Nurcholish urged to speak more on practical strategies

The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

With Nurcholish Madjid expected to leave Pondok Indah Hospital in South Jakarta on Monday, his colleagues have called on the prominent Muslim scholar for more practical ideas to promote good governance in the country.

Nurcholish, better known as "Cak Nur", underwent a liver transplant in Ghuangzhou, China, last year. He had been treated in Singapore before being transferred to Pondok Indah Hospital several weeks ago. His supporters and other intellectuals this weekend held a three-day symposium marking Cak Nur's 66th birthday and the seventh anniversary of Paramadina Mulya University he founded, which finished on Saturday.

One of his closest friends, Utomo Dananjaya, said Cak Nur's health continued to improve and he could now speak firmly and clearly, although he still needed an assistant to help him walk.

The Pondok Indah hospital would on Monday discharge Cak Nur who had recently won acclaim for his outstanding contribution to the way people understood Islam, Utomo said.

Ekki Syachrudin, another of Cak Nur's close friends, said on Saturday that once the 66-year-old scholar fully recovered from his illness, he should talk more about public policy and clean governance to help the predominantly Muslim country nurture democracy and fight corruption.

"My question to him is whether he can transform his theological discourse to issues about how to govern a state. If he only talks about religion, his followers will only be those of the same faith," Ekki said.

"He once said that the Muslim Student Association (HMI) should be dissolved because many of its activists were involved in endemic corruption. Why didn't he also say that we have to dissolve the government because it is also corrupt," said Ekky, a former ambassador to Canada. Cak Nur once led the HMI for two five-year consecutive terms.

Ekki said Cak Nur should start talking about practical solutions on how to increase the people's welfare instead of merely elaborating on concepts of theology.

He believed that if Cak Nur advocated such issues, it would help curb the breeding of Islamic fundamentalist or hard-line groups.

"They (hard-liners) grow up not because they are being inspired by religious teachings, but because they are extremely poor. Cak Nur should provide solutions to addressing this problem," Ekki said.

M.M. Billah of the National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM) said Cak Nur's thoughts on human rights issues still had to be developed. The scholar currently only focussed on promoting freedom of thinking.

"He should respond to the effects of modernization, which is one of his main topics that has sidelined the poor and peasants," he said after delivering a paper titled A Reflection on Cak Nur's Thoughts on Human Rights at the symposium.

Billah said Cak Nur should also respond to sharp criticism that his modern Islamic movement was "elitist" as it did not involve people at grassroots levels.

He said such a movement was in contradiction with his teaching that Islam was an inclusive religion that was supposed to open doors for everyone from all segments of society to participate in the reinterpretation of their religious teachings.

However, Franz Magnis Suseno, a professor of philosophy, said he was more concerned with what Cak Nur had produced instead of expecting him to talk more on issues he had not mastered.

"Nurcholish is an intellectual popular among academic communities and top political parties. He is not a figure who should go to villages and talk to locals. It is not his calling. I think he knows what his domain of competence is and does not need to comment on everything," Franz Magnis said.

Syafi'i Anwar of the International Center of Islam and Pluralism (ICIP) comment on Cak Nur was this: "He is a man of ideas and not a man of action. His ideas have been spreading throughout the new generations of Indonesian society. That is what's important." (006)