Suluk Wragul 'The Otter'

I am preparing a lecture summarizing the teaching work I did in Indonesia in the 1980s, in Jakarta and Yogyakarta. One aspect was, in the Yogyakarta period, the project of research about suluk religious poetry in Javanese. There is a small booklet of ten poems, published by the staff of the project. The first is Suluk Wragul, with a number of animals. The leading figure is despised by the others, like in Suluk Abesi the 'nigger' also here the hero, although initially despised by the others, finally gives the basic truth to the others. The black monkey hates the otter because he is only involved in seeking food. The religious leader or penghulu and the wayang players are seen as ideal, and praised.

 But the otter also criticises the religious functionaries (who are often criticised in suluk poetry): this man only seeks money by selling his knowledge of mantras, religious formulas. And also the hermits have hidden motivations of richness and power. In stanza 20 the monkeys are threatened that the 'Lord of the river' may come to punish them and they disappear. A cuckoo  comes and some kind of heron, finally also a crow (stanza 26). But the poem does not change to a syair burung, a debate of birds, like the ones written in Malay by Raja Ali Haji in the period 1850-1870 in Penyengat.In stanza 27 a dalang enters the poem as someone who could be able to explain the object of religious veneration. Arjuna is mentioned in stanza 30 as someone who may be able to explain the threefold question: who is venerated, how can we see who is venerated, and finally how can we enter the presence of who is venerated? It is suggested that the dalang, who is sitting behind the screen may explain us about the truth of the relation between the servant and the divinity.
Many aspects of Islam are mentioned here in passing: from amulets to formal prayer, often in a critical way: in stanza 24 even the kalimat tauhid or the confession of faith is said to been made divine in such a way that it prevents the believer from reaching truly to God! - But I am also aware that my source is the free Indonesian rendering by Emha Ainun Nadjib, so there should be more comparison with the suluk literature in general. And here the problem remains that so little research had been done to this genre, although there is a great amount of poems in the greater collections.

Suluk Abesi

Mrs Himemoto Yumiko was for a long time the official for Indonesia of the Toyota Foundation. She asked me probably in 1985 for a proposal from the IAIN, to be sponsored by her organization. In Yogyakarta from IAIN staff there was the proposal for a study of Suluk literature. Some scholars have deducted the typical Javanese Suluk poetry as influenced by the mystical suluk, popular in the Naqshbandi brotherhood, as a period of fasting and praying, practised in seclusion during forty days. More generally accepted is the theory, that the word suluk does not originate from the Arabic salaka or mystical travel, but from the Sanskrit shloka, the chief metre used in the epic poetry of India. Whatever may have been its origins, this great corpus of Islamic poetry in Javanese, created during the sixteenth until the nineteenth century, experienced a lack of interest in the last century when Malay and later Indonesian became the most important la­nguage. This poetry was `too Islamic' for the few experts in older Javanese literature. So it was neglected by most. It was also seen as  `too  Javanese' for Muslim scholars. So, with the help of the Japanese dollars a project could start in Yogyakarta.

                Because very little was published, the project took a Leiden Manuscript, LOr 7375. Its Javanese script was put in Latin script on the computer and translated by a small team. The ten poems were translated into Indonesian. Then this was dipuitisasikan or put in poetic Indonesian by the well known poet Emha Ainun Najib.

                One of these is the poem Suluk Abesi. It has the riddles of the Abyssinian faqir, a poor black man, who was insulted by a penghulu or qadi of Java, because he had entered a mosque: “You should not sit in front of me, because I never will give my instruction to common people like you...” Thereupon the Abyssinian planned to obey and only wanted to inquire after a few things: “ Where is the shore of the wide ocean? Where is the tablet without any scrip­ture? The Lotus flower outside any pond?.. A lamp without a wick, a green leave without a twig, a mu'azzin without a drum?” The answer to the riddles is always the same: “An ocean without a coast is nothing else then Allah: every being will vanish and merge, be lost in God's essence, the Zatullah...  The lotus flower, that blossoms forever, without standing in a pond, that is the Ruh Idafi. The Most Highest exists without a location ... The lamp, burning without a wick, reflects Allah, existing by Himself: He eradiates out of Himself, without oil, there is no source for his shine. He gleams continuously and illuminates this world. So it is. Everything is God.”

                The last verse of the poem formulates the basic democratic value of the religious education. The wise man shows that there is no social hierarchy valid in the face of God: “And you, my Excellency, you became a penghulu, not by yourself; also the King has no final power: only Allah is the true King, who appointed you to become a qadi. When you leads the prayer, followed by the congregation, it is not you who performs the salat. If you would think so, your prayer would be fraudulent.”

                Kejawen means literally ‘something Javanese’. But it is often used in contrast to pure Islamic belief. Then it has the connotation of ‘Javanese folklore, deviating from pure Islam’. In the mood of a more proud and self-respecting Indonesian Islamic identity or the culture of Islam Nusantara, this word Kejawen perhaps will experience an update. Then it can be the label for a self-respecting distinct Islamic culture.

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'Nobody is immortal except Wiranto...'

Yesterday KITLV in Leiden had an interesting, although overloaden seminar with three speakers: each given 15 minutes only. Instead of the usual 20 people on Thurday afternoon, there were more than fifty now, including the Indonesian ambassador, Pak Puja. Theme was Indonesia's Political Economy update..

Philips Vermonte in the rather dark, narrow conference room of KITLV in Leiden
First was Philips Vermonte, from the USA but working at CSIS in Jakarta (no longer ruled by Ali Murtopo and friends, now a liberal research centre). He put comments on the fair elections and the weak, often quite undemocratic political parties as the weakest element in Indonesia democracy. Notwithstanding the success of Jokowi, there are quite many 'oligarchs' in Indonesian politics. 'Nearly the same bosses as before Reformasi. In 1998 it were, next to Suharto, Prabowo, Wiranto, Akbar Tanjung, Amien Rais and they still are leading parties, that lack internal democratic procedures.' So he had the joke, that 'Nobody is immortal except Wiranto'. His title was 'Consolidating a fledgling democracy'. He doubted whether proposals like a possible third term for a president and a return to indirect presidential elections would give new inspiration to democracy. This would lead instead to what he called a 'minimal democracy'. He also was sometimes optimistic: in 2017 there were 171 local elections. Only in Jakarta there was the tumult about Ahok, but most other elections went smoothly, also in places where Muslim parties supported non-Muslim candidates, like one Nurdin Abdullah in South Sulawesi. Besides an increase in religious concern (but decline of openly Muslim  parties!) he noticed a favour for technocrats as well.

Two other speakers were Arief Yusuf (Bandung, Padjadjaran Univ., here in the centre) and Rizal Shidiq, right, now in Lweiden University), who had many statistic material on the increase of religious intolerance. In 2007 and 2014 some 30.000 people were interviewed with similar questions like whether they would tolerate non-Muslim neighbours, a non-Muslim governor, partner for their children. Apparently people qualifying themselves as deeper/more religious were also more intolerant. Where there were greater differences in income, there was also greater intolerance. Primary or secondary education had not much influence on intolerance, only people with tertiary education were more tolerant. Is Islam special intolerant?
There was not much about history. I see myself two developments: since the 1970s the great expansion of primary education went hand in hand with an increase in religious classes obligatory for all pupils. These classes were and are given by very strict teachers, who follow overt Muslim doctrines. They must have given a great stimulus to the decline of abangan spirituality. After 2000 there is a quick spread of religious interference in what was before rather 'secular'. It started with the marriage law of 1974, followed by a steady process of a ban on interreligious marriage, but then after 2000 with more and more rules about halal food, about Islamic banking, dress codes, halal tourism. Moderation of religion could be good too if it only would mean that the impact of specific religious rules for many secular fields could be reduced.

Debate about the new Minister of Religion, Fachrul Razi

Between 13-20 October, while we were in Yogyakarta, there were all kind of speculations about the new cabinet of Jokowi II. There was in the local newspaper of Yogyaarta a curious interview with UIN Rector Prof. Yulian Wahyudi, who was nominated a candidate by the 'Forum Rektor PTKIN" , the Council of Presidents of Islamic Universities of Indonesia, to become the new minister of religion.

 In the interview Yudian Wahyudi communicated  some plans about what to do if he would be nominated to the position. The most important issue was that he wanted to start a procedure of 'preaching permits': all imams only should be allowed to give Friday sermons if they had passed some kind of examination, guaranteeing that they would not spread radical ideas. This licence would become one of the first measures against the ongoing lack of flexibility and tolerance among Muslim clerics and the increase of hardliners.
Wahyudi was not nominated for the position, and he also did not receive a position as minister of education and research, his other choice. But the retired army general Fachrul Razi, 72 years, without special religious qualifications, took over the idea of issuing special certificates for Friday preachers. In one of his first interviews he protested against to much hate talk against people taken for non-Muslim or bad Muslim in mosque preaching and he threatened that he would be serious in banning this kind of people from the pulpits.

The Nahdlatul Ulama had to be happy with the position of Vice-President, given to its leader Amin Ma'ruf  'worth like five ministers',  and not complain about a Minister of Religion of quite different background this time! Fachrul Razi also had some soothening words: a beard and 'short' trousers (above the ankle or celana cangkring) is not automatically a proof of being a dangerous radical Muslim. In his first week of office, it was the 'Day of the Santri' for all Indonesia, but in the true santri-land of East Java the new minister was not invited for the great ceremonies. For this moment, it is a long list of aspect of a heated debate about 'who is radical?' and 'how can radicalism and hate speech be stopped?'