Gus Dur writes on subjects he knows best

Gus Dur writes on subjects he knows best

Kiai Nyentrik Membela Pemerintah (An Eccentric Moslem Scholar in
Defense of the Government)

By Abdurrahman Wahid

Introduction by Mohamad Sobary

LKIS, Yogyakarta, 1997

VI and 133 pages

Rp 10,000

YOGYAKARTA (JP): The essays in this book can be considered
among the most significant rational adventures made by Moslem
intellectual Abdurrahman Wahid, popularly known as Gus Dur, the
leader of Nahdlatul Ulama, the nation's biggest Moslem
organization.

They were originally published in the now banned Tempo
newsweekly in the 1970s and 1980s, and Kompas daily in the 1990s.
In reading the book, we are compelled to sociologically trace the
inside-outs of the world of a Moslem intellectual, or kiai, and
that of a Moslem boarding school (pesantren), plus the daily
activities of both as imbued with religious significance.

One of Gus Dur's advantages over others doing special research
on the subjects is that he knows them both so well. He is more
familiar with the stuffy, "loquacious" aura of a boarding school
as he has been part of it and fully savors the taste of its life.

The two are distinguishable yet inseparable. A Moslem boarding
school without a learned scholar at its helm is just like a
captainless ship, and really not worthy of bearing the title.

Kiai and pesantren refer connotatively and denotatively a
tradition-imbued community with a traditional lifestyle, clinging
tightly to religious values and faith, and having a full and
contextual comprehension of religion.

What Gus Dur aims at in his writings can be perceived as a
description of the reality of the Islamic boarding school
community, previously hidden behind strict tradition, firm
religious comprehension and a traditional lifestyle.

Gus Dur has opened the door to this otherwise restricted and
narrow room, and he is thus letting everyone find a new way of
comprehending religion. He deliberately avoids presenting the
face of the subjects in a scientific, methodological and
formalistic form and language. He talks about this subject in a
smooth flow of description, revealing the religious attitude of
the community, which most people have never glimpsed.

He is able to expose the innermost facets without running out
of materials, owing to his own rich and profound adventures in
that world. Add to this his noble origins, and Gus Dur is
definitely the right person to serve as the chief spokesman of
the boarding school community in affirming the principles of a
social and religious life.

Take for example his piece on Muchit, an ulama from Jember,
who is also an intellectual teaching at a state university in
this city. Gus Dur dubs him eccentric. When meeting an
"outsider", this intellectual is always ready to engage in an
intellectual debate with his interlocutor, but when he is before
members of his religious community he does not stray from his
duty in leading them in religious prayers.

A Moslem boarding school community may be said to be one
directly undergoing quite strong clashes, with fresh values
developing in the general community owing to development. Not
infrequently, these clashes lead to longer and more complicated
debates.

This is because the new values are often no longer compatible
with religious teachings or deeply rooted tradition of the
boarding school community. Two examples, family planning and the
law on matrimony, used to be subjects of long-winded polemics
about how the religious community should respond to new trends.

Gus Dur describes these matters using personification and
characterization of various kiai figures, many of whom he is
acquainted with. The references he has of the life of an
intellectual with all aspects of behavior and the life view, is a
separate text. When Gus Dur conveys it in his pieces, it can get
across a religious message stronger and more impressively than
that conveyed through the approach of a particular discipline.

He spices up the message with humor and homespun wisdom. He
details kiai Wahab Sulang of Rembang, a motorbike novice who
nevertheless tried out a new motorcycle his wife received as a
regional legislator.

He did not know how to use the brake, and instead tried to
stop the motorbike by planting his feet. How could such a
simple, artless man gain followers?

"Because this kiai with all his lifestyle and ordinariness has
planted the seeds of concrete humanism based on his religious
faith, while many people do often pit one against the other,"
writes Gus Dur.

M. Sobary in his foreword writes that in many respects Gus
Dur's behavior is the legacy of the views and attitudes of the
same scholars he discusses. Besides, the essays in this book
reflect the wisdom, humor, honesty and piety of the scholars that
Gus Dur has accurately perceived and then formulated in this
essays.

This is where the strength of Gus Dur really lies. He can
recount the life of a pesantren as Sobary described. His
description shows that the writer masters various disciplines, or
at least has an outstanding intellectual and religious wealth. It
is in the simplicity of the stories which they can easily
understand in which the serious and meticulous intellectual work
if found.

This book can actually be used as a new means to understand
Gus Dur's eccentric attitudes. Although no explicit connection is
made, Gus Dur's attitude may well be crystallized from the
lifestyle that he knows and describes here.

-- A. Wisnuhardana

The writer is a researcher at the Forum for Social and
Humanistic Studies in Yogyakarta.