Thursday, February 21, 2013

Akhiri Korban Filsafat

February 21, 2013


Judul : Misykat (Refleksi Tentang Westernisasi, Liberalisasi, dan Islam)
Penulis : Dr. Hamid Fahmy Zarkasyi
Penerbit : INSISTS (Institute for hte Study of Islamic Thought and Civilizations)
Tebal Buku : 302 halaman
Cetakan : Pertama, 2012
Harga : Rp. 65.000,00

“Secara brilliant dan tangkas, Dr. Hamid Fahmy, dalam buku ini mampu mengurai konsep-konsep yang rumit tanpa harus terjebak pada “oversimplikasi”, sehingga buku ini mudah dinalar dan enak dibaca”. Demikian sekelumit komentar tentang buku ini yang disampaikan oleh salah seorang dosen IIUM, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, ialah Dr. Anis Malik Toha.
Layaknya Cak Nur (Dr. Nurkholis Majid) yang menggebrak dunia pemikiran Islam Indonesia dengan gagasannya yang menggoncang nalar umat, kali ini hadir Dr. Hamid Fahmy sebagai seorang pembaharu pemikiran-pemikiran Islam dan sekaligus mengakhiri pemikiran sekuler Cak Nur.
Tak ayal dunia pemikiran dewasa ini banyak menuai pertikaian dan korban-korban. Namun bukan korban dalam ranah fisik, melainkan pergumulan itu terjadi dalam aspek pemikiran, filsafat, agama, dan kebudayaan.
Banyak kalangan, tua dan muda, yang memikirkan hal-hal secara kelewat mendalam. Saking dalamnya sehingga mereka menemukan kegelapan yang tak terarah dan membutakan mata hati. Mereka tidak menemukan titik akhir di penghujung pencarian mereka, sampai tak berujung. Fauz Noor, penulis novel filsafat Tapak Sabda, menjuluki orang-orang yang seperti itu sebagai para korban filsafat. Mereka yang memperkaya otaknya dengan khazanah pemikiran namun rela mengorbankan akidah mereka karena mengandalkan otak yang kerdil, bahkan menarik Tuhan ke dalam dimensi akal yang sama sekali tidak mungkin menjangkau Tuhan. 
Nalar diciptakan oleh Tuhan. Tentu banyak hal yang tidak dapat dinalar, melainkan Tuhan sendiri yang memberitakan hal-hal yang di luar jangkauan nalar, dan manusia hanya patut untuk percaya.
Hegemoni westernisasi dan liberalisasi sekarang menjadi bumerang bagi keberlangsungan pemikiran Islam. Keduanya bak amunisi tak terelakkan bagi kehidupan para ilmuwan dan cendikiawan muslim. 
Ulama dan cendikiawan muslim, Dr. Hamid Fahmy Zarkasyi, dalam bukunya yang berjudul MISYKAT : Refleksi tentang westernisasi, liberalisasi, dan Islam, mengungkapkan kegelisahannya dalam sebuah refleksi yang ditulis secara bernas, lugas, dan pas, bahwa kini di Indonesia dan di negeri-negeri Muslim lainnya sebagian cendikiawan Muslim mulai ikut-ikutan risih dengan konsep Allah Maha Kuasa (Supreme Being). Tuhan tidak lagi mengatur segala aspek kehidupan manusia. Bahkan kekuasaan Tuhan harus dibatasi. Benteng pemisah antara agama dan politik dibangun kokoh. Sebagian kyai dan cendikiawan Muslim seperti berteriak “Politik Islam, No” tapi lalu berbisik “Berpolitik, Yes”...”Money Politics laa siyyamaa (apalagi)”. Murid langsung Prof. Dr. Syed Mohammad Naquib al-Attas ini memang cerdas dan kritis dalam menanggapi isu-isu pemikiran dewasa ini. Buku Misykat berisi berbagai opini dan refleksi tentang westernisasi dan liberalisasi terutama dalam kaitannya dengan Islam. Buku ini merupakan himpunan artikel-artikel yang ditulis oleh Gus Hamid di Jurnal Islam Republika selama 3 tahun. Alur pemikiran yang dituangkan di setiap artikelnya bersifat induktif. Ia menarik berbagai pengalaman-pengalamanya sehari-hari lantas dikaitkan dengan kebudayaan dan konsep yang komprehensif.  Hal ini tentu memberikan rasa dan aroma khusus yang dapat dinikmati oleh setiap pembaca dalam menyusuri kata demi kata tulisannya. Dalam pada itu, meski merupakan kumpulan artikel-artikel terpisah, namun susunan penulisan buku ini terasa begitu teratur dan sistematis.
Buku Misykat diumpamakan Dr. Syamsuddin sebagai secangkir ilmu yang mengandung banyak vitamin dan antibiotik intelektual, bukan hanya setetes ilmu seperti semboyan para penerbit buku pada umumnya. Dalam buku Misykat terdapat vitamin islamisasi dan antibiotik untuk mengenyahkan demam westernisasi dan liberalisasi.
Buku ini pun mengupas tuntas tentang esensi westernisasi dan liberalisasi terutama dalam kaitannya dengan Islam. Dalam buku ini juga dibahas tentang dewesternisasi yang memiliki cakupan bahasan tentang Barat, Timur, Agama, Tuhan, Kecerdasan dan Keimanan, Filsafat Agama, Iconoclasme, dan pembahasan-pembahasan menarik lainnya. Selain itu, Dr. Hamid Fahmy pun membahas tentang Ideologi dan teologi liberal, Evil of Liberalism, Pluralism dan Islam, Toleransi, Toleransi Tanpa Pluralism, dan lain-lain.
Tentang teologi misalnya, ia menyampaikan kritik mendalam dengan tulisan yang amat renyah dibaca. Ia mengungkapkan bahwa teologi (theos dan logos) secara etimologi tidak lagi memiliki akar ketuhanan. Istilah teologi pembebasan, teologi emansipasi, dan sebagainya tidak lagi berurusan dengan Tuhan. Agama bagi postmodernisme tidak lebih dari sebuah narasi besar (grand narrative) yang dapat diotak-atik oleh permainan bahasa. 
Sungguh renyah dan enak dikunyah. Menarik dan mudah dicerna. Namun, tidak lengkap rasanya bila sebauh buku tanpa kekurangan. Karena kekurangan sudah barang tentu menjadi sebuah keniscayaan bagi semua makhluk selain Allah Yang Maha Sempurna, tanpa kekurangan, karena sempurna tak berarti lengkap. Sebagaimana ungkapan sebuah peribahasa, a perfect book has never been published. Kekeliruan tifografis atau penulisan huruf agaknya menjadi kekurangan yang dapat ditemukan dalam buku ini. Memang, tulisan reflektif tidak perlu disertai catatan kaki yang berjibun, tetapi dalam buku ini tidak ada footnote sama sekali sebagai buku pemikiran.
Walhal, mengomentari perihal absolutivisme dan relativisme dalam sebuah artikel yang berjudul “Agama”, Gus Hamid menulis, “Tuhan tidak pernah meminta kita memahami yang absolut apalagi menjadi absolut. Dalam Islam yang relatif-pun bisa mengandung yang absolut. Secara berkelakar seorang kawan membayangkan di Jakarta nanti ada papan iklan besar bergambar seorang kyai dengan latar belakang ribuan santri dengan tulisan singkat, “Yesus Tuhan kita juga”.”.

Hanif Rahmat
11611101

hanifr.3@gmail.com

Tuesday, February 12, 2013

THEOLOGY AND ACADEMY

February 12, 2013
Hanif Rahmat
11611101
Faculty of Mathematics and Science, Major of Statistics, 
Universitas Islam Indonesia, Yogyakarta





THEOLOGY AND ACADEMY
(a resume and reflection of "The Routledge Companion to
the Study of Religion", topic of "Theology" by David Frank Ford)



ABSTRACT
This paper explains how to understand the theology based on the perspectives of religions and the academy in terms of some religions that have a lot of major influences on the world civilization and was instrumental in the development of theology in the world, the Christian, Islamic, Buddhist, Hindu, and Judaism. But the tendency of this paper is to understand based on the perspective of Christian theology because of the author's own background.
The problem of theology would invite controversy from various parties depending on how each culture and thought unite the theory that yielded various different conclusions.
Theology is closely related to academic and cultural issues. They is two factors that affect the existence of theology. In addition, political factors also influence the emergence of sects who claim their own theological background so that the problem started happening and started venturing into many spheres of life.
This paper tries to uncover how widespread the problem solves both the problems and the application of the concept in the real world. That different thoughts arise many questions about the solutions that should be done by academics in particular to understand the theology.

PROBLEM STATEMENT
The religious communities mentioned in the definition above all place a high priority on learning and teaching. An immense amount of time and energy is spent on such activities as the study and interpretation of key texts, and instruction in tradition, prayer and ethics. Much learning happens through imitation, and the adoption of habits of thought, imagination, feeling and activity, which are assimilated through participation in a community’s life. Such learning and teaching have been important in helping those traditions survive and develop over many generations (Hinnels, 2005: 62). So, the problem statements is what the conceptual framework of the author and how he solve the problem of theology based on the academy and religions.

THE BASIC CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK
The paper of David Frank Ford broadly defined theology as thinking about questions raised by and about the religion. It then went on to describe the modern world in terms of multiple overwhelmings, with religions as both agents of overwhelming and shapers of life within them, and theology pursuing its questions in that context. He also described briefly some of the overwhelmings in the sphere of education and research, where specifically academic theology is located, and he suggested that the phenomenon labelled ‘posmodernity’ is in some ways helpful to theology.
In this paper, there are three point that discussed with fuller treatment of academic theology :
First, theology in the academy is located at a convergence of what have been described above as overwhelmings. The religion are fundamentally about being overwhelmed and are also undergoing massive trasformations; the academy is deeply involved in modernity. Both in shaping it and studyin, and has itself been undergoin major changes; and the multipliation of disciplices and explosion of knowledge make a specially strong impact on a subject which draws on a great many disciplines.
Second, theology in some academic settings is in a particularly sensitive situation. He refers to those institutions which are not run by a church or other religious community but teach theology.
Third, there is an issue which presses further the discussion of modernity begun above and deserves a brief concluding section to itself (Ford, 1999: 11-12).

THE STEPS, THE PROCEDURES, AND THE APPLIED EXAMPLES
Philosophy, theology, and other areas of thought have contributed to a mood of radical suspicion dericted at anyway of making overall sense of life. They have especially foccused on key ‘integrators’ of human existence.
For example, one way in which we try to make sense of life is to see ourselves as part of some overarching history or drama. This might be the story of our family, of our nation, of God’s involvement eith the world, of human progress, of a revolutionary movement, or even of a television ‘soap’ drama.
A second example of an integrator under attack is the idea of human self. This can be seen as a bundle of conditionings, drives ,and attractions which modern conditions is fragmanted or even shattered. There is no centre of a person’s identity; many pressures overwhelm us from outside us and from parts of ourselves (especially the subconsocious or unconsocious); and in the midst of all this we are continually trying to invent and reinvent who we are fairly arbitrary ways.

A third example is the loss of confidence in reason or rationality. It is seen as an exercise on domination. ‘Knowledge is power’, and is used to manipulate people. So there is deep suspicion of rational argument and debate because they are seen as instruments of coecion by powerful groups who use them for their owh ends. These try to contro education, the directions of research, communications, who is consired knowledgeable and authoritative, and what is regarded as conceivable or true. Specially intensive attention has been paid to language: does it really refer to reality, or is it a theoritic in the service of power and control? Without some trust in language’s aility to identify reality and create a trustworthy shared world of meaning, reasoning is impossible (Ford, 1999: 12-13).

CONCLUTION
Academic theology is distinguished from theology in general mainly by its relation to the various disciplines of the academy (Hinnels, 2005: 62).
In this paper, the author suggested that theology deals with questions of meaning, truth, beauty, and practice raised in relation to religions and pursued through a range of academic disciplines. That is still very broad because it is intended to embrace theology in different types of institution. This matter of the different settings in which theology is studied is important and controversial, and it needs to be faced now (Ford, 1999: 16).

REFLECTION
This paper offers a concise and original introduction to the whole of the theological discipline. Writing with a focus on Christianity, David Ford provides a trenchant and balanced discussion of the study of faith and religion. He describes the development of the field of theology, and explores such issues as knowledge, community, worship, salvation, God, prayer, and evil. Ford also weaves the idea of the quest for wisdom into the entire fabric of his discussion, and concludes with a look ahead to the theology of the next century. 

REFERENCES
Ford, David Frank. 1999. Theology: A Very Short Introduction. New York: Oxford University Press.
Hinnels, John R. 2005. The Routledge Companion to the Study of Religion. New York: Rouletge.


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