Very few studies explicitly, let alone quantitatively, examine gaps in religious intolerance among individual Muslims based on affiliation with major Muslim organizations in Indonesia. Most... Show moreVery few studies explicitly, let alone quantitatively, examine gaps in religious intolerance among individual Muslims based on affiliation with major Muslim organizations in Indonesia. Most existing studies either focus on a single organization (non-comparative), are at the organizational policy level (not examining individual attitudes), or use a limited number of samples in their analysis. Against this backdrop, this study compares Indonesian Muslims’ levels of religious intolerance based on their affiliation with Muslim organizations or traditions: Nahdlatul Ulama (NU), Muhammadiyah, and other organizations. We utilize a large-scale household survey, the 2014 Indonesia Family Life Survey-5, and run an ordinal logistic regression to identify organizations’ rank on the religious intolerance scale. We find that Muslims without any affiliation with a Muslim organization (some 18 percent of Indonesian Muslims) are the most tolerant. Against this reference group, we find that NU followers are generally the most tolerant, followed by those affiliated with Muhammadiyah, and those affiliated with other Muslim organizations. This finding adds a stock of knowledge to our understanding of religion and society, especially regarding interfaith relations in Indonesia and in the Muslim world in general. Methodologically, this study also shows the benefit and feasibility of identifying the dynamic of religious intolerance using a quantitative approach at a micro level. Show less
This ethnographic book deals with the emergence of the Wali Pitu (seven saints) tradition and Muslim pilgrimage in Bali, Indonesia. It touches upon the issues of translocal connectivity between... Show moreThis ethnographic book deals with the emergence of the Wali Pitu (seven saints) tradition and Muslim pilgrimage in Bali, Indonesia. It touches upon the issues of translocal connectivity between Java and Bali, Islam-Hindu relationship, relations between Muslim groups, and questions of authority and authenticity of saint worship tradition. It offers a new perspective on Bali, seeing the island as a site of cultural motion straddling in between Islam and Hinduism with complexities of local figurations, and belongings of ‘Muslim Balinese’. The study also urges the intricate relationship between religion and tourism, between devotion and economy, and shows that the Wali Pitu tradition has facilitated the transgression of spatial and cultural boundaries. Show less
How Muslims in Indonesia consider their religious practices, politics and culture as Islamic is described in this volume. By examining the various ways Bima Muslims constitute their Islamic... Show moreHow Muslims in Indonesia consider their religious practices, politics and culture as Islamic is described in this volume. By examining the various ways Bima Muslims constitute their Islamic identities and agencies through rituals and festivals, this book argues that religious practice is still vigorous in present Bima. It explores the reproduction of religious meanings among various local Muslims and the differences between social groups. Islam is represented as divided between the traditionalist Muslims and the reformist Muslims, between the royal family and the ordinary Muslims, and between Muslim clerics and lay people. Consequently, there is no single picture of Islam. As Bima Muslims construe their Islam in response to their surroundings, what it means to be a Muslim is constantly being negotiated. The complexity of religious life has been a result of the duality of socio-political settings in Bima which stems from the early period of the Islamization of Bima to the present. Show less
Situated at the crossroads of the Indian and Pacific Oceans, the Spanish Philippines offer historians an intriguing middle ground of connected histories that raises fundamental new questions about... Show moreSituated at the crossroads of the Indian and Pacific Oceans, the Spanish Philippines offer historians an intriguing middle ground of connected histories that raises fundamental new questions about conventional ethnic, regional and religious identities. This volume adds a new global perspective to the history of the Philippines by juxtaposing Iberian, Chinese and Islamic perspectives. By navigating various underexplored archival resources, senior and junior scholars from Asia, Europe and the Americas explore the diverse cultural, religious, and economic flows that shaped the early modern Philippine milieu. By zooming in from the global to the local, this book offers eleven fascinating Philippine case studies of early modern globalization. Show less
By way of retracing the 1935 Shahidganj mosque dispute, this article explores how Indian Muslims transformed their vision of community from one seeking moral legitimacy within colonial law to a... Show moreBy way of retracing the 1935 Shahidganj mosque dispute, this article explores how Indian Muslims transformed their vision of community from one seeking moral legitimacy within colonial law to a vision geared towards political action outside of the colonial legal order. This represented a radical departure from Muslim politics of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century where liberalism—while circulating around ideas of mysticism and moral community – remained largely the domain of polite petititoning. By piecing together the legal micro-his-tory of the Shahidganj mosque dispute and by mapping native responses to colonial law, I show how Indian Muslims, under the leadership of Muhammad Ali Jinnah, located and shaped their political identity by moving beyond colonial prescriptions of legal pacts based on interests. Show less
This dissertation provides a comprehensive and cross-religious analysis of representations of religious conversion in early modern English drama. An urgent topic due to the religious upheavals of... Show moreThis dissertation provides a comprehensive and cross-religious analysis of representations of religious conversion in early modern English drama. An urgent topic due to the religious upheavals of the early modern period, conversion provoked questions about a variety of religious and social issues, including divine and human agency, mystical experience, the demarcation of religious identities and the nature and possibility of religious transformation. The stage, which served an important socio-cultural role in early modern England, responded to these questions in dramatizations of conversion that investigated conditions under which it could be successful. By distinguishing between spiritual and interfaith conversion, this study demonstrates that in plays perceptions of faith in spiritual terms were increasingly replaced by an understanding of belief in terms of mutually exclusive denominational identities. Moreover, despite the great interest in interfaith conversion, and despite the importance of religious change and transformation on the stage, early modern playwrights did everything in their power to suppress conversion and the idea that the same depraved Muslim, Jewish, Catholic or pagan identities they had constructed could be shed and exchanged for a righteous (Protestant) Christian one. Show less
The main focus of this dissertation is exploring the position of people with disabilities within two Islamic sciences, namely, Islamic Theology and Islamic Jurisprudence as reflected in the early... Show moreThe main focus of this dissertation is exploring the position of people with disabilities within two Islamic sciences, namely, Islamic Theology and Islamic Jurisprudence as reflected in the early and modern writings of Muslim scholars. Within Islamic Theology, attention is paid to the opinions of early and modern Muslims theologians and philosophers on the existence of disability in this life, the wise purposes behind the existence of this phenomenon in addition to the efforts of these scholars in order to reconcile between the existence of this phenomenon on one hand and specific divine attributes such as the Mercy of God. Within Islamic Jurisprudence, the contentions of early and modern Muslim specialists in Islamic law have been probed into concerning a broad scope of topics with modern relevance such as the human dignity of people with disabilities, their employability, medical treatment, social life with main focus on marriage-related issues, financial life and means of living for this group of people. Show less