Indonesia's Religions
by R. MOHAMMAD KAFRAWI
THE PLACE of religion in the life and culture of Indonesia is often rather difficult to explain to Westerners. Yet in a certain sense religion embodies the whole meaning of life on our islands, and without an understanding of ft. no outsider can truly interpret our social and political characteristics.
It is precisely in this area of politics that the Westerner is most likely to be perplexed. For the Indonesian government is, to a certain extent, a theocracy. It is founded on a state philosophy which we call the Pantja-Sila, or Fire Principles. They affirm, first of all, the being of the Supreme Deity, from whom all authority descends. Furthermore, our Ministry of Religion is specifically charged in the Constitution with the responsibility for the spiritual welfare of all citizens. Yet at the same time we insist on the separation of church and state and the absolute freedom of the individual to choose his own faith.
As for the people themselves, most, of us — ninety per cent, in fact — are Muslims. Indeed, Indonesia constitutes one of the main centers of the Mohammedan faith in the modern world. Yet even in this we have preserved our own customs, some of them quite different from those in other Muslim countries. Our women, for instance, are not in purdah, but are allowed to come and go as they please. Already in our new republic, a number of them have become members of Parliament and cabinet min isters.
In addition to the Muslims, we have approximately four million Christians of various denominations. There are also about two million Hindus, most of them concentrated on the island of Bali, and about one and a half million followers of Buddha, the majority of whom arc of Chinese descent. And then, on our easternmost islands, we still have a million or more people who practice the ancient animist faiths of our earl lest forefathers.
Each of these, except the last, came to us on one of the successive cultural waves which swept over our islands from the Asian mainland. And each combined permanently with some aspect of the native spirit, until today we have a many-hued but closely woven religions tapestry. Thus in a predominantly Muslim country one finds, in names and customs, constant reminders of Hinduism. It was Indian Hinduism which teas the first outside religion to come to us, and because of the many forms of the deity and the richness and variety of its religious practices it easily absorbed the indigenous animism. Then came Buddhism, with its quest for nirvana, and then in the thirteenth century, when the movements of Persian mysticism were at their highest. Islam reached across the water to Sumatra. A hundred gears ago, when Christian, missionaries came to do their work in Indonesia, they found a people with a long and highly developed religious tradition, a people who were adept in the refinements of mystical experience. And today, in liturgy, ritual, and art, Indonesian religion is among the richest cultural attainments of the Orient, and the domain of the spirit extends into every reach of Indonesian thought and life.