(Dr. Farish A. Noor is currently visiting Professor at Sunan Kalijaga Islamic University of Jogjakarta, Indonesia)
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Excerpts: Read here full article by Dr. Farish A. Noor"Lina(Joy)is a Malaysian like the rest of us.
That she has been forced into hiding is a SHAME that ALL of us will now be forced to carry on our collective shoulders.
I happen to be a Muslim NOT because it is stated so on some piece of paper, but because that happens to be my current existential status. The same certainly applies to Lina, our fellow citizen.
I am writing this without the benefit of ever having met Lina herself. Perhaps one day I shall finally come face to face with this fellow citizen whose choice of belief proves my point that identities are crafted and decided by agency, rather than the dictates of history and the circumstances of politics.
When that day comes, I shall be quite happy indeed – for citizen Lina is proof that Malaysia is still capable of defining itself according to the will and agency of its citizens, and it is we, after all, who define what Malaysia is.
-Farish A. Noor
Identities are funny things.
The conflation of Malay and Muslim identity is ARTIFICIAL. It has NO basis in history is embarrassingly evident for all to see.
(Just) hop on the first AirAsia flight to Indonesia next door to see for ourselves that the SAME rule does NOT apply for them.
Our Indonesian Neighbours
Indonesians seem more comfortable with the idea that in the SAME family there can be Muslims, Christians and Hindus living under ONE roof.
Unlike us, they don't go around crafting slogans and jingles for the ad campaign to sell Indonesia as some multi-culti happy land of harmony that is ‘Truly Asia’.
Moreover, it proves that our Indonesian friends are quite capable of living with Pluralism that doesn't have to be imported from the liberal capitals of the West.
But try taking that road to multiculturalism in Malaysia and see what happens... well, in fact one among our number has done just that, though at a rather hefty cost to her well-being. I am, of course talking about our fellow Malaysian citizen Lina Joy.
Malaysia and Citizen Lina Joy
Though I’ve never met her and have no idea what she looks like, I am disturbed by the fact that right now, as we stand precariously on the brink of our big fiftieth anniversary, the Malaysian nation has lost – some would say ejected – one of our own.
At fifty Malaysia as a nation should be mature enough, wise enough, and gutsy enough to live with the realities of a complex plural society. Yet Lina’s decision to leave Islam and to convert to another religion has irked many among her former faith community.
Legal technicalities aside, what surprised me the most was the reaction of some quarters who immediately pounced upon citizen Lina and denounced her as a traitor to her race and religion.
Death threats ensued, with hatemail and slander aplenty. (Something Malaysians seem particularly fond of and good at.) Mobs took to the streets demanding their brand of small town justice, and warnings were issued to latte-drinking liberals not to stir the hornets’ nest or revise the constitutional set up of the country.
It doesn’t take much intelligence to see that behind this wayang kulit of inflated egos and boiling tempers were some other political motives at work.
First and foremost one is struck by how citizen Lina was accused of being both a race traitor and an apostate at the same time, underscoring the fact that here in our quirky little tropical paradise, being Malay is inextricably bound to being a Muslim.
Of course any historian worth his or her salt would be the first to tell you that this notion raises a plethora of unanswered questions, such as ‘if being a Malay means being Muslim, then what the heck were our ancestors who built all those temples like Borobudur and Prambanan, and their humbler cousins here in Lembah Bujang?’ Swedish??
Such are the commonsensical fictions that guide our understanding of identity in this benighted country of ours that till today conversion to Islam is referred to as ‘masuk Melayu’ (becoming Malay).
Following the same skewered logic that got us into this mess in the first place, leaving Islam is tantamount to abandoning the Malay community as well.
Thus it hardly comes as a surprise if the groups who were most vocal in demonising our fellow citizen Lina happened to be the gung-ho rempit-types who are more than happy to harp on and on about preserving the agenda of Ketuanan Melayu as well.
Citizen Lina was accused of breaking the law, causing trouble, upsetting the neighbours and keeping hundreds of conservative die-hards awake night after night.
Yet in the midst of this brouhaha we forget that this story involves the plight of a fellow Malaysian citizen whose only fault – if we can even call it that – was to ask to be recognised for what she is today.
She is living proof that someone can be Malay and Christian at the same time, a fact rooted in our collective past which recurs again and again to spook the simplistic worldview of some today.
For all intents and purposes, Lina is a Malaysian like the rest of us.
That she has been forced into hiding is a shame that all of us will now be forced to carry on our collective shoulders.
Furthermore she also happens to be a Christian, and no legal hassling, soap-box dramatics, verbal pyrotechnics and rabble-rousing will alter that simple fact.
I happen to be a Muslim not because it is stated so on some piece of paper, but because that happens to be my current existential status. The same applies to the rest of us, whatever our beliefs may be; and the same certainly applies to Lina, our fellow citizen.
I regret the fact that I am writing this without the benefit of ever having met Lina herself.
Perhaps one day our paths may cross and I shall finally come face to face with this fellow citizen whose choice of belief proves my point that identities are crafted and decided by agency rather than the dictates of history and the circumstances of politics.
When that day comes, I shall be quite happy indeed – for citizen Lina is proof that Malaysia is still capable of defining itself according to the will and agency of its citizens, and it is we, after all, who define what Malaysia is.
To Lina, my fellow Malaysian, I wish a Happy Merdeka and all the best.
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