Dialectical Relations of Modernity and Tradition

B. Modern Structural transcendental Approach

Muhammadiyah was established on November 18th 1912 by KH Ahmad Dahlan. Muhammadiyah is a modern Islamic movement in the ways of the Islam modernists of 19th century such as Jamaluddin al-Afghani (1838-1897), Muhammad Abduh (1849-1905), Rasyid Ridla (1856-1935). Modernists claimed that this movement was the continuation of the “salaf ”[^4] movement from Ibn Taimiyah and his follower Qoyyim al-Jauziyah (1292-1350) and then continued by Muhammad bin Abdul Wahab (1703-1787) who tried to open the gate ofijtihad [^5] (Kamal, 1994: 6-7).

However we should analysis further these statements ofsalaf andijtihad and confront them to historical facts. Muhammadiyah usedsalaf to justify its spirit to open the gate ofijtihad (religious reformation) and to offend those who were accused to be the supporters oftaqlid (following tradition) and the later then organized themselves into Nahdlatul Ulama (NU). However NU also claimed its rights ofsalaf because it followed the true Islam as interpreted Muhammad the Prophet’s followers of His era, the next generation, and the following generation. In 1924 the dispute oversalaf was settled in the conference of Al-Islam in Surabaya. Both agreed thatsalaf is only to those who live up to the third century of Hijrah, out of them do not belong tosalaf (Hadar, 1998: 52). It implied that Muhammad denied that it follows Muhammad bin Abdul Wahab’s movement in Saudi Arabia, although both have the same characteristics as stated above by Kamal, Muhammadiyah intellectualist.

Muhammadiyah and Abduh are also different in some respects. They have different orientation in reforming Islamic society. Muhammadiyah tended to follow Muhammad Abdul Wahab’s purification movement than of Abduh’s modernization. It meant that Muhammadiyah emphasized on the belief aspect of Islam, meanwhile Abduh called forijtihad inmuamalah (social aspect of Islam) such as in politic, education, and sciences and technology. As results, Muhammadiyah’s reformation faced the great opposition from the traditionalist group which then joined in NU in 1926 so that the movement was not able to progress smoothly, especially in the rural area (Haidar, 1998: 50).

Muhammadiyah tried to modernize Islamic thinking in Indonesia by adopting the structural approach of modern ideas originated from the West. This meant that Muhammadiyah want to implement the social principles of the Koran during the early history of Islam into the new social condition of modernization. Prof. Dr. Kuntowijoyo (2001: 9-29), a prominent Muhammadiyah thinker, confirms that Muhammadiyah had imitated the modern structure of state and society to implement Islamic social principles. In deed, it ha s been relatively success ful in fill ing in the modern structures of Indonesia in such areas as bureaucracy, education, and military.

Muhammadiyah also adopted the modern cultural ideas of growth and progress as a derivation of materialism. It tried to introduce materialism into Islamic society, which had been ignoring this worldly life and had fallen down into the inappropriate practices of Sufism. Another characteristic of this systematic approach to worldly life is a result of rationalization of religious interpretation. This is not only an intellectual movement but also

modern organization covering all aspects of living. Within Muhammadiyah there has developed many autonomous organizations to support worldly living, besides religious bod ies to develop religious interpretation s .

Abdul Munir Mulkan (2000, v-xiv), a vice-secretary of Muhammadiyah, mentions that two kinds of expenses should be paid for following the modern approaches. The first is elitism, in which religious interpretation only fit s well for the Moslem middle-upper class es by excluding the interest s of the Moslem majority who live in the rural areas. Second is the tendency of diverting from a social-religious movement into a formally religious interpretation. Both consequences are a result of the modernist misusing of materialism and of rationalism as an ideology instead of a methodological framework.

Moreover, Kuntowijoyo argues that Muhammadiyah lacks a cultural movement so that it is not able to attract the majority of Moslem s He traces that this cultural senseless ness is rooted in the sociological structure of Muhammadiyah’s followers at the time of its establishment. They come from urban society with the main attention to fulfill ing the material needs of modernity. That is why they are pragmatic by fulfilling the temporal demands of modern society while ignoring ultimate human desires. They think that life is a matter of material needs, which can be fulfilled by technical and organizational means alone .