Melbourne, Kebebasan dan Kursus Inggris

Sudah lima minggu lebih saya menikmati dan melewati hidup di Melbourne. Melbourne adalah kota multikultural dengan beragam orang, bangsa, polah, makanan dan lainnya; kota yang tiap minggunya ada pertunjukan seni, festival dari bermacam budaya dan bangsa; kota yang penuh dengan gedung-gedung cantik, modern dan juga tua; kota dengan transportasi publik yang sangat baik; kota yang dimana-mana tersedia taman yang nyaman dan terbuka untuk publik; kota yang betul-betul menghargai pentingnya keberadaan ruang publik untuk warganya; kota yang sadar dengan sejarah karenanya museum terserak dimana-mana; kota yang sungguh tertata dan terencana. Saya betul-betul menikmati kota ini. Saya beruntung bisa singgah 10 minggu lebih di kota ini dan saya masih punya lima minggu lagi untuk merambahi kota ini.

Saya bisa di sini karena bantuan dari TAF. Terima kasih saya haturkan untuk Douglas, mba Robin, John, kak Budhi, Kathleen dan teman-teman TAF lainnya. Dan juga dukungan yang penuh dan luar biasa dari mas Celi dan teman-teman Freedom Institute. Juga mas Indra yang menjaga Andrea. Karena merekalah saya di sini sekarang.

Awalnya saya tak yakin bisa pergi selama dan sejauh ini. Ketika saya mendapat kabar dari TAF kalau saya disetujui didanai ke Melbourne, saya sempat ragu, maju mundur. Bahkan sempat kepikiran belajar di Singapur saja. Lokasinya lebih dekat dan saya bisa bebas pulang kapan saja. Tapi beberapa teman menyarankan untuk tetap di Melbourne. Bahkan mas Celi bilang ‘kamu harus menikmati kebebasanmu sekarang, Nong. Kamu harus nikmati itu. Tak ada kemewahan selain kamu menikmati kesendirianmu. Kalau kamu tetap di Jakarta atau kamu milih Singapur, kamu akan tetap disibukkan dengan keluarga dan pekerjaanmu. Jadi, pergilah dan enjoy your freedom.” Meski saya sudah memilih Melbourne tapi saya tetap gamang. Aneh, kok diberi kebebasan malah seperti ini?

Tak pernah saya merasa segamang ini. Biasanya setiap saya mau pergi ke luar negeri, saya menyambut dan merayakannya dengan suka cita. Ada kebanggaan saya punya kesempatan mengenal langsung negeri lain. Saya sudah pergi ke US, Jerman, Jepang, Bangkok, London, dll dan saya antusias banget. Saya suka berpetualang dan banyak mendapat belajar hidup dengan mengunjungi tempat-tempat baru, asing, dan senang mengenal orang-orang baru. Tapi sekarang menjadi lain. Mungkin karena posisi saya sekarang sudah beda, bukan pribadi yang seperti dulu, saya sebagai ibu sekarang. Ini benar-benar sulit dan dilematis.

Saya ngga bisa ngebayangin bisa ninggalin anakku karena aku sangat dekat banget. Andrea tidak akan tidur kalau mamanya belum datang dari kantor dan aktivitas kerjanya. Meski dia harus nunggu sampai jam 12 malam karena aku sering bikin dan ngehadiri diskusi dan ‘acara’ lainnya. Dia memang anak yang betul-betul ngerti pekerjaan dan posisi mamanya. Kedekatanku dengan anakku mungkin juga karena dia masih menyusui meski usianya sudah 2,5 tahun. Keberangkatanku ke Melbourne ini dijadikan cara untuk menyapihnya. Sebenarnya dari usia 1,5 tahun aku sudah coba menyapihnya. Berbagai cara sudah dilakukan tapi ngga mempan terus. Jadi waktu itu saya ngga bisa bayangin kalau saya tak ada di sisinya. saya khawatir dia ngga bisa tidur karena saya tak disisinya, khawatir dia sakit, khawatir dia kangen dan seribu kekhawatiran lainnya. tapi anakku memang benar-benar ngerti mamanya. Duh Ea, mama kangen banget…

Akhirnya saya putuskan dan niatkan belajar bahasa inggris di Melbourne. Saya pilih Hawtorn English Language Center (HELC) www.hawtornenglish.com, milik University of Melbourne. Saya sengaja memilih tempat ini karena letaknya tak terlalu dekat dengan pusat kota Melbourne. Saya juga homestay di North Balwyn yang jaraknya lumayan jauh dari City. Tempat kosku seperti di komplek perumahan Tanjung Barat, perumahannya cukup mewah, nyaman dan akses kemana-mana sangat mudah. Lokasiku ini penting agar saya tak terlalu terhanyut mengikuti hiruk pikuk pelbagai acara di city. Dan yang terpenting lagi, di HELC ini tidak terlihat ada orang Indonesianya. Di sini banyaknya orang Korea, Cina, Jepang, Middle East, Turki, Spanish, dan beberapa orang Prancis. Ada sekitar 6000-an siswa. Beda kalau di city, dimana-mana, di setiap sudut, kita menemukan orang-orang Indonesia. Jadi saya pengennya belajar, belajar dan belajar. Supaya ngga suntuk belajar, kadang Sabtu dan Minggu serta di waktu libur saya pergi ke city, ketemu dengan teman-teman dan berpetualang dengan keramaian hiruk pikuk Melbourne.

Bila ingat tujuan saya di sini itu belajar bahasa Inggris, kadang saya merasa sesak nafas karena sampai sekarang saya kok masih belajar Inggris aja. Hey, kemana aja selama ini? Dulu-dulu saya malas banget, bukannya ngga mau dan ngga tahu kegunaannya belajar inggris ini. Cuma megelin aja gitu loh. Kalau cuma sekedar baca, ngomong dikit dan ngerti omongan orang sih aku mampu. Tapi ternyata itu tak cukup bila ingin mendapatkan banyak hal di dunia ini. Saya nyesel banget sekarang, padahal teman-temanku udah melanglang buana studi dimana-mana karena inggrisnya udah bagus. Sementara saya masih begini-begini aja. Duh, ketinggalan banget deh. Tapi udahlah, masih untung aku diberi kesempatan seperti ini. (Jangan mengeluh terus, Nong…)

Hari pertama, saya di test penempatan kelas. Speaking, listening, reading ok semua. Perfect dan kamu sudah level advance, kata mereka. Eh, pas writing saya jatuh banget nilainya karena saya menulis sesuatu yang menurut mereka, tidak ilmiah dan tidak akademis. Karena aku homesick banget, aku menulis tentang perasaan kangenku ke dea. Trus, saya juga belum pernah ikut tes IELTS jadi ngga tahu kriteria writing itu seperti apa. Mereka minta aku memilih aku mau masuk kelas mana: English for Academic purposes (EAP) 1 atau EAP 2? Saya memilih yang pertama dengan pertimbangan saya udah lama tak belajar serius bahasa Inggris dan waktuku juga tak terlalu lama di sini, cuma 10 minggu. Buatku jadinya tak terlalu ngotot ngejar dan mengikuti kelas yang sudah lanjut. Saya khawatir, jangan-jangan saya tak bisa mengikutinya kalau saya masuk di EAP 2.

Ada sekitar 15 orang di kelasku. tiga orang Spanish (manis dan cantik), satu orang Turki (itu loh mba ade, yang dibelakangku yang ngacungin tangannya), empat orang Arab Saudi (pasti cowok semua dan megelin lagi. Mereka sok-sok banget, sombong karena merasa dari negara kaya), empat orang Korea dan satu orang Cina (pokoknya wajah dan ngomongnya Cina banget). Kelas ini diajar oleh 2 orang guru namanya Ivonne dan Katryn. Dua-duanya Oz dan ngomongnya oz banget gitu loh. Beda kalau kita dengerin inggris amerika dengan inggris oz, saya ngerasa lebih susah paham omongan mereka. Pronouncitionnya banyak beda dengan inggris amerika, kadang juga ada beberapa yang lain dengan inggris british.

Karena ini kelas untuk tujuan akademis, setiap hari kita diberi kiat bagaimana cara menulis, mengambil point-poin yang disampaikan dosen atau tulisan, meresume tulisan dan juga presentasi pakai power point. Setiap hari kita disuruh nulis esai dari mulai tema yang sangat sederhana sampai tema yang lumayan sulit. Minggu pertama saya disuruh menulis tentang Indonesia. Saya coba nulis dan saya dapat pujian (nanti saya tampilkan tulisan itu diblog ini). Trus kita disuruh nulis tentang small cars, animals, colour, membandingkan sesuatu antara di negeri kita dengan Melbourne (saya pilih membandingkan transportasi publik. Nanti saya masukkan juga di blog ini), censorship, pollutin, poverty, unemployment, women discrimination (saya menulis dalam konteks masyarakat Islam).

Saya sempat merasa sedikit stress karena harus nulis dalam bahasa inggris terus. Udah gitu dengerin orang ngomong bahasa inggris terus. Trus harus ngomong inggris terus. Kan cape ya, harus mikir terus. Ini benar-benar ngga biasa dan ngga pernah seperti ini. Saya jadi ingat Sahal ketika dia pulang beberapa bulan lalu. Badan dia tambah kurus dan langsing. Ketika saya tanya kenapa dia begitu dia jawab karena dia lari terus untuk menghindari ngobrol inggris. Ah sahal, ada-ada aja. Di Jakarta atau kalau saya diminta menulis dalam bahasa inggris, saya pasti minta diterjemahin orang. Saya selalu bilang, ini kerjaan Lanny hehehe…Jadi lima minggu ini saya merasa luar biasa banget.

Padahal kondisi perasaan saya masih naik turun karena kadang masih homesick dan kadang merasa kesepian dan belum terbiasa jauh dari anak, keluarga, kerjaan dan teman-teman. Ingat kebebasan? Ternyata kita memang tak pernah merasa bebas meski kebebasan itu udah kita genggam. Hmmm.. Dalam seminggu selalu ada satu masa dimana saya merasa kangen banget ama Andrea. Ini bener-bener ngga bisa dirasionalisasi dan dialihkan ke yang lain. Tiba-tiba muncul rasa kangen banget, ingin memeluknya dan karena ngga bisa, saya akhirnya menangis keras-keras, ngga bisa ngapa-ngapain. Padahal hampir setiap malam saya selalu melihatnya (terima kasih YM). Dalam lima minggu kemarin, itu terjadi tiga kali, di kelas. Saya lari ke toilet, nangis sekencang-kencangnya supaya lega tapi tetap tak bisa ngerjain apa-apa. Duh. kok anak bisa luar biasa gitu ya?

Belajar bahasa inggris 10 minggu tentu tak berharap mendapat banyak. Waktunya sangat pendek, padahal bahasa itu kebiasaan, tuntutan dan kebutuhan. Seperti halnya makan, minum, tidur dan gituan (hehehe..yang terakhir nggalah). Saya tetap berusaha dan melakukan yang terbaik untuk inggris saya meski kadang merasa terbebani karena khawatir tak mendapatkan apa-apa dari waktu 10 minggu ini. Padahal pengorbanan dan ongkosnya sangat mahal sekali. Btw, TAF nanti marah ngga ya? Kata Sukidi, “jangan kuatir, teh Nong, nanti bisa dilanjutin di Jakarta.” Bisa kah? Semoga bisa.

Ulang Tahun Jaringan Islam Liberal

Bulan Maret ini, tak hanya saya yang merayakan ulang tahun. Jaringan Islam Liberal (JIL), yang didirikan enam tahun lalu, juga merayakannya. Tak seperti ultah saya, sejak awal ultah JIL selalu kita rayakan. Bukan untuk merayakan JIL itu sendiri, tapi untuk merayakan dan mengingatkan pentingnya perjuangan kebebasan “berpikir” dalam beragama khususnya Islam. Tak hanya itu, kegiatan tahunan ini juga diperuntukkan sebagai ruang publik yang secara bebas mendedah dan mendiskusikan tema-tema yang dianggap ‘berbahaya” dalam perdebatan normatif dan doktrin Islam. Ruang seperti ini sangat mewah dan langka kita temukan sekarang.

Sejak awal didirikan, JIL dihadirkan untuk mengisi kelangkaan itu. Makanya tak heran bila kegiatan yang JIL lakukan “mengganggu” sebagian orang yang sudah merasa mapan dengan agamanya. Sejak awal JIL dianggap “mengancam”. Berbagai tuduhan negatif selalu ditimpakan ke JIL dan orang-orang yang terlibatnya. JIL menjadi stigma untuk orang-orang yang merasa terganggu dengan kehadiran dan aktivitas JIL.

Kembali ke Ultah JIL. Setiap tahun kami berusaha selalu merayakan kegiatan tahunan ini. Meski ancaman datang menghadang dan keterbatasan dana yang kami miliki. Kegiatan ini sebisa mungkin kami rayakan dengan meriah sampai tiga hari bahkan pernah lima hari berturut-turut dengan memutar film, diskusi dan kadang ada bursa buku pilihan. Setiap tahun kami yang di JIL selalu membahas dan mendiskusikan terlebih dahulu tema dan film apa yang penting untuk kami munculkan di tiap ultah JIL. Bulan ini ultah JIL diselenggarakan dari tanggal 22 – 24 Maret dengan mengambil tema sekularisme. Menurut ceita teman-teman di JIL, peserta yang datang membludak dan antusias. Sampai-sampai Teater Utan Kayu (TUK), tempat diskusinya, tak cukup memuat banyaknya peserta yang ingin menghadiri dan menyimak diskusi JIL. Begitu juga Kedai Tempo terlihat penuh dan berdesak-desakan.


Dua tahun terakhir ini ultah JIL selalu berbarengan dengan ultah saya. Mestinya ultah JIL diselenggarakan awal Maret, persisnya tanggal 3 Maret, berbarengan dengan munculnya milis islamliberal@yahoogroups.com yang diasuh mas Luthfi.. Tahun lalu diselenggarakan pada tanggal sama seperti tahun ini karena disesuaikan dengan kedatangan TV ABC Australia yang ingin mengambil profil JIL. Mereka membuat acara Islam Indonesia dan mengambil JIL sebagai salah satu representasi Islam Indonesia http://www.abc.net.au/compass/s1765937.htm. Dan tahun ini diselenggarakan di tanggal itu karena menyesuaikan waktu TUK dan kesiapan teman-teman.

Tentu saja berbarengan ultah JIL dengan ultah saya bukan berarti JIL milik dan identik dengan saya. Ini untuk menjawab kekecewaan salah satu teman saya karena saya terlalu ‘dominan” perannya sekarang di internal JIL. Saya selalu tekankan, JIL milik semuanya bukan milik para pendirinya. Meski saya, mas ulil, mas luthfi, anick, burhan, sahal, mas Goen ngga ada, ngga terlibat dan ngga hadir di ultah JIL ternyata acara ultah JIL sukses luar biasa seperti yang diceritakan mas hamid dan novri dimilis internal kami. Ini menunjukkan JIL sekarang bukan punya siapa-siapa dan tak identik dengan siapa-siapa tapi milik semuanya. Seperti lampu yang menerangi kita, siapapun yang menikmati terangnya lampu itu tak perlu tahu siapa yang menemukan dan menciptakannya. Saya ingin JIL seperti itu. Saya yakin, JIL akan ada dan hidup terus karena banyak orang yang akan menjaga dan merawatnya.

Seperti yang sudah saya tulis di atas, di ultah sekarang saya tidak hadir. Saya merasa betul-betul kehilangan moment ini. Seperti juga mas ulil, mas luthfi, anick, sahal, mas goen dan teman-teman yang tak bisa hadir. Makanya saya meminta teman-teman JIL menceritakannya untuk kami. Saya berterima kasih pada Novri yang dengan luar biasa kerennya menceritakan ultah JIL dengan detail. Saya udah meminta izin Novri kalau laporannya akan saya muat diblog ini. Terima kasih Novri. Terima kasih Lanny, Umdah, Guntur dan mbak Ade yang dengan kerja kerasnya berhasil menyelenggarakan ultah JIL sekarang. Terima kasih kepada semua orang yang telah mendukung baik materi dan lainnya. Tak bisa saya sebutkan nama-namanya di sini, karena saking banyaknya.

Ini dia laporan Novri, selamat membaca!

Hari Pertama
Pengunjung membludak, mungkin sampai 350-an orang. Sejak jam tiga sore, mereka sudah menyemut dan minum teh botol di kedai. Ada banyak orang mungkin dari STT Jakarta ataupun STF Driyarkara. Tapi orang yang tidak kita kenal benar-benar banyak. Saya lihat lebih banyak dari tahun kemarin. Orang seakan penasaran, ada apa dengan JIL.

Tamu khusus yang diundang JIL emang dikit yang datang. Hanya ada Pak Fikri Jufri, Mas Tosca Santoso, Pak Zulkifli Lubis, Qodari, Rahman Toleng, Bu Tini Hadad, Zumrotin, Amanda, dll. Sejak awal saya sudah suruh Rusdi (operator TUK) agar nyetel liputan TV ABC Australia yang meliput ultah JIL tahun lalu tentang Islam Indonesia. Kita cuma setel yang edisi progresif yang menampilkan senyum Mas Luthfi, Syafii Anwar, Dhani Dewa, dan Nong Darol Mahmada. Film itu diluncurkan ke layar dengan volume yang sengaja dikencangkan agar ketahuan kita lagi kenduri.

Selesai menyaksikan film, Mas Hamid Basyaib, Koordinator JIL, mulai sambutan soal betapa tidak seberapanya usaha yang dilakukan JIL di tengah gelombang konservatisme di Indonesia, dan betapa beratnya merawat oase kebebasan yang kita ciptakan. JIL memang tidak kehabisan moral, tapi material memang tidak ada. Karena itu, Mas Hamid mengetuk hati orang-orang untuk juga sumbangsih material di samping moral.

Saiful Mujani atau yang akrab kami panggil kak ipung, ketua yayasan JIL, selanjutnya ngomong soal perlunya "bersedekah" gagasan untuk menjaga keseimbangan neraca moderasi Islam di Indonesia. Kalau ada yang ekstrem di kanan, harus ada yang ekstrem di kiri agar yang tenggah-tengah tetap stabil. Tapi yang lebih penting dari itu, Kak Ipung berpesan agar yang tengah-tengah ini jangan mau enak sendiri; tidak berbuat apa-apa, oportunistik.

Pak Zul pertama ingin menanya apa prestasi jil dalam beberapa tahun ini. Tapi melihat kompleksitas perkaranya, dia lebih suka melihat proses, bukan hasil. Ini masih on going process. Pendek kata, dia tetap support JIL karena menghidupkan suasasa komunitas utan kayu. Pak Fikri Jufri saya agak lupa dia ngomong apa karena waktu itu saya sedang ngobrol sama Trisno. Terakhir Bu Zumrotin yang kasih selamat, dan minta nggak banyak sambutan, tapi langsung makan-makan aja. Tentu hadirin sepakat amin... Kita makan, stok kurang, karena dipesan hanya 150 porsi. Tapi ada banyak kue dari simpatisan yang datang, dari Mbak Amanda dan Emak yang konon isteri Direktur Astra.

Tibalah saatnya diskusi. Wah, teater penuh sesak. Sampai hanya tersisa ruang setengah meter dari meja pembicara untuk tempat saya moto-moto. Mungkin banyak fans Franky B. Hardiman, Ioanes Rakhmat, dan Kak Ihsan Ali-Fauzi yang datang. Sampai-sampai, di luar pintu banyak juga yang hanya bisa liat-liat suasana diskusi di dalam. Franky bicara soal mayarakat post-secular. Ioanes hanya memberi memaparkan pendapat Berger dan satu orang lagi tetnang sekularisme. Maklum, dia baru dihubungi empat hari sebelum acara untuk menggantikan Eri Seda yang harus ke Singapura ngantar ibunya berobat. Kak Ihsan bintangnya malam itu. Penjajakan teoretis tentang sekularisme dipaparkan dengan banyak referensi dan analisis yang baik dari Kak Ihsan. Tapi waktu sesi diskusi agak kurang greget karena penanya banyak yang nggak mutu. Tapi dari sisi kuantitas pengunjung, kita menang malam itu. Jamaah bertambah, hati kita dibesarkan oleh antusiasme banyak orang...

Hari Kedua
Film Jesus Camp diputar jam 2 dan Soldier of God setelahnya. Penonton sekitar 50 orang saja. Tapi diskusi dengan Rizal “Celi” Mallarangeng, Samsurizal Panggabean dan Dick van der Meij sungguh menarik. Dick bilang ke saya kalau dia justru banyak dapat pengetahuan dari diskusi malam itu ketimbang memberi pengetahuan tentang sekularisme dalam prakteknya. Mas Celi tentulah bintang di forum apa pun. Tapi Rizal Pangabedan tak kalah menggigit dan kocaknya.

Oh ya, peserta di hari ini agak berkurang. Tapi hanya susut setengah meter dari depan meja pembicara dari pada malam sebelumnya. Tapi kualitas diskusi malam ini benar-benar punya greget. Mas Celi dapat porsi pertanyaan paling banyak tentang praktek sekularisme di Amerika dan tantangan di Indonesia dengan adanya perda-perda syariah. Seperti biasa, Celi adalah orang yang selalu optimis kalau modernisasi akan tetap memperkuat sekularisasi walau di Indonesia saat ini aspirasi agama di tingkat kultural makin menguat.

Karena dia dianggap orang dalam istana, peserta banyak juga yang berpesan agar pemerintah lebih tegas terhadap aspirasi-aspirasi syariah yang sudah mewabah di beberapa daerah. Itu terutama disampaikan Yenni Rosa Damayanti. Tapi Celi mengingatkan pentingnya bersabar, kayak ustad aja, mungkin karena sebelumnya ketemu Kiai Gontor dengan saya, dan pentingnya mempertimbangkan sensitifitas masalah. Celi juga mengingatkan bahwa sejarah Indonesia adalah sejarah pemberontakan daerah dan karena itu harus lebih arif menghadapi masalah. Dia juga mengingatkan betapa perlunya tetap menghargai kompromi-kompromi sejarah yang telah dicapai para founding father kita dengan mengakomodasi nagara ketuhanan, depertemen agama, pesantren, dan undang-undang seperti perkawinan yang sebetulnya tidak ideal juga.

Syamsurizal Panggabean juga tampil memikat. Dia banyak cerita tentang kontradisksi-kontradiksi yang terjadi dalam penerapan syariah di banyak negara, dan terutama di Aceh. Kocak betul abang kita ini malam itu. Mereka yang rewel-rewel dengan syariah itu, belum sampai saja ilmunya, katanya. Dia juga mengingatkan, inilah masa di mana kita melihat Indonesia sebenarnya, dengan segenap warna-warninya sembari optimis bahwa aspirasi agama yang ngawur-ngawur di mana-mana itu tak akan mengubah apa-apa.

Pak Dick tampak puasa bicara dan tidak komentar banyak. Tampaknya, filolog ini lebih banyak ingin mendengar ketimbang berkomentar. Dan dia salut besar dengan diskusi kita dan berpesan pada saya untuk selalu mengundangnya dalam acara-acara kita.

Oh ya, Franky tampaknya terkesan betul dengan forum diskusi kita. Dia juga merasa bahwa dia merasa mendapat tempat yang betul-betul menantang untuk diskusi karena tesis-tesis dia, terutama tentang post-secular society, dan dia menganggap masyarakat Indonesia sudah sampai ke situ, banyak mendapat tantangan. Dia minta rekaman audio-visual diskusi kemarin, katanya untuk introspeksi.

Hari ke 3
Kiranya diskusi tentang sekularisme sudah berakhir dengan optimisme Celi dan Rizal Pangabean yang menyimpulkan sekularisme tetap akan berjaya dengan modernisasi. Rupanya tidak. Pada hari ketiga, keempat pembicara kita, Saiful Mujani, Gadis Arivia, Martin Sinaga, dan Dadi Darmadi benar-benar memikat. Pengunjung pun tak susut, bahkan tampak lebih banyak dari hari kedua. Jika pada hari kedua jarak yang tersisa antara pembicara dan peserta jadi satu meter, pada hari ketiga ini, jaraknya menyusut jadi 75 centi.

Iklan sponsor Tolak Angin rupanya menginspirasi Saiful Mujani untuk membuka pembicaraan. Di situ tertulis kalimat, Orang Pintar Sayang Keluarga. Nah, Saiful mengubahnya jadi Orang Sekuler (Mesti) Sayang Keluarga. Itu penting karena nasib sekularisme bergantung pada keluarga. Keluarga menentukan tingkat populasi. Dalam hitung-hitungan demografis, bagi Saiful, dalam hitungan ratusan tahun yang akan datang, sekularisme akan mati. Sebabnya sederhana, orang sekuler tidak sayang keluarga.

Sebaliknya, orang non-sekuler justru berkembang-biak dengan begitu cepat, bahkan perkembangbiakan itu tidak hanya dari satu betina, tapi dari banyak betina. Orang non-sekuler ini, taruhkan PKS, memacu jumlah populasi mereka dengan cepat. Saya jadi teringat salah satu masalah yang cukup mengkhawatirkan Israel saat ini adalah cepatnya pertumbuhan populasi orang Arab-Israel berbanding orang Israel umumnya yang sekuler, maju, dan terdidik.

Ini bukan lelucon, kira-kira begitulah Saiful mewanta-wanti. Sebab selama ini, orang sekuler tidak perhatian terhadap keluarga, sibuk dengan aktivitas mereka, malas kawin, dan kalau kawin pun, malas punya anak. Karena itu, bagi Saiful, optimisme Celi dan Rizal P sehari sebelumnya pantas untuk diragukan. Diskusi terbuka kembali. Saiful yang membuka tabir itu. Ia bagai mendapat wahyu lalu memberi fatwa tepat saat berada di meja presentasi.

Bagi saya pribadi, tesis besar Saiful itulah pusat pembicaraan yang perlu didiskusikan. Tapi Gadis Arivia yang tampil sebelum Saiful bicara soal pasca-sekularisme, hampir mirip dengan pembicaraan Franky sebelumnya. Saya merasa, Gadis bicara apa yang seharusnya, bukan apa yang seadanya. Ia berkaca pada kasus Iran dan Afganistan lewat dua novel Reding Lolita in Teheran dan Kite Runner. Tampak ia mengkhawatirkan nasib sekularisme sembari berharap kita semestinya sudah melampaui itu. Tapi uraiannya mengena pada tema malam itu, tentang tantangan sekularisme. Katanya, kita hanya ingin menjaga jernihnya kolam kita bersama untuk tetap bisa dimasuki dan direnagi oleh semua kalangan, baik yang sekuler maupun nonsekuler, yang berjilbab maupun tidak berjilbab. Tapi, di Indonesia kini, banyak indikasi ingin mencemari kolam itu.

Kita memang ingin melampaui sekularisme, tapi faktanya kita belum melampaui itu, kata Saiful. Ungkapan Saiful ini sekaligus membantah harapan Gadis dan juga tesis Franky tentang masyarakat pasca-sekularisme. Saiful menandaskan bahwa masa depan sekularisme cukup gelap. Tapi apakah kita akan menyaksikan orang-orang mengucapkan rest in peace terhadap sekularisme?

Bagi Martin, menanggapi saya yang bertanya pada Saiful yang bagi saya mengandaikan sejarah akan berjalan linear dan seakan-akan tidak ada dinamika dan perubahan orientasi pada kedua pihak, yang tumbuh sekuler dan nonsekuler, mengingatkan, studi Yudi Latif tentang Perkembangan Inteligensia Muslim Indonesia justru menunjukkan bahwa dalam seratus tahun terakhir, intelektual Islam di Indonesia justru merasa baju Islam terlalu sempit. Dia mengutip ungkapan Amien Rais. Karena itu, Martin merasa, dalam tubuh umat Islam pun ada pergulatan dalam memilih baju yang sesuai.

Selebihnya, Martin lebih fokus pada pembicaraan bagaimana pandangan dunia sekuler tumbuh dalam konteks kekristenan Indonesia sejak zaman Belanda. Untuk melompat ke masa sekarang, setelah reformasi, orang Kristen Indonesia justru menyaksikan fundamentalisme yang tidak hanya anti-sekularisme, tapi juga anti-Kristen, terutama dalam kasus-kasus kekerasan terhadap umat Kristen sejak reformasi bergulir.

Dadi Darmadi tidak banyak mengeluarkan pandangan baru. Dia hanya mengutip kekhawatiran Paus Benediktus yang tampak gundah akan sekularisme dan mengharapkan umat Katolik menemukan kembali identitas dirinya. Kediktatoran relativisme, itulah yang dilihat Paus dalam sekularisme. Selebihnya dia ngomong kurang terfokus, mungkin karena dia juga baru dihubungi untuk bicara tiga hari sebelumnya, untuk menggantikan Saiful. Eh, ternyata Saifulnya juga datang dan justru menjadi bintang yang tiada taranya malam itu.

Sesi tanya jawab dan tanggapan tidak banyak yang menarik, kecuali munculnya beberapa penanggap dari suporter Gadis Arivia dan aktivis Kapal Perempuan yang terus bilang "Jangan berwacana terus". Mari aksi! Mahasiswi filsafat UI yang cakep-cekep juga datang untuk memberi support kepada godmother mereka, Gadis Arivia. Mereka inilah yang tampaknya dapat disebut sejumput masyarakat pascasekular yang diomongin Gadis sebelumnya. Tapi mereka berada dalam samudera masyarakat antisekularisme dan mungkin juga prasekularisme.

Pendek kata, diskusi malam terakhir itu tak kalah menariknya dari malam sebelumnya, kalau bukan malah lebih menarik. Moral JIL terus terangkat, dan jemaah tampak terus bertambah. Mbak Amanda ingin acara seperti itu terus diadakan tiap bulan. Mbak Tamalia Alisyahbana juga berharap hal serupa. Saya minta Amanda mencarikan uangnya, katanya akan membantu. Intinya, JIL never die. Panjang umur Jaringan Islam Liberal...!

Di Melbourne Usiaku Bertambah

Jumat 23 Maret, ketika saya lagi istirahat sekolah saya mendatangi ruang komputer. Iseng-iseng buka email dan saya mendapat ucapan selamat ulang tahun dari teman-teman di milis internal JIL : “Selamat ulang tahun Mba Nong”. yang menarik ada ucapan selamat dari mas ulil yang bilang “keren kamu ya Nong, ulang tahunnya di Melbourne. Padahal biasanya di Pandegalang.” Persisnya sebenarnya Labuan, bukan Pandeglang, tempat saya dilahirkan dan menjalani masa kecil saya.

Iya, bulan ini saya ulang tahun. Ada yang berbeda dibanding ulang tahun sebelumnya. Seperti kata mas Ulil, saya sekarang berada di Melbourne sejak tanggal 22 Februari lalu. Saya dapat beasiswa short course dari TAF. Kalau di Jakarta, saya ngga punya waktu dan selalu ada alasan untuk tak bisa belajar. Karena kerja lah, aktif di sini di sana, ngurus anak dan lain-lain. Di sini saya benar-benar dipaksa belajar. Meski saya harus pontang panting mengendalikan perasaan yang tercabik-cabik. Duh, kenapa ya kalau lagi belajar pasti banyak godaannya?

Di Melbourne, saya tinggal bersama keluarga imigran England-Jepang. Di sini susah banget nyari yang benar-benar OZ, kebanyakan pendatang. Bahkan walikotanya pun orang Cina. Keluarga yang saya tempati ini suami orang England namanya Alvin. Sedang isterinya orang Jepang, namanya Tami. Mereka udah puluhan tahun tinggal di Melbourne dan udah mapan. Tami tipe isteri rumahan yang pandai masak terutama masakan Jepang (jelaslah namanya juga orang Jepang :-)). Saya betah dan enjoy banget karena makannya enak terus dan mereka berdua baik banget.

Kembali ke laptop eh ultah. Di moment yang cukup penting dalam hidup saya ini, saya jauh dari keluarga dan teman-teman. Tengah malam, saya sempat terbangun: sedih, ingat Umi saya yang sudah meninggal, ingat andrea (anakku yang lagi lucu-lucunya), keluarga, teman terdekat dan tiba-tiba merasa kesepian sekali. saya telpon indra, suami saya, dan dia langsung ngucapin selamat ulang tahun dan berdoa untuk kebaikanku. Di kamar yang sunyi dan sendiri, saya juga berdoa untuk hidup saya dan mereka semua. Setelah itu, pikiran saya enteng memasuki fase baru dengan bertambahnya usia saya. “Wah, saya makin tua nih. Harus tambah dewasa dan tidak boleh terbawa perasaan terus,” tekadku. Saya review kembali hidup saya: Apa ya yang sudah saya perbuat selama ini? Adakah hidup saya ini berguna untuk orang kebanyakan? Adakah prestasi saya? Jawabannya, ternyata saya belum banyak melakukan apa-apa. Hidupku masih begini-begini aja.

Paginya, seperti biasa saya sekolah. Saya sudah tak mengharapkan ada perayaan, ucapan, atau apalah di ultah tahun ini. Yang terpenting, saya sudah berdoa dan bertekad menjalani dan melakoni kehidupan yang lebih baik di tahun ini dan seterusnya. Lagian sebenarnya dalam tradisi keluarga saya pun tak pernah ada perayaan ultah-ultahan. Bahkan tanggal lahir anak-anaknya pun kadang ngga jelas. Versi A begini, versi B begitu. Keluarga saya santri banget yang tak terlalu perduli dengan pernak pernik kelahiran. Bagi Abah dan Umi saya (panggilan untuk orang tua saya), merayakan ultah dengan meniup lilin itu tradisi Kristen, tradisi Barat katanya. Saya ingat, waktu kecil saya merengek minta ke Umi dirayain ulang tahun dengan mengundang teman-teman. Umi saya bilang, “Jangan nong, tradisi Kristen kok diikuti. Pamali.” Pamali itu artinya berdosa. Makanya di keluarga saya, ngga ada itu perayaan ultah-ultahan. Malah sebaliknya, tradisi kita selalu merayakan kematian. Ada 7 hari, 40 hari, 100 hari, setahun dan seterusnya. Tiap tahun terus menerus dirayakan.

Saya baru merasakan ultah saya dirayakan dan dianggap berarti ketika saya bersuami. Keluarga suamiku sangat menghargai kehidupan. Setiap ultah anggota keluarga pasti dirayakan dan disyukuri bersama-sama. Itu yang membuat saya merasa kehilangan di tahun ini.

Tapi ternyata perasaan saya salah. Hari itu, saya sengaja pulang terlambat dengan berkubang dulu di perpustakaan. Pulang sekolah ternyata keluarga Alvin sudah mempersiapkan pesta ultah yang cukup meriah. Semua keluarganya berkumpul dan beberapa temanku diundangnya. Duh, saya begitu terharu. Ternyata di muka bumi ini kita tak pernah benar-benar sendiri. Semua orang menyayangiku.

Malam itu, rumah benar-benar meriah. Tami masak makanan Jepang: sushi, sashimi, sabu, sop dan lain-lain. Alvin membuat cake ulang tahun, salad, dan Pizza vegetarian. Semua minuman tersedia: champign, wine, bir, soft drink sampai air zam-zam he..he.. Pokoknya malam itu benar-benar meriah. Ketika mereka meminta saya meniup lilin, saya menghela napas dalam-dalam, mata saya terpejam dan berdoa suatu saat saya diberi kesempatan bisa membalas kebaikan mereka, trus puuuh… lilin-lilin itu saya tiup...mereka semua memberi selamat dan mendoakanku. Suasananya jadi begitu mengharukan.

Usai perayaan ultah di keluarga Alvin, indra menelpon kalau andrea, anakku, ingin tiup lilin untuk mamanya. Maka cepat-cepatlah aku menyalakan laptopku dan connect internet. di layar laptopku, andrea sudah manteng dengan lilin ulang tahun dan pizzanya. "Met ulang tahun, mama," kata andrea dan suamiku. aku jadi makin terharu.

Seperti kata mas Ulil, buatku ultah sekarang memang benar-benar keren. Bukan sekedar ultahnya di Melbourne tapi juga karena ultah saya dirayakan oleh orang-orang yang tadinya saya anggap mereka tak perduli saya, bukan saudara, bahkan sebagai teman pun baru ketemu dan kenal. Ternyata saya salah. Mereka dan keluargaku luar biasa. Meski jauh dari keluarga & teman terdekat, ulang tahun sekarang benar-benar berarti dan berkesan. Terima kasih Alvin, terima kasih Tami, terima kasih dea, terima kasih mas in, terima kasih semuanya…

Is There a Rainbow in Islam?

In 1997, Nong Darol Mahmada became furious with God. Her mother-who had been active in organizing Islamic prayer meetings in her neighborhood in Labuan, Banten, West Java-was struck with an incurable illness that would leave her crippled for life. Nong thought that God had abandoned them. "My mother was a good person and a devoted wife. Why would God let her suffer? When she became ill, everything fell apart." At Nong's father's pesantren religious school, the enrollment dropped from around 500 to 100. "My mother used to take care of everything," Nong says. "No one could replace her. I thought, why doesn't God see that by making my mother sick He was losing so many people who had praised Him?' I was very angry."

Nong's relationship with God has been a passionate affair. As a young woman, she desired only to devote herself to religion. As a middle-school student at her father's pesantren, she dreamed of leaving the school to live alone in a rented room where she could spend more time in solitary praise of God. Nong found her inspiration in Rabi'ah al-Adawiyah, an 8th century woman Sufi from the area that is now Iraq, who was well-known for her concept of divine love. "Rabi'ah didn't marry, she spent all her time performing wirid," says Nong, referring to the practice of reciting the Qur'an to praise God, usually done after completing the five daily prayers or h.

Nong lost interest in school, preferring to spend her time reciting the Qur'an and praying. One night in the middle of her devotions, she got up and left her room. She walked alone through the dark streets until she arrived at the small prayer room (musholla) at the bus terminal. She prayed there alone until dawn. That incident led her teacher to reprimand her, warning that a bus terminal was a dangerous place for a young woman.

This was not Nong's first scolding. She had grown up in a very strict religious environment under her paternal grandmother, since her parents were busy running the religious school. Nong's grandmother believed in a literal adherence to Islamic scripture. It was she who made sure that Nong wore a jilbab, the scarf worn by many of Indonesia's Muslim women to cover the hair, neck and chest. Nong remembers her grandmother warning her, "If you don't wear a jilbab and cover your hair, when you die your hair will burn in the fires of hell." Once she watched her grandmother yank the hair of her older sister, which had been fashionably curled and styled in a ponytail. "Hey, you're going to hell! You'll be burned up!" her grandmother shouted, pulling on her granddaughter's offending coiffure.

It was not until Nong entered university at the Syarif Hidayatullah State Academy for Islamic Sciences (IAIN) in Jakarta that she was introduced to interpretations of Islam that challenged her grand`mother's thinking. Exposed to a new world of books and Qur'anic interpretations, she came across the works of Fatima Mernissi, a Moroccan Muslim feminist.

"Fatima says that the jilbab exists for the political self-interests of men," Nong says. "I became convinced that the command to wear the veil was very political. I saw the revelation of the Qur'anic verse about the veil to have been meant not as a requirement but as an appeal. It was revealed during the time of the Prophet Muhammad, when people harassed Muslim women as a way of attacking the Prophet. But now there is no difference if I wear jilbab or not. It's a warning. The Prophet saw the clothing traditions of the Quraishi women at the time, and he said, 'pull your coverings over your chests.' There was no command to cover your hair. I wear modest clothes that don't attract people's attention-that's my jilbab."

On campus, Nong began to participate in discussions with her new friends, and she felt that her previous understanding of Islam had been backward. "All that I experienced in the pesantren made me restless at university. It seemed that what I had understood to be true wasn't right. How, I asked myself, could I have accepted those kinds of teachings? I felt really out of it."

Like Nong, Ulil Abshar-Abdalla was raised in an orthodox Islamic tradition. His father was the head of a pesantren in Pati, Central Java, and believed that formal schooling was syakkun fil Rab, a symptom of doubt in God. Ulil's father was distressed to see his son reading books written in Latin letters rather than the holy texts written in Arabic. For Ulil's father, true knowledge was contained in these Arabic texts.

But Ulil was drawn to read widely, despite his father's warning that such books would lead him astray. By the time he was of middle-school age, Ulil had read h (Upheaval in Islamic Thinking), the journal of Ahmad Wahib, a young Indonesian Islamic intellectual writing in the 1970s and who died at a young age. Wahib introduced Ulil to the notion of freedom of thought, not yet a popular concept among Indonesian Islamic thinkers. In the introduction to his journal, Wahib wrote, "I believe in God, but God is not a land forbidden to thought. God exists not in order for his existence to be un-thought. God takes shape not in order to hide from the light of critique." Wahib believed that God was living, fresh and flexible: "He does not want to be fixed in place."

Wahib's writings fuelled Ulil's search for new thought. Ulil also found a teacher to offer him encouragement. He says, "Kyai Sahal [Mahfudz] introduced me not only to modern Arab thinkers but also to the thought of Cak Nur [Nurcholish Madjid, a progressive Indonesian Muslim thinker] and Gus Dur [Abdurrahman Wahid, a leader of Nahdlatul Ulama, the largest Muslim organization in Southeast Asia and former president of Indonesia]. It gave me a sense of pride in Islamic thought. He also introduced me to Western philosophy. Many kinds of books were available in his school library back then." (Sahal Mahfudz is now the head of the Majelis Ulama Indonesia, an organization of Indonesian Islamic intellectuals.)

Books, however, were not enough to give Ulil a clear path. He also sought a social environment that could provide an answer to his restless questioning. "I entered the fundamentalist milieu and became a member of their religious community. For two years I was one of them."

The fundamentalist outlook inspired Ulil to even greater devotion. Previously he had followed Islam simply as a social tradition; now he grew to see Islam as not just a set of religious rules but as a compass to guide society and state. He remembers thinking at the time, "This is amazing."

But Ulil's perspective changed again after listening to a lecture by a young Islamic intellectual, Imanuddin Abdurrahim, at the Salman Mosque in Bandung. "[Imanuddin] had once been jailed by Suharto's New Order government. I listened to him speak and I read his books, and it was very inspiring. His background was in physics and he had a very logical way of thinking. He said that the law of God is natural law, having an objective quality, and that it does not discriminate between one group or another."

Imanuddin gave an example that stuck in Ulil's mind. "There are two buildings, one a mosque and the other an office," Ulil recounts. "The office installs a lightning rod, but the mosque does not. When a storm comes, the mosque will be hit by lightning, even though it is a place for the worship of God. Because it does not follow the [natural] law of God, it will face the consequences. This means that if Muslims want to progress, they cannot depend only on religious texts that were produced in a certain social and historical context, as if they were God's law, without considering how social laws have developed. Social law is not static. The mistake of the fundamentalists is to see it as static."

Ulil came to see fundamentalism as archaic. He became more deeply convinced of this in the midst of political shifts following the fall of Suharto in 1998. Radical Islamic movements, such as the Islamic Defenders' Front (FPI) and Laskar Jihad, injected religious emotion into political conflicts that had been brewing across the nation during Suharto's thirty-three-year regime-often they advocated violence as a moral response. In areas such as Ambon and Poso in eastern Indonesia, the issues at stake became colored as an inter-religious war. In Javanese cities, vigilante squads of the FPI attacked cafés and discotheques, claiming that they were protecting the public from sin. There were raids and "sweepings" in boarding houses in Central Java, enforcing curfews in the name of preventing immoral acts.

"This fundamentalism comes from a sense of desperation, a feeling of disappointment," says Ulil. "They're disappointed because Muslims once knew a golden age and now they feel degraded. They are experiencing political fragmentation, they are being left behind in science and economics. Looking at American policy in Palestine, they become spectators of injustice. 'Has God left us out?' That's their fundamental question. They feel belittled. Fundamentalism gives them a sense of pride. The real challenge, though, is regain their pride by confronting the roots of the backwardness in certain fields, not to withdraw into a conservative group."

Nong interjects, "Fundamentalist Muslims are unproductive, exclusive and they don't follow the developments of the times. As Ulil says, religion is a living organism that makes us feel enthusiasm. If we feel enthusiasm, then what Nietzsche said, 'religion is already dead,' that couldn't possibly happen."

Hamid Basyaib adds, "These days people just react to situations, which at the level of discourse are dominated by aggressive Islam or uneducated Islam," adds Hamid Basyaib. "These movements aren't terrifying, but they do promote rigidity, backwardness and literalist thinking."

In 1999, Ulil, who graduated from the Institute for Islamic and Arabic Knowledge in Jakarta, met with a number of friends, including Goenawan Mohamad, Luthfi Assyaukanie, Ihsan Ali Fawzi, Nong Darol Mahmada, Ahmad Sahal and Hamid Basyaib, all of whom shared many of Ulil's views and his determination to address Indonesia's growing fundamentalism. Ulil says, "We've seen radical Islam grow militant, systematic and organized, while liberal Islam has been unorganized, weak-seeming, not militant, not resistant and unassertive in giving voice to its perspectives. The Liberal Islamic Network was in fact motivated by the appearance of these radical Islamic movements."

It's January 4, 2001 in Jakarta, and a meeting is underway in a wood-floored study with dark blue walls, the office of Goenawan Mohamad, a columnist for the Indonesian newsmagazine Tempo and one of the founders of the Jakarta-based Institute for the Study of the Flow of Information (ISAI). The space is furnished simply with a table and six black-varnished wooden chairs, and a long wooden bench covered in red pillows. The walls are decorated with paintings and posters from European art exhibitions. An easel stands near the door, holding drafting paper covered with pen strokes. The seven people in the room have been engaged in serious discussion for hours.

Goenawan picks up a phone and calls Dahlan Iskan, the Chief Editor of the Jawa Pos newspaper, to ask him for some space to publish liberal Islamic thought. They have already agreed to appoint Nong Darol Mahmada to work on a funding proposal, while Luthfi Assyaukanie will be in charge of planning and managing a mailing list for discussing liberal Islam on the Internet.

"The Liberal Islamic Network was born in that meeting," says Nong. "All we want is to provide a choice for interpreting Islamic teachings."

"A lot of people don't realize that reading the Qur'an cannot be value-free," Ulil adds.

"In other words, the Qur'an can be read from different perspectives or angles. Each angle has its own validity. Even though each of these angles is valid, that doesn't negate the possibility of mutual critique. Without mutual critique, there's no possibility of us learning from each other."

These days, Islamic liberal thinkers take inspiration from many sources, including the work of Charles Kurzman, whose book Liberal Islam: A Sourcebook differentiates between those Islamic revival movements which reject modernity and claim to be searching for the pure Islam practiced in the time of the Prophet Muhammad, and liberal Islam, which supports a division between state and religion in its search for a route to modernity. Ulil explains, however, that even within the liberal Islamic community there are varying opinions about secularism. Some argue that an attempt to separate politics and religion is impossible in today's world, or even that it is an old-fashioned notion belonging to another era when secularism seemed much simpler. In today's modern society, religion carries with it a cultural identity, and despite attempts to marginalize it, it returns in much more complex forms.

"This makes it difficult to find the point at which liberal Islam diverges from literal Islam-that's our term for the fundamentalist movements. On some matters our positions meet-about pornography, for example, because pornography does damage ideals about the family, and our religion places a great emphasis on the family. Just like the Christian conservative George Bush, their rhetoric is filled with references to family values," Ulil says.

However, as Kurzman explains, a respect for the rights of women and non-Muslims, freedom of thought, anti-theocracy and support for democracy provide liberal Islam with a wide space in which to move.

Indonesia's Liberal Islamic Network spreads their viewpoints not only by publishing newspaper articles and hosting mailing list debates, but also by sponsoring radio talk shows and Friday bulletins, and they have plans to launch their own magazine. Funds for their operations come from The Asia Foundation and The Freedom Institute, a nonprofit organization headed by the Indonesian pro-democracy figure Rizal Mallarangeng. The Liberal Islamic Network has found that of all these channels for publicizing their thought, it is syndicated media that has been the most effective to date.
Ulil says, "People's reactions to the articles we published in the Jawa Pos were amazing. I didn't realize it until I visited local communities, especially in East Java and Eastern Indonesia."

Not everyone, however, has had a positive reaction to the Liberal Islamic Network. The most heated response came after Ulil published an article in the Kompas newspaper entitled "Freshening Up Islamic Understanding" (Menyegarkan Kembali Pemahaman Islam)on November 18, 2002.

At seven o'clock in the evening, several weeks after the article appeared and two days before the Muslim holiday of Idul Fitri, Nong received a call on her cell phone from Hamid Basyaib. Hamid was in Jakarta, but Nong had already returned to her parents' home for the holidays.

"Nong, Ulil has had a death fatwa issued against him. Look at Detikcom [a news website]. I've been trying to call Ulil but I can't get through. His cell phone isn't ringing. Ulil has to hear this. You let him know, okay, Nong? Try to call him."

"Okay, I'll contact him later," Nong replied easily.

After talking to Hamid, Nong opened her laptop and logged onto the Detikcom website. Sure enough, she found a news item saying that a group of religious scholars called the Forum Ulama Umat Indonesia (FUUI) in Bandung, West Java had issued a fatwa calling for Ulil's death. Trying not to panic, Nong interrupted her father, who was busy watching television. "Father, a death fatwa has been issued against Ulil. Did you have anything to do with it?" Nong's father replied that he had known about the plans for the group of religious scholars to meet, but that he didn't know anything about a fatwa concerning Ulil. Her father assured her that the fatwa wasn't really serious.

Meanwhile, Ulil was in a car driving through Central Java on the road home for the holidays with his wife and child when his cell phone rang with a message: "What about those religious teachers in Bandung? How should it be followed up in Bandung?" Ulil did not understand the message.

"What I imagined at the time was that it wouldn't be the FUUI who would execute Ulil, but that it would be taken up by radicals on the street and they would kill him," Nong remembers.

Ulil stood accused of insulting the Muslim community and spreading enmity and hatred through society by way of his writings. But Athian Ali Muhamad Dai, head of the FUUI, denied that his organization had issued such a fatwa against Ulil. "We never issued a death fatwa especially about Ulil in our press release. We only called upon the state apparatus to dissolve that network, then we noted that whoever insulted Islam could reasonably expect the death penalty." Athian stated that he had already turned over Ulil's case to the police, complaining that what Ulil wrote in his article was an evil act against religion. Athian says he had reported Ulil to the police based on complaints from the Muslim community in Bandung. "Around 700 people complained. We distributed a questionnaire for this purpose-this was also what the police wanted, proof of how much influence this act had on society. Some people who were so fed up that they wanted to see Ulil hang."

For his own part, Athian considered Ulil's thinking dangerous for, he argued, it positioned the human mind above God. "It's a perfect example of insulting Islam," he said. "Ulil dares to say there is no law of God, there is only the law of man. He calls the Islamic punishment of stoning to death and other matters things that 'not meaningful'." Athian claimed that he would not forbid Ulil from having an alternative interpretation of Islam as long as he did not spread his ideas by writing in the mass media. "If Ulil wants to scream and shout in his room or with his own group, that's not a problem. If Ulil wants to say he has no religion at all, that's not a problem. But don't say those things while claiming to be a Muslim."

Fauzan Al-Ashari from the Majelis Mujahidin Indonesia-a fundamentalist organization that counts among its members Abu Bakar Baasyir, the man accused of complicity in several terrorist bomb blasts in Indonesia-said that he disagreed with the plan to issue a fatwa against Ulil. "I heard about that," he said, "but the fatwa doesn't exist. It's just a speculative thing." Fauzan said he was, however, among those who supported the FUUI in its attempts to have the police investigate Ulil. He suggested that the way out of the debate was to muhabalah-to leave the decision in God's hands.

"For example," explained Fauzan over the telephone, "we ask for a sign from Allah within three days, that one of us should be struck by lightning and that's how we'll know which of us is wrong."

Kedai Tempo, an open-air Jakarta cafe, feels relaxed this March 24th afternoon. It is near the Jaringan Islam Liberal offices, and Nong and her friends like to meet here, drinking coffee or bottled tea, enjoying the breeze that wafts in from the open sides of the café. But Nong Darol Mahmada's cell phone rings often and she looks tired. She's organizing a campaign against the U.S. war on Iraq, a campaign involving the Liberal Islamic Network and a number of well-known Indonesian performers, including Iwan Fals, Franky Sahilatua and Trie Utami.

"When the Bali bombings occurred," Nong says, "I thought the fundamentalist groups would fade, because people would see that they were wrong. But now the Iraq war becomes a new justification for the fundamentalist attitude toward America or the West. Everything we've been working for-democracy, freedom of thought-all seems in vain."

She turns to Ulil. "What are we going to do now?"

"Well, you know, we'll just continue with our agenda," he answers, already on his feet.


**Linda Christanty is a journalist and writer.
Reference : Latitudes, July 2003

Syahidah

Minggu, 27 Januari 2002. Seorang perempuan yang mengenakan mantel modern bergaya barat, selendang di leher dan dagu, bermata cokelat bagai kulit rusa, berambut ikal panjang, dilengkapi make up yang sempurna, tersenyum hangat dan riang ketika memasuki pusat perbelanjaan di Yerusalem. Ia mendatangi toko sepatu dan pakaian seraya melihat-lihat seperti layaknya pengunjung lain. Tak seorang pun mengira kalau di tas punggungnya terdapat sepuluh kilogram bahan peledak yang dibubuhi banyak paku. Sebuah bom yang mematikan.

Tiba-tiba dia gugup dan bergegas menuju pintu toko, berhenti, lalu memasukkan tangannya ke ransel untuk mengambil bedak dan lipstik. Ketika berusaha menahan pintu dengan satu kaki agar pintu itu tetap terbuka sambil memegang cermin untuk merapikan make up-nya, tasnya tersangkut. Ia berusaha memutar posisi untuk melepas tas, namun tas itu langsung meledak. Bum! Perempuan itu langsung tewas beserta satu orang Israel yang sudah tua serta ratusan orang yang terluka.

Perempuan itu bernama Wafa Idris. Dia menjadi pelaku bom bunuh diri perempuan pertama dalam Islam. Di pagi hari sebelum bom meledak, almarhum Yasser Arafat, pemimpin Palestina saat itu, berpidato mengobarkan semangat kesyahidan kepada lebih dari seribu perempuan Palestina, “Kalian adalah Pasukan Mawarku yang akan menghancurkan tank-tank Israel.” Kalimat itu langsung direspons Wafa di sore harinya. Ia menjadi syahidah pertama, Pasukan Mawar Arafat. Peran yang mungkin luhur dan mulia. Kisah ini diceritakan dengan detail oleh Barbara Victor dalam bukunya Army of Roses.

Sejak saat itu, peran perempuan Palestina berubah. Mereka tak lagi menjadi ibu yang terpaksa melepas putranya ditawan, isteri yang merelakan suaminya raib, saudari yang menyaksikan saudaranya tewas diterjang peluru atau meledakkan diri. Mereka mulai memilih opsi meledakkan diri dan mengambil posisi setara dengan lelaki yang selama ini melakukan peran itu. Mereka konon akan mendapat imbalan yang sama: kemuliaan hidup di surga.

Untuk perempuan seperti Wafa yang miskin dan dicerai suami karena tak bisa punya anak—alasan yang cukup untuk membuat perempuan merasa tidak berharga—kesetaraan dan imbalan surga adalah inti dari harapan yang benar-benar memikat. Bom bunuh diri menjadi jalan satu-satunya untuk menjadi perempuan sempurna (al-mar’ah al-kamilah).

Namun, kesetaraan untuk Wafa benar-benar pantas diragukan. Seperti ditulis Barbara, di tempat dimana pemahaman Islam masih sangat konservatif, tak sepenuhnya laki-laki dapat menerima perempuan sebagai sesama, atau menghormati mereka sebagai prajurit yang berkedudukan setara dengan mereka. Hubungan antara calon syahidah dan laki-laki yang merekrut, membujuk, serta melatihnya, sudah berbeda sejak awal hanya karena ia perempuan. Perempuan seperti Wafa mungkin hanya “dimanfaatkan” untuk menjadi martir.

Begitu pula dengan imbalan surga. Tak ada imajinasi tentang surga buat perempuan. Selama ini, tata kehidupan surgawi digambarkan dengan sangat maskulin. Tak heran bila laki-laki yang memilih bom bunuh diri sangat mendambakan kehidupan di sana. Mereka meyakini, ketika jasad lepas dari raga, empat puluh bidadari akan menyambut dan mereka akan tinggal di sana selamanya dengan pelayanan bidadari-bidadari itu. Kita tak tahu, bagaimana nuansa surga tatkala menerima jasad syahidah. Akankah ia disambut empat puluh bidadara (istilah nenek saya ketika menyebut bidadari laki-laki)?

Saya menghormati Wafa karena keberaniannya memilih cara mati seperti itu. Mungkin juga itu sesuai dengan kondisi negerinya. Namun pilihan Wafa itu hendaknya tidak menginspirasi perempuan-perempuan lain untuk ikut serta. Pilihan medang juang untuk setara, tentu banyak jalannya. Begitu juga dengan cara berjihad. Ada banyak pintu menuju surga, kata Cak Nur. Kita pun tak pernah tahu, seperti apa surga buat kaum perempuan. Jadi, sudah selayaknya kita membuat surga di dunia. []
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Referensi: http://islamlib.com/id, 19/03/2007

Moderate Indonesian Muslim Rejection of the US Attack on Iraq

In this essay, I reflect on how moderate Muslims in Indonesia came to terms, in late 2002, with George W. Bush’s zealous preparations to attack Iraq. The topic is quite important, as Indonesia is well known to have the world’s largest Muslim population, and the majority of Indonesia’s Muslims are moderate and tolerant in their religious views. At the time, there were “pro” and “contra” views of the planned attack. The fundamentalist camp saw it as ammunition – proof that the United States of America was indeed the Great Satan. The fundamentalists could not differentiate between U.S. citizenship and U.S. government policy. Consequently, they pursued U.S. citizens on the streets in what are known locally as “sweepings,” although no major or violent incident ensued.

Meanwhile, the moderate Muslim camp saw the U.S. plan as having the potential to destroy the image and future of Islam, which it had worked extremely hard to develop as part of a mature civil society. For some time, Muslim organizations like Nahdhatul Ulama (NU, the nation’s largest), Muhamadiyah (the second largest), and my own Liberal Islam Network (Jaringan Islam Liberal, JIL) have launched numerous and various activities to create an Islamic community that is tolerant, moderate, pluralist, and emancipative. These are activities that have received American support through USAID. In bringing the danger posed by U.S. war plans to the attention of the Indonesian public, Muhamadiyah leader Dr. Syafi’I Maarif carefully focused his harsh criticism on Bush administration policy.

In early October 2002, in my capacity as JIL representative, I contacted friends representing “moderate” Islamic organizations. These included elements from the NU – Lakpesdam, Muslimat, Fatayat, and others; from Muhammadiyah – Pemuda Muhamadiyah (its youth wing), Mahasiswa Muhamadiyah (students), Aisyiyah (women), and others; and campus-based groups such as those from the State Islamic University (Universitas Islam Negeri) and Paramadina Mulya Universitas in Jakarta. I felt the need to survey their attitudes towards the planned attack on Iraq, and to my surprise, they all expressed the same opinion, rejecting this U.S. policy. JIL itself, long before these inquiries were made, had condemned and rejected the planned attack through interviews on our weekly radio talk shows and articles published on our website and syndicated media.

However, JIL’s serious objections conveyed through media were deemed insufficient. A more tangible action was needed so that all parties would see this condemnation in concrete form. We finally decided upon October 8 as the date to express our objections through a mass demonstration at the U.S. Embassy in Jakarta. At that time, not one organization or institution had demonstrated at the Embassy against the planned attack. If we may so claim, “moderate” Islamic organizations pioneered these demonstrations.

Many were were surprised, never expecting such an action plan from us. The U.S. Embassy called me the day before the action. There was concern that the planned demonstration would provide justification for violent acts by fundamentalist groups that had long despised the United States. I replied that the demonstration would prove positive for the moderate Muslim community, because the insane U.S. plan had to be rejected outright, and that this matter had no connection whatsoever to the actions of fundamentalist groups. Indeed, if the moderate Muslim camp remained quiet and did not react to the planned attack, its lack of action would boomerang and set a bad precedent in the ongoing development of Islam in Indonesia. Further, our demonstration aimed to underline to fundamentalist groups that the planned attack was the policy of the Bush administration, which should not be equated with the American people, most of whom rejected this policy of their own government. We chose to see the planned attack on Iraq in terms of humanitarian concerns, as such an attack would represent a threat to world peace and cause unnecessary civilian deaths.

Fundamentalist groups were also surprised about our planned demonstration. They primarily believed that no such action could issue from and be coordinated by JIL. Their reason: JIL and its like-minded friends were considered very pro-American because we agree with and campaign for what they call the “western ideas” of tolerance, pluralism, and democracy; and furthermore the U.S. government had funded some of our activities. Naturally, we viewed this as a feeble argument. Just because JIL, the NU, and Muhamadiyah had received funds from the United States did not mean we could shut our eyes to the arbitrary policy of its government. What we rejected and despised was the policy of the Bush administration to attack Iraq, not Americans per se. Accordingly, we condemned the “sweeping” actions launched against U.S. citizens by fundamentalist organizations at the time.

The Basis of our Rejection

For us, all the statements and official documents issued by the U.S. government about the planned attack on Iraq were illogical and full of contradictions, displayed a pervasive hatred and a lust for war, and failed to make any connection to the September 11 tragedy, “Al Qaida,” or even the “war on terror.”

Moreover, the plan contravened the United Nations Charter, whose Preamble pledges nations to “save succeeding generations from the scourge of war” and which was established to “take effective collective measures for the prevention and removal of threats to the peace” (Article 1 section 1).

We believe that the reasons put forth in the official document outlining the “preemptive attack” (the “Bush Doctrine”) violate international law. The UN Charter prohibits unilateral cross-border military actions without the justification of self defense, yet there was not a single reason for the U.S. government to need to defend itself against Iraq. UN Security Council Resolution 678 also prohibits any country from invading another without that body’s consent.

Finally, this attack would be undertaken after Iraq had endured more than ten years of economic sanctions that caused suffering to millions of Iraqi civilians, particularly women and children, because the sanctions had destroyed access to clean water. Such economic sanctions themselves stand in direct contradiction to the Additional Protocols to the Geneva Convention of 1977, which prohibits the use of economic blockades against civilians as a method of war. Economic sanctions are perhaps responsible for more deaths in Iraq than the murders committed throughout history with the use of what are known as weapons of mass destruction (John and Karl Muller, Foreign Affairs, May/June 1999).

The Weakness of Bush’s Position

The reason the U.S. government gave for the attack was that the Iraqi regime was developing weapons of mass destruction – chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons – that threatened international security. This reason was proffered repeatedly, although, in fact, these weapons were in evidence only in the past, during the Iran-Iraq war, when their development received the full support of the United States government itself in the form of raw materials, storage facilities, and technical expertise. These facts have been underlined by agencies of the United Nations, international NGOs, and even sources within the U.S. Congress.

Now the so-called weapons of mass destruction claimed to be in Iraq’s possession have failed to surface. Indeed, even if Iraq had possessed such weapons, the United States would have had no right to attack, just as Iraq has no right to attack the U.S., despite the latter’s possession of weapons of mass destruction in far larger number and scale.

In our view, this war was perpetrated for no other reason than to fulfill American hegemonic and imperialistic ambitions, and this is clearly indicated by the “Bush Doctrine.” The war was waged to make all other nations vassals to the American Empire, parties to an eventual Pax Americana. Considered from the perspective of “threat,” it is the U.S. ambition to become a global empire that represents the true “clear and present danger” to peace, welfare, and humanity on earth.

With our demonstration, we took the following stance:

1. We opposed the planned devastation of the Iraqi state and people – we opposed it in the highest and most steadfast terms. This in no way implies that we supported the dictatorship of then-president Saddam Hussein in all its manifestations, which had for almost a quarter century caused great suffering to the vast majority of Iraq’s people.

2. We appealed to U.S. and world leaders to heed a very clear lesson from history – that war leads only to disaster and misery; that it would serve no purpose but to increase suffering in the world in this time of heightening tension. War causes deep wounds in our civilization because it not only causes suffering for the victims, but also betrays the spirituality and humanity of the perpetrators.

I am convinced that war, in the sense of one country attacking another, will surely never produce a clear winner and that the combatants will reap only failure – failure as human beings and the failure of cultural backwardness. War is not the way to ring in the twenty-first century. After the experience of the previous twenty, this century should be devoted to perfecting the humanity of all people; it should bring us greater consciousness that we are all bound together in one great humanity; and it should demonstrate the logic of cooperation, not confrontation, between the inhabitants of our earth.

Such are my reflections, subjective though they may be, on the U.S. attack on Iraq. As one member of one organization working toward a better future for the millions of Indonesia’s Muslims, I hope to see no further attacks by one country on another in the name of world peace or the democratization of the other.

Reference: http://kyotoreview.cseas.kyoto-u.ac.jp, March 2004

Perempuan dan Kue Donat

Di sebuah televisi swasta ketika sedang sahur, saya mendengar Ustadz Jefri al-Buchori, da’i yang sekarang naik daun, sedang memberi petuah-petuah keagamaan. Di antara percikan petuahnya itu, ia menganjurkan perempuan-perempuan muslimah memakai jilbab. Dengan penuh percaya diri, dia mengumpamakan, bahkan menyamakan perempuan berjilbab seperti kue donat yang dibungkus plastik rapat-rapat. Menurutnya, donat yang dibungkus plastik itu lebih sehat, terjaga, tidak dicolak-colek tangan-tangan yang hanya iseng tapi tak mau beli. Menurut teman-teman saya, Ustad Uje, begitu panggilan akrabnya, kerap sekali menyinggung soal ini di setiap ceramahnya.

Sebagai perempuan, tentu saya terusik dengan perumpamaan seperti itu. Bagaimana mungkin perempuan disamakan, meski sekadar umpama, dengan kue donat. Itu namanya kiyas dengan sesuatu yang salah (qiyâs maal fâriq) dalam ilmu logika atau mantiq. Perempuan dan kue donat sudah jelas berbeda. Kue donat hanyalah sekedar barang mati, yang diracik manusia, kemudian dibeli dan dimakan. Sementara perempuan adalah manusia yang mempunyai akal budi. Bahkan menurut Ibn ’Arabi, seorang sufi yang filsuf, perempuan merupakan manifestasi Tuhan yang paling sempurna.

Dan perlu diketahui, kue donat paling enak dan mahal, yang sekarang lagi trend pun—sampai-sampai orang harus bersabar ngantri untuk membeli—sama sekali tak berbungkus plastik. Jadi, alih-alih ingin memromosikan keunggulan perempuan yang berjilbab, dia malah keliru mengambil perumpamaan.

Sementara di sebuah acara talkshow di televisi yang sama tentang perda syariat beberapa bulan lalu, saya juga mendapatkan penjelasan yang menggelikan dari seorang walikota yang rajin mengeluarkan perda tentang pewajiban jilbab di daerahnya. Menurutnya, paling tidak ada tiga alasan pewajiban itu.

Pertama, karena daerah itu bersuhu dingin. Dengan jilbab, perempuan-perempuan di sana tak lagi kedinginan dan masuk angin. Kedua, sejak diturunkanya perda jilbab, menurutnya, tidak terdengar lagi kasus penjambretan. Perempuan-perempuan pun tidak perlu lagi memakai perhiasan. Ketiga, pelajar putri yang selama ini tak mampu memiliki perhiasan, tidak perlu malu lagi masuk sekolah.

Bagi saya, baik perumpamaan yang dibuat Ustad Uje maupun alasan walikota di atas, amatlah dibuat-buat. Alasan yang dibut-buat tentang baiknya pemakaian jilbab itu kini menjadi trend di kalangan kita, bahkan harus diatur dalam peraturan daerah. Saya bukannya anti terhadap jilbab, tapi saya anti terhadap pemaksaan pemakaian jilbab. Karena secara hukum syar’i, mengutip guru saya, M. Quraish Shihab, masih ikhtilaf (ragam pendapat).

Bila kita kembali ke sejarah tentang anjuran pemakaian jilbab dalam Islam, konteksnya sangat terang benderang. Jilbab berasal dari kata jalaba, yang artinya menghimpun dan membawa. Pada era Nabi, yang dimaksud jilbab adalah pakaian yang besar dan longgar, menutupi seluruh tubuh dari kepala hingga kaki. Dan pada masa itu, tak hanya perempuan yang memakai pakaian itu tapi juga laki-laki. Sampai sekarang kita masih melihat hal seperti itu di tanah-tanah Arab. Pakaian seperti ini berfungsi sebagai pelindung dari panas dan debu yang pekat di padang pasir.

Dalam surat al-Ahzab ayat 59, anjuran jilbab juga sangat berkait-erat dengan ”alasan rasionalnya” (al-’illah)—bukan alasan buatan seperti walikota di atas. Alasan pertama, ”supaya mereka mudah dikenal” (dzâlika adnâ an yu’rafna) dan kedua, ”agar mereka tidak diganggu” (fa lâ yu’dzayna). Dahulu, jilbab juga berfungsi untuk menandai perempuan merdeka dan budak. Perempuan budak memang bisa diperlakukan sewenang-wenang sesuai kehendak yang punyanya. Namun untuk konteks sekarang, situasi itu sudah tak relevan lagi. Bahkan dalam Islam, sistem perbudakan sudah dihapus.

Alasan untuk menghindari pelecehan terhadap perempuan, saya rasa bukan dengan membungkus perempuan rapat-rapat seperti kue donat yang dibungkus plastik, tapi dengan cara yang lebih manusiawi dengan memberdayakan akal budi. []
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Referensi: http://islamlib.com/id, 16/10/2006

A Critic upon Jilbab

What is Liberal Islam Network’s (JIL) interest in publishing a book on hijâb (recognized as jilbab in Indonesia)? Actually this question is a personal one because the answer must necessarily be subjective. I’m very conscious of the fact that my thoughts on this issue are derived from my personal experience.

I remember that when I was a child my grandmother was very strict about wearing a veil though then it was merely a piece of cloth for covering the head. She was a pious Muslim up to her death (âllâhummâghfirlâhâ). To her, the hair of an adult (baligh) woman should not be exposed since it is aurat (part of the body which may not be visible). If anyone breaks this rule, her hair would be burnt in hell. Surely, the idea of burning in hell haunts me and worse still as a statement coming from someone I adore. Hence, when I grew up and became an adult, I faithfully wore the veil due to the fear of the consequences for not wearing it.

Nevertheless, my decision to wear the veil did not stop my criticism and my search for the answer to the question of why it is that a woman’s head and hair happen to be aurat and thus have to be covered. Why is it that women are deemed aurat so that they must be covered while a man’s aurat is limited only from the knee up to his navel? That curiosity triggered me to study more about the veil.

Apparently, the matter is not as simple as I had been led to believe. It is not merely about definitions of aurat and burning in hell. It is far more complicated than that. For example, in every case of the implementation of Islamic sharia, the first step is to always make women wear veils. Similarly, for example, in several regions in our country, the first consequence of implementing Islamic sharia in the region would be the obligation upon women to wear veils. Thus the regulation of wearing the veil is singled out as it is the most physical evidence or indicator of the success of the implementation of Islamic sharia law. It is almost as if wearing the veil is synonymous with Islam itself. The question is this: Is it true that wearing the veil is an essential aspect of Islamic sharia?

The answer is certainly lengthy and not a black or white one. Even though the veil is merely a part of a woman’s outfit, this concept has a long history. The word Jilbab is derived from the word jalaba meaning to gather and to carry. In the period of the prophet Muhammad SAW the Jilbab was an outfit covering the whole of an adult woman’s body. In contrast, the head covering outfit in Indonesia was initially recognized as a veil, but by the ‘eighties the word jilbab became more popular.

Jilbab in the sense of being merely a head cover is acknowledged only in Indonesia. In several Muslim countries it is a full body cover. The jilbab-like costume known variously as the chador in Iran, the pardeh in India and Pakistan, the milayat in Libya, the abaya in Irak, the charshaf in Turki, and lastly, the hijâb in a number of Arab-African countries like Egypt, Sudan and Yemen.

Actually the concept of hijâb is not exclusive to Islam. For instance in the Old Testament, the Jews Holy Book, the hijâb was referred to as tif’eret. Similarly in the Bible, the Holy Book of the Christians, the terms of zammah, re’alah, zaif and mitpahat all refer to the veil. Even according to Eipstein, as quoted by Nasa-ruddin Umar in his article contained in Journal of Ulumul Quran, the concept of hijâb (in the sense of a head cover) predated the samawi (sky revealed) religions (Jew and Christian). According to Mr Nasar, this sort of wear became established in the Code of Bilalama (3.000 SM) and continued in the Code of Hammurabi (2.000 SM) and the Code of Asyiria (1.500 SM). The regulation of wearing the veil was practiced in several ancient cities like Mesopotamia, Babilonia, and Asyiria. (Kompas, 25/11/02)

The tradition of wearing the veil was an aspect of family law amongst the Assyrians. This law stipulated that wives, daughters and widows should wear the veil whenever they go out into public space. In analyzing this concept further, when Adam and Eve were evicted from the garden of Eden, covering their genitals was the first thing they had to do (aurat) (QS. Thaha/20: 121). In this regard, the Jewish literature mentions that the use of hijâb began with the original sin: the sin of eve tempting her husband, Adam, to eat the forbidden fruit. The consequence is that Eve and her clan (women) were cursed not only to wear the hijâb but also to menstruate and to be restricted by menstrual regulations. The difference between the concept of hijâb in the Jewish and Christian traditions and in Islam, is that hijâb has no relation at all with original sin or with menstruation. In the Islamic concept, hijâb and menstruation have their own contexts. The accentuation of the Hijâb is much more closely related to ethic and aesthetic issues.
The hijâb institutionalization in Islam is based on two verses of Qur’an QS. Al-Ahzab/ 33: 59 dan QS. An-Nur/24: 31. These verses affirm the regulations in regard to dress for Muslim woman. In surah An-Nur, the word khumur is a plural form of khimar, meaning veil. While the word juyub is the plural form of jaib, means ash-shadru (chest). Hence the sentence and to draw their veils over their bosoms, is a reaction to the dressing traditions of the women of Arab Jahiliya. In the era of ignorance, the Jahiliya period, women used to go out in public with naked breasts and would reveal their necks in order to show off their adornments as illustrated by Al-Allamah Ibnu. For instance, Imam Zarkasyi wrote that in this period the women wore dresses that revealed their necks and chests as well as other parts of their bodies. They also drew their veils backwards while leaving the front parts wide open. Consequently, they were commanded to draw their veils forward in order to cover their chest.” Moreover, dress codes even incited the war between the unbelievers (kafir) of Mecca with the Muslims at the battle of Uhud


The tradition is political, discriminative and elitist-natured. Surah Al Ahzab contains the verse about hijâb revealed after the battle of Khandaq (5 Hijriyah), while surah An-Nur was revealed long after that. They are political because the verses are revealed in order to answer the attack by the munafik (unbelievers who pretend to be Muslims, hypocrites), in this case Abdullah bin Ubay and friends. This attack of munafik “used” the Muslim women by slandering the wives of prophet, especially Aisha. The event is known as al-ifk.* In that period, this event was so important so that it was affirmed in five separate verses: QS. An-Nur/23: 11-16. The problems this has created for Muslim women are incessant though the verses were intended to protect Muslim woman from acts of disrespect. Allah has decreed that the reason for wearing jilbab is so that women maybe recognized and not annoyed and so that the free can be distinguished from slaves.

Thus the laws can be understood to be both elitist and discriminative, since this verse distinguishes between free and slave Muslim woman. Here the ambiguity of Islamic law regarding slavery can be observed. On the one hand Islam is opposed to slavery yet on the other hand, it still supports the distinction of dress for different classes. In my opinion, to avoid ambiguous interpretation, the interpretation should stress the ethical issue of the verse, and not be read merely as a code about the regulation of dress. There should be no difference between a free woman and a slave, good manners and modesty should apply equally to both.

In the Muslim world, many books have been written about hijâb which mention that it is a good Muslim woman’s clothing which separates woman and limits contact between women and men who are not family. The verses do not deliver explicit orders rather they provide expectations about woman’s modesty and the regulations applied to the prophet’s wives. Fatima Mernissi in Women in Islam, has written that in the beginning of Islam the Prophet did not set up a dichotomy between the his own private space and his wives’ with that of other Muslims’. QS. Al-Ahzab/33:53 affirms that there was originally no dichotomy between public and private space.
The institutionalization of the veil and the separation of woman from public space crystallized when the Muslim world came into contact with Hellens and Persians in cities. In these contexts, the veil which was formerly used as an occasional costume became institutionalized and women became obligated to wear it. Moreover, the codification of the standard books like hadits, tafseer, fikh, history, including the codification of standard writing (rasm) and reading (qira’at) of Alqur’an, were influenced by Hellenism and Persian culture. For example, the Israiliyat (transmitted from Israel) history is included in the book of Tafseer al-Thabary and it subsequently became the reference of the ulemas in codifying the tafseer.


According to Ruth Rodded in her book Kembang Peradaban, the debate has centered upon the meaning and practical implementation of the verses of hijâb. Her opinion is based on what consists the proper definition regarding certain words (including the terms hijâb), their contexts and whether the regulation set for the prophet’s wives should become norms for every Muslim woman. Nevertheless as it has been argued by Harun Nasution, “the view that says that hijâb is an obligation, could be answered yes to. And those who say it is not an obligation, could be answered yes to as well. But the clear regulation boundary regarding hijâb is not mentioned in the Qur’an and the hadits mutawatir.” (Islam Rasional, p.332).

In short then, this book takes the view that wearing the jilbab is not an obligation. Even Al Asymawy has proclaimed that the hadits taken as the reference regarding jilbab or hijâb obligation is a hadits ahad (transmitted by single person) which cannot be perceived as having a legal foundation. If jilbab was obligatory for women, the impact would certainly be substantial. As he quoted: “the statement that woman’s hair is aurat, is because it is their crown. It follows that her face, which is her throne, is also aurat. Then her voice which is her authority becomes aurat and her body which is her kingdom aurat. Eventually, the entire female being is considered aurat.” The implication is ultimately that woman cannot do anything as Allah’s creature because she is all-aurat.

We are used to reading books or booklets regarding the obligation of wearing jilbab in the verses of Qur’an and Hadits as well as in experiencing threats made to women who do not want to wear it. For us, this book, bluntly and frankly, explains that wearing the jilbab is not an obligation. Even the tradition of wearing the jilbab amongst the sahabat (prophet’s companions) and amongst their followers is more of a cultural obligation than a religious one.
I wish this pocket book could be a positive contribution for everyone who does or does not wear jilbab. I am not entirely for or against wearing the jilbab as long as wearing it is due to someone’s consciousness that it is an option and one potential mode of expression of self-searching for a Muslim woman. When used without coercion it is a legitimate dress code.



-- Utan Kayu, 17th April 2003



* The event of al-ifk occurred when Aisha was left out of the group in a battlefield because she was looking for her lost necklace. When she reached the camp, nobody was there anymore. The entire troop had left the location. During the time when Aisha was alone in the camp, Safwan ibn Mu’attal al-Sulami arrived with his camel and carried her to Medina. This incident became widely known and was utilized by the munafik (hypocrites) coordinated by Abdullah bin Ubay such that the Prophet formed a special team to investigate the case.


Referensi: http://islamlib.com/id, 05/04/2003

Terorisme dan Islam Warna Warni

SAYA bersama Ari A. Perdana, peneliti ekonomi dari CSIS, mendapat kesempatan berkunjung ke Jepang, bulan lalu. Kunjungan itu dalam rangka menghadiri program Global Youth Exchange (GYE) 2003, program tahunan yang diadakan Kementerian Luar Negeri Jepang. Kegiatan ini diikuti 35 peserta dari 26 negara.

Topik yang dipilih adalah Asia-ASEAN and International Community. Ini sejalan dengan Tahun Kerja Sama Jepang-ASEAN yang dicanangkan pemerintah Jepang untuk tahun 2003. Seperti biasa, pemerintah Jepang memberikan kesempatan kepada peserta untuk memperlihatkan kebudayaan, tradisi, dan warisan sejarahnya yang sangat mereka banggakan. Tradisi dan modernitas yang tak terpisahkan melahirkan negara Jepang yang maju seperti sekarang ini.

Selama dua minggu, kami berinteraksi secara intensif dengan semua peserta: berbagi informasi tentang kondisi negara masing-masing, bergelut dan berdebat pendapat lewat cara pandang kita melihat semua masalah yang terjadi di dunia ini. Agar lebih intensif, peserta dibagi menjadi tiga kelompok. Ada tiga isu yang dibahas: kerja sama regional di bidang ekonomi, keamanan, serta kebudayaan.

Masing-masing kelompok terlibat dalam diskusi intensif seputar tiga tema tersebut. Kalau Ari A. Perdana mengambil isu ekonomi -karena memang bidangnya di situ- saya memilih isu keamanan dengan tema spesifiknya tentang terorisme. Tema yang menjadi hangat di negeri kita setelah tragedi Bali, Oktober tahun lalu. Apalagi, saya punya misi; ingin membantu menghilangkan citra terorisme pada Islam.

Tak hanya tentang terorisme. Apalagi untuk Jepang, sebagai penyelenggara, isu ini tak terlalu penting karena tak terkait langsung dengan negaranya. Banyak persoalan keamanan yang dihadapi Jepang, terutama masalah Korut dan China. Kata Summit Mandal, teman dari Malaysia yang sekarang sedang riset di Kyoto University, kebijakan luar negeri Jepang khususnya tentang terorisme akan manut dengan Amerika Serikat. Kebetulan, pikir saya, sebagai peserta yang mewakili Indonesia, saya perlu menjelaskan apa yang terjadi di negara kita. Syukur-syukur, ini akan mempengaruhi cara pandang mereka tentang definisi terorisme.

Perlu diakui, sekarang ini agak susah menemukan definisi terorisme yang diterima semua pihak. Bila mengikuti definisi terorisme versi Amerika Serikat yang sekarang sedang berjalan, terorisme lebih terkait dengan Islam radikal atau militan atau apalah namanya. Akhirnya, terorisme sendiri menjadi identik dengan Islam. Karena mayoritas rakyat kita muslim, tentu saja kita kena bidikan itu.

Apalagi setelah terjadinya tragedi Bali dan adanya penangkapan pelaku yang melakukan pengeboman itu serta indikasi kuat adanya jaringan Jamaah Islamiyah. Semua peserta meyakini bahwa Indonesia merupakan sarang teroris. Malah ada seorang peserta yang bilang Indonesia adalah negara teroris. Memang, untuk kenyataan itu, saya susah mengelaknya. Namun, saya dengan agak ngotot menerangkan kondisi umat Islam di negeri kita: warna- warni, tak cuma satu.

Saya bilang, teroris memang ada di negara kita. Tapi, jangan digebyah uyah bahwa Indonesia adalah sarang teroris, apalagi negara teroris. Pernyataan itu mengabaikan kondisi mayoritas umat Islam di Indonesia. Kalangan yang disebut sebagai teroris itu hanya segelintir orang dibanding umat Islam yang moderat dan toleran yang berjumlah jutaan orang. Bahkan yang mayoritas ini pun mengutuk para teroris yang memakai cara-cara kekerasan dengan legitimasi agama. Saya menekankan, harus ada pemisahan yang tegas antara terorisme dan Islam. Dalam Islam pun, tak semua yang radikal, fundamentalis, atau militan adalah teroris. Teroris ya teroris. Terorisme terdefinisi karena cara-caranya yang menghalalkan segala cara dengan pemaksaan dan kekerasan yang mengakibatkan banyak korban. Dan itu tak cuma di Islam. Ada pada semua agama bila agama "salah" dipahami dan dilakoni ajarannya.

Agak susah memang menghapus citra terorisme atas negara kita, bahkan Islam kita. Kita tak punya cukup energi dan waktu untuk menghilangkannya lewat penjelasan di sebuah program seperti GYE. Apalagi banyak faktor yang berperan membentuk citra tersebut. Yang paling penting untuk kita sekarang, mari kita buktikan dengan sikap kita melakoni dan mengamalkan ajaran kita. Ber-Islamlah secara damai dan ikhlas, itulah intinya. Wallahu a’lam bissawab.


Referensi: http://islamlib.com/id, 09/02/2003

Fatima Mernissi: Rebel for the Sake of Women

Fatima Mernissi was born in 1940 in Fez, Morocco. She grew up in a harem along with her mother, grandmothers and other sisters. It was a harem guarded strictly by a janitor so that the women could not escape from it. The harem was well-maintained and served by a maid servant. Her grandmother, Yasmina, is one of nine wives but the same fate did not fall upon her mother. Her father took only one wife and did not choose polygamy since the nationalists rejected polygamy. Even so, her mother was illiterate because she spent all of her time inside the harem.

When she was born, Moroccan nationalists successfully decolonized the country from French rule. As she related,”.... if I was born two years earlier, I would not have obtained an education. I was born at the right time.” The nationalists who fought against France promised to create a new Morocco with equality for everyone. Women and men had equal access to education. The nationalists also sought to abolish the practice of polygamy.

Fatima was lucky that despite of her life in a harem, she got the opportunity to acquire a higher education. In her book The Harem Within, Mernissi tells us about her childhood in a harem in Fez but it’s only part of the book as her childhood was not as wonderful as depicted in the book. For example, although she illustrates life in the harem appealingly, she does not ignore the oppression for those inside. She explained how women in the harems looked up to the sky and dreamt about simple things like walking freely on the street, or how they might peep at the outside world through key holes.

To Mernissi, westerners always visualize harems as castles. She distinguishes between the high class harem (imperial) and the ordinary harem (domestic). The westerners imagination is about the high class harems of rich and powerful men with hundreds of female slaves guarded strictly by a kasim. This sort of harem ceased to exist in World War I when the Ottoman Empire was destroyed and those practices were forbidden by the new Western rulers. Mernissi lived in an ordinary harem of the kind which still exists in the Gulf countries.

Since she was a little girl, Mernissi was involved in the national upheaval of thought and raised wild questions for instance on the limits imposed between boys and girls. The little Mernissi asked, if there is an approved boundary between boys and girls, why is it only girls who are covered and limited. She only posed such questions to her grandma Yasmina who could not reply since it was too dangerous for her.

At that time she also had an ambivalent relation with religion, due to the difference and tension between the perspective of Alqur’an she perceived in the school of Alqur’an and what was taught by her grandma. She was taught strictly in the school where she should memorize Alqur’an everyday. She was constantly berated, yelled at and beaten whenever she made a mistake. Thus she viewed religion as something to be afraid of.

On the other hand, the little Mernissi perceived the beauty of religion through her grandmother Yasmina, who lead her towards the poetic side of religion. Her grandma frequently told the story about her hajj and enthusiastically told Mernissi about Mecca and Medina. She constantly talked about Medina and ignored the other cities like Arafah and Mina. This influenced Mernissi so much that she became obsessed with Medina.

Mernissi nursed this attitude for many years. To her, Alqur’an depends on our perspective and on our perception toward it. These holy verses could be the gate to escape from or instead be an obstacle. To her Alqur’an can lead us towards dream or instead damage our fortitude.

Meanwhile, Mernissi’s mother always taught her how to behave and carry herself as a woman: “you should learn how to shout and protest just as you learnt how to walk and talk.” For example, she told her the story of how woman should behave wisely and prudently. She often told her the story of A Thousand and One Arabian Nights. It’s about a Sultan who was very fond of tales. Once, Sultan Nebuchadnezzar found his wife engaged having sex with his guard. He was furious and killed them both. He hated women afterward and it led him to the bad habit of marrying woman one night and then killing her the next day. It constantly happened and led to the death of many women. This habit was finally stopped by a girl named Scheherazade who magnetized him through her stories so that the Sultan always delayed his plan to kill her.

The mother regularly recounted such wisdom. Nevertheless, we should highlight how the little girl asked: “How can we learn how to tell stories that please the King?” The mother, as if she was talking to herself, said that it is the life long task of a woman. Mernissi admitted that it was her mother and grandma who supported her in getting a higher education so that she could be independent.

***

When Mernissi became a teenager, she started having religious lessons. She found it heart breaking:

“….. Some Hadits (prophetic tradition) originated from Kitab Bukhari which are told by the teachers hurt me. They state that the Prophet said: “Dog, donkey and woman would annul anyone’s prayer whenever they pass ahead them, break off between the praying man and kiblah.” I was shocked to hear that sort of Hadits and never repeat it with the hopes that silent would wipe away this Hadits out of my mind. I asked, “How come the Prophet said that sort of Hadits which hurt me so much... how could the beloved Muhammad hurt a little girl who is in her growth, attempt to make him as pillars of her romantic dreams.” (Woman in Islam, p. 82)

Mernissi experienced an upheaval in her thinking. Yet despite the merits of the nationalists who allowed women to get an education, Mernissi admitted that many ideas of Arabic nationalism are still to be accomplished. Polygamy is not yet forbidden, women cannot achieve equal status and democracy has not yet become established in the Arab world.

Currently, Mernissi has obtained her master in politics from Mohammed V University in Rabat, Morocco, and a PhD from Brandeis University in America in 1973. Her dissertation, Beyond the Veil, become a text book and a key reference in the west about women and Islam.

And at the moment, she works as a lecturer of Sociology at Mohammed V Rabat University where she graduated. She is well-known as a Muslim feminist in North Africa and is a prominent activist in the Islamic world.

Thought and works

I notice that Mernissi’s works stem from her individual experiences which triggered her to conduct historical research about things which have disturbed her religious comprehension. For example, in her work The Veil and Male Elite which she revised later as Women and Islam: A Historical and Theological Enquir, her investigation of the sacred texts of Alqur’an and Hadits is based on her individual experience, as for instance the case of the misogynist Hadits which equate a females position to that of dogs and donkeys.

Mernissi’s heartbreak deepened when she heard about Hadits regarding female leadership. Her motivation to investigate such Hadits seriously was instigated by the Hadits spoken by a trader in the market who negated female leadership. Surprised by her questions, the trader quoted the Hadit that “there is no salvation within society led by females.” To her, this indicates that the Hadits are embedded within the Muslim community and that therefore female leadership is still debatable despite the case of Benazir Buttho who became the prime minister of Pakistan and despite the fact that Alqur’an discusses the leadership of Queen Bilqis.

She is also concerned with another matter: hijab. The topic of hijab has dominated her intellectual career. The Hujab, which is a instrument of limitation, segregation and isolation which is used to keep women out of the public space. To her Hijab means segregation and is used as a medium of asserting heirarchy between the rulers and the people.

She communicates her understanding through interpretations of Alqur’an and Hadits and through historical research and sociological analyses. Her goal is to deliver an alternative interpretation through her books The Forgotten Queen in Islam and Islam and Democracy. In these works she attempts to show that the defects within Arab governments are not inherent in religious teachings, but that they are due to the manipulation of the religious teaching by rulers for their own interests. Nevertheless, Mernissi defends Arab countries when they are maligned by the western press (see Islam and democracy p. 26).

In most of her works, she attempts to illustrate that religious teachings can be easily manipulated and for that reason she believes that the oppression of woman is not part of the real teaching of Islam. That’s why she is careful not to oppose sacred tradition. Most of her articles regarding woman express these notions. We can see this, for example, in her book Rebellion's Women and Islamic Memory, (London & New Jersey: Zed Books, 1996).

In conclusion, her articles are rich in sociological analyses. In the works mentioned above and in her published dissertation, Beyond the Veil, she writes specifically about her research on Moroccan woman and about the sexual limits placed on woman. Nevertheless, her intellectual struggle and experience can be seen as representative of Muslim matters in general.

Referensi: http://islamlib.com/id, 01/05/2002