Moeflich Hasbullah

Halal issues are increasingly important to be discussed and implemented in Malaysia, particularly in terms of economic, social, legal and political issues. Halal is highlighted in Malaysia, among others, through the institutionalization of several institutions such as the Department of Islamic Development Malaysia (JAKIM), the Halal Industry Development Corporation (HDC), as well as the government's strong support led to its rapid expansion. This halal phenomenon is also contributed by the changing process of the socio-political landscape of Malaysia, and is associated with the development of the Islamic revivalism since the 1970s. In addition, this development is also assisted by the increasingly strong relationship between science, technology and Islam. The objectives of this study are to study the relationship between Islamic revivalism and halal institutionalization, and to analyze the influence of science and technology as the catalyst in the development of halal institutio...

"The development of Islam in Indonesia during the New Order period can be seen as cultural struggle between groups which Geertz called abangan (nominal Muslim with less Islamic concern), santri (the ‘pious’ Muslims) and priyayi (elite group). By the mid-1980s, abangan and priyayi were associated with Soeharto and his government who dominated Indonesian politics (Emmerson 1976; Anderson 1990). The santri, on the other hand, were powerless, marginalized and known as the ‘outsiders’ (McVey 1983). The rivalry between these groups emerged for the first time when, in the early New Order, Soeharto backed by the military, did not approve rehabilitation of the Islamic party, restricted Muslim political activists, and made alliances with non-santri political actors in running modernization and economic development. The New Order’s commitment to development through the economic growth paradigm resulted in restriction and suppression of any political group who developed a political ideology. Those who suffered most from this policy were the santri group. In the 1970s and 1980s, when there was Islam-phobia amongst government officials, the restriction applied to Muslim religious activities. Anyone who intended to expand Islamic influence in national life was suspected and accused of trying to establish an Islamic state and being anti-Pancasila. Dakwah activities were strictly controlled; criticizing authority was illegal and often condemned as subversion. Santri believed that the government was ‘hostile to Islam.’ The state was hegemonic and the New Order became an authoritarian regime. Restriction after restriction made the santri resentful as though they were outsiders in their own country. However, during the 1980s and 1990s, facilitated by the movement of ‘cultural Islam,’ a Muslim redefinition of their earlier ‘ideological or political Islam,’ Indonesia experienced an Islamization almost in every social group and all social levels, from students to government elite circle. There was a significant increase of religious activities within Muslim society. The agenda of ‘cultural Islam’ was that, the image of Islam should be changed from ‘ideological’ to ‘cultural’ through the activities of mass education, dakwah (religious predication), arts and anything that was not ‘political.’ Supported by the success of Indonesian economic development, the changing face of Islam and the problems of dislocation and identity crisis that accompanied the urbanization process, the result of cultural Islam was remarkable: there was an Islamic education boom, Islam was no longer linked to a political party but conversely viewed as ethical support for development. Through cultural Islam, ‘ideological Islam’ changed to be ‘benign Islam.’ Political orientation shifted to cultural orientation. After 1985, there was a ‘deideologization of Islam’ and Islam-phobia gradually disappeared. Various social and political communities started adopting Islamic teaching and applied it in their daily life. Identifying as Muslim identity became a trend among various groups of people from the students up to government elite. The abangan gradually declined in numbers and santri increased. Because of these changes, many believed that Geertz’s trichotomy was no longer useful in analysing Islam in Indonesia (Hefner 1997, 1998; Anwar 1998). The most interesting phenomenon in the emergence of religious revival is found amongst the middle class people. This thesis argues that in the 1980s and 1990s, there was a shaping of the Muslim middle class identified by five cultural traits: First, is the wearing of the veil. Beginning in university mosques, head-scarves spread to schoolgirls and middle class women. Since the 1980s, the veils have been worn by civil servants, government officers, business people, professional groups, actresses etc. For the middle class, veil wearing has become a religious means for catering to their psychological needs to escape from the problem of dislocation and identity crisis. Second, is the emergence of kasidah songs of Bimbo. The Muslim middle class is a class of people who have been urbanized and transformed into urban life and modernized whose aesthetic taste has also changed. Bimbo’s kasidah emerged to cater to the changing taste of the Muslim middle class. Third, the clearest evidence of the formation of a Muslim middle class was the establishment of ICMI in 1990 (Kuntowijoyo 1991; Ramage 1995; Hefner 1993, 1997; Vatikiotis 1997). ICMI was possible due to the Islamic education boom from the 1970s that has been the basis of Islamization in the New Order bureaucracy called ‘Islamization of bureaucracy.’ A huge number of university graduates became civil servants and government officials. The expansion of educated Muslims has an inevitable political impact, and this in the resulted establishment of ICMI. ICMI is the organization supported by qualified human resources with 75 per cent of its participants are university...

... of Islamic resurgence– by way of Muhammad 'Abduh and Rash”d Rida in Egypt or Sayyid Ahmad Khan in India, and Muhammad Iqbal in Indo ... the West, their moving into the West, or their access to the West– such as Fazlur Rahman, Ismaصil al-Faruqi, Syed Hossen Nasr, Akbar ...

Artikel ini menganalisis peran intelektual ulama sebagai perantara budaya dalam masyarakat dari beberapa tahap dalam sejarah Indonesia. Bab-bab terpenting dalam sejarah Indonesia secara umum dapat dibagi menjadi lima periode: Pertama, periode masuknya Islam dan perkembangan awal islamisasi. Kedua, masa penjajahan. Ketiga, era era modern, yaitu munculnya gerakan modern dalam Islam di awal abad ke-20. Keempat, periode kemerdekaan revolusioner, dan kelima, periode pasca-kemerdekaan. Artikel sosio-historis ini melihat bahwa ulama di setiap periode ini adalah aktor utama sejarah dan menentukan arah perkembangan bangsa Indonesia. Khusus untuk bagian 'pembangunan komunitas' dalam penelitian ini, kasus peran seorang ulama yang merupakan kepala desa di Rancapanggung, Cililin, Bandung Barat pada 1930-an.

Tulisan ini menyatakan adanya hubungan antara pengembangan sumber daya manusia yang dilakukan oleh pesantren dengan hadirnya kelas menengah santri di tingkat nasional. Dengan kajian literatur dan lapangan, kajian ini menemukan bahwa pada akhirnya kelas menengah muslim itu pun kembali membangun pesantren yang notabene berada di pinggiran pembangunan nasional.

Kajian ini berusaha untuk mengidentifikasi dan menganalisis dua gerakan politik, yaitu dari pinggir ke tengah dan dari tengah ke pinggir. Yaitu, bagaimana kaum santri maju ke arena politik dan bagaimana politisi Muslim memberi kepada kelompok rujukannya, yaitu kelompok santri. Kajian ini, dengan demikian, bersifat perbandingan gerakan, dengan menggunakan metode analisis tindakan, yaitu menyelidiki makna gerakan dari peristiwa-peristiwa sosial politis. Dengan metode tersebut ditemukan bahwa kaum santri telah mendapatkan manifestasi politiknya melalui berbagai kesempatan sosial politis sehingga berada di tengah-tengah pusaran kekuasaan. Selanjutnya ditemukan pula bahwa keberadaan kaum santri di tengah-tengah kekuasaan itu memberikan ruang kepada mereka untuk membuat kebijakan-kebijakan yang menguntungkan tempat asal mereka datang, yaitu institusi pesantren.

This study analyzes two political movements, namely from the edge to the middle and from the middle to the edge. That is, how the santri advance to the political arena and how Muslim politicians give to their reference groups, namely the santri group. This study, thus, is a comparison of movements, using the method of action analysis, which investigates the meaning of the movement of social political events. With this method it was found that the santri had gained their political manifestations through various political and social opportunities so that they were in the midst of a vortex of power. Furthermore, it was also found that the existence of the santri in the midst of that power gave them space to make policies that benefited their place of origin, namely the pesantren institution.

ABSTRACT: One of the most tremendous events in the history of Southeast Asia is the massive wave of Islamization, the process that still attracts big curiosity among the historians. Islamization has radically replaced the centuries-rooted pre-Islamic belief. Based on the fact that Islamization took place in the period of lively commerce of Southeast Asia, many have said that one of the strong motivations being Muslim was economic gains. Kingdoms and courts which mainly located in coastal ports whereby Islamization vigorously took place, gained much more state wealth from the 15-17 th commercial activities. This paper examines this conclusion by looking at the phenomena deeper into indigenous worldview from the psycho-social perspective. Exploring Southeast Asian religious conversion from psycho-social perspective has come to the conclusion that indigenous converters did not merely see Islam as a religion, as a set of doctrinal worship. Global community, international cooperation and...

Islamic modernism represented by Muhammadiyah and Persatuan Islam and Islamic traditionalism symbolized by Nahdlatul Ulama have lasted a century old in Indonesian history (1912-2014). The unavoidable tensions and conflicts between these two contrast Islamic movements occurred in various fields. The modernist has been trying to promote their modern views and to eradicate tradition. On the contrary, the traditionalist has been working hard to maintain their Islamic tradition and fight for the modernist mission in disseminating their ideas. To some extent, the modernist is quite successful, however by comparative study methods applied in this article to see the result of these two Islamic streams, I argue that in common Islamic modernism has failed to weaken and to eradicate tradition as their initiators firstly introduced it over a century ago. The modernist is only successful in its attempt to build its own empire of modernism but without vanishing tradition. Rather than weakening, let alone disappearing, what has been occuring shows the opposite result. Islamic traditionalism even grows larger than modernist group and develops more dynamic in various fields. More than that, Islamic neo-traditionalism has emerged as its new variant, an intellectual movement that found a new land on the problems of modern spiritual drought.

... Also meeting this demand is Fenny Mustafa, an Islamic dress businesswoman from Bandung, West Java, who has established two labels: Shafira, a product and trademark aimed at the upper middle class, and Syahida, targeting university students. ...

Abstrak Artikel ini menganalisis peran intelektual ulama sebagai perantara budaya dalam masyarakat dari beberapa tahap dalam sejarah Indonesia. Bab-bab terpenting dalam sejarah Indonesia secara umum dapat dibagi menjadi lima periode: Pertama, periode masuknya Islam dan perkembangan awal islamisasi. Kedua, masa penjajahan. Ketiga, era era modern, yaitu munculnya gerakan modern dalam Islam di awal abad ke-20. Keempat, periode kemerdekaan revolusioner, dan kelima, periode pasca-kemerdekaan. Artikel sosio-historis ini melihat bahwa ulama di setiap periode ini adalah aktor utama sejarah dan menentukan arah perkembangan bangsa Indonesia. Khusus untuk bagian 'pembangunan komunitas' dalam penelitian ini, kasus peran seorang ulama yang merupakan kepala desa di Rancapanggung, Cililin, Bandung Barat pada 1930-an. Abstract This article analyzes the ulama's intellectual role as a cultural broker in society from several stages in Indonesian history. The most important chapters in Indonesian history can generally be divided into five periods: First, the period of the entry of Islam and the early development of Islamization. Second, the colonial period. Third, the era of modern era, namely the emergence of modern movements in Islam in the early 20th century. Fourth, the revolutionary period of independence, and fifth, the post-independence period. This socio-historical article sees that the ulama in each of these periods is the main actor of history and determines the direction of the development of the Indonesian nation. Specifically for the 'community building' section of this study, the case of the role of a cleric who was the village head in Rancapanggung, Cililin, West Bandung in the 1930s.

Islamic modernism represented by Muhammadiyah and Persatuan Islam and Islamic traditionalism symbolized by Nahdlatul Ulama have lasted a century old in Ind onesian history (1912 - 2014). The u n a v o i d a b l e t e n s i o n s a n d c o n f l i c t s b e t w e e n t h e s e t w o c o n t r a s t Islamic movements occurred in various fields. The modernist has b e e n t r y i n g t o p r o m o t e t h e i r m o d e r n v i e w s a n d t o e r a d i c a t e t r a d i t i o n . O n t h e c o n t r a r y , t h e t r a d i t i o n a l i s t h a s b e e n w o r k i n g h a r d t o m a i n t a i n t h e i r I s l a m i c t r a d i t i o n a n d f i g h t f o r t h e modernist mission in disseminating their ideas. To some extent, the modernist is quite successful, however b y comparative study m e t h o d s a p p l i e d i n t h i s a r t i c l e t o s e e t h e r e s u l t o f t h e s e t w o Islamic streams, I argue that in common Islamic modernism has failed to w e a k e n a n d t o eradicate tradition as i t w a s f i r s t l y introduced by their initiators over a century ago . The modernist is o n l y s u c c e s s f u l i n i t s a t t e m p t t o b u i l d i t s o w n e m p i r e o f m o d e r n i s m b u t w i t h o u t v a n i s h i n g t r a d i t i o n . R a t h e r t h a n weakening, let alone disappear ing , what has been occuring shows the opposite result . Islamic traditionalism even grows larger than modernist group and develops more dynamic in various fie lds. More than that , Islamic neo - traditionalism has emerg ed as its new variant , an intellectual movement that found a new land on the problems of modern spiritual drought .

Orientalism has been for long assessed in pejorative terms  by Muslims. This is due to how Muslims have perceived the works of Western scholars. Islam has been for hundreds years described inaccurately and even falsely compared with real Muslim conditions, Qur’anic teaching and the Prophet Muhammad’s life. On the one hand, historically, as evidenced by some Western scholars themselves such as Edward Said, the false pictures of Islam have been intentionally produced as a Western project to maintain its political and cultural hegemony over Muslims. On the other hand, huge collections on Islam written by Orientalists have advantageous impact for Islam behind Western scholars’ endeavours to weaken Islam and Muslims as examined by this essays. Unpredictably, it is something like a boomerang to the West itself.

One of the closest ways to understand the history of Southeast Asia is by looking at this field as a fight of civilizations zone, in which the world civilizations came one after the other and competed each other for power. In this case, India came first, followed by China, Islam and the West for political and economic purposes and religious preaching. In term of the lastest, Islam came out as predominant actor, considering that Islam formed majority in this region amounting to more than 300 million followers (more than 200 million followers in Indonesia). This article extensively analyzes Islamization as psychological and social phenomena. Thus, it tries to answer why religious conversion in this case of Islam took place effectively in a massive scale. Islam and Muslim alike, have laid strong foundations for the process of this religious conversion through the role of kingdoms and supporting international community.

Orientalisme telah lama dipandang pejoratif oleh dunia Islam. Hal ini disebabkan oleh pandangan dan persepsi kaum Muslimin atas karya-karya orientalis dan para sarjana Barat yang umumnya menggambarkan Islam secara distortif. Beratus-ratus tahun Islam digambarkan secara tidak akurat dan bahkan disalahfahami. Di satu sisi, secara historis, seperti diungkapkan kritikus orientalisme paling menonjol, Edward Said, gambaran-gambaran salah tentang Islam dan Timur dalam orientalisme memang dengan sengaja diproduksi sebagai proyek Barat untuk mempertahankan dominasi politik dan ekonominya atas dunia Islam. Tapi, di sisi lain, gudang koleksi raksasa tentang literatur keislaman yang tersimpan baik dalam perpustakaan-perpustakaan universitas Barat, tidak bisa dinafikkan juga. Koleksi itu juga merupakan blessing in disguise (berkah, hikmah) karena dampak positifnya yang luas dan tidak terduga. Dampak positif itu berupa kontribusi terhadap perkembangan studi Islam yang luas, terbuka, gambaran Islam menjadi lebih historis dan sosiologis yang memberikan informasi dan pemahaman yang lebih realistis tentang sejarah Islam. Yang tak terduga kemudian adalah orientalisme berfungsi ibarat bumerang. Awalnya seperti diungkap Said adalah usaha Barat untuk mendominasi Timur, tapi diam-diam ia justru berdampak positif pada proses pengenalan Islam lebih luas di Barat terutama dalam wliayah akademik dan bahkan pada kebangkitan Islam sendiri.

The development of Islam in Indonesia during the New Order period can be seen as cultural struggle between groups which Geertz called abangan (nominal Muslim with less Islamic concern), santri (the ‘pious’ Muslims) and priyayi (elite group). By the mid-1980s, abangan and priyayi were associated with Soeharto and his government who dominated Indonesian politics (Emmerson 1976; Anderson 1990). The santri, on the other hand, were powerless, marginalized and known as the ‘outsiders’ (McVey 1983). The rivalry between these groups emerged for the first time when, in the early New Order, Soeharto backed by the military, did not approve rehabilitation of the Islamic party, restricted Muslim political activists, and made alliances with non-santri political actors in running modernization and economic development.

The New Order’s commitment to development through the economic growth paradigm resulted in restriction and suppression of any political group who developed a political ideology. Those who suffered most from this policy were the santri group. In the 1970s and 1980s, when  there was Islam-phobia amongst government officials, the restriction applied to Muslim religious activities. Anyone who intended to expand Islamic influence in national life was suspected and accused of trying to establish an Islamic state and being anti-Pancasila. Dakwah activities were strictly controlled; criticizing authority was illegal and often condemned as subversion. Santri believed that the government was ‘hostile to Islam.’ The state was hegemonic and the New Order became an authoritarian regime. Restriction after restriction made the santri resentful as though they were outsiders in their own country.

However, during the 1980s and 1990s, facilitated by the movement of ‘cultural Islam,’ a Muslim redefinition of their earlier ‘ideological or political Islam,’ Indonesia experienced an Islamization almost in every social group and all social levels, from students to government elite circle. There was a significant increase of religious activities within Muslim society. The agenda of ‘cultural Islam’ was that, the image of Islam should be changed from ‘ideological’ to ‘cultural’ through the activities of mass education, dakwah (religious predication), arts and anything that was not ‘political.’

Supported by the success of Indonesian economic development, the changing face of Islam and the problems of dislocation and identity crisis that accompanied the urbanization process, the result of cultural Islam was remarkable: there was an Islamic education boom, Islam was no longer linked to a political party but conversely viewed as ethical support for development. Through cultural Islam, ‘ideological Islam’ changed to be ‘benign Islam.’ Political orientation shifted to cultural orientation. After 1985, there was a ‘deideologization of Islam’ and Islam-phobia gradually disappeared. Various social and political communities started adopting Islamic teaching and applied it in their daily life. Identifying as Muslim identity became a trend among various groups of people from the students up to government elite. The abangan gradually declined in numbers and santri increased. Because of these changes, many believed that Geertz’s trichotomy was no longer useful in analysing Islam in Indonesia (Hefner 1997, 1998; Anwar 1998).

The most interesting phenomenon in the emergence of religious revival is found  amongst the middle class people. This thesis argues that in the 1980s and 1990s, there was a shaping of the Muslim middle class identified by five cultural traits: First, is the wearing of the veil. Beginning in university mosques, head-scarves spread to schoolgirls and middle class women. Since the 1980s, the veils have been worn by civil servants, government officers, business people, professional groups, actresses etc. For the middle class, veil wearing has become a religious means for catering to their psychological needs to escape from the problem of dislocation and identity crisis. Second, is the emergence of kasidah songs of Bimbo. The Muslim middle class is a class of people who have been urbanized and transformed into urban life and modernized whose aesthetic taste has also changed. Bimbo’s kasidah emerged to cater to the changing taste of the Muslim middle class. Third, the clearest evidence of the formation of a Muslim middle class was the establishment of ICMI in 1990 (Kuntowijoyo 1991; Ramage 1995; Hefner 1993, 1997; Vatikiotis 1997). ICMI was possible due to the Islamic education boom from the 1970s that has been the basis of Islamization in the New Order bureaucracy called ‘Islamization of bureaucracy.’ A huge number of university graduates became civil servants and government officials. The expansion of educated Muslims has an inevitable political impact, and this in the resulted establishment of ICMI. ICMI is the organization supported by qualified human resources with 75 per cent of its participants are university graduates. Fourth, print media is another means whereby the Muslim middle class articulated their taste and ideas. The journal Ulumul Qur’an (UQ), daily Republika and weekly Ummat were three Muslim media with similar traits: modern life oriented, professionally organized, and liberal. These were the media where educated Muslim middle class articulated themselves. Showing Islam as relevant to modern life, these media received an enthusiastic welcome from educated people. In short, these media emerged as the expression of the changing taste of knowledge of Muslim society. Lastly, the phenomenon of prestigious religious learning activities called “kelompok pengajian elit” was another trait of the Muslim middle class. Since the mid 1980s, there has been a new trend where religious learning activities overwhelmed the middle class people. Professional groups, businessmen, government officials etc. returned to religious devotion. The pengajian activities were regularly held in hotels and prestigious places. These five cultural phenomena —emerged during the same period— are put and analised in the context of Bourdieu’s concept of ‘habitus’ that is class codes that reinforced one another to link behaviour, ideology and identity. These cultural codes demonstrate the emergence of Muslim middle class during the New Order period. They indicate the decline of the abangan culture and symbolize the santri’s “cultural domination.”

Tulisan ini adalah catatan kritis atas studi Azyumardi Azra, Jaringan Ulama Timur Tengah dan Nusantara. Selain keunggulan-keunggulannya yang dijelaskan dalam artikel ini, tentu saja, tidak ada gading yang tak retak. Catatan kritis harus diberikan. Karya ini, selain sumbangannya yang sangat besar, masih memerlukan penyempurnaan eksplorasi jaringan ulama dengan studi-studi susulan berikutnya, terutama jaringan-jaringan lokal, agar jaringan ulama tidak hanya terungkap dan terlihat sebagai fenomena di permukaan air laut sejarah tetapi menjadi sebuah peta sosiologis-historis yang masuk ke kedalaman struktur historis.

Syarat menjadi profesor itu semestinya dinilai dari kemanfaatan ilmunya, apalagi bagi dosen-dosen Perguruan Tinggi Islam, bukan dari eksklusifitas dan elitisitas dimuat di jurnal internasional tapi minim bahkan tidak dibaca orang. Ilmu bukan untuk ilmu an sich tapi untuk transformasi masyarakat dan kemajuan umat."