[FAC] How extremely confusing it is to be a Muslim
Alam Faizli bin Mohd Zain
[FAC] How extremely confusing it is to be a Muslim
Posted on Wednesday, May 26, 2004, 04:28 pm
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Free Anwar Campaign
By Raja Petra Kamarudin
Wednesday, 26-May-2004 10:02 AM
How extremely confusing it is to be a Muslim
Dear Pak Lah, this is the first time I am writing to you since you
took over as the Malaysian Prime Minister. I hope you don't mind if I
write this as an 'open letter'. You see, I am a staunch opposition
supporter, in particular Parti Keadilan Nasional, and a Reformasi
activist. I thought if I wrote to you privately it might leak out and
people may accuse me of trying to negotiate my entry into Umno like
what happened to those keADILan leaders who met you awhile back to
discuss Anwar Ibrahim's health condition. I can understand after the
'first wave' just before the recent elections people are waiting for a
mass exodus of opposition supporters crossing over to Umno and I
certainly do not want to give them the impression this is what is
happening.
I thought I should turn to you and bounce off you some of the things
that have been going through my mind of late. Seeing that you are the
Prime Minister, a man of religion, and all that, and considering you
were the one who recently introduced the concept of Islam Hadhari, you
are probably the best person to help put my troubled mind at ease. I
had always imagined that, as I get older, life would become simpler. I
mean, is it not your growing up years which should be full of
complications and once you have reached your prime, like me, with
grandchildren and all, then life should be so routine it should be
almost boring?
I have to admit this does not seem to be the case with me. As I gain
in years; and also in width may I add; I find my life getting more
complicating. What should by now be my years of boring routine is not
so boring, neither is it routine. I am constantly reminded I should
take so many things into consideration that my life ends up more
confusing and disturbing than ever.
Now what, you may ask, is this guy going on about? Okay, allow me to
explain, but it is not going to be so simple mind you. By the time you
finish reading my letter you too may end up as confused as I currently
am.
Thirty years or so ago I had only one thing on my mind, other than sex
that is, and that was to get rich. And I did mind you. I of course
blame all this on May 13 and the New Economic Policy that taught us
'getting rich is glorious'. Incidentally, this was also Deng Xiao
Peng's ideology. He told the Chinese that getting rich is glorious, as
if the Chinese did not know this already.
In fact, Deng also told the Chinese, 'Never mind if it is a black cat
or a white cat. As long as it catches a mouse that is all that
matters.' In other words, never mind whether China practices
capitalism or socialism, as long as the people prosper under whatever
'ism' that is all that counts. So the Chinese never went the way of
the Russians in asking for political reforms. They are quite happy
living under a socialist system as long as the government allows the
people to get rich.
Well, the Chinese did get rich and there are now probably more
millionaires in China than in the rest of the world. And they did not
press for democracy or free and fair elections as long as the
government did not interfere with their right to pursue wealth. And,
as in any good fairy tale, they all lived happily ever after. China
did not suffer the fate of Russia that pursued political reforms
without economic reforms and collapsed in the process. China allowed
economic reforms and all those Tiananmen demonstrators who tried to
push for political reforms were squashed by the military's tanks.
(Hmm, this sounds very much like Malaysia doesn't it Pak Lah?).
But what China did was actually not new. Malaysia too did this decades
before that. While China had its Tiananmen, Malaysia had its May 13,
and both our countries told its people the same thing: we will allow
economic reforms, just don't ask for political reforms; you do that
and we will squash you.
So I joined the Bumiputra rat race, the post May 13 breed of Malays
who 'answered the call of the government' to get rich quickly, and in
1972 I went into business. Nothing should stand in the way of getting
rich, we were taught. Old values need to be discarded and new ones
adopted, just like what Mahathir said in his book, 'The Malay
Dilemma'. And many of the so-called Islamic values that are a
hindrance to getting rich, like wasting too much time praying when we
should instead be spending that time doing business, needed to be
pushed aside.
There is no such thing as an honest millionaire, we were also taught.
If you are honest you will never be a millionaire. You must be
ruthless, devious, dubious, and be prepared to do anything under the
sun to get rich. And, in Malaysia, bribery gets things moving. So you
must bribe your way to success. Anything and everything is for sale,
we were told. You just need to know the price and ask yourself whether
you can afford it.
And I did just that. I bought my way through everything. I wheeled and
dealed and tried at all costs to do the other guy in before he did me.
I turned every trick in the book to make that extra buck. I
practically bought my way through life and, to my delight, found that
everything and everyone was for sale, at the right price, even the
Prime Minister.
Then something happened, I don't know what. I started getting very
restless. I found my life so empty and felt that money did not bring
me that satisfaction in life I thought it would. So I went searching
to find my Nirvana and probably by ordain of God or whatever, I do not
quite know, I found it quite by accident. And it happened this way.
I was touring the market in Kuala Terengganu when I saw this very
beautifully framed verse of the Koran in the bazaar. I did not know
what it said but it looked very artistic, so I bought it and hung it
on my office wall.
A friend who came visiting saw it and expressed his appreciation. I
felt pleased. Here was someone else who shared my taste in fine art.
But it was not the artistic value that he acclaimed but what the verse
said and he translated it for me. Hmm, I did not know how to read
Arabic, let alone knew what it meant. But it intrigued me. My friend
read it so fluently and it sounded so melodic. I too wanted to be able
to read Arabic so I went out and bought a beginner's Arabic book, the
menkadam, which seven-year-old kids had to start with. Okay, so I was
27 and the book was meant for those of the age of seven, but I was
starting from scratch.
I struggled though the book -- Alif, Bah, Tah -- until I reached the
end. Within a day I had become an expert and could rattle on from
memory the entire Arabic alphabet. It did not take me long to complete
the entire book after which I chucked it aside. It would take a year
for a kid to complete the book, another friend told me. I had
completed it in less than a month. I was now bored again. This is too
easy. I wanted to move on to bigger things so I bought my first copy
of the Koran and read that too.
But the Koran is something else. It is not as easy as the primer. You
can't learn the Koran by yourself, my friend told me, you need to get
yourself a teacher and learn from him. I sought out a teacher and got
him to teach me, which he did. But you can't just read the Koran like
a parrot, the teacher advised me, you must also understand what you
read, and he taught me what the Koran said.
It was beautiful. What the Koran says is almost what the Bible too
says -- and I had studied the Bible at the age of seven so I should
know. But what the Koran said troubled me. You mean beer and gin rummy
are a no-no? I am a Muslim but I was not living the life of a Muslim.
Some changes in my life were in order and I began to set my priorities
straight. Do you know you also need to pray five times a day? I do?
Okay, let's then also learn how to pray. I was after all pushing 28 so
maybe it was time to learn. And, within a week, I memorised all the
verses required in our prayers and learnt how to pray.
Okay, now you can read the Koran and you know how to pray, how about
going to Mekkah to perform your Hajj? Now hold on! I only wanted to
learn how to read that beautiful piece of art on my office wall, that
Arabic text, the verse from the Koran. How did I get dragged into all
this? First the Arabic alphabet, then the Koran, then prayers, and now
performing the Hajj -- we are certainly deviating here. This was not
how it was meant to be.
I eventually went for my Hajj anyway, by the time I was 32, around
five years after I first embarked on my mission of learning how to
read that beautifully framed Arabic text on my office wall. How I had
deviated. What was originally just an exercise of trying to learn the
Arabic alphabet had now become so complicating.
I began to have no more interest in the pursuit of wealth through foul
and corrupt means. Making money is certainly nice, but if it must be
done by breaking every rule in the holy book, then no thanks. Better I
be poor than filthy rich if I need to grovel in filth to get rich.
How did a framed Arabic text hanging on my office wall start all this?
How come I ended up in Mekkah performing my Hajj? Complicating, very
complicating. Anyway, somehow, without intending so, I had now become
a Muslim. It is not that I was a Christian or Hindu or whatever before
this. I was born a Muslim. But that was all. I was not a practicing
Muslim though. Now I was a born-again Muslim.
Well, maybe that framed piece of art on my office wall opened up a
whole new world that I never knew existed. But now that I had
discovered it I kind of liked it. Life seemed not so complicating
anymore. Hmm, I thought Islam was so confusing. It is not so,
actually. Islam is quite simple and I found it not too much a problem
living the proper life of a Muslim.
Okay, so now I should no longer play poker during Ramadan to 'kill
time' but instead go to the mosque to do my Tarawih prayers. I should
also not break my fast with beer. And that other thing too -- well,
you know -- is also a no-no. But this was no problem for me if being a
good Muslim means you must steer clear of all these vices.
Twenty years passed and I diligently performed my Islamic duties. My
life was regimented but I fell into the routine quite comfortably.
There were the dos and don'ts, and I did the dos and didn't do the
don'ts. I understood that you are either a Muslim or you are not.
There is no such thing as in-between. Islam is all about black and
white. There are no grey areas in Islam. There is no compulsion under
Islam though. You are free to choose and I did chose -- no one
compelled me to do what I did not want to do.
Then I woke up one day and discovered that being a Muslim is still not
as simple as I thought it was. There is no such thing as 'either you
are a Muslim or you are not' as I originally believed. There is also
either you are a Hadhari Muslim or you are a Fundamentalist Muslim.
You are either a modern Muslim or you are a radical Muslim. You are
either a moderate or you are an extremist.
Now hold on! You mean there are different categories of Muslims we can
choose to be? How come I was not told this, thirty years ago? Which
kind of Muslim am I then? Can someone give me examples of what the
different categories of Muslims look like? I thought there was only
one kind, the kind that Prophet Muhammad taught us to be. At least
that was what I was taught 30 years ago.
Okay, let us look at what the first Prime Minister taught us, a friend
offers to help me out of my dilemma. Tunku Abdul Rahman was a man who
was a Hadhari Muslim. He was a moderate. He was not extreme like those
PAS people. He propagated Malaysia as a secular state, not like those
extremist PAS people who want to turn Malaysia into an Islamic state.
Then came Tun Razak, Hussein Onn, Mahathir Mohamad, and now you, Pak
Lah. And, just like the Tunku, all of you are moderate Muslims, not
radicals like those PAS people. You all believe in maintaining
Malaysia as a secular state, not sending Malaysia back to the dark
ages by turning it into an Islamic state like what those PAS
extremists are trying to do.
Ah, now I get it. It is starting to become very clear. So that is the
kind of Muslim we should be. The Tunku spent his years in England at
the dog races. He spent most of his life in Malaysia at the turf club.
I believe he even owned some racing horses. And he always started his
day with a peg of whisky. Or was it brandy? Never mind; one liquor is
as good as another.
Yes, I certainly hate to be called a radical. I do not want to be
viewed as backward and outdated. I am, after all, a modern man. The
Hadhari Muslim label will suit me fine. Okay, I will reject the
Islamic State thingy that PAS is propagating. I will be a true
Hadhari.
But hold on, I am not allowed entry into the Genting Highlands casino.
I will be arrested if I check into a hotel with a woman who is not my
wife. I will also suffer arrest if I get drunk in a pub. Is this not
an infringement of my rights as a modern or Hadhari Muslim? Why am I
not free to practice my modern Muslim ideology like in the days of the
Tunku?
If I cannot gamble, drink and indulge in indiscriminate sex is this
not backward? Are we not going back to the middle ages, to the time of
Prophet Muhammad? If I am a modern Muslim, then all these restrictions
should be removed.
In fact, PAS also says you cannot gamble, drink or indulge in
indiscriminate sex. And Umno says PAS is extreme. But your Umno
government too will not allow me to gamble, drink or indulge in
indiscriminate sex. Is then not your Umno as extreme as PAS?
I am now really, really confused. Maybe, Pak Lah, you can help me out
of my dilemma by explaining what the hell this Hadhari Islam is all
about.
Yours truly,
Confused Malaysian Muslim
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URL: http://www.mggpillai.com/sections.php3?op=viewarticle&artid=6470
Lim PE
voting for BN, yourself told us this.
| no such thing as an honest millionaire
False, many of my friends & relatives are such : rags to riches via hard
work, thrift, good genes ( no autism / deformity etc. from in-breeding /
addiction ), little / no addiction, without cheating any1.
| You must be
| ruthless, devious, dubious, and be prepared to do anything under the
| sun to get rich.
Criminals & con men's motto. 1 of my relatives has this, cons illiterate
minority shareholders.
| And, in Malaysia, bribery gets things moving.
Some TNB staff demand developers to bribe them, or else will demand
a substation for just a few houses.
| bribe your way to success.
1 MB told a briber to buy his (MB) 's old car @ a high price.
| everyone was for sale, at the right price, even the Prime Minister.
Which 1 ?
| money did not bring me that satisfaction in life I thought it would
Money gives a diminishing return of satisfaction.