Cak Nur: A locomotive for change in Islam

Cak Nur: A locomotive for change in Islam

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Prominent Muslim scholar Nurcholish "Cak Nur" Madjid has won
acclaim from scholars for his contribution to changing the way
people understood Islam by encouraging Muslims to accept
contemporary values.

"Nurcholish has emerged as one of few intellectuals in
Indonesia who cares and is aware of the importance of making a
distinction between culture and religion," Muslim intellectual
Abdul Hadi told a two-day symposium that ended on Friday.

The event was held to mark Cak Nur's 66th birthday by the
Paramadina University in Jakarta, which he leads. The respected
scholar had been hospitalized in Singapore after undergoing a
liver transplant in China. He is now being treated at Pondok
Indah Hospital in South Jakarta.

Hadi said Cak Nur encouraged Muslims to embrace modern values
by arguing that many developments in a Muslim's modern life
should be not considered bid'ah, or forbidden innovations under
Islamic law.

"Cak Nur believes that Muslims unable to differentiate between
cultural and religious values will face a kind of 'mental
imprisonment'. He thinks that these people consider symbols more
important than the function and substance of culture," Hadi said,
describing Cak Nur's critique of Muslims opposed to modernization
who tried to live the way they believed the pious did during
Prophet Muhammad's era.

Another scholar, Ahmad Gaus, called Cak Nur a locomotive of
change in Islamic thought and praised his support for
secularization.

That idea sparked prolonged controversy in the 1990s, when Cak
Nur, a graduate of the Gontor Islamic boarding school in East
Java and Jakarta's Syarif Hidayatullah State Institute of Islamic
Studies (IAIN), espoused the liberal slogans -- "Islam Yes,
Islamic Party No" and "No Islamic State".

"For him, secularization is a consequence of faith, which
distinguishes between God and humans, heaven and earth, the
relative and the absolute, the profane and the sacred," Gaus
said.

Cak Nur, who obtained a doctorate degree from Chicago
University, also promoted ideas on gender equity in Islamic
perspectives.

His views on this issue were based on tauhid (the teachings of
Allah as the sole power to be worshiped), according to Siti
Musdah Mulia, the Indonesian Conference on Religion and Peace
(ICRP) secretary general who led a team designing the much
criticized draft Islamic law code that promotes gender equality.

"In Cak Nur's minds, tauhid contains human liberation, which
leads to egalitarianism. In this context, according to him,
tauhid forbids absolutism against other humans and therefore it
aspires the establishment of a democratic society, and democracy
always needs the contributions of both men and women. That's what
he believes," Musdah said.

Nurcholish, who was granted an award from the Freedom
Institute last August, also defended ideas of inter-religious
marriage and the freedom of choice to wear head scarves. He also
brought up women's affairs as a human rights issue, she said.

A lecturer at Driyarkara School of Philosophy, Budhy Munawar
Rachman said many people had been amazed that while Cak Nur
quoted Koranic verses in his speeches, he ended up with liberal
and modern conclusions.

"Once several ambassadors asked him why he kept quoting
Koranic verses, but ended up with liberal conclusions. He
answered,'This logically would mean that the Koran itself is
liberal'," Budhy said.

Cak Nur used Koranic verses as the base to building new
perspectives on issues, he said. (006)