Amin Rais on Religion and Politics

AMIN RAIS' THOUGHT ON RELIGION (ISLAM) AND POLITICS

Book Title : Mengupas Pemikiran agama dan politik Amin Rais sang pahlawan reformasi (Analyzing Amin Rais's thought on Religion and politics).
Author : Akh Muzakki.
Chapter I Introduction.
The first chapter of this book is introduction in which the writer wrote about the background and context of Amin's thought. He also wrote about his theoritical background.
Chapter II About Religion (Islam)
Social Tawheed as a base of social justice.
Tawheed is an Arabic word means oneness. It is based on an imperative verb wahhada which means to unite. This is the central idea of Islam. Tawheed means monotheism. For Amin Rais Tawheed means unity of Godhead, unity of creation, unity of mankind, unity of purpose of life. Unity of godhead means people must purify their belief from superstitions and misleading belief. As a consequence of the first one, people must believe that there is a unity of creation. Universe is god's creation. Further consequence is unity of mankind. Then unity of purpose of life. With tawheed man will be free and equal. Thus there is no priesthood or rabbihood in Islam.
For Amin a muslim is a secular person if he / she believes that Islam is only about rituals and spiritual things like prayer, alms giving, fasting etc. He / she is no different from secular people since his/her thought on social reality is secular. In politics his/her behavior will also similar. He / she will neglects morality and ethics. He /she will think that the end justifies the means. So it is clear that Islam for Amin is an ideology.
Characteristics of Tawheed people :
1. Tawheed people will deny all but God.
2. Tawheed people have complete trust in God.
3. Tawheed people have total commitment to devote everything he/she does to god.
4. Tawheed people develop good deeds.
5. Tawheed people take criteria of good and bad only from God's guidance.
Tawheed will free people from dependency on other people. Tawheed brings spirit of egalitarianism and freedom from all kinds of oppression and bondage other than God. Tawheed give insight that social environment must be perceived as instruments to realize devotion to God.
Therefore, according to Amin Rais, all social problems like economic backwardness, intelectual stagnation, social degeneration etc are rooted in the decadence of tawheed.
The concept of tawheed is developed on idea that the central idea of Islam is justice. Amin said explicitly that the first commandement of Islam is justice, after that do good and avoid evil. That is why Islam rejects discrimination based on race, gender, religion, and language to build a comprehensive social justice.
For Amin Rais Islam must be functional in the society. Therefore implementing social justice is imperative. Eliminating imbalances in the society like conglomeration, monopoly, oligopoly etc is a must. Eliminating takhayul and khurafat (believe on superstition), bid'ah (misleading belief) is not enough.
For Amin there are two ways to implement social justice. First, is by giving alms to needy people. Believers must spend a portion of their money to give alms to needy people. But this is just emergency measures. Second way is by rebuilding the social system that creates injustices. People need to restructure the economic and political structures. Amin realizes that this is a long and difficult struggle because this effort will collide with political interests. Political and economic elite will surely try to preserve status quo. The Holy Koran gives example from history. There was a conflict between Moses and Pharaoh. On Pharaoh's side there were Haman, an intellectual and Qarun, an economist.
Amin believes if social tawheed is neglected, followers will leave religion because religion is not capable to solve their social problems. What happened in the West with Christianity is an example. Islam is under three threat. First is crisis of relevance. Islam has no relevance to daily problems of the society. Second, there will be non-Islam or even anti-Islam ideologies because Islam cannot offer solution to their problems. Third, secularism will grow if Islam fail to solve social problems.
But Amin rejects the idea of leftist Islam by Hassan Hanafi. He thought that it will block introduction of the substance of social spirit that Islam bring. He worries that someday there will be rightist Islam, leftist Islam, Marxist Islam, Maoist Islam, Castroist Islam, Leninist Islam, etc if we accept the idea of leftist Islam.
Sharia as a system of religious teaching
For Amin sharia is universal principles that deducted tawheed into a system of religious teaching which is a way of life for muslims. Therefore an Islamic community will not adopt any system but sharia. Sharia regulates all aspect of individual as well as community life, in rituals and social matters. Amin believes that Islam is open to any input as long as they comply to the Koranic paradigm. In Amin's opinion the Holy Koran rejects outside intervention because it is already perfect.
Amin's concept on democracy is similar to Maududi's. He believes that if a concept or thought is not based on divine revelation, it will make mistakes. In this point Amin forgets that even divine revelation can be misinterpreted. God can do no wrong, but human being ?
Amin is sure that sharia is a set of God's commandment that will bring true happiness if it is applied correctly. Sharia is the platform for any muslim society. Since society changes rapidly sharia must be able to adjut to those changes. Therefore there must be innovations (tajdid).
Amin thinks that the Holy Koran is not a book of law but it is a source of law. Therefore there must be flexible comprehension to its principles to be able to meet the changes and problems of society. Sharia is larger than law. It is a comprehensive system. It is a platform for a comprehensive constitutional law, administrative law, public law, private law, and even international law. Sharia provides the basic principles only. There are three points that cannot be changed because they are decisive to human being. First, explicit and definite regulations. Enjoinment on drink of alcohol, riba (exessive interest), and gambling are definite. Second, directive principles. Examples are cancellation of involuntary transaction and man as protector to woman. Third, limit to human activities. Examples are wills must not exceed one-third of total asset, marriage must not exceed four women, and divorce to a woman must not more than three times. Those elements are permanent. They neither need any amendment nor modification.
On the other hand there are elements of sharia that may receive modifications to keep up with current events. Elements not explicitly exposed in the Holy Koran are open to modifications. There are several methods to modify that must be carried out by experts.
Amin's thought on Islamic law, especially on those explicitly exposed in the Holy Koran, is very rigid. For example his opinion on law of inheritance. For him if an issue is explicitly exposed in the Holy Koran, we cannot make different interpretation. It is clear that Amin Rais is a fundamentalist Muslim, in terms that he embraces his religion really as it is written.
As to issues not explicitly exposed in the Holy Koran, Amin agrees to reinterpretation as long as they stick to priciples of truth and justice. For example about payment of due to poor people (zakat). Today's obligation of paying 2.5% of income is not fixed. It is not based on the Holy Koran but interpretation of ulama (Islamic scholar) of the past. Therefore we may change it according to situations. We may apply greater number. For professions that bring great income we may apply 10% or even 20%.
Amin believes that there were limited number of profession in the past while today there are many professions. In addition he is sure that we pay due to keep justice and fair distribution of wealth.
Amin's opinion on innovation (tajdid) in Islam is that we have to renew our comprehension on Islam. How we understand and apply its principles. There are five agendas. First, renewal of faith (aqidah). It means purification of Islam from non-Islamic beliefs. Second, renewal of Islamic theology. The objective of this action is to make Islam relevant to problems of society. Third, renewal of science and knowledge. This action is important because development od science and knowledge affects the basic of ethics and morality of individuals and society. Fourth, renewal of organization and management to meet current challenges. Fith, renewal of work ethos.
Amin admits that there are two kinds of Islam. One is ideal or original Islam and the other is historical Islam. Ideal islam is in theory while historical islam is in reality. There are deviations and superstitions in historical Islam. For example worshipping saints and certain tombs.
For Amin it means degeneration of belief (aqidah) that will obstruct dynamics and creativity. Furthermore there will be socio-political degeneration. For instance Muslim will tolerate explotative, tiranic, absolute kingdoms. Therefore unjustices are common in Muslim societies while Islam strive for justice. Islam after the Prophet died fell into such practices. Sultanate and kingdoms were nepotistic and oppressive. Socio-political situation at that time was contrary to the principles of equality and justice in Islam. That's why it is urgent to renew Islamic thinking continously.
Chapter III The concept of s