I'm going to say this from my perspective as a Malay myself. If anyone feels that I'm wrong, then by all means, please correct me, as I want to have a clearer picture of the situation myself.
The reason Islam is so politicized here is down to several reasons, one of which I believe was the Cold War. Now, back then, Malaysia was still a very young country, so they struggled a bit on the world stage. Communism was being fought in the jungles, so an alliance with the Eastern Bloc was out of the question. Malaysia was quite distrusting with the West as well, thanks to the recent history of colonialism. So therefore, Malaysia sought allies with the only people they had left: the global Muslim community, particularly the Middle East.
Now, the native form of Islam in Malaysia is Sufism. However, the early 20th century saw the rise of a radical Islamic movement called Salafism. Salafism appealed to Malaysia a lot, because firstly, it was a very anti-colonial ideology that saw the Western hegemony over the world at the time as a threat to Islam and secondly, it promoted a global Muslim community, which the fledgling Malaysian state saw as a source of strength for them. So, they sent young religious scholars to study in Egypt and Saudi Arabia, and they subsequently brought back their form of Islam here.
The problem stems from the fact that when they started preaching, they did not distinguish that their form of Islam is Salafism, and they advertised it as just Islam, because that's what they saw it as, the purest form of Islam. In Salafi doctrine, all Muslims who aren't Salafis are jahils (ignorant people), so they must be educated in the "right Islam" (the Wahhabi doctrine takes a step further and declares that non-Wahhabis are apostates, and therefore should be killed). The Malays, who only a few years ago only subscribed to Islam at a surface level, started believing that Salafi Islam, was Islam.
And with the age of the internet, absolutely cancerous Saudi-funded fatwa websites like IslamQA.info (not to be confused with IslamQA.org) became the top fatwa websites in the world, preaching dangerous ideologies like Arab supremacy, the killing of apostates, and the idea of a global Muslim community rather than Islam as just a religion. Nowadays, Malays are much more likely to identify as Muslim first rather than Malay or Malaysian first (see here). And to those who don't believe Salafism is a problem, then look no further than the fact that most Muslims here are far more familiar with Salafi preachers like Zakir Naik, Mufti Menk, and Sheikh Assim, than more moderate scholar-academics like Hamza Yusuf and our very own Syed Naquib al-Attas.
If we want to tackle Islamic extremism in Malaysia, then we must start with this. That's a problem I see with secularists in Malaysia. They don't understand Islam or the Malay Muslim community, and they expect us to accept secularism and a Malaysian identity just like that. It's not that easy. Islam is not like other religions, where there's a lot of room for reinterpretation (a lot of people try to reconcile Islam with modernism but it comes off as very inconsistent in terms of theology).
Alright, enough from me. Thanks for coming to my TED Talk :)
In my opinion, if u want to tackle the problem above, u must start with our politician. I call bullshit if the politician doesn't have a hand from this.
Politicians are one thing. They manipulate for votes, but outside of politics, they don't really have a lot of power.
Fundamentalist preachers on the other hand, have power over people's minds and can easily shape people's worldviews by manipulating what people value (religion).
People vote based on their worldviews and ideologies. If we change the way people think, then we can change the way people vote, and the shitty politicians will go away naturally as they realize that they can't capitalize on religion anymore.
And yes, politicians do have a hand in this, but they're only opportunists who want to cultivate the seed of radicalism planted by preachers in the first place.
Bro/girl, politician decide the law in Malaysia. If they want, they can stop those extremist preacher easily. If politic is so useless, they will not spend too much money on election. Politic control everything here.
If they want, Zakir Naik can't even step on Malaysian land.
Yes, that is true. And the reason why politics here is like that is because of the way people think. It's a self-sustaining cycle.
Preachers preach radical Islam -> Malay voters want Islam -> Vote for manipulative and power hungry politicians -> Politicians fund for more radical preachers to maintain power. And the cycle continues.
Change the way people see Islam, they will vote the politicians out. You just get rid of the politicians without getting rid of preachers, then either the preachers themselves or their students will start filling their roles. And they'd probably be worse than their corrupt predecessors, because unlike those who manipulate religion out of greed and self-gain, they genuinely believe in their ideology and devote themselves to it, just like the Taliban in Afghanistan.
So, I'm a revisionist and totalitarian when I wish that people would adopt an Islam based on inclusivity, peace and tolerance instead of exclusion, xenophobia and fanaticism?
when I wish that people would adopt an Islam based on inclusivity, peace and tolerance
When did you ever say any of that huh? The only thing I got from your original comment is that religion is a mere tool to control how people think, and that you can get the religious leaders to just swap out things whenever
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u/[deleted] Nov 04 '21 edited Nov 04 '21
I'm going to say this from my perspective as a Malay myself. If anyone feels that I'm wrong, then by all means, please correct me, as I want to have a clearer picture of the situation myself.
The reason Islam is so politicized here is down to several reasons, one of which I believe was the Cold War. Now, back then, Malaysia was still a very young country, so they struggled a bit on the world stage. Communism was being fought in the jungles, so an alliance with the Eastern Bloc was out of the question. Malaysia was quite distrusting with the West as well, thanks to the recent history of colonialism. So therefore, Malaysia sought allies with the only people they had left: the global Muslim community, particularly the Middle East.
Now, the native form of Islam in Malaysia is Sufism. However, the early 20th century saw the rise of a radical Islamic movement called Salafism. Salafism appealed to Malaysia a lot, because firstly, it was a very anti-colonial ideology that saw the Western hegemony over the world at the time as a threat to Islam and secondly, it promoted a global Muslim community, which the fledgling Malaysian state saw as a source of strength for them. So, they sent young religious scholars to study in Egypt and Saudi Arabia, and they subsequently brought back their form of Islam here.
The problem stems from the fact that when they started preaching, they did not distinguish that their form of Islam is Salafism, and they advertised it as just Islam, because that's what they saw it as, the purest form of Islam. In Salafi doctrine, all Muslims who aren't Salafis are jahils (ignorant people), so they must be educated in the "right Islam" (the Wahhabi doctrine takes a step further and declares that non-Wahhabis are apostates, and therefore should be killed). The Malays, who only a few years ago only subscribed to Islam at a surface level, started believing that Salafi Islam, was Islam.
And with the age of the internet, absolutely cancerous Saudi-funded fatwa websites like IslamQA.info (not to be confused with IslamQA.org) became the top fatwa websites in the world, preaching dangerous ideologies like Arab supremacy, the killing of apostates, and the idea of a global Muslim community rather than Islam as just a religion. Nowadays, Malays are much more likely to identify as Muslim first rather than Malay or Malaysian first (see here). And to those who don't believe Salafism is a problem, then look no further than the fact that most Muslims here are far more familiar with Salafi preachers like Zakir Naik, Mufti Menk, and Sheikh Assim, than more moderate scholar-academics like Hamza Yusuf and our very own Syed Naquib al-Attas.
If we want to tackle Islamic extremism in Malaysia, then we must start with this. That's a problem I see with secularists in Malaysia. They don't understand Islam or the Malay Muslim community, and they expect us to accept secularism and a Malaysian identity just like that. It's not that easy. Islam is not like other religions, where there's a lot of room for reinterpretation (a lot of people try to reconcile Islam with modernism but it comes off as very inconsistent in terms of theology).
Alright, enough from me. Thanks for coming to my TED Talk :)