SERMONS, EDICTS AND THE RELIGIOUS SPACE

A sermon (khutbah) is a religious address delivered orally and directly to a specific audience, small or large, in the mosque and other religious spaces. A fatwa is an edict or a ruling on specific religious matters (masail diniyyah) that concern the community.

While the khatib or preacher who gives a sermon must seek to conform to the tradition of the Prophet Muhammad and the Qur’an, how success­ful he/she is in this endeavour of course depends upon circumstances and each individual.^[1495] The preacher’s education and experience shape his or her way of preaching. In Kelantan and in South Sulawesi, the pondok (traditional boarding school)-educated preacher has greater training on and hence understanding of traditional Islamic knowledge such as the Qur’an, the science of the Qur’anic interpretation (tafsir), the science of Hadith, jurisprudence (fiqh), and Arabic, enabling him to be better versed than others in delivering sermons.

For sources, a preacher would select one or several out of more than 6000 verses of the Qur’an and/or one of or several of the thousands of the Prophet’s sayings and tradition (Hadith) of six major collections.^[1497] Since the structure of the Qur’an is neither systematic nor thematic, the selection of verses may come from a major Hadith collection or from selections incorporated in religious books. A sermon can be delivered ‘deductively’, meaning that a preacher would speak of a phenomenon and then examine it in accordance with his/her interpretation of the normative values derived from particular verses. An ‘inductive’ sermon, on the other hand, is one where the preacher quotes from the Qur’an and the Hadith to explain a particular issue.

Apart from the Qur’an and the Hadith, a preacher may pick ideas from books in Arabic, in translation, or in the vernacular. The preacher may be influenced by works such as those of al-Imam al-Ghazzali (d.1111), to mention just one example.^[1498] Other sources of sermons may come from material gathered from international and local journals. In Kelantan, reform-minded preachers (kaum muda) might consult the international publications of al-Urwat al-Wuthqa (the Strong Bind) and al-Imam (the Leader), as well as the local ones, such as Pengasuh (the Bearer) and al-Hidayah (the Guidance). In South Sulawesi preachers found inspir­ation in the stories or commentaries found in the local bulletins such as SuaraAs’adiyah (Voice of As’adiyah), magazines of the Muhammadiyah, and al-Wafd (the messenger). One sermon manual mentions a book of Qur’anic exegesis entitled Tafsir al-Jamal (The Beautiful Interpretation) and that of the legal philosophy of fiqh (entitled Hikmat al-Tasyri’ wa Falsafatuhu, the Wisdom of Islamic Law and Its Philosophy).^[1499] During the colonial period, references from Western books in sermons were un­common and mainly used to highlight shortcomings or emphasize favourable remarks on Islam, such as a statement by a Scottish scholar of Islam, H.

In Kelantan during this time, the language of Friday sermons was predominantly local Malay (Kelantanese dialect) and usually written in jawi, a modified Arabic script used for the Malay language.^[1501] In South Sulawesi, sermons were delivered in the local vernacular language (Bugis, Makassarese, or Mandarese) and were sometimes written in the Arabic-script called serang, but more often in Latin script. The use of serang in South Sulawesi, however, was limited and not as popular as the use of jawi in Kelantan because Malayness and Arabic were intertwined. In South Sulawesi, while the majority preached in the vernacular, some gave Friday sermons in Arabic, as occurred in the mosque of As’adiyah in Wajo.^[1502]

The Muhammadiyah in South Sulawesi urged their preachers to use the local languages or the national language of Indonesian.^[1503] But Arabic was used for the main part of the sermons, which included the recitation of the praise to Allah (hamdalah), the praise to the Prophets (shalawat), encouragement to do good (wasiyyat taqwa), the declaration of faith (shahadat), the quoted Qur’anic verses and Hadith, and the recitation of prayer (do’a).^[1504] Most of the ordinary people in Kelantan and South Sulawesi did not know Arabic, except in some pondok where Arabic was taught intensively and sermons were delivered in Arabic for educational purposes.

Fatwa is more formal than a khutbah. The fatwa uses different sources, including the Quran, the Hadith, and religious books regarded as ‘accept­able’ by the mufti. In Kelantan, during this period, fatwa were issued in the journal Pengasuh. The sources of the fatwa were various, but primarily Ahl al-Sunnah wa al-Jamaah books of Abu Hasan al-Ash’ari (873-975) in matters of belief, and books of Imam al-Shafi’i (767-820) for matters of ritual, legal and social matters.^[1505] South Sulawesi did not have a state-supported fatwa and office of mufti as in Kelantan,^[1506] but the Muhammadiyah and the Nadhlatul Ulama (NU) branches circulated their nation-wide collection of religious rulings in the form of religious decisions (tarjih, keputusan) considered as fatwa.

The NU as an organization did not penetrate into South Sulawesi until early 1950, although the Ahlussunnah wal-Jama’ah theological and Shafi’i legal school of thought was represented by Islamic schools, such as Madrasah al-Arabiyyah al-Islamiyyah (Islamic Arabic School) and Darul Da’wah wal-Irsyad (House of Mission and Guidance) and some other pesantrens in the island of Salemo and other districts in South Sulawesi. During the first half of the twentieth century, South Sulawesi did not have a collection of fatwa, but they had individual religious edicts, such as those issued by K. H. As’ad. Comparatively speaking, in Java, the NU organizational fatwa, collected later on, used about 160 religious books (kitab kuning) as references to the fatwa issued between 1926 and 1994. The fatwa are in the vernacular with references in Arabic without Indonesian translation, whereas the Muhammadiyah fatwa pro­vide Indonesian translation for the references as well. The Muhammad- iyah fatwa use the Qur’an and the Hadith more but Arabic books less than the NU fatwa collections. In matters ambiguously explained in the Qur’an and the Hadith, the Muhammadiyah uses the legal methodology of ijtihad (reasoning) and ittiba (following but knowing the reasons), while the NU applies taqlid (following the established opinions of the ulama without necessarily knowing the reasons).^[1508]

With regard to sermons in South Sulawesi, local ulama individually and organizationally write down various aspects of their sermons in manuals or guidebooks for limited or wider circulation.^[1509] In Kelantan during the colonial period, the journal Pengasuh had a section devoted to religious rulings or edicts, but no section on sermons until the 1950s. Few books of sermons were written and published by individual preach­ers and/or the Council of Religion in Kota Bharu, and after independence published more manuals.^[1510] The khutbah, despite its simple form, is a complex practice.

This performative aspect of sermon is situated within a ‘religious field’ between the preacher and the audience. The stories are usually about the Prophet Muhammad, his companions, his four successors (caliphs), other prophets, and other exemplary figures. What was important for the preachers and the audience was not the factuality of a story, but rather the moral meanings behind the stories, such as patience, courage, fairness, devotion and other qualities that the preacher intends to emphasize. A Bugis preacher KH Muhammad Abduh Pabbaja, for example, said that when he was a boy he used to listen to the stories of the Prophet Muhammad, Ali bin Abi Talib, Khalid bin al-Walid, and Hamzah, which gave him lessons on courage.^[1511] The ulama see the moral values that govern the daily behaviour of such figures not as ‘secular’ and ‘contin­gent’, but as ‘religious’ and ‘constant’. The sermon acts as a link between the past, the present, and the future by providing an occasion for the preacher and the listener to share in a common religious space where exemplary figures - prophets, saints, scholars - become living and real.

The preacher maintains the ‘religious’ character of the sermon by interpreting particular issues through his/her understanding of Islamic doctrine and practice.^[1512] Thus, to believe and to preach are intertwined.^[1513] Even while adhering to the belief in the absoluteness and universality of knowledge (wahyu), the preacher nevertheless conveys it through his/her individual interpretation. In religious sermons, pure thinking and reason­ing without reference to the sacred texts are rarely made and would make them less authoritative for the congregation. References to the Qur’an and the Hadith are a sign of authoritative sermons and usually precede purely personal opinions.

The regular and the most frequent sermon is Friday sermon. The Friday sermon functions as a practical religious guide, source of religious information, a religious response to any problem, and as encouragement

Khutbahs and fatwas in colonial Indonesia and Malaya 437 to strengthen faith and deepen religiosity.^[1514] Sermons are by nature repetitive (daily, weekly, or annually) and therefore contribute to a sense of continuity. The Friday sermon is in reality not a space for dialogue or debate; it is one-way communication. One sermon manual suggests that the Friday congregation should be a space for those who seek spiritual peace and for uniting the heart and the mind of the Muslim community. The sermon is not intended to create friction and disunity among the Muslim community by highlighting errors committed by the people or imposing the preacher’s political ideology. Public sermons, particularly those delivered in a public space or the electronic media, tend be more general in content to appeal to an audience that may include both non-Muslims as well as Muslims with varying theological and ritual orientations.^[1515] The main concern of sermons, however, continues to be the introduction, maintenance, and reinforcement of a sense of com­munity among Muslims within a particular space - neighbourhood, village, city, country, etc.

Even though sermons and edicts are endowed with religious authority, they are not legally binding. In Kelantan in colonial times, sermons were often the business of the state and the Sultan through the Council of Religion. There were regulations that attempted to force attendance at Friday sermons, for instance. However, even though the Friday sermons were forcefully attended, the degree of reception by the audience during this time could not be exactly measured, as there was rarely direct feedback to a sermon by audience. The ulama hardly intended to measure the feedback from the audience they preached, neither did they examine if their fatwa were actually followed by the asker (mustafti), although there were sometimes letters from the audience sent to journals. For example, one reader of a fatwa sent his letter to the journal Pengasuh, expressing his agreement with the fatwa issued by the Council on the recitation of basmalah in the Surah of Fatihah of the Qur’an since it was according to the Shafi’i school of thought in the kitab al-Um.^[1516] In South Sulawesi, a local ruler in Bone discarded his membership of the Sufi

Order Tariqah Khalwatiyya after he heard in a meeting KH As’ad fatwa on the falseness of the Sufi Order. KH As’ad’s fatwa about ritualistic matters such as Friday sermons in Arabic was followed by the preachers in the mosque of Sengkang, Wajo. But the Muhammadiyah preachers also gained a following since the 1930s when the khutbah began to be preached in local languages.^[1517] There was, therefore, some leeway among Muslims to choose which religious opinions to follow.

A khutbah is not inherently political if this means practical politics. M. B. Hooker has argued that the mosque and the khutbah are ‘socially and even politically identified and the khutbah is the public expression of a specific identity’.^[1518] This view is true to some extent and in some cases. As mentioned earlier and demonstrated below, the preacher sees his or her sermon as ‘religious’, even though the topic is categorized as ‘political’, ‘social’ and ‘non-religious’. The issues are theological and ritualistic, but when political and social concerns are the focus of the sermon, the preacher delivers judgments based on his/her try interpret­ation of the Qur’an, the Hadith, and other religious sources. In the sermon and the edict, the distinction between religious and the non­religious aspects of knowledge thus becomes blurred because the khutbah and the fatwa are viewed as being ‘religious space’. This emphasis on the ‘religious’ character of the khutbah and fatwa and the constant return to the sacred texts explain why the secular, context-specific problems and issues tend to become ‘de-secularized’.

III.