Prospek Hubungan Antaragama di Arab Saudi dan Indonesia Sumanto Al Qurtuby ;  Direktur Nusantara Institute, Staf pengajar di King Fahd University of Petroleum & Minerals, Arab Saudi

KOMPAS, 4 Agustus 2021

 

 

                                                           

Di saat Indonesia sedang mengalami ujian dan tantangan serius mengenai pembangunan relasi antar dan intraumat beragama belakangan ini, Arab Saudi justru menunjukkan perkembangan menarik dan menggembirakan yang patut diapresiasi.   Ujian dan tantangan serius terkait pembangunan relasi antar dan intraumat beragama di Indonesia itu sendiri menyeruak akibat munculnya gelombang kelompok militan-konservatif agama dan elite sektarian, sejak tumbangnya Orde Baru.   Selama ini, oleh masyarakat dan lembaga internasional (misalnya, "International Religious Freedom Report" yang dikeluarkan secara berkala oleh Pemerintah Amerika Serikat), negara-kerajaan terbesar dan adidaya di kawasan Teluk dan Arab Timur Tengah ini dinilai negatif dan sangat buruk dalam hal pembangunan relasi dan dialog antar dan intraumat beragama. Mereka juga dinilai buruk dalam hal perlakuan terhadap kelompok minoritas agama, termasuk minoritas Muslim, misalnya warga Syiah. Meskipun, realitasnya tidak selalu demikian.   Buruknya penilaian masyarakat internasional itu didasari sejumlah hal. Misalnya, di kawasan Timur Tengah, Arab Saudi adalah satu-satunya negara yang tidak membolehkan pembangunan tempat-tempat ibadah non-Muslim. Kebebasan ekspresi beragama atau merayakan ritual agama di ruang publik bagi masyarakat non-Muslim sangat dibatasi dan dikenakan sanksi berat (dipenjara atau dideportasi) jika ada pelanggaran.   Padahal, populasi masyarakat non-Muslim cukup besar di Arab Saudi. Mereka adalah para ekspatriat atau warga imigran yang bekerja di berbagai sektor, kebanyakan di sektor “ekonomi informal”. Tercatat lebih dari 33 persen dari total jumlah penduduk di Arab Saudi adalah warga migran. Mereka datang dari berbagai negara di Afrika, Asia (khususnya Asia Selatan dan Asia Tenggara), atau Timur Tengah sendiri.   Dari segi agama, para pekerja migran ini sangat plural bukan hanya Muslim saja, tetapi juga Protestan, Katolik, Hindu dan lainnya. Menurut estimasi Global Religious Futures Project, diperkirakan ada lebih dari 1,4 juta umat Kristiani yang berasal dari berbagai negara: Lebanon, Mesir, Filipina, Suriah, atau negara-negara di Afrika. Ada juga umat Kristiani dari negara-negara Barat yang bekerja sebagai tenaga profesional.   Karena tidak ada bangunan tempat ibadah khusus, mereka menjalankan ritual peribadatan di rumah masing-masing atau di Bahrain, negara tetangga dekat Arab Saudi di ujung timur yang bisa ditempuh dengan perjalanan darat.   Penting untuk diketahui, meskipun tidak ada bangunan fisik tempat ibadah non-Muslim serta pelarangan pelaksanaan ibadah di tempat-tempat umum, bukan berarti Arab Saudi “apati” dan tidak melakukan “engagement” dengan masyarakat non-Muslim.   Terbukti di bidang ketenagakerjaan di sektor pendidikan, industri, dan usaha mereka banyak menerima atau menyerap tenaga kerja dari kalangan non-Muslim maupun warga Syiah. Di universitas tempat saya mengajar saat ini juga banyak sekali staf dan dosen non-Muslim maupun Syiah.   Terobosan historis   Berkaitan dengan relasi antarumat agama ini, sejak beberapa tahun terakhir telah terjadi perubahan penting di Arab Saudi. Tokoh penting yang menjadi pelopor atau perintis (pioneer) di balik upaya pembangunan hubungan harmonis antaragama (Muslim-non-Muslim) maupun intra-agama (Sunni-Syiah) adalah mendiang Raja Abdullah (wafat 2015) yang dikenal sangat moderat dan pro terhadap reformasi dan perubahan positif atas aneka masalah sosial, budaya, dan agama di Arab Saudi.   Berbagai upaya reformasi atau pembaruan sosial-keagamaan yang ia rintis, kelak dilanjutkan oleh adiknya, Raja Salman, beserta Putra Mahkota Muhammad Bin Salman (MBS).   Beberapa terobosan historis yang sangat penting yang dilakukan oleh Raja Abdullah dalam hal upaya merajut hubungan harmoni dengan umat non-Muslim maupun warga Syiah dan Sunni non-Hanbali adalah sebagai berikut.   Pada tahun 2007, Raja Abdullah bertemu dengan Paus Benediktus XVI di Vatikan. Setahun kemudian ia mengundang sekitar 500 tokoh agama dari berbagai negara untuk mengadakan pertemuan antaragama di Makkah. Raja Abdullah (bersama pemimpin dari Austria dan Spanyol) juga turut mensponsori pendirian King Abdullah International Center for Interreligious and Intercultural Dialogue yang berpusat di Vienna.   Pula, Raja Abdullah memprakarsai pendirian King Abdulaziz Center for National Dialogue (majlis al-hiwar al-watani), sebuah forum “dialog nasional” di Arab Saudi yang melibatkan berbagai kalangan, termasuk para tokoh Syiah moderat dan ulama non-Hanbali.   Upaya membangun relasi harmonis antaragama yang digagas oleh Raja Abdullah itu kemudian dilanjutkan, diperkuat, dan diekstensifkan oleh Raja Salman dan MBS yang gencar melakukan pertemuan dengan tokoh-tokoh agama, khususnya dari kalangan Kristiani, baik Katolik maupun Protestan, baik di Arab Saudi maupun negara-negara lain seperti Mesir, Inggris, Amerika Serikat, dan sebagainya.   Misalnya, tahun 2017, Raja Salman dan MBS menerima kunjungan pemimpin tertinggi Gereja Maronite Lebanon, Patriach Bechara Boutros Al-Rahi, beserta rombongan. Kemudian, tahun 2018, Raja Salman dan MBS mengadakan pertemuan di Riyadh dengan Kardinal Jean-Louis Tauran (beserta delegasi), presiden Pontifical Council for Interfaith Dialogue (PCID), Vatikan.   PCID, kini dipimpin oleh Miguel Angel Ayuso Guixot yang ahli di bidang studi sejarah Islam dan Timur Tengah, merupakan lembaga penting Gereja Katolik yang dibentuk oleh Vatikan untuk mempromosikan dialog antaragama sesuai dengan spirit Konsili Vatikan II (khususnya deklarasi "Nostra Aetate") agar tercipta perdamaian global serta spirit saling memahami dan menghormati antara umat Katolik dan non-Katolik di jagat raya ini.   Lalu, pada tahun 2019, Raja Salman dan MBS kembali melakukan pertemuan dengan para tokoh kristiani dari Gereja Evangelis Amerika Serikat yang dipimpin oleh Joel Rosenberg. Bukan hanya di Arab Saudi, MBS dalam kunjungan ke Amerika Serikat, Inggris, Mesir dan lainnya juga sering menyempatkan untuk bertemu dengan para tokoh Kristen. Di era pandemi Covid-19 ini, Arab Saudi juga menggelar beberapa kali konferensi virtual antaragama.   Santer beredar kabar kalau berbagai pertemuan dengan para tokoh Kristen (Katolik, Maronite, Koptik, Anglikan, Evangelis, dan sebagainya) tersebut bukan hanya sekadar “formalitas persahabatan”.   Lebih jauh, pertemuan-pertemuan tesebut juga untuk membangun dialog antaragama yang lebih konkret agar upaya pemerintah membangun, mengubah, atau mentransformasi Arab Saudi menjadi negara-kerajaan yang modern, moderat, dan terbuka menjadi lebih solid, mendapat dukungan masyarakat internasional, dan semakin komprehensif.   Bukan hanya di wilayah perekonomian, sains, teknologi, kebudayaan, atau emansipasi perempuan saja, tetapi juga sektor keagamaan.   Moderasi beragama   Sejak beberapa tahun terakhir, pemerintah memang gencar melakukan kampanye “Islam wasatiyah” atau “Islam garis tengah” (baca, Islam moderat) yang tidak “ekstrem kiri” maupun “ekstrem kanan”. Keseriusan pemerintah dalam upaya melakukan “moderasi beragama” atau mewujudkan “Islam moderat” itu ditandai dengan berbagai program dan kebijakan fundamental.   Di antaranya, seperti mengubah kurikulum pendidikan (khususnya buku ajar agama), menghapus lembaga “polisi syariat” yang selama ini menjadi “momok” masyarakat, serta merestrukturisasi fungsionaris institusi penting keislaman seperti para imam dan khatib masjid maupun para ulama yang duduk di Majelis Hay’at Kibar al-Ulama.   Semua diganti dengan para klerik atau ulama yang berhaluan moderat dan berwawasan inklusif. Para penceramah dan guru agama yang berhaluan radikal-militan juga “ditertibkan” supaya tidak menyebar dan mewabah di masyarakat.   Kini, desas-desus beredar kabar, hasil pembicaraan dan pertemuan dengan para tokoh Kristiani tersebut, kalau pemerintah membolehkan wilayahnya untuk dibangun gereja agar 1,4 juta umat kristiani di Arab Saudi bisa leluasa menjalankan ibadah.   Dulu sebetulnya pernah ada gereja di Jazirah Arabia yang kini masuk wilayah Arab Saudi seperti gereja tua di Jubail yang dibangun di abad keempat Masehi (dikenal dengan sebutan Gereja Jubail atau Kanisat al-Jubail). Ada pula sumber yang mengatakan kalau di Jeddah ada sebuah Gereja Anglikan yang dibangun oleh orang-orang Inggris seabad silam.   Kawasan Najran di Arabia selatan juga dulu dikenal sebagai pusat umat Kristiani, dan bahkan Nabi Muhammad diriwayatkan pernah membangun persahabatan dengan para tokoh Kristen Najran. Jadi, kalau Pemerintah Saudi memutuskan untuk membolehkan pembangunan gereja, itu sebetulnya mempunyai landasan historis yang kokoh.   Kalau pembangunan gereja (atau tempat ibadah non-Muslim lain) bisa dilakukan, maka akan menjadi “peristiwa historis” yang luar biasa. Dampak globalnya, Arab Saudi akan semakin didukung oleh komunitas internasional dalam upaya untuk memodernkan negaranya dan memoderasikan masyarakatnya.   Pelajaran penting   Ada sejumlah pelajaran penting yang bisa dipetik dari Arab Saudi bagi pemerintah dan masyarakat Indonesia. Antara lain, upaya mewujudkan relasi antaragama yang toleran dan harmonis itu akan susah terwujud jika banyak bertebaran kelompok agama militan-konservatif yang closed-minded serta elite politik yang berwawasan dan berperilaku sektarian dan etnosentris di berbagai lini kehidupan.   Oleh karena itu, pemerintah dan elemen masyarakat perlu mewaspadai secara serius dan kemudian menangani dengan tegas, cermat, dan saksama fenomena berkembangnya kelompok konservatif, militan, intoleran, sektarian, dan etnosentris di Indonesia.   Kelompok ini perlu “diruwat” dan “ditertibkan” seperti yang dilakukan oleh Arab Saudi. Jika tidak, mereka bisa menjadi “batu penghalang” (stumbling block) bagi pemerintah dalam upaya merealisasikan jargon “moderasi beragama” dan mewujudkan Indonesia sebagai negara moderat, toleran, dan pluralis di kemudian hari. ●

 

Blaming Muslims, scapegoating Americans

Blaming Muslims, scapegoating Americans Sumanto Al Qurtuby ;  A Visiting Research Fellow at the Joan B. Kroc Institute  for International Peace Studies, University of Notre Dame, Indiana, USA

JAKARTA POST, 28 September 2012

At any moment in Western history, some people have been targeted for broad-based hatred: Jews, Catholics, Protestants, Anabaptists, Africans, Irish, Slavs, Gypsies, peacemakers, communists, liberals, radicals, homosexuals, and, unfortunately, so forth. Today, anthropologist John R Bowen wrote in his 2012 book Blaming Islam, the main targets of abhorrence are Muslims. 

Bowen’s observation, on some points, might be right. In the eyes of some non-Muslims and Westerners nowadays, the image of Islam, more or less, resembles al-Qaeda, Taliban, and other Islamist extremist groups that (1) exert violent means to achieve their goals, (2) advocate oppressing and torturing women, (3) condemn Westerners and non-Muslims as infidels, (4) struggle for an Islamic state or application of Islamic Sharia, (5) oppose Western values of democracy, secularism and liberalism to name but a few. 

The tendency to view Islam as “a religion of the sword” colored by acts of terrorism and violence, it should be noted, is not a new phenomenon that emerged following the attacks on the Pentagon and the World Trade Center on 9/11. 

Instead, such biased views and stereotypes are deeply rooted in propaganda of media, speeches of conservative evangelists, and works of (some) early and modern orientalists since the rise of so-called “Western civilization”, which regards Islamic civilization as a “Green Peril”, borrowing the term of Nader Hashemi, for the existence of Western gestalt. 

For early or even current “unfriendly orientalists” and “religious propagandists”, Islamic civilization is perceived to be an incarnation of what Western civilization was not. While they considered Western civilization as peaceful, progressive, dynamic, rational and humane, Islamic civilization was deemed as violent, aggressive, decadent, stagnant, irrational, mythical, despotic and inhuman. 

This perception certainly is only a half-truth. However, unfortunately, such biased views of Islam have gradually undergone a process of internalization in the minds of some Western people today, and then, have subsequently formed an attitude of hatred, enmity and prejudice toward Islam and Muslim societies. 

Mohammed Abu-Nimer, director of the Peacebuilding and Development Institute at American University, Washington, D.C., in his book Nonviolence and Peace Building in Islam (2003, 2) reveals that there are some reasons why some Westerners and non-Muslims view Islam and Muslim societies pejoratively. 

The reasons are, Abu-Nimer said, because of “selective reporting, lack of scholarly works on nonviolent and peaceful issues within Islam, the legacy of colonial subordination of Islamic countries to the West, ignorance of cultural differences, the failure of Muslims to convey their messages, and the violent Arab-Israeli conflict”.

The movie, as we can see on the Internet, portrays the Prophet Muhammad as a buffoon, a “bastard”, greedy, bloodthirsty, a womanizer, a homosexual and a child molester. Such negative portrayals of the Prophet actually had been written in a number of books by some non-Muslims or Muslim apostates (e.g. Ibn Warraq’s edited book, Leaving Islam or Anwar Shaikh’s Faith and Deception). 

But such rude depictions of Islam never resulted in the massive public protests or popular rage among Muslims (this perhaps due to limited access to the books and, for sure, no actors that mobilized masses). 

Now, with the Internet and YouTube, people can easily post or broadcast any intolerant idea or controversial product that is accessible wide-reaching audience. 

No doubt, the posting of Innocence of Muslims on YouTube was meant to incite fear, anger, and hatred of Islam and Muslims, and to provoke Muslims worldwide, and so it did. 

The civilian protests — exploited by conservative religious groupings and violent extremists — have spread from North Africa to Southeast Asia, often leading to mob violence and the death of innocent civilians. 

While Muslims around the world still protest in streets, French satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo published cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad. Issues of the magazine, as the Huffington Post reported on Sept. 19, “hit newsstands with a cover showing an Orthodox Jew pushing a turbaned figure in a wheelchair with several caricatures of the Prophet on its inside pages, including some of him naked”. No doubt, the cartoons also triggered mass demonstration in France. 

It seems that the attacks on the US Consulate General in Benghazi ,Libya that killed US Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three embassy staff, and the major riots in Cairo and elsewhere look similar and share in common the incitement and exploitation of popular outrage among many Muslims, as we previously witnessed during the Salman Rushdie affair in late 1980s and Danish cartoon affair in 2005.

They, as Georgetown University professor of religion John Esposito recently noted, “exploit deep-seated popular anti-American sentiment, based on decades of resentment over US and European foreign policies in the Middle East” (Aljazeera, Sept. 15). The primary drivers or motives behind the attacks, Esposito claims, are political agendas reflecting the shifting political landscape in the Arab world. 

Indeed, as Esposito has noticed, there are some ambiguities with regard to the Muslim protests to the movie. The Muslim protesters and rioters not only denounce the film but also scapegoat American societies and US government which they said were behind the making of the movie aiming at ridiculing Prophet Muhammad and insulting Islam, despite the fact that President Barack Obama and many Americans have condemned the movie. 

The men behind the movie have been identified as (1) Alan Roberts, a 65-year-old porn director, and (2) Sam Nakoula, a hard-line anti-Muslim Egyptian-American Copt and convicted embezzler. In contrast, Bishop Serapion of the Coptic Orthodox Diocese of Los Angeles denounced the film, and noted that the Christian teaching is to respect people of other faiths. 

The duo maybe has been paid by some shadowy anti-Islam non-Muslim figures with fat pockets and a hidden agenda to destabilize Arab, the Middle East, or even the “Muslim world”. But still, it is unfair to point their fingers at the US government and American people as a whole. 

As Esposito has observed, I suspect that the initial protests against the movie have been manipulated by some anti-American Muslim hardliners for their political agenda and individual interests. 

If my suspicions are correct, then the plan of whosoever lurks behind Nakoula and Roberts, as well as the America haters may have been successful. It is easy to provoke masses in order to commit violence and hostility, but it is extremely hard to create “peace provocateurs” and incite people for tolerance and harmony! ● 

Uniting against rising extremist terrorism

Uniting against rising extremist terrorism

Sumanto Al Qurtuby ;  The writer holds a Ph.D. from Boston University, and is now a visiting research scholar at the Joan B. Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies at the University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, Indiana, USA

JAKARTA POST, 07 September 2012

After the raid on two “kingpins” of Malaysian-born terrorist operations in Indonesia, namely “The Demolisher” Dr. Azahari Husin ( 2005) and “The Financier” Noordin M Top (2009), plus the capture — and then the executions — of the Bali bombers, Indonesian people assumed that terrorist activities would end, and the country would be free from such violence. Unfortunately, terrorist attacks continued to persist.

After deadly attacks in Aceh, Medan (North Sumatra) and Cirebon (West Java), the terrorists recently targeted Surakarta, or Solo, in Central Java. 

These latest attacks are indeed a worrying sign of rising Islamist terrorist activity not only on the main island of Java but also in other parts of the archipelago. 

It is significant to note that Indonesian terrorist groups, as the International Crisis Group (ICG) has reported, have built their institutional and personal networks not only in towns around Java but also in Maluku, Sulawesi and Sumatra.

It is also worth underlining that some terrorist groups in the country are purely locally based uncivilized civilian groupings that have nothing to do with al-Qaeda, a stateless international network of terrorists operating in, according to Zachary Abuza in his article “Al-Qaeda’s Asian web of terror” (Time Asia, 2002, p38-40), 50 countries stretching from the Middle East to the Philippines. 

Al-Qaeda is no longer the “axis of global terrorism”, as international terrorism expert Rohan Gunaratna revealed in his fine book, Inside al-Qaeda.

The Surakarta-based terrorist cell Tim Hisbah has been accused of being behind a series of recent terrorist activities in the country, including the bombing of a church in Surakarta last year. But the latest attacks in the city, as National Police chief Gen. Timur Pradopo said, were possibly committed by a new radical group (The Jakarta Post, Sept. 1).

Unlike al-Qaeda, Indonesia’s current extremist groups do not target “distant” enemies, ie: the Western (non-Muslim) “infidels”, but local (Muslim) “infidels”, including the police.

Moreover, and most strikingly, they no longer target buildings, such as cafes, embassies or hotels belonging primarily to the United States or Australia, or churches. Rather, they target police posts and a police mosque, as was the case in Cirebon, West Java.

It is, therefore, obvious that these terrorist groups have now changed in terms of actors, interests, motives, objectives, financial resources, and perhaps even the ideology behind their deadly activities. 

Radical Islamist ideologies of Wahabism and Salafism might still play some role but clearly these Islamic extremist philosophies are not the only source of present-day terrorism. 

Indonesia’s new terrorist cases suggest that Islamist terrorism has morphed into an ever-more decentralized series of networks, with new targets, tactics, financial resources, and an ability to capitalize on new grievances. 

In light of the recent increase in terrorist attacks across the archipelago, and given the plurality of the actors engaged in their implementation as well as the complex nature of “new” terrorism, it is high time for the government and state apparatus to apply multiple, appropriate approaches and effective techniques of strategic counterterrorism aiming at two things: (1) dismantling the terrorist networks and, over the long term, (2) prevailing over the religious convictions or ideologies that give rise to terrorism.

In this regard, security and non-military strategies need to be taken into account. 

Although the Densus 88 counterterrorism unit has succeeded in capturing some terrorists and destroying some of their safe havens (which we must appreciate), they nonetheless have a burdensome task in trying to track down funds and change hearts and minds. 

Despite relative successes in the state-supported global campaign against terrorism, especially since the Bali blasts in 2002, more attacks from terrorists linked to various radical Muslim groups in the country have occurred since that year. 

Still, despite years of intensive attempts on the part of the government at weakening their bases, terrorist networks remain resilient and are, perhaps, strengthening.

Following the observation by peace scholars David Cortright and George Lopez in their edited volume, Uniting Against Terror: Cooperative Nonmilitary Responses to the Global Terrorist Attack (2007), Indonesia’s “small” success in its efforts to combat terrorism perhaps owes it origin from an overemphasis on “tactical counterterrorism”, which focuses on finding, destroying and defeating operative terrorist cells, while neglecting or de-emphasizing “strategic counterterrorism”, which includes multiple policy responses designed to eliminate the sustaining and underlying conditions that feed extremist terrorism.

In brief, the government is focusing too much on the “military approach”, while paying little attention to “nonmilitary strategies”.

“Due to the global nature of the terrorist threat,” David Cortright and George Lopez (2007: 2-3) remind us, “cooperative nonmilitary responses are necessary elements of counterterrorism strategy.” 

No doubt, countering the multifaceted and complex threat of terrorism requires a broadly cooperative effort involving religious, legal, economic, political, cultural, and military cooperation from virtually every organization and grouping in the country.

Indonesia will never succeed in its “war on terror” if the government’s tools work in isolation from, or in conflict with, one another. Terrorists may die, but ideology never. Densus 88 can shoot them down, but they will not be able to kill the ideology — the underlying principle of terrorism! ●

Does religion matter in violence?

Does religion matter in violence?

Sumanto Al Qurtuby ;  The writer is a visiting research fellow at the Joan B. Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies at the University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, Indiana, USA

JAKARTA POST, 30 Agustus 2012

In response to a spate of religious violence that broke out in some parts of Indonesia, such as the recent attack on the Shia community in Madura, Religious Affairs Minister Surya-dharma Ali claimed that such riots had nothing to do with religion.

It is not clear whether his statement aims at creating stability, preventing recurring disturbances or avoiding the “real” problems facing Muslims in the region. This is not the first time that the minister has issued such a “silly” statement, and he is not the only political leader that claims there is “zero connection” between religion and violence, although in some cases, religious discourse, institutions and actors did figure into the turmoil.

Rather than investigating religious networks in sectarian conflict settings, social scientists also tend to look at political and economic dimensions of the collective riots. For most of them, religion is considered a peripheral issue. Indeed, observers from secular traditions generally find it difficult to acknowledge the degree to which different logic and moralities affect behavior in religious communities, and they consequently underestimate the degree to which religion underwrites violent conflict on its own terms.

Academic observers also tend to downplay the role of religion in the riots, insisting that what appears to be a religious conflict is, upon closer analysis, really motivated by political interests as well as socio-economic and territorial grievances that are mobilized and manipulated by greedy elites, outside provocateurs or agents of conflict.

Taking the same line, moderate religious leaders and scholars also tend to refuse identification of violent conflict with religion, noting that religion teaches peace not violence, tolerance not intolerance, love not hate, and the like.

Unfortunately, however, many cases show otherwise. Many violent conflicts throughout the world, including Indonesia, have been cloaked in religious garb. What the moderates think of or idealize as religion might differ from the conceptions of radicals. While moderates denounce radicalism as “irreligious” or “un-Islamic,” extremists regard and believe that violence is a part of a “sacred mission” and strongly rooted within their religious traditions, beliefs, doctrines and teachings.

Does religion matter? If so, why does it matter?

There are a number of reasons why religion does matter in some cases of communal violence, including but not limited to, the numerous cases of communal conflict in post-Soeharto Indonesia.

The first reason is that, as prominent religion historian R. Scott Appleby noted in The Ambivalence of the Sacred: Religion, Violence and Reconciliation, religion’s confessional loyalty translates into a clearly defined and durable community, its model of faith counters rational calculation and enlightened self-interest, it cultivates a righteous sense of persecution and provokes passion against evil that fuels the excesses of group hatred.

Although religions were indeed manufactured or invented within particular historical and political contexts of thousands of years ago, their creeds, Appleby (2000: 57-61) has argued, are represented as fundamental truths, providing security in times of uncertainty, and countering the challenges of relativism and secularism of late modernity. This is precisely what Salafi, Wahabi and other religious radical groups have held up in Indonesia and other parts of the world. 

Second, religion, Islam included, possesses a stock of material metaphors and military imagery, and promises rewards for violent sacrifice. The concept of some transcendental authority — the “will of God” — which translates into the absolute authority of church officials, and religious myths of election (e.g. the concept of the “chosen people” or the “best religious community of believers”) and persecution, provides a powerful alternative to the delusional formation of paranoia, which transforms victimhood into vengeful action. This is among the reasons why “religious culprits” and doers of violence never regret their inhuman, violent acts.

Third, religion potentially transfers secular differences between a particular “us” and “them”, the known and the unfamiliar, to the cosmic plane and thus into a moral struggle between the amorphous forces of order and chaos, and good and evil, for which the ultimate sacrifice — murder or martyrdom —is possible.

Fourth, religion did matter during the anti-Shia or anti-Ahmadiyah campaigns since it provides a more powerful and effective force for mobilization than other forms of collective identity partly because, according to Chris Wilson in his From Soil to God, religion is “not only strongly linked to a sense of self, but also provides a far-reaching and uplifting ideology, powerful institutional structures and an enduring and clear-cut definition of an ‘other.’” Rioters, unsurprisingly, often were discovered to be driven by religious zeal. The mobilization of ordinary people in the riots was full of religious symbolism. Some religious institutions became primary conduits for the mobilization of people for violence in the name of God, faith or even particular schools of thought (mazhab). These institutions, moreover, exercised vast emotional influence over some adherents of Islam, as well as provided social meeting places, communication networks and pools of resources.

Fifth and finally, religion provides the concept of a “sacred territory” and a set of ready materials and symbolic targets, which if attacked provokes intense feelings. Accordingly, mosques were destroyed, religious centers desecrated, sacred texts and beliefs were ridiculed, prophets or religious figures were slandered and other symbols of faith violated.

To conclude, while religion never acts autonomously as a cause of conflict, ignoring its role completely would preclude a proper understanding of much of the violence in Indonesia. 

Throughout the many instances of communal violence in the country, religious sentiments, material interests and political motives interacted with one another to magnify and alter the influence each would have had in isolation. Take away one factor, such as religious tension, economic inequality or political competition, the violence would not occur.

This is to say that although religion matters in most outbursts of violence in the nation, it is also too simple to reduce the complexity of the riots to just a matter of religion without investigating the political economy of particular religious followers and groups in the broad and varied social field of Indonesia. ●