried out until the
Dutch colonialists were expelled and until "the laws of Islam are
[operating] in all perfectness throughout [the country]".
The intolerance and ferocity of the so-called Darul Islam (House
of Islam) movement, which spread in varying degrees to most Muslim
areas of the nation, claiming an estimated 25,000 lives before it
was suppressed in 1962, left an abiding distaste for
fundamentalism in Indonesia, which had rejected arguments for an
Islamic State when the Constitution was drawn up in 1945.
That fear of religious fundamentalism remains as strong as ever.
But today, 30 years after President Soeharto came to power,
something new and very significant is happening in the world's
most populous Muslim nation.
Islam, long sidelined by Soeharto's army-backed government, is on
the march, to the beating of mosque drums and the waving of green
flags.
It is winning millions of newly devout adherents in mushrooming
urban centres like Jakarta and Surabaya. It is making inroads in
the densely populated heartland of Java.
Islamic leaders are in no position to oust President Soeharto. You
would have to be a lieutenant general, at least, to have any
chance of doing that and the army has given no sign that it is
about to withdraw its support for the nation's embattled leader.
But Soeharto, having played the Islamic card for his own ends, now
finds himself confronted by disenchanted leaders who have the
power to sway the Muslim masses, a dangerous development at a time
of mounting social, economic and political crisis.
More than 87per cent of Indonesia's 202million people are Sunni
Muslims. But on Java, distinctions have traditionally been made
between two main social-cultural groups - the pious or orthodox
Muslims (santri) and the more numerous abangan, who follow a
syncretic Javanese religion that includes many pre-Islamic
practices.
As a new wave of Islam washes over East and Central Java, where as
many as two-thirds of the population has been seen as abangan and,
as such, deeply wary of "purer" varieties of Islam, some key
assumptions about Indonesian society are being called into
question.
NO-ONE can miss the strong Islamic wind blowing across Indonesia.
New mosques are going up everywhere, each topped with a glistening
silver dome, a crescent symbol of Islam and a powerful public
address system.
Mushollas (prayer houses) are being established in city office
blocks, in government ministries and along highways. University
mosque groups are running successful Islamic outreach programs.
In high schools, many girls now wear the jilbab, or Islamic shawl,
a practice outlawed until seven years ago, when the Government
gave in to rising popular pressure. So, too, do many older women,
including Siti Hardiyanti Rukmana, known as Tutut, Soeharto's
eldest daughter. More and more people are making the haj
pilgrimage to Mecca. Others are setting off on the umroh, or
"smaller haj", which is usually made in the non-haj season,
omitting some of the ritual.
Christians have all but disappeared at the upper levels of the
Indonesian Army, where there is a renewed emphasis on Islam,
although partly, it is true, for tactical and career reasons.
Above all, there is a new willingness to identify with Islam,
especially in the bureaucracy and among the urban middle class.
Indonesians who only a few years ago would have been reticent
about proclaiming themselves Muslims are proud to stand up and be
counted.
They pray five times a day. They observe the fast. They turn up in
ever-growing numbers at the huge prayer rallies that are held in
the big towns and cities at Lebaran, the day of celebration at the
end of the Muslim fasting month.
On Fridays, the mosques are full to overflowing. In cities such as
Jakarta, many worshippers are businessmen, arriving from their
offices in white shirts and ties. In the past, people such as
these were seldom seen at the mosque. This has all happened in the
space of 20 years, confounding many in the older generation.
"There has been an erosion of the abangan position," says a
lecturer at the prestigious Gajah Mada University in Yogyakarta,
once a stronghold of abangan sentiment. "Many people are mystified
by the zeal and orthodoxy of their young."
Nor is eclipse of Javanese religion necessarily a temporary
phenomenon. "I don't see this as a pendulum," says the lecturer,
"but as a long-term trend." A university colleague, sitting
nearby, endorses that view. These days, he says, the once-dominant
nominal Muslims feel a bit demoralised. "They feel that their time
of glory has gone."
WHAT is behind the Islamic revival in Indonesia? In part, it is
driven by a search for spiritual moorings amid the turbulence
engendered by rapid social and economic change. Islam, like the
other great religions, offers a reassuring system of values and
beliefs. The mosque offers a sense of community, as well as many
ancillary social services.
There is a sense that Islam provides a bulwark against a tide of
modernisation that sometimes seems to be swamping the country.
Under the late President Sukarno, Indonesia was renowned for its
prickly, sometimes self-destructive, nationalism. That is a thing
of the past.
"The bangsa [nation] no longer has the appeal that the umat
[Islamic community] does," says a Western political scientist who
has monitored developments in Indonesia since the 1950s. "August
17 [national day] means nothing. It's not spirit-charged as it
once was. In Indonesia, as in Egypt, Turkey and Iran, nationalism,
like socialism, is seen to have failed."
That said, nationalism may be reappearing in a different guise. At
one level, says this source, nationalism has lost its appeal. At
another level, nationalism is reviving under Islamic auspices.
Finally, the deepening sense of Islamisation is driven by
political factors. In recent years, Soeharto has gone out of his
way to get the modernist urban Muslims on side, if only to
compensate for an erosion in support in the armed forces, his
power base since 1965.
Those overtures have been welcomed in Islamic circles.
"[The identification with Islam has] always been there," says
Rosihan Anwar, a retired editor and publisher. "But once they feel
that encouragement has been given to practise their religion, they
all come streaming back."
If this were simply a matter of people seeking spiritual moorings
at a time of profound change it might not excite much comment.
There is concern, however, that heightened fervour in the Islamic
community is beginning to threaten Indonesia's precarious
religious and racial balance, a disturbing prospect for the
minority Christian and Chinese, who have long been the object of
envy and resentment in Muslim circles.
In June 1996, Muslims rampaged through the streets of Surabaya,
Indonesia's second city, destroying 12 Christian churches. The
army did nothing. No-one was arrested.
That sent a dangerous signal to those with an interest in stirring
up trouble. In the Islamic "horseshoe" of East Java - a U-shaped
region that takes in the staunchly Muslim island of Madura and the
nearby mainland - word spread that it was open season on
Christians. In October 1996, 3,000 Muslims took to the streets in
the East Java town of Situbondo, setting fire to 25 churches in a
single day after a man was charged with making disparaging
comments about Islam. Five people, including a priest, died in a
blazing church.
The violence continued last year, with riots in East, Central and
West Java.
This week, as the Government grappled with the nation's worst
economic crisis in 30 years, thousands of Muslims went on a
violent rampage in East Java, protesting against brothels and
stalls selling alcohol during Ramadan. Two policemen were wounded
by machetes. In Bandung, West Java, 1,200 riot police were
deployed after evicted stall-holders ran wild, hurling rocks
through the windows of supermarkets owned by ethnic Chinese.
Each of these riots was sparked by a particular incident. But in
each case, the rioters vented their fury on Chinese and/or
Christian targets.
"At the grassroots, Christian-Muslim relations are quite bad,"
says an analyst in Jakarta. "All the riots [in 1996] ended up with
churches and church-run homes for the elderly being burnt. Every
Lebaran there are more and more incidents occurring."
This is something that disturbs many Indonesians.
"I'm very concerned," says Dr Mely Tan, head of the research
institute at the Atma Jaya Catholic University in Jakarta. "I
think we have gotten away from this whole idea of unity, where we
were all one despite the differences in ethnicity, despite the
differences in religions, despite differences in world view."
All of a sudden, Tan says, minority groups have become fair game.
"In the last year we have had a number of incidents that make you
really sit up and wonder what is happening. Wherever there is
unrest, the Chinese are the easiest target. They are visible, they
are vulnerable and they're powerless. They won't hit back and
nobody will defend them."
The situation is becoming serious. According to an expert in
criminal law at Airlangga University in Surabaya, no fewer than
300 churches have been put to the torch in the past decade, mostly
in Java.
"There is this pent-up frustration in society, a deep resentment
towards the Chinese," says a source in Central Java.
"A lot of people are banging the anti-Chinese, anti-Western,
anti-Christian drum. People say, "We have been stupid. We have let
the Chinese take over [the economy].' There is great concern among
the Christians. In Situbondo, Muslims have an internal dispute and
what do they do? They burn down Christian churches."
Nor is that the end of it. In the highly charged atmosphere that
characterises political discourse in Indonesia, conspiracy
theories abound. It is claimed that the army gave the Situbondo
rioters a wink and a nod. It is said that Islamic modernists
instigated riots in Tasikmalaya to discredit Islamic
traditionalists, their long-time rivals.
Indonesians take great pride in national tolerance. For the
moment, however, tolerance is under strain, trust in short supply.
And the worst may be yet to come.
Indonesia is yet to feel the full impact of a currency crisis that
has triggered the third-biggest International Monetary Fund
bailout in history.
The nation is bracing for corporate bankruptcies, loan defaults,
mergers, further job losses, food shortages, price increases and
higher inflation.
Even in good years, Lebaran has been a time of labour unrest, with
some companies seeking to avoid paying year-end bonuses to their
workers. This year, many companies will simply not be able to pay.
To make matters worse, the country is suffering from the effects
of a prolonged El Nin~o-induced drought.
Then there's the President's health. At 76, Soeharto is suddenly
looking old and tired. He is suffering from fatigue, stress, high
blood pressure, kidney problems and a leaking heart valve. He may
have had a minor stroke.
Until recently, it was widely believed that Soeharto would seek a
seventh five-year term from the rubber-stamp People's Consultative
Congress when it convenes in March. Suddenly, all bets are off. It
is mid-afternoon at a modern, nondescript office in central
Jakarta. The retired general, a Javanese Christian, is pouring
coffee from a stainless steel jug and reflecting on the
significance of a nationwide resurgence in Islam.
On the wall behind him is a sepia-toned photograph of Soeharto
with key political officers from his inner circle, taken in the
early days of the New Order when political Islam was viewed with
the deepest suspicion, something to be kept strictly in check.
Soeharto is smiling his broad, enigmatic smile.
"It's difficult to say [how important this Islamic phenomena is],"
the general is saying. "I would look at it as just the mood of the
day. To become Islam. To show that you are Islam and all that.
While I think that more than half of these people, if you asked
them to pray, to use the right words, they don't know [how to do]
it ... They say [everything] in Arabic. But if you ask them to
translate it, they don't know how."
There may be something in that. For some women, the decision to
dress in the Islamic manner may be no more than a fashion
statement. Islamic dress has become de rigueur. An escort agency
in Malang, East Java, is said to provide its clients with young
women dressed demurely in the jilbab. But there is much more to it
than fashion. "I talk to a number of students, friends of my
grand-daughter," says Rosihan Anwar, receiving a guest before
setting off for Friday morning prayers. "They say, "We would like
to show our [Islamic] identity. It is nice to be different from
the rest. Our religious teacher says you must cover yourself, so
we do that. And by doing that we show our identity.' Which, to me,
is a good explanation. But if you ask them, "Do you want to be
like the Taliban in Afghanistan, women completely covered, [girls]
not allowed to go to school?', I don't think they like that. I
think they reject that."
In short, many Indonesians find the "new" Islam more attractive
and user-friendly than the "old" Islam, which was seen by some as
unnecessarily stern, even severe. That may go for the President
too.
When Soeharto came to power, he seemed the personification of
Agama Jawa, or Javanese religion, seeking the guidance of
dukuns(shamans), consulting primbons(Javanese manuals of
divination), meditating overnight on mist-shrouded volcanoes in
Central Java. He was, of course, a Muslim. But as with many
Javanese, the Islamic veneer did not seem especially deep. Today,
the leader of the world's most populous Muslim nation gives every
sign of being a devout Muslim.
He has made the pilgrimage to
Mecca. He prays five times a day. He meets regularly with learned
scholars to discuss the finer points of Islamic doctrine.
At public gatherings, he prefaces his remarks with an Arabic
salutation: "Assalamu' alaikum wa rahmatullahi wa baratatuh." "May
peace be with you, and the blessing and grace of God."
In short, the President seems to have come full circle in his
religious beliefs. Or has he?
"Soeharto is a smart guy," says Rosihan Anwar. "He's a fox, an old
fox. He just looks. "Do I have to play the Islam card?' He plays
it. That means he must go on the haj and he is doing that. That's
no problem. As long as he's in power."
For most of the New Order period, the modernist stream of
political Islam was viewed with misgivings, especially in the
army, where a secular nationalist ethos prevailed and where a
significant number of senior officers were from either a Christian
or Central Javanese abangan background. In the words of the late
Mohammad Natsir, a former prime minister and prominent Islamic
modernist, "they have treated us like cats with ringworm".
DURING his first two decades in power, Soeharto made a sustained
attempt to neutralise political Islam. He refused to permit the
reappearance of Masyumi, the modernist political party, allowing
instead only a tame alternative. He pushed in 1973 for a secular
marriage bill that was anathema to modernists and traditionalists,
backing off only when confronted by threats of nationwide unrest.
He sought in 1978 to give Javanese mysticism (kepercayaan) the
same status as religion.
He stripped the state-sponsored "Islamic" political party of its
highly potent electoral symbol, the black cubist Ka'bahshrine at
Mecca. He insisted that all three political parties accept the
state ideology, Pancasila, as their sole principle, a bitter pill
for many Muslims, for whom Islam is the only possible sole
principle. He gave preferment in the armed forces to Christian and
abangan officers.
But as Robert Hefner of Boston University pointed out in an
illuminating 1993 paper, it did not follow that New Order
restrictions on political Islam - "that is, on the Islamic parties
that aimed to capture the reins of government" - meant that the
Government was opposed to "cultural" or "civil" Islam, or Islam as
a source of ethical and cultural guidance.
On the contrary, the Soeharto Government provided graphic evidence
that it was willing to support cultural Islamic programs. For a
start, it allocated large sums for higher Islamic education. Under
Soeharto, State Islamic Institutes sprang up everywhere, turning
out graduates trained in Islamic theology, law and arts. It also
allocated large sums for the construction of mosques, prayer halls
and Islamic schools. In Central Java alone, the number of mosques
almost doubled in the 12 years to 1992, from 15,700 to 28,700.
These programs came at a time of far-reaching change in the
Islamic community. Faced with continuing government restrictions
on political activity, Hefner noted, many young Muslim
intellectuals "distanced themselves from mass politics in favour
of a new strategy of Islamic revitalisation", especially in the
fields of education and social work. One result of this was that
large numbers of devout Muslims began entering the bureaucracy,
"where they quietly laboured to promote Muslim interests".
SOEHARTO, a politician of astuteness and high watchfulness, was
well aware of these broad social trends; he also saw an
opportunity to advance his own interests. Bolstered by his success
in persuading Muslim groups to accept Pancasila - and not Islam -
as their sole ideological foundation, and feeling in need of a new
political ally to compensate for an erosion of support in the
armed forces, the President began making overtures to Muslims.
Starting in the late 1980s, those initiatives came in quick
succession. Soeharto approved an education law that made religious
instruction compulsory in all public schools. He introduced a law
clarifying and reaffirming the independence of religious courts
and their equality with civil courts. He reversed a ban on Muslim
schoolgirls wearing the jilbab. He backed the establishment of an
Islamic bank. He went on the pilgrimage to Mecca, dressed in the
flowing white robes of a haji and taking the additional name
Muhammad. Most important of all, the President gave his blessing
to the establishment of the Indonesian Association of Muslim
Intellectuals (ICMI), a body headed by the Minister for Research
and Technology, Dr B.J. Habibie, a Soeharto protégé. In 25 years
of New Order politics there had never been anything quite like
ICMI. The association brought together not just trusted cabinet
ministers and senior officials but also a number of Islamic
intellectuals who had been outspoken critics of the Soeharto
Government.
One such figure was Dr Imaduddin Abdulrahim, head of an Islamic
outreach program at the sometimes volatile Bandung Institute of
Technology (ITB). Imaduddin, who was detained after the army
opened fire on Muslims in the crowded Jakarta dock area in 1984,
was once described by a leading general as "the most dangerous man
in Indonesia".
ICMI had its own newspaper, Republika. It had its own think tank,
CIDES. As one analyst puts it, "the idea was to bring in
non-participating Muslims".
SOEHARTO'S gesture of reconciliation was welcomed in modernist
circles. "Muslims can now participate actively in the debate in
Indonesian society - on the economy, on technology, on politics,
on development issues and on the question of succession," Dr Nasir
Tamara, a senior editor at Republika, said in 1994. "This is
important. The Muslims feel secure. When the Muslims feel secure,
they are not going to throw bombs. [Without this] you will have a
Hamas-type [reaction] against anything that is considered Western.
Now we have CIDES. Now we have Republika. In the past, when [the
generals] Ali Moertopo and Benny Moerdani were there, there was no
way Soeharto would have done this."
A persuasive case can be made in support of the proposition that
Indonesian Muslims - often characterised as a majority with a
minority mentality - had been pushed too far to the periphery. But
Soeharto's decision to play the Muslim card was hardly risk-free.
One problem was that ICMI became a vehicle for modernist Islam. It
had the support of Muhammadiyah, the largest modernist
organisation in Indonesia, with 25million members. It had the
support of independent Muslim intellectuals. That sharpened the
divide between the urban modernists and the rural-based
conservatives in Nahdatul Ulama (NU), Indonesia's largest
religious body, with about 34million members.
Worse still, as many Indonesians saw it, the creation of ICMI
sharpened religious and ethnic tensions.
According to Mely Tan, Indonesian society is becoming polarised:
"It started with ICMI, which is a very exclusive group. There is
nothing wrong with people showing their religious identity. But in
a pluralist society there should continue to be respect for other
religions ... Why should the Muslims be in a group? After all,
90per cent of the population is Muslim anyway." If ICMI gave
non-participating modernist Muslims a sense that they were at last
getting their place in the sun, the President was careful to cover
his bets. ICMI was organised along familiar corporatist lines,
which made it responsive to the presidential will. It was headed
by a man whose political career was entirely dependent on his
relationship with Soeharto. Its membership was weighted heavily in
favour of bureaucrats.
Despite those constraints, many modernist Muslims believed that
ICMI presented them with an opportunity to promote their interests
from within the system, an appealing thought, not least for
marginalised intellectuals such as Imaduddin, who had experienced
years of harassment by the army and police. But "acceptance" came
at a price. Before, says a source in Jakarta, people such as
Imaduddin were opposition figures. "The New Order has done its
thing and co-opted more people. True, it has now pushed them out
again. But they are now compromised and can't become radicals
again."
Today, seven years after its formation, ICMI is in some disarray.
Soeharto was not amused when Amien Rais, chairman of Muhammadiyah
and a powerful voice in ICMI, lashed out at his government's
foreign investment policies. Soon afterwards, Rais was forced out
of ICMI.
He has not gone quietly. At a gathering in Jakarta on December 28,
during which Muslim intellectuals rejected a seventh term for
Soeharto and supported the improbable notion of Rais standing as
an alternative candidate, the Muhammadiyah leader accused Soeharto
of fostering "corruption, collusion, nepotism, greed and moral
degeneration".
To make matters worse, Abdurrahman Wahid, the leader of
Indonesia's conservative Muslims, is letting it be known that he
"understands", if not supports, Rais's position. This is an
unwelcome development. A rapprochement between the traditionally
disputatious urban and rural wings of Indonesian Islam - which
between them claim the support of nearly 60million people - is the
last thing the Government wants. As it happens, the two main
Islamic groupings have merely papered over their deep-seated
differences. In the opinion of Abdurrahman Wahid, Soeharto gave
the modernists too much leeway during the 1990s, unleashing
dangerous forces.
"There are still two orientations within the Islamic movement,"
says Wahid, an engaging, seriously overweight man who perches on
the edge of a sofa at NU headquarters, tilting his head crookedly
to make the most of his rapidly diminishing eyesight. "One type is
the NU, which likes this idea of having a modern Indonesian
society in which the Muslims can implement the teachings of their
religion voluntarily, not monitored by the state and controlled by
the state, not promoted by the state. The less the state involves
itself in religious matters, the better.
"But there are still people like Amien Rais, like Imaduddin
Abdulrahim from ICMI, who demand that Indonesia should develop
into a Muslim society. Not an Islamic state but a Muslim society
in which Islamic teachings are implemented by the society. That
means the society has to be helped by the state [with] more and
more legislation of syariah [Islamic law] teachings."
For the Government, meanwhile, the spectre of political Islam is
anything but dead and buried. The President may have been able to
engineer the ouster of Megawati Sukarnoputri, the daughter of
Indonesia's first president, as leader of the minority Indonesian
Democratic Party (PDI) ahead of last May's general election. But
that ploy backfired badly when many of Megawati's supporters
linked up with members of the Muslim-backed United Development
Party. At noisy, sometimes violent, campaign rallies, ordinary
people mocked the Government and its works. In 1996, says
Professor Arief Budiman, a former Indonesian student leader who is
head of Indonesian studies at Melbourne University, "it was all
Megawati against the Government. It was Sukarnoism versus
Soehartoism. Without the PDI, it is Islam against the Government.
That creates a new dynamic. The perception is that this Government
is against Islam. And that's dangerous."
AS these events unfold, some Indonesians play down the
significance of the "Islamisation" of Indonesian - and more
particularly Javanese - society.
The religious pendulum may have swung towards Islam in recent
years, they say. But it is now swinging back again. "It has not
yet reached the middle," says a Christian intellectual from
Central Java, "but it is going [in that direction]."
Asked how the nominal Javanese Muslims felt about Islamic
revivalism, this source says, "There are no abangan any more."
Where have they gone? "Well, they are following the abangan
tactics as usual. They will take it [a greater emphasis on Islam]
if they have to take it. Because they never believe it actually
wholeheartedly. But they will happily comply with the ritual and
the formalities."
In this view, nominal Muslims are simply swimming with the tide,
following Islamic procedures when there is no real cost in doing
so, as is the case with the marriage ceremony, rejecting Islamic
injunctions when these are inconvenient, as they are on matters of
inheritance law, an area in which Islam treats women unequally.
"On inheritance, you can follow the Muslim or the non-Muslim law,"
says this source. "By following the latter, it actually means you
are undermining the [Islamic law]."
WHAT changes do Indonesia's modernists want? At the elite level,
people are calling for the reform of the Government and its
institutions. One demand is for "proportionalism" - making sure
that Muslims are adequately represented in the bureaucracy and in
the state universities. That has created a good deal of hostility
among minorities, who have seen opportunities closed off in those
institutions.
Another centres on the need to establish a more "correct" balance
between pribumi (indigenous) and non-pribumi (ethnic Chinese)
interests. This is an area in which complex economic, ethnic and
religious strands become intertwined.
Although ethnic Chinese account for less than 4per cent of the
population, they control an estimated 70per cent of the private
wealth. That many Chinese are also Christians does nothing to
assuage the resentment felt by many poorer Indonesians. For some
Muslims, it would be enough were the Government to promise to
provide more help for small and medium indigenous enterprises.
Others insist that Indonesia will never come to terms with
deep-seated economic and ethnic inequality until it introduces
affirmative action along the lines of Malaysia's New Economic
Policy. Such a thought alarms the big ethnic Chinese
conglomerates.
At the grassroots, Muslims express concern about more
down-to-earth issues, including "Christianisation", especially the
offers made to young Muslims of education and scholarships at
Christian schools.
For the moment, however, much of the discussion about longer-term
reform has been put on the back-burner. Indonesians want to know
how the Government plans to rebuild an economy that has fallen in
a heap. They are not getting many convincing answers, and if the
comments of the Muhammadiyah leader, Amien Rais, are anything to
go by, patience and moderation are in increasingly short supply.
David Jenkins is the Herald's Asia Editor.