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Hating the Ahmadiyya: the place of “heretics” in contemporary Indonesian Muslim society

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Abstract

Religious diversity and pluralism is commonly understood within the context of the relation between various religious traditions, not within a single religious tradition. This limitation of the boundary of religious pluralism could overlook the fact that conflict within a single tradition can be bitterer and more disastrous than conflict with other religions. In the last decade, for instance, the Ahmadis in Indonesia have become victims of constant attacks. This article, therefore, intends to study the place of the Ahmadiyya in the context of religious pluralism in Indonesia by answering the following questions: Why was the treatment of the Ahmadis in recent years by Muslims more vitriolic than their treatment of non-Muslims? What is the nature and quality of life for people who have been excluded from a ‘normal’ religious identity in a time when religious attachment is a necessary fact for that society? Why did the attacks on the Ahmadiyya occur in the present regime, not during the past authoritarian one? This article argues that the charge of heresy issued by Muslim institutions put the Ahmadiyya in liminal status; they are in the zone of indistinction between Muslims and non-Muslims. This makes them vulnerable to persecution since they have been deprived of their rights as Muslims, while their rights as non-Muslims are still suspended. Non-Muslims, particularly ahl al-kitāb (People of the Book), have been accepted theologically in Muslim society, but there is no place of tolerance for heretics. The rise of intolerance in Indonesia parallels the rise of religious conservatism after the fall of Suharto in 1998.

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Notes

  1. In term of acts, the Setara Institute mentions that from 367 acts of religious intolerance in 2008, 238 were related to the Ahmadiyya (Setara Institute 2010: 8)

  2. The video of this lynching is widespread through youtube and can be found in the following links: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aH2AuhBHDwQ&feature=player_embedded and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SVexuQCVKXg and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DWHzc8ZxRuQ (accessed 13 January 2012). Please be advised that the mentioned videos contain graphic brutality. For the reports on this case, see Komnas HAM (2011) and Kontras (2011).

  3. See the Majelis Ulama Indonesia (MUI – Council of Indonesian Ulama) fatwas in 1980 and 2005, the Rābiṭa al-‘Ᾱlam al-Islāmī fatwa in 1974, and the Council of the Islamic Fiqh Academy of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) fatwa in 1985. For a discussion about fatwas against the Ahmadiyya, see Burhani (2013). There are a number of distinctive beliefs associated with the Ahmadiyya, but some of them are created by its enemies to denigrate this movement such as the belief that the Ahmadiyya has its own holy book, i.e., Tadhkira.

  4. The opposition of Shi’i Islam to the Ahmadiyya can be seen, for instance, in Ayatollah Allameh Yahya Noori’s Finality of prophethood and a critical analysis of Babism, Bahaism, Qadiyanism (1981).

  5. The opposition, therefore, was based on broad prediction, and not on the fact of the existence of the Ahmadiyya in Indonesia.

  6. Elsewhere, Kurtz also says, “What makes heresy so potent is that it bears such a close resemblance to orthodoxy. It is developed within the framework of orthodoxy and is claimed by its proponents to be truly orthodox” (1983: 1088). A similar view is stated by Georg Simmel. He says, “People who have many common features often do one another worse or ‘worser’ wrong than complete strangers do… if a quarrel arises between persons in such an intimate relationship, it is often so passionately expansive” (Simmel 1964: 44, 45).

  7. The statement from Habib Rizieq Syihab can be found in his speech entitled “Kesesatan Ahmadiyah” at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pSQ04yvB9OM&NR=1 (accessed 5 January 2012). The term ‘hijacking Islam’ is also used in Pakistan when people talk about the Ahmadiyya. Antonio Gualtieri, for instance, refers to the statement of Lutfulla Mufti of the Pakistan Ministry of Religion and Minority Affairs. “The Ahmadis… had hijacked Islam… they used epithets that appropriated orthodox Islam to their own duplicitous purposes” (Gualtieri 2004, 149).

  8. As quoted by an Ahmadi during my interview with him in Bogor in July 2012, the head of Cibinong district also called the Ahmadiyya a ‘tumor.’

  9. Yusril Ihza Mahendra, former Indonesian Minister of Law and Human Rights, is among those who state that the Ahmadis do have some religious rights in their current status. Therefore, he suggested that they completely leave Islam. This statement is written by Mahendra in his blog entitled “SKB tentang Ahmadiyah,” posted on Friday, 9 May 2008 and available at http://yusril.ihzamahendra.com/2008/05/09/skb-tentang-ahmadiyah/ (accessed 6/22/2011).

  10. The punishment usually begins from the simplest level and goes incrementally further: “On the simplest level, basic human courtesies were denied… smiling at them, initiating the Islamic greeting and participating in their funerary prayers. Going a step further, scholars sought to dissuade the public from accepting certain heretics as qualified to lead communal prayer” (El Shamsy 2008: 108).

  11. Discussion on this issue can be found in Coser (1964: 67–72).

  12. The key concept in this situation is ‘opportunity’. Discussion on this issue can be found in Hanspeter Kriesi (2004).

  13. Gerry van Klinken mentions for conditions after the fall of Suharto: “the inability of the state’s security apparatus to deal repressively with protest; the fragmentation of the national elite following the sudden resignation of President Suharto; the presence of a large number of educated and talented but frustrated aspirants to elite positions who no longer believed in the legitimacy of their leaders; and a population suffering economic decline and who were ready to be mobilized” (2007: 23).

  14. ICG mentions four factors that contribute to the persecution of the Ahmadiyya. They are: (1) systematic lobbying of hardline groups to the bureaucracy; (2) the fact that this issue has been used as a weapon to gain sympathy and support from people; 3) the lack of neutrality of the government, particularly under president Soesilo Bambang Yudhoyono; 4) the fact that this issue has been manipulated in political competition (ICG 2008: 1).

  15. This quotation is taken from ICG (2008: 8). The original source (http://www.presidenri.go.id/index.php/pidato/2005/07/26/370.html) is no longer available.

  16. The video of this speech is available at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pK98JL-LN4g&feature=related or http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U7RLCXNdKF4 (accessed 15 January 2012).

  17. In Islamic discourse, there are a number of terms that could have two opposite meanings such as the terms harām and kufr. The term harām, for example, has disparate meanings. One of its meanings is ‘don’t touch it’ or ‘it is taboo,’ but the term ‘Masjid al-harām’ means ‘the sacred mosque’.

  18. The term ‘non-Muslim Muslims’ is used by The Nut Graph as a title of its news on the Ahmadiyya in Malaysia. Available at: http://www.thenutgraph.com/non-muslim-muslims (accessed 6 August 2011).

  19. From the point of view of the Ahmadiyya, they consider themselves the real Muslims while other people calling themselves Muslim people are, in fact, not true Muslims in their eyes. This declaration, however, is often not pronounced out loud; further, these ideas are sometimes found ambiguous and open to multiple interpretations in their main religious texts. Although they believe that they are the real Muslims and other Muslims have left Islam, they have tried to avoid speaking about it in Muslim countries. In secular states, such as the United States, the Ahmadis have no fear making this declaration. See, for instance, “History of Islam Ahmadiyyat (the real Islam) in Los Angeles, California” and “Los Angeles: spreading the real Islam in USA—session with US missionaries”. Available at: http://www.alislam.org/v/7447.html and http://www.alislam.org/v/74476.html (accessed 15 May 2013).

  20. This statement can be found in his speech during ‘Apel Siaga Umat Islam Bubarkan Ahmadiyah’ (Public gathering of Muslims to dissolve the Ahmadiyya) on 1 March 2011. Available from the YouTube link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_hLgDw6z3aU&feature=related (accessed 1 June 2012).

  21. When human rights activists and non-Muslims tried to mediate the conflict between Sunni Islam and the Ahmadiyya, people such as Hasyim Muzadi, former president of the NU, and Habib Rizieq Shihab, the leader of the FPI, rejected it. They claim that this is an internal issue for Islam, in which people from different religions should not interfere (Lazuardi 2011; Desastian 2011).

  22. In Pakistan, the Ahmadis are given a seat in parliament as a non-Muslim minority, but they rejected this as they do not consider themselves non-Muslims.

  23. Personal interview in Bogor, West Java, 26 July 2012.

  24. Personal interview in Bogor, West Java, 26 July 2012.

  25. This fatwa is available from http://www.anti-ahmadiyya.org/en/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=180. The Arabic version of this fatwa is available from http://alhafeez.org/rashid/rabita.jpg. (accessed 25 December 2011).

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  1. The Indonesian Institute of Sciences (LIPI), Jakarta, Indonesia

    Ahmad Najib Burhani

  2. Althia Park A-6 No. 35, Perigi Baru, Pd. Aren, Tangsel, Banten, Indonesia, 15228

    Ahmad Najib Burhani

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Burhani, A.N. Hating the Ahmadiyya: the place of “heretics” in contemporary Indonesian Muslim society. Cont Islam 8, 133–152 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11562-014-0295-x

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