JP/ 7/kartini

JP/ 7/kartini

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Today Indonesians commemorate the 110th birthday of their
foremost pioneer for women's rights, R.A. Kartini. In the
following article writer Carla Bianpoen recounts theologian Th.
Sumartana's recent discussion on an aspect of the heroine's
personality which is not commonly known.
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Kartini looked to religions for world harmony

By Carla Bianpoen

JAKARTA (JP): Much has been written and said about Raden
Adjeng Kartini, the national heroine who died at 25, and, for
many, a symbol of women's emancipation.

Born in 1879, she lived at a time when Dutch power on Java was
well-established.

She was the daughter of the Jepara regent, who was part of the
Dutch administration, and therefore she was privileged and
allowed to enter an elementary school for Dutch children.

It was here that Kartini first recognized the differences
between traditional rules and western thought.

Her letters to Dutch friends, and articles written in De
Locomotief, a Dutch newspaper, are the most remarkable evidence
of the young woman's comparably modern views, especially
considering she was born and raised in the tradition of the
Javanese nobility.

Her letters have been translated worldwide, her intelligence
praised, and her linguistic abilities lauded. Each year her
birthday on April 21 is commemorated nationwide.

But not much attention has been paid to Kartini's views on
religion, which were discussed recently by Indonesian theologian,
Sumartana.

His remarks came in light of a series of lectures organized at
the Dutch Cultural Center to commemorate 400 years of Dutch-
Indonesian "encounters" in 1995.

Explaining that Kartini was a part of the belief system in her
society, Sumartana described several instances in which Kartini
was inspired by the tones of traditional music and by mystique,
including spiritism and occultism.

"What greatly touched my heart were the melodies of the
gamelan. I was taken back into past times ..." Kartini also went
to see a clairvoyant to address the question of her attending
school in Holland.

She then wrote to her close friend Mrs. Abendanon, "Perhaps
you will consider this amusing and laughable and would expect us
not to believe such nonsense. But how could this person who had
never seen me know exactly who I was? She pictured my appearance
and character."

Although Kartini believed in spirits, occultism, and mystique,
she was still a devout Moslem.

"There is no God but God," Sumartana quoted from a letter she
wrote in 1902 to a friend, Nellie van der Kol.

"We say this as an Islamic community," Kartini added,
"...together we are all believers, monotheists; God is the Lord,
Creator of the universe."

To Dr. Adriani, a philologist in Central Sulawesi, she
conveyed that she and he actually believed in the same God, the
only difference being in the name.

"The one you call God, we call Allah," she said. Her views of
God then were quite universal.

Her contacts with friends who adhered to religions other than
Islam provoked a serious search to blend the beliefs of her
friends' religions with her own.

"Oh, Lord," she lamented in a letter to Stella Zeehandelaar in
l899, "at times I think how wonderful it would have been if there
was never any religion.

"For religion, which should unify all humankind, has for
centuries become the cause of quarrel and division, and of
horrible bloodletting."

Nevertheless she was convinced of the unity of God and the
brotherhood of mankind in which God gave religions as a blessing.

Sumartana emphasized that Kartini had no specific knowledge on
religion, including Islam.

Deeply influenced by syncretism prevalent in Java, he said her
syncretism was not dogmatic, but resembles an "ethical
syncretism."

He explained that she did not intend to create a new religious
doctrine mixing various religious dogmas unified into one system
of teaching.

Arguing against Mrs. Abendanon's belief that only the
Christian religion was able to bring humans to genuine truth, she
wrote, "It is not religion that has no love, but rather human
beings that ruin everything that was originally beautiful and
holy.

"As far as I can see, the religion that is most lovely and
most holy is love. And to be able to live according to that
sublime command, must one absolutely become a Christian?

"Buddhists, Brahmins, Jews, Muslims, even those who worship
idols can live with pure love."

First person

Kartini's conviction in religious pluralism was unshakable.
"I do not care which religion is followed by any person or
people," she wrote to Dr. Adriani in 1903. Children of God are in
every religion, they are found among every people."

According to Sumartana, Kartini is the first person in Java to
have started an interreligious dialog, in this case with the
Dutch.

During the time when Kartini wrote her letters, there were no
records of any other religious thinker on Java attempting such
dialog.

Sumartana said that in her time, Kartini was often
misunderstood by Islamic teachers, and was sometimes considered
an enemy of Islam.

Among Christian missionaries, her thoughts were never
mentioned, let alone valued. Asked how her views would be
perceived today, Sumartana avoided answering.

The concept of Pancasila, the state philosophy developed long
after Kartini's lifetime, parallels her views in more ways than
one.

Her views on religion are recognizable in three of the five
principles of Pancasila: belief in one God, a just and civilized
humanism and social justice for all Indonesian people.

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