To Turn the World a Better Place, Religions Need to Be More Secular
These four Indonesian neo-modernist Muslim thinkers think about the other, more essential side of Islam
Those who seek to maintain the status quo are always concerned about the passage of time and the growth of civilizations in the world. Religions and secularism or the elimination of religion in light of reason and science appear to be a perennial discussion.
People anticipate the growing number of atheists. On the world stage in 2010, it came in third place behind Muslims and Christians, with 1.1 billion ‘adherents’. Yet it is projected, that Muslims and Christians are expected to expand quicker in the next decades. Meanwhile, Atheists are predicted to shrink compared to the global population percentages.
Whether it’s the rise of the caliphate and sharia, the resurgence of the Catholic-Orthodox Church in Russia, Trump’s militant Christian supporters, or supernatural evangelists, it shows that religion is here to stay.
Islamophobia was a major concern in Europe and the United States, despite the fact that the influence of religion was declining. Ironically, it became their greatest fear. When it comes to Westerners’ views on Islam, I believe it is the most scrutinized and misinterpreted religion. In the United States, many still view Islam as unfavorable, with Republicans being the most critical of it.
A religion that is often misinterpreted as the source of violence and misogyny.
Yet, there is also the other side to it.
In Islam, as in any other religion, there are many different schools of thought, and most of them aren’t as violent as the West believes them to be. Indonesian neo-modernist Muslims are among those who tout Islam as tolerant and humanitarian.
They are Abdurrahman Wahid— former Indonesia president — Ahmad Wahib, Nurcholish Majid, and Djohan Effendi. Rather than predicting that religion would be wiped out by modernity, they predicted that religion would thrive in the face of modernity.
We may learn from them that religion and secularism should coexist.
Religions are not going anywhere
Ever wonder what the world would look like without religion?
As I see it, the globe would still be in disarray, and social disputes would continue to roil society. Why? Because humans will have to redefine morality as exclusively personal, and this can lead to many different viewpoints, even without religion.
Left and right would still exist. Good and bad, right and wrong, would be defined in a variety of ways, some of which would be contradictory. It would make little to no difference. Except that things could get worse.
According to Jonathan Haidt, the foundation of liberals’ morality is “People can do whatever they want, as long as not harming others”. Yet, morality is more than about happiness and suffering.
Sometimes, just because religion is focused on keeping the social status quo, while the secular focuses on individual freedom, the former is seen as symptoms of fascism, and the latter is seen as peaceful and modern.
To avoid bias, Haidt levels up the playing field by defining morality as:
Moral systems are interlocking sets of values, practices, institutions, and evolved psychological mechanisms that work together to suppress or regulate selfishness and make social life possible.
By using this term, Haidt distinguishes between the liberal and conservative morality views as contractual and beehive, respectively. Individuals and the creation of a free and safe society are the emphasis of the contractual approach. As a result of beehive’s concentration on societal issues, it seeks to establish a society that is safe but without total freedom.
However, those that place a greater emphasis on society will be more inclined to spend the time to help those around them. Donations of money or blood will be more common among religiously conservative people. First to help and donate to persons or countries in need — usually the victims of natural disasters — is the Islamic United Front (FPI), an Indonesian religious conservative militant group.
Religious conservatives worried more about their children’s lives and education. Leftist Kurt Vonnegut sympathized with conservative mums who didn’t want their children to read Slaughterhouse-Five because it depicted misery. To him, the First Amendment and the people who bully conservatives in the name of free speech are ironic.
Religious people are also stated to be “extremely happy” more than their non-religious counterparts when it comes to happiness, purpose in life, and life satisfaction. As a result of their contentment and lack of curiosity, religious conservatives tend to find life more rewarding and meaningful.
Indonesia, the world’s largest Muslim country, is where I call home. I see those that are religious do many meaningful things with their community and the most important thing is that they have an ultimate purpose that equips people with the conviction to navigate this complex world with a sense of acceptance and surety. This is what atheists might struggle with.
It’s true that religion can cause problems in a secular society at times. But the four horsemen of neo-modernist Muslims are here to bring a clear message to both sides: the religious/secular division must end.
Religion isn’t always occupied by deluded sheep; there are some who desire to make the world a better place. For some, religions must coexist with secularity and modernity to keep up with the challenge of time.
Religion should have a healthy dose of secularity
According to Nurcholish, religion is a blend of two elements: empirical (which deal with earthly concerns and usually apply to society) and supra-empirical (which deal with holiness and God’s transcendence). Religion would be nothing more than an ideology without these two.
The emergence of civilization, capitalism, and industrialization raises the prospect of religions becoming obsolete. With scientific and technical growth, modernity will question religion’s supra-empirical essence. Meanwhile, capitalism and industrialization may put someone’s faith and intimate relationships with God in jeopardy.
But the one that poses the greatest threat to religions in the face of modernity is that it causes them to become more introverted, restrictive, and stubborn in their professed traditions. They become stale.
Already in the 1970s, he advocated — going against the mainstream — that religions need to keep up and be more secular.
Let’s start with the freedom to think
Humans, according to God, are caliphs, or rulers on earth. God created us in accordance with the best visions and shapes. We were armed with the most potent and one-of-a-kind weaponry, namely the ability to imagine and think critically.
Ahmad Wahib, religious yet critical of God, said that because God gave us the ability to reason, it would be an insult to Him to accept what He ordered without additional thoughts of its applicability to the world around us.
It does not imply unrestricted freedom of thought, but rather the freedom to arrive at the truth and substance of the Holy Koran or any of the scriptures of any religion.
On the other hand, Nurcholish argues that the Koran is not meant to be adopted instantly, but rather as a revelation that is interdependent on reason. A deeper meaning can’t be grasped by reason alone and revelation alone will lead to misunderstandings. Analyzing the context and how it will be applied to the world around us is the sort of thinking that is acceptable. No passage is overlooked and blindly obeyed.
For them, rationality and faith go hand in hand to avoid theological incorrectness. It is a situation in which religious people believe or act opposite of what God tells them to do, such as being intolerant and murderous. To avoid this, the only way to grasp religions’ essences is through deliberate thinking.
What are sacred needs to be desacralized
Omar Ibn Khattab, one of Prophet Muhammad’s chief counselors, went against the Koran once during his rule as the second Rashidun caliph in 634 CE. The Koran lays forth the guidelines for the division of spoils of war and land pillaging in verse 8:41. Omar, seeing the potential for turmoil and wasting valuable, cultivated land, decided to prohibit the land from being distributed as spoils of war.
Similarly, Nurcholish questioned the Koran 4:11, which states that women should get 50% less of their deceased parents’ inheritance than males in the same household. He contended that males were the breadwinners back then. However, there is a growing phenomenon in which males are becoming househusbands and more women are becoming breadwinners.
The two examples above demonstrate that the Koran is inextricably linked to cultural circumstances and real-world progress. Most significantly, the Koran distinguishes between rules dealing with social issues and laws dealing with God’s transcendence, such as mandatory five-times-a-day prayer or belief in a single God.
When it comes to the Koran, Wahib and Nurcholish believe that Indonesian Muslims take it too literally. Our understanding of the Koran and Muhammad depends on contextual ijtihad or independent thinking in Islam on social issues, says Wahib. In other words, when times and circumstances change, so must the interpretations of God’s commandments, while yet maintaining the basic and intrinsic principles of Islam.
It is nearly hard to separate the mosque from the state in Islam. Not that a theocratic government is required, but Islam is a religion that extends beyond spiritual and interpersonal relationships with God. It mostly addresses the concerns of the Muslim community and the broader public.
Separating the mosque and the state, according to Nurcholish, would convert Islam into secularism. Putting everything in the hands of a secular authority renders faiths useless. Secularization is what is required.
Secularization implies that what belongs in the worldly sphere does not need to be labeled as forbidden or sacred. Only God may be awarded such position. When you are going to convert to Islam, you should recite the shahada, which is a profession of faith that encapsulates the idea of tawhid. This means that God is the one and the only thing that is omnipotent and divine. To appoint His creations as divine is to deny His oneness.
Nurcholish differentiates Islam from animism which asserted that everything in the world is a vessel to divine spirits. Without desacralization, we tend to accept worldly and mutable things as something that shouldn’t be reformed or scrutinized. Hence, there would be no progress in the world for the betterment of human conditions. The worst-case scenario is that lethal customs such as female genital mutilation or infanticide are seen as sacred and should be preserved.
The sacralization of human laws and societal problems will impede society’s rationality and general advancement. Religion will never bring about peace, tolerance, or make life easier. Its adherents will continue to be literal and misinterpret religious ideals since everything, without exception, is a holy word of God.
Religion that is tolerant in a plural civil society
Horizontal conflicts are unavoidable in a pluralistic society like Indonesia. There were numerous murderous and non-bloody conflicts caused by differences in race, religion, and ideology. Furthermore, Indonesia is a religious country. The designation of the largest Muslim country necessitates ongoing rebalancing and upkeep between the majority and the minority.
This is a completely different world from the secular West. Here in the East, where religion is inseparable from everyday life, where the people prefer to be guided by it. We must determine whether a thing is halal or haram (forbidden). We must decide whether or not sexual assault rules are feasible. When religious people believe it fosters unrestricted sex, while secular people believe it is a measure to safeguard women. In a country like this, religion is really essential.
Abdurrahman Wahid — Indonesia’s fourth president — aims to realize the situation of a plural and democratic civil society through tolerance. He lamented the sectarian sentiments in the form of exclusionary Islamic political parties. The essence of Islam is to treat other people with different backgrounds as brothers and sisters with no discrimination and ill-will.
Djohan also aims that society, mainly Indonesians should have mutual respect toward other religions. The freedom of religion and the goodwill of Muslims toward society is mirrored in Wahid’s policy in 2006 to recognize Confucianism as one of the six official religions in Indonesia. During the New Order, it was banned because Soeharto thought it was a communist-atheist religion.
What has become a goal for these four neo-modernist philosophers was previously accomplished during Prophet Muhammad’s time as the leader of the Muslim community in the Arab world.
Medina Charter: Religion as the basis of a just governance
You could imagine Medina in the 600’s was like New York or Indonesia today. It is a melting pot of tens of tribes from many ethnicities and religions, including Arabs, Pagans, Jews, and Christians. Medina, in contrast to the scenario in modern states today, was riddled with inter-tribal conflict.
With rising tension and persecution from the pagans in Mecca, Prophet Muhammad was forced to flee to Medina, formerly known as Yathrib. Seeing Medina ripped apart by ethnic strife, the Prophet drafted the Medina Charter, the world’s first constitution.
The Prophet then assembled the Muslims, Pagans, Christians, and Jews to discuss terms to long-term peace. The first part of the article contains the terms for Muslims, while the second focused on the Jewish community. Those who believe in one God are considered as ‘believers’.
He aimed to integrate minorities with majorities, just as in Article 37 which stated that Muslims and Jews:
Must seek mutual advice and consultation, and loyalty is a protection against treachery
Focusing on community and trust-building, the Charter contained three main themes:
Unity of a nation
Prophet Muhammad turned a fragmented community into united city-states. In Article 1 of the Medina Charter, it is written that:
They form one nation — ummah. Believers are all friends to each other to the exclusion of all others.
Just as today, the Prophet re-formulated state boundaries to exclude other countries. As a result of this unification, the people who live within it become citizens of the same city-state. So, regardless of tribe or faith, we have a duty to defend each other. According to Article 25–35 of the Koran, Jews and Muslims should unite as a community and support each other in the event of an attack from the outside.
Equality of rights before the law
After the Medina Charter, disagreements between competing parties would no longer be sent to a more powerful individual in each tribe. But instead of God and Muhammad as the superior authority and impartial mediators, the people must refer to the stipulations of the Medina Charter.
He forbade family and friends from helping anyone who had disobeyed the law. By doing so, he switched the focus from individual decisions in the tribal age to the concerns of the community, therefore bringing more equality to the system. Death penalty for murder was substituted in the place of blood money to make it fairer.
Religious freedom
In the Medina Charter, everyone had the freedom to practice their own religion. I think I just need one quote to illustrate it:
And the Jews of Bani ‘Auf shall be considered as one political community (Ummah) along with the believers — for the Jews their religion, and for the Muslims theirs, be one client or patron. He, however, who is guilty of oppression or breach of treaty, shall suffer the resultant trouble as also his family, but no one besides.
Last but not least
People fear that religions may perish in the face of a scientific and technological renaissance. Yet, religion bounced back. Although with a harsher reinterpretation or ‘misinterpretations’ of their own teachings.
But religions can mobilize a huge swath of people at once. It can bring personal and communal satisfaction and a good way of life if practiced correctly.
Also, religious people are not as some believed it to be, a mass of deluded sheep. There are people who based their actions and intelligence on what religion has ordained. It can turn for better or worse.
The four neo-modernist Muslim thinkers then feel that religion is essential. It should not be the one that is abolished. What should disappear is the way people cling to religion in a traditional, outdated, and dangerous kind of way. They set forth trying to secularize religion.
It started with the freedom to think critically about the verses in the holy book, then to treat society and God’s creations as something mundane to be molded according to collective long-term goals. They hope that it will lead to a just and democratic society, which was done by Muhammad through His Medina Charter a long time ago.
