Global and local in Indonesian Islam

To foreign observers as well as to many Indonesians themselves, Indonesian Islam has always appeared to be very different from Islam at most other places, especially from the way it is practised in the Arabian peninsula. From Raffles to Van Leur, it has been claimed by colonial civil servants and missionaries that, especially in Java, Islam was not more than a thin veneer, underneath which one could easily discern an oriental world view that differed in essential respects from the transcendentalism and legal orientation of Middle Eastern Islam. The religious attitudes of the Indonesians, it was often said, were more influenced by the Indian religions (Hinduism, Buddhism) that had long been established in the Archipelago and the even older indigenous religions with their ancestor cults and veneration of earth gods and a plethora of spirits.

Two categories of residents of the Archipelago were singled out as exceptions to the syncretistic rule and as a security risk: the Arab traders and religious teachers (especially those claiming to be descendants of the Prophet Muhammad, the sayyids) and those Indonesians who had made the pilgrimage to Mecca (hajis), many of whom had changed their lifestyle, their public behaviour and their political attitudes upon return. Both categories represented, or so it seemed, an incursion of Middle Eastern Islam into Indonesia. Several authorities have claimed that the hajis remained an alien element in Indonesian society. Even such an acute and relatively sympathetic observer as C. Snouck Hurgronje remarked in the late 19th century that when parents wished to scare disobedient children they threatened that they would call a haji. (The only human beings that were considered as even more frightening than hajis were European soldiers.)[1]

Here we have side by side two contrasting forms in which Indonesian Islam appeared to (European) outsiders and, no doubt, to many Indonesian Muslims as well: the local and the global. Hajis and sayyids most visibly represented the forces of globalisation that appeared to be breaking up local structures, patterns of thought, tastes and habits. Local Islam was, in the view of many observers, not really Islamic but at best superficially Islamicised. "Global" Islam was, in the late 19th century, not only perceived to be a less pleasant form of this religion but inherently threatening because of its transnational character. Pan-Islam was, in those years, a bogeyman taken very seriously by most colonial administrators.>>>>>>>>>



Other voices: political dissent and "fundamentalism"

The most vehement critics of the pembaharuan movement, especially of Nurcholish himself, were to be found in former Masyumi circles. The party Masyumi had been dissolved in 1960 after its participation in an abortive regionalist rebellion against Sukarno; in spite of their welcoming the fall of Sukarno and the destruction of the Communist Party, Suharto never allowed its leaders to play a prominent role in political life again. The party board transformed itself into an organisation for Islamic dissemination (dakwah), the Dewan Dakwah Islamiyah Indonesia, and occasionally spoke out as a political critic from the margin. Al-Banna's Muslim Brothers appear to have served as the model that the Dewan wished to emulate; it always refrained, however, from open political opposition and never openly embraced Sayyid Qutb's more radical views. The Dewan Dakwah established close contacts with (and received financial support from) the Saudi authorities. Mohamad Natsir, the chairman of both Masyumi and Dewan Dakwah, became a vice-president of the World Muslim League (Rabitat al-`Alam al-Islami), and the Dewan Dakwah came to represent the conservative, neo-fundamentalist form of Islam emanating from Riyad.

The leaders of the Dewan Dakwah took offence at many of the ideas represented by the pembaharuan movement: its stand against Muslim political parties, its legitimation of the New Order, its defense of secularisation, its openness towards other religions, and its respect for local forms of Islam.[19] Dewan Dakwah authors polemicised against kebatinan, against Christianity and Judaism. Their world view became increasingly one in which Islam was under threat from a new Christian Crusade and international Jewish conspiracies. Following the Iranian revolution, Shi`ism (which appealed strongly to Indonesian Muslim students because of its perceived revolutionary potential) was added to the list of threats; the Dewan published a whole series of anti-Shi`a tracts and books.

The Dewan Dakwah represented the politically uncompromising wing of Indonesian Muslim "modernism" (as Indonesians commonly term it) or "puritanism" (a more appropriate term). Its major objective was to purge ritual and belief of all elements that do not derive from the Qur'an and hadith. It found neither traditional practices nor liberal new interpretations acceptable and, as said, increasingly drifted towards the Hanbali-Wahhabi views of its Saudi sponsors.[20]

One remarkable effect of globalisation on thought and discourse in the Dewan Dakwah and related groups is the emergence of a virulent anti-Semitism. This is a new phenomenon in Indonesian Islam, that has no precedent apart from a single foreign-inspired journal article published during the Japanese occupation. It is through Saudi and Muslim Brothers contacts, as well as through Kuwait and Pakistan, that a wide range of anti-Semitic literature has become available. Much of this literature (which includes at least three different versions of the notorious Protocols of the Elders of Zion) is of Russian, German or American origins, and it was translated into Indonesian from the Arabic. Indonesia has no Jewish population, apart from a handful of families of European or Ottoman Jewish descent, but like elsewhere that has not prevented the spread of anti-Semitism. The anti-Semitic literature appears to be used as a weapon in the struggle against all forms of cosmopolitanism: Chinese, "pembaharuan" or otherwise.[21]

Muslim anti-Semitism is usually associated with the Palestine-Israel question, and this is also the case in Indonesia. It has its strongest reverberations among those Muslims who profess international Muslim solidarity, notably the Committee for Solidarity with the World of Islam (KISDI), which became conspicuously active as a pressure group during the 1990s. Apart from organising demonstrations in support of the Palestinians (but against the peace process), KISDI mobilised mobs against newspapers who published articles it did not like. Towards the end of Suharto's rule it became increasingly openly anti-Christian and anti-Chinese, considering Indonesia's Chinese business community and Christian bureaucrats as part of a world-wide Jewish conspiracy to destroy Islam.

Conclusion

The question that 19th-century observers asked themselves — and usually answered in the negative because Indonesian Islam was "different" — is being raised again. Is Indonesian Islam going the same way as Islam in the Middle East, is it following a global "fundamentalist" trend? Abdurrahman Wahid, the prominent liberal Muslim leader, has repeatedly raised the spectre of "Algerian" developments, implicitly accusing groups as the Dewan Dakwah and KISDI of striving for an Islamic state, in which minorities will be deprived of equal rights and liberal voices will be silenced.

It is true that radical, often intolerant political Islam was increasingly prominently present in Indonesia during the 1990s. Ironically, however, its successes were not primarily due to global trends but to Indonesia's internal political dynamics. It was Suharto's turning against some of his erstwhile Chinese and Christian allies and co-opting a large part of the educated Muslim population through the establishment of the Association of Indonesian Muslim Intellectuals (ICMI) that strengthened radical political Islam. The unstable situation in the period leading up to and immediately following Suharto's involuntary resignation offered various "fundamentalist" groups allied with various political and military factions favourable conditions for further strengthening their positions.

The elections of June 1999 have meanwhile shown that radical political Islam does not have much of a constituency in Indonesia. Indonesian Muslims voted overwhelmingly for parties that were not exclusively Muslim and that emphasised an Indonesian identity that incorporates ethnic and religious diversity.

This is not to say that Islam is retreating from the public sphere and that globalisation reins in Islamisation. The visibility of Islam and public performance of Islamic ritual go on increasing. In the present phase of globalisation, however, a wide range of Islamic influences have become available, and Indonesians eclectically pick what pleases them. Unlike in the past, when Meccan Islam represented the example to be emulated, there is not a single authoritative form of Islam. Individuals enter into networks that link them with Muslim movements in various parts of the globe, they read books and journals reflecting a wide range of Muslim thought, they try out various Muslim life-styles. The various global influences appear not to be leading to a homogeneous "Middle Eastern" type of Islam but to an ever growing variety of ways of being Muslim.

Facing Down the Fanatics
A more tolerant Islam is confronting extremism in the world's most populous Muslim country.

By Michael Finkel
Photograph by James Nachtwey

He answers the door himself. No armed guards, no attempt to hide. Abu Bakar Baasyir lives in a modest one-story home on the campus of the boarding school he helped found in the quiet village of Ngruki, amid the central highlands of the main Indonesian island of Java. Baasyir is 71 years old, stalk thin, with a white goatee and lively dark eyes magnified by gold-rimmed glasses. He is the alleged spiritual leader of the militant Islamist group Jemaah Islamiyah, which has been linked to at least a half dozen bombings in Indonesia over the last decade, including the devastating 2002 Bali nightclub blasts and, perhaps, the suicide bombings at Jakarta luxury hotels this past summer.

Baasyir denies involvement in violence and, like a successful mafia don, has avoided a proven connection to any attacks. He served two stints in prison—a total of less than four years—on minor charges not directly related to the bombings. But the Islamic boarding school he established clearly was the hub for a network of jihadists set on creating an Islamic state in Southeast Asia; several of Ngruki's graduates have been convicted of involvement in major bombings. There's little question that Baasyir's teachings have been the inspiration for hundreds, perhaps thousands, of killings and for attacks against "deviant" Muslim groups that fall outside mainstream Islam. Still, he opens his own front door. "Come in," he says, speaking Bahasa Indonesia, the country's official language. "Have a glass of juice."

He is wearing a long, loose shirt, a white skullcap, and a large wristwatch. There are no chairs in his living room and no artwork, just clean white walls, a potted plant, and a low table supporting a plastic container of sesame cookies. He sits on the floor, barefoot, on a grass green rug. His adult son, Abdul Rahim, serves melon juice in tall, clear glasses.

"There is no violence in Islam," says Baasyir, in his deep, gravelly voice, waving his left hand like a conductor. "But if there is hindrance by enemies, then we have the right to use violence in response. That's what we call jihad. There is no nobler life than to die as a martyr for jihad." He praises the September 11th and Bali bombings. They were not, he insists, acts of terrorism. They were simply "reactions to what has been done by the enemies of Islam."

Indonesia is tucked away in a far corner of the world map, a rain of islands just north of Australia, yet violence here can have global repercussions. It is the most populous Muslim country in the world, home to 207 million Muslims—36 million more than the next largest Muslim nation, Pakistan, and two-thirds as many as all the countries of the Middle East combined. It is extremely devout; a recent Pew Global Attitudes survey found that Indonesia was one of the world's most religious nations. It's also a thriving democracy, the third largest in the world, after India and the United States.

But it's a new democracy, still finding its legs—little more than a decade has passed since the country's virtual dictator, Suharto, was ousted. The end of his rule granted Indonesians new freedoms of expression, though it also unleashed radicals like Baasyir, who had honed his extremist views during a long exile in Malaysia, where he'd fled after his arrest for opposing Suharto. A year after the 2002 Bali bombings came the first J. W. Marriott hotel bombing in Jakarta, then in 2004 a strike on the Australian Embassy, also in Jakarta, and in 2005 a triple suicide attack, again in Bali. And just a few months ago, after a long gap during which many experts came to believe that the threat of terrorism was greatly reduced, came the bombings at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel and, once more, the J. W. Marriott. These are scattered events in a vast nation. But in the words of one Indonesian proverb, roughly translated, "It takes just a little poison to spoil all the milk."

Indeed, Indonesia's 17,500 islands can feel, at times, like so many marbles on a wobbly table. A subtle tilt, and they'll all roll in one direction. As recently as 2005, Indonesia seemed to be tipping toward Islamic radicalism, feeding Western fears that it was becoming a haven for terrorists. For several decades, Indonesian society had been growing more overtly Islamic: Attendance at mosques swelled, and Muslim dress became popular. In the late 1990s, a growing number of district governments began enacting regulations inspired by sharia, or Islamic law, and support for Islamic political parties was on the rise. Increasingly, militant Islamic groups that advocated a violent struggle to recast Indonesia as an Islamic republic seemed to be drowning out the voices of the majority of Indonesian Muslims, who believe that their faith can smoothly coexist with modernity and democratic values.

But in the past few years, although Indonesians continue to embrace Islam in their private lives with greater fervor, it's become clear that most don't want religion to be enforced in the political sphere. "So many people equate Muslim piety with radicalism," says Sidney Jones, an Indonesia specialist with the nonprofit International Crisis Group who has lived in the country for more than 30 years. "Indonesia is full of examples of why that notion is wrong." As Islamist politicians have moved to regulate women's dress codes and ban activities like yoga, moderates have begun to make their voices heard. In the Indonesian parliamentary elections this past April, candidates backed by Muslim organizations received less than 23 percent of the vote, down from 38 percent in 2004.

Though the recent bombings are a setback, Indonesia has lately been seen as a success story in how to curb violent extremism. Authorities have arrested at least 200 members of Jemaah Islamiyah in the past five years, although some dangerous fugitives remain at large. Many radicals have shifted to advocating the establishment of Islamic law. Even Abu Bakar Baasyir, since his release from jail in 2006, has distanced himself from more militant factions of Jemaah Islamiyah and begun promoting the struggle for sharia as the way for Islamists to achieve their goal of transforming the democratic nation into an Islamic republic.

Baasyir believes that any human-created lawmaking body—a house of congress, a court of law—is an insult to the sovereignty of God. "Allah has sent a manual on how to treat human beings," he says. "That manual is the Koran." There's no need, in his view, for any other code. "Islam and democracy," he concludes, "cannot coexist." Now that Suharto is out of power and centralized rule has been weakened, local districts can decide for themselves whether to institute sharia-based regulations. Where this has been done, Baasyir says, everything is better. Much better. "Go see for yourself," he says.

The province of Aceh, on the western prow of the Indonesian archipelago, is now perhaps best known for suffering a direct strike from the December 2004 tsunami, which killed more than 160,000 Indonesians. But for centuries, the Aceh region has been recognized as one of the most devout Muslim areas in all of Asia. Aceh's unofficial slogan is that it is the "veranda of Mecca," and many of its residents seem to sit on this porch with their backs to the rest of Indonesia, embracing an Islam closer to that which exists across the ocean on the Arabian Peninsula. Here, more than anywhere else in the islands, people observe a strict Islamic code of conduct. In 1999 the national government paved the way for Aceh to become the nation's first province to establish sharia as criminal law.

Devi Faradila is a fashionable, 35-year-old mother of two and a parliamentarian in Aceh Province. At the time of my visit, she was the leader of the all-women's unit of the Banda Aceh Sharia Patrol, a municipal force in charge of monitoring compliance with local rules in the province's capital. On a typical Friday—a day, according to Aceh law, when all Muslim men must attend mosque—Faradila readied her unit for duty, breaking up a Ping-Pong game in the station house, wagging her finger at a couple of text messaging officers.

Faradila and 13 patrollers donned black baseball caps to complete their uniforms—black shoes, black slacks, black blouses, and lime green head scarves—and piled into a pickup equipped with loudspeakers. Faradila, in the driver's seat, pulled on leather gloves, added a fresh coat of lipstick, and put on mirrored sunglasses. Her deputy hopped in beside her. The rest of the women sat in the bed of the pickup.

The truck moved slowly through the city, Faradila blasting a constant stream of announcements over the speakers. "Hurry up, men! Friday prayers are about to begin." "Stop all activities. It's time to pray." Men on the streets or in shops—a carpet seller, a furniture maker, a fruit vendor, a bricklayer—turned their heads and stared. A few checked their watches. "Today is Friday. It is obligatory for men to pray."

Aceh is the only Indonesian province with a sharia patrol unit; a total of 800 officers, mostly men, police the region day and night. But at midday on Fridays, the Muslim Sabbath, sharia enforcement is left to the women, who can pray at home. Faradila wove the truck around the massive five-domed mosque at the city center, then toward the shoreline, which was both gorgeous, with mountains rising green from the sea, and haunting—giant swaths turned to swampland by the tsunami. One officer in back spotted a teenage girl strolling down a sidewalk with no head scarf, a reckless act in a city where virtually every Muslim woman is covered. The truck immediately screeched to a halt. "Veil! Veil! Veil!" the officers shouted. The girl looked aghast. She indicated in pantomime that she would put a covering on, and the truck drove off.

As prayer time grew near, Faradila's pleas became less polite. "Close your shop!" "Find the nearest mosque!" The truck pulled over in front of a dilapidated two-story building, a fish market and artists' studio, a known place for drinkers. The team leaped out of the truck—half Charlie's Angels, half Taliban. Two men were swiftly nabbed. They were fishsellers, they said, and smelled too bad to attend a crowded mosque. The women issued them citations anyway.

A widely distributed booklet, A Brief Look at Sharia Islam in Aceh—the cover shows a man being whipped—outlines the rules. If you're caught gambling: six to 12 lashes. Improperly mingling with the opposite sex: three to nine lashes. Drinking alcohol: 40 lashes. Skipping prayer on three consecutive Fridays: three lashes. The whip, according to the booklet, must be made of rattan a quarter to a third of an inch thick. At the Banda Aceh Sharia Patrol station, two whips were on display, each as long as a cane and as snappy as a flyswatter. There was a photo album filled with images of the whippings; more than a hundred have taken place since 2005. The man who administers them wears a maroon robe, white gloves, and a face-covering hood. The crowds are enormous.

Polls indicate that, although most Indonesians say they want sharia as the foundation of public life, they are uneasy about the imposition of such corporal punishments. Outside of Aceh, adoption of religious-based regulations has been piecemeal, with some districts prohibiting gambling or drinking, or requiring women to wear veils. Yet these rules have often been enacted by secular politicians who see Islamic regulations as a way to curry favor with their pious constituents or distract attention from ongoing corruption. In the future, experts say, playing the "Islam card" may not have the populist force it did just three or four years ago.

Except, perhaps, in Aceh, which appears to be ratcheting up its Islamization and has even considered implementing the surgical severing of hands in accordance with the Koran's punishment for theft. That would be fine with Faradila. Sharia law, she insisted, has made Banda Aceh more reverent and much safer. She'd like to see an expansion of the laws. "Cutting hands," she said, "in the correct circumstances, would serve as a lesson to others. Crime would be greatly reduced." Stoning for adulterers would also be fine. "When you embrace Islam," she said, "you have to embrace all the laws."

Fundamentalist Islam is a fairly recent import to Indonesia, where a relaxed if no less fervent form of the religion has long held sway. "Smiling Islam," it's often called. Islam originally came here the way most things come to islands—by sea. The islands' volcanic soil is ideal for growing spices, and by the 12th century most of the traders taking Indonesian pepper and nutmeg and cloves to the West were Muslims from the Middle East. For Indonesian producers, converting to Islam had advantages—trading partners preferred fellow believers.

The spread of Islam into Indonesia was gradual and peaceful. What took one frenzied, blood-soaked century in the Middle East required a leisurely half millennium in Indonesia. Scattered across some 3,000 miles of ocean, the islands had hundreds of ethnic groups and religious practices. Islam helped integrate previously separate peoples into a single regional culture. By the time the United East India Company, run by the Dutch, won control of the spice trade in the 17th century, Islam had spread to nearly all of Indonesia's coastal societies. "Islam was so successful coming to Indonesia because it was able to accommodate the existing culture and religions," says Syafii Anwar, executive director of the International Center for Islam and Pluralism in Jakarta. "Even in the architecture of the mosques, local style was incorporated."

Yet when the global reshuffle following World War II opened the path to independence from Dutch rule, Indonesia's first president, Sukarno, chose not to establish an official state religion. Creating an Islamic republic, he felt, would alienate the minority of the population that was not Muslim; Sukarno himself had a mother of Balinese Hindu ancestry and a Muslim father. Indonesia's second president, Suharto, took power in 1966, in the wake of explosive anticommunist violence that killed half a million people, and for a while he was able to smother the hostilities and foster economic growth. But his regime was repressive and militarized. Suharto's resignation, in 1998, was triggered by a student-led, largely Muslim pro-democracy movement a few million strong—a development that some historians have cited as a landmark event in contemporary Islam.

But the end of Suharto's regime also intensified a schism within the Muslim community between those who supported the nation's traditional blending of Islam with local beliefs and those who sought to "purify" Islam, stripping away its regional flavor. That clash continues today, fueled in part by ideas and practices originating in the strict Wahhab­ism of Saudi Arabia, which has funded Islamic universities and boarding schools throughout Indonesia.

Still, across most of the country Islam continues to meld with a multitude of indigenous faiths and traditions. Rhythmic drumming, once associated strictly with native ceremonies, is often used before the Muslim prayer call, introducing the standard chant broadcast from mosque minarets. An Islamic group on Lombok Island even drinks a traditionally made palm wine in its celebrations, though the Koran warns against any alcohol consumption.

Perhaps the quintessential expression of Smiling Islam can be found in Jakarta, Indonesia's messy, manic capital, where extravagant malls and cinemas with names like Hypermart and Blitzmegaplex are under construction, and luxury high-rises abut teeming slums. Here, on a gravel side street, is the dusty, cluttered office of Ki Demit. Ki is the honorific bestowed upon Indonesian mystics. Ki Demit, whose name means Little Ghost, is 28 years old, baby-faced, and the son of another ki—Big Ghost—as well as the grandson and great-grandson of mystics. "I come from the most magical bloodline in Indonesia," he says.

In most places across the Middle East, such a statement would be heretical—anything paranormal not attributed to Allah is forbidden in Islam—but inscribed on a black batik in Ki Demit's waiting room is the menu of his charms. These include santet (sending a hex), pelet (gaining a lover), kekebalan (immunity from injury), and kejantanan (prowess in bed). One wall is covered with photos of celebrities—a soap opera star, a singer, a comedian—who have sought the help of Ki Demit or his father.

Ki Demit's clients sit cross-legged on the floor in front of him, a creaky ceiling fan above, the room crammed with candles and perfume bottles and prayer beads and antique knives. "I can read people's minds, and I can see the future," he says. "But I don't want to compete with God. I am only God's mediator." At the conclusion of many of his sessions, he'll give a client a handful of dried flowers he says are imbued with supernatural powers. Once the client takes a bath with the flowers, he says, his spell begins.

"I'm a good Muslim," insists Ki Demit. "Of course I pray five times a day. Of course I observe Ramadan. But long before Islam came to Indonesia, my ancestors were practicing these rituals. My father trained me as a ki, and when I have a son I will, of course, train him. I embrace Islam strongly, but I hold tightly to my powers. You cannot play with this power."

Across town from Ki Demit is the television studio where singer and talk-show host Dorce Gamalama recorded her daily show (before it ended this past May). She's the Oprah of Indonesia, widely known by her nickname, Bunda, which means "mother." She taped her show in front of a studio audience of mostly middle-aged women in head scarves—conservative Muslims seem to be her biggest fans, perhaps because Dorce herself, beneath the buzzy energy and megawatt smiles, is a devout Muslim. Near her home in Jakarta, she's built her own mosque.

Oh, and one more thing: Dorce was born a male. She's a transsexual. She's had her "condition," as she calls it, all her life and had a sex-change operation in her 20s. She's been married twice, both times to men. She owns 300 pairs of shoes and a thousand wigs. She sings, dances, and tells mildly risqué jokes. She's not above taking the occasional comedic pratfall.

Her talk show, which featured movie stars, musicians, and athletes, set the conversational tone of Indonesia—her otherness, in a way, allowed her to openly express what might ordinarily be left unsaid. She chatted about marital troubles, spoke candidly of sex. ("Women, if you want to make love, don't wait for your man to offer. Go ahead and ask for it.")

In her dressing room after one show, she kicked off her shoes and greeted a stream of well-wishers. A 19-year-old boy told her, "I like your show because you are cute." A 90-year-old woman said, "I just want to kiss you." All the while, she rarely stopped talking, reminiscing about her early days in show business, when she served as the in-flight entertainment on chartered flights to Mecca. Only in Indonesia could a transsexual troubadour be deemed an appropriate diversion for hajj pilgrims.

"I'm a normal person," she said. "I behave as a woman. I'm even prudish! There's no sex with me before marriage." When asked if her faith always comes before her career, she looked insulted. "My life," she told me, "is for God."

That's what everyone says: the militant, the mystic, the sharia cop, the TV star. United in their devotion to God, divided on how, precisely, one should express that devotion. The version of Islam that captures the minds of the next generation—the tolerant Smiling Islam or the austere and sometimes violent brand advocated by extremists—could determine the path Indonesia takes and perhaps provide a model for the future of global Islam. One place to gauge its direction is at the country's Islamic boarding schools, particularly the one located at the end of a bucolic lane in Ngruki, where Abu Bakar Baasyir teaches.

The school is actually a lovely place, buildings of white-painted brick capped by red- and blue-tiled roofs. Outside the gate a man sells ginger milk from a bicycle-pulled cart. In front of the school's mosque, in the center of campus, an array of gum-ball-colored flip-flops are stuffed into wooden cubbies. Shouts echo across the basketball court. About 1,500 students, slightly more girls than boys, attend the school, which offers education at the junior and senior high school level. Students live in dorms, 20 to 30 per room, and sleep on mattresses on the floor.

Noor Huda Ismail is a former student at Ngruki, now 36 years old and an expert on security issues in Southeast Asia whom I hired to help set up interviews for this story. After the first Bali bombing, Ismail says, the Indonesian government sent an investigative team to Ngruki. The results were inconclusive. "There was nothing specific to terrorism in the curriculum," says Ismail. "The public face of Ngruki was like any other. There was nothing at all clandestine—unless you were 'picked.' "

While at Ngruki, Ismail was, in fact, picked. "My indoctrination took place outside of class," he says. "It began with small meetings, teacher-student meetings during sports, during day hikes. I was told that our enemies are strong." He was an ideal candidate, he believes, due to his ability to speak English and Arabic.

"Just before I graduated," says Ismail, "I was invited to one of the teacher's houses. I sat on a mat on the floor. The light was low. There were three of us students there. The message was that Islam is your only possible salvation, and if I wanted to go to heaven, I had to join the squad. I was 15 years old." One of Ismail's roommates was Hutumo Pamungkas, who is now serving a life sentence for his participation in the Bali bombings. "It's shocking that more of us didn't turn to extremism," Ismail says.

Robert W. Hefner, an anthropologist who has studied Muslim politics in Indonesia, believes that Islamic extremism has lost much of its momentum in the archipelago, though it may be impossible to stop all attacks. Significant credit belongs to the Indonesian police, who have not only arrested hundreds of violent Islamists but have also successfully "deradicalized" some imprisoned militants by offering them conjugal visits and scholarships for their children. But the change is also the result of a decades-long effort by Islamic educators to implement reforms in their schools. Since 2004, all students entering the state Islamic system are required to take courses on civics, human rights, and democracy. Even Ngruki, despite its reputation as a hotbed of radicals, accepts the government's guidelines.

Ultimately, Indonesia may be simply too big and diverse to adhere to any narrow definition of Islam. Even something as secular as one Indonesian takeoff on American Idol can be a platform for Islamic variety. During a recent season, the final two contestants were both Muslim women. One wore a veil, one did not. No one seemed to care. Indonesia's national motto, after all, is "Bhinneka tunggal ika—Unity in diversity."

"Islam in Indonesia is a huge tent under which all voices can talk to each other," says Robin Bush, of the Asia Foundation. Fringe groups, she points out, can receive an inordinate share of media attention and frighten people away from publicly denouncing them. They can even send suicide bombers into hotels. But their reach has not extended into the ballot box.

Of course, that could change. Continued government corruption, another Suharto-like leader, a charismatic imam who can rally the disaffected—any of these might shift Indonesia's balance. "If our secular government fails to deliver, Jemaah Islamiyah will have fodder to recruit," says Ismail. "I think we are going to be constantly in flux," he adds. "When the Western influences get too strong, the Islamist elements will get louder. When Islamist voices get too loud, the more secular voices will be raised. It will always be that way. Up and down. Up and down. Welcome to Indonesia." 

The situation may seem similar, but it is quite different. Unlike Indonesia, Islam in Malaysia are State sanction. example, Marriage between Muslim and non-Muslim couple are prohibited, consuming alcohol by Muslim can get him/her to be caned and conversion from Islam to other religion are illegal. you won't see any of this in indonesia.

Recently I read that Malaysia and Indonesia banned Yoga calling it unislamic.

indonesia still has Yoga classes everywhere.

Yoga is neither a religious practice not associated with any religion. It is similar to Buddhism in that it does not involve a god or a religion although some may claim that Buddhism has has been corrupted to simulate a religion. Buddhism is a philosophy in the strict sense of its philosophies..

Completely agree with you. Yoga is a way of life. Therefore it is even more sad that Indonesia and Malaysia have banned it calling it unislamic.

That info is a bit weird..... Molsky's publicist just hung up on me because she had to run off to her yoga and pilates class.
Therefore Denpasar definitely still has yoga.
Really I think your source is just another story written on an alarmist rumour.

Muslims in Indonesia have been banned from doing yoga if they engage in Hindu religious rituals during the exercise, the chairman of the country's top Islamic body said on Sunday.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics...or-Muslims.html

I am not quoting a blog or wikipedia. I am quoting The Telegraph, one of the most respected newspapers in the world.

You might want to double check your statement.

No offense but..., religious fanatics can eat my shorts...
I can do yoga, meditation, or contemplation as I please...

Well said. Now just watch out and be careful.

And you like threatening

Failed intepretation.

And you like threatening

Not at all. Just asking him to be careful from radicals who want to implement the rule.

Hundreds dressed down by sharia officers during raid on clothing

Antara , Banda Aceh, Aceh | Tue, 01/26/2010 8:54 PM | National

Hundreds of residents considered to be wearing unacceptable clothing according to sharia regulations, were temporarily detained during an operation at the busy Mesra Darussalam traffic crossing in Banda Aceh, Aceh Nanggroe Darussalam, on Tuesday afternoon.

The residents, including around 100 women wearing pants and tight shirts and a number of men wearing shorts, were pulled aside, lectured and then released by sharia (Wilayatul Hisbah) officers, who had been standing by in the area, which is a main thoroughfare for university students.

The women targeted by the officers were allegedly wearing un-Islamic clothing and several of them did not wear headscarves, now compulsory in Aceh.

Sharia law was put into effect in (Aceh in) January 2002, alarming non-Muslim minorities. In September of that year, the Aceh legislative council announced that caning or imprisonment would be the punishment for those who propagated beliefs other than Islam. Anyone who skips Friday prayers three times in a row without an acceptable reason would be fined a maximum of two million rupiahs, six months in jail or three strokes of the cane. Caning also applies to those who open their food stalls during Ramadan (fasting month).

Sharia Law
Muslim or Islamic law, both civil and criminal justice as well as regulating individual conduct both personal and moral. The custom-based body of law based on the Koran and the religion of Islam. Because, by definition, Muslim states are theocracies, religious texts are law, the latter distinguished by Islam and Muslims in their application, as Sharia or Sharia law.

I wan't a less-religious Indonesia....

I wan't a less-religious Indonesia....

[ As Indonesia is 86% Muslim and as the Dutch influence recedes, I wonder how Indonesian laws will be modified in the future?[/b]

Subj: Aceh: Shari'a - the Islamisation of Acehnese Culture

The oil- and gas-rich region of Aceh is located on the northern tip of Sumatra, Indonesia. Aceh has a population of 4.3 million and has historically been staunchly Islamic. On 1 January 2002, as part of a wide-ranging autonomy package that the Indonesian government hoped would appease separatists, Aceh was granted the right to adopt Islamic law.

On 3 January 2002 the Jakarta Post reported, "The Aceh or Nanggroe Aceh Darusallam administration has officially put the special autonomy law and syariah (Islamic law) into effect." The article went on to quote Teungku Sofyan Hamzah, an imam at the grand Baiturrahman Mosque. "Asked about feelings of anxiety by some non-Muslims in Aceh following the implementation of the Islamic law, he (Hamzah) said that the minority should not worry. 'The administration will use national law for them.'"

Well - an article appeared in the Jakarta Post on 28 September 2002, detailing how under shari'a law, caning or imprisonment would be the punishment for those who "propagated beliefs other than Islam to Muslims in the province."

JAKARTA POST 28 September 2002 "Aceh to implement caning punishment"

In line with sharia law, the Aceh legislative council is proposing that caning be one of the punishments for people who tempt Muslims to desert religious teachings.

A special team set up by the council is drafting the bylaw in response to Law No. 44/1999 on Aceh's special status and Law No. 18/2002 on special autonomy for Aceh.

Chairman of the special team Azhari Basar said that caning would be imposed on those who propagated beliefs other than Islam to Muslims in the province. "Those who violate the ruling will face a maximum jail term of two years and a maximum fine of Rp 6 million or 10 strokes of the cane," he told Antara.

Azhari said that according to Article 17 of the draft, anyone who skips Friday prayers three times in a row without an acceptable reason would be fined a maximum of Rp 2 million, six months in jail or three strokes of the cane.

"Caning also applies to those who open their food stalls during Ramadhan (fasting month)," he said. Food stall owners who sell food, beverages or cigarettes publicly or secretly during the holy month will be fined a maximum of Rp 4 million, spend one year in jail or receive five strokes of the cane.

However, it is not clear who is in charge of carrying out the caning punishment: the police or the sharia police.

SHARI'A - THE ISLAMISATION OF ACEHNESE CULTURE

The implementation of shari'a punishments is a profound change in Aceh, which has not been governed by the shari'a for over 100 years.

Most Acehnese people do pray regularly, and attend the Friday prayers. However in cities, not everyone would have complied. The use of force to require attendance, on pain of caning, is a disturbing trend.

In Aceh traditional ways - referred to as "adat" - have in the past been a very important authority for regulating daily life. The role of adat is recognized in Indonesian law, and was central to the role of Acehnese rulers in pre-colonial Aceh. This adat or "custom", being linked to the secular authority of the sultan, was always a balance to the shari'a. The recent introduction of shari'a law in Aceh is part of a centuries-long process of Islamising Acehnese culture, ultimately replacing adat with shari'a.

One can anticipate that there will be various areas of tension or conflict between adat and shari'a. For most Acehnese people, the whole Acehnese way of life is regarded as "Islamic", so this tension will be confusing. It will slow the rate of shari'a implementation. Paradoxically, Christians could be more vulnerable in this context, because non-Acehnese adat has little authority in Aceh.

I ask because Indonesia is probably in a state of transformation and Indonesians should be thinking about what they want for their nation. I also ask because of the following:
Also this:

and this:


http://jmm.aaa.net.au/articles/10294.htm

Maybe people in Jakarta are not interested in what is happening in Aceh but there are changes taking place.

A chronology of major terrorist attacks in Indonesia:

July 17, 2009: Bombs tear through the JW Marriott and Ritz Carlton hotels in Jakarta.

October 1, 2005: Four explosions rock popular tourist spots on the Indonesian resort island of Bali killing at least 32 people, including several foreigners, and injuring 101.

The explosions occur less than two weeks ahead of the third anniversary of blasts in 2002 that left 202 people dead.

August 25, 2005: Seven people are wounded when a home-made bomb explodes at a market in the religiously divided eastern Indonesian city of Ambon.

May 28, 2005: Twin bomb blasts tear through a busy market place in the town of Tentena, killing 19 people and injuring at least 40.

Police say the attack bears the hallmarks of fugitive Malaysian bomb maker Azahari Husin, who is wanted for involvement in earlier attacks blamed on South-East Asia's Jemaah Islamiah extremist group, said to have links to Al Qaeda.

September 9, 2004: A car bomb outside the Australian embassy in Jakarta leaves 10 people dead, plus a suicide bomber, and more than 100 wounded.

Then Australian foreign minister Alexander Downer described it as a terrorist attack on Australia and named Jemaah Islamiah as the prime suspect.

August 5, 2003: A car bomb tears through the American-owned JW Marriott Hotel in Jakarta, killing 12 people and wounding 149 others.

Jemaah Islamiah is blamed for the attack, which police link to Husin and another Malaysian fugitive Noordin Mohammad Top.

July 14, 2003: A bomb explodes at Indonesia's parliament building, just days after the arrest of Jemaah Islamiah suspects. The blast shatters windows and a door in an office area but no-one is hurt.

April 27, 2003: A bomb rips through a restaurant area at Indonesia's main international airport, wounding 11 people. The blast happened near a Kentucky Fried Chicken outlet.

December 5, 2002: A blast at a McDonald's outlet and a car showroom in the eastern Indonesian city of Makassar kills three people and wounds 11.

October 12, 2002: Blasts at crowded nightspots in the resort island of Bali kill 202 people, mostly foreign tourists. The blast is blamed on Jemaah Islamiah.

devout
adjective
1. religious, godly, pious, pure, holy, orthodox, saintly, reverent, prayerful She was a devout Christian.
religious irreverent, sacrilegious, irreligious, impious
2. sincere, serious, deep, earnest, genuine, devoted, intense, passionate, profound, ardent, fervent, heartfelt, zealous,