A Discussion on Thoughts of Indonesian Muslim Scholars #Day29

The following note was taken when I was teaching Islam Subject part-time at Sampoerna Academy. According to the date saved here, I put it in this blog on November 11th, 2017. And, I have never touched it since then. 

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In this term, I decided to have my Grade 12 students do a research on how Indonesian Muslim scholars view religious tolerance. The information to be collected and presented consisted of the scholars' basic information, educational background, opinion on religious tolerance, and how they call on all Muslims in Indonesia to show religion tolerance. Additionally, the students had to give their own opinion responding to the scholars' views if they agree or disagree along with their arguments. The instruction covered in the following questions.

• Who is the scholar?
• What is his/her educational background?
• What does the scholar think about tolerance?
• Do you agree with his/her opinion? Why?
• How does the scholar mostly call on Muslims in Indonesia to religious tolerance?

I searched on Google by typing "daftar tokoh Islam Indonesia". Wikipedia provided a list of names, but I picked only some and put them in my list. To choose the scholars to be discussed by the students, I considered two points, the scholars' influence  or contribution to the development of Islam in Indonesia and the availability or access to relevant information on the internet. 

• Abdullah Gymnastiar (Aa Gym)
• Abdurrahman Wahid (Gus Dur)
• Dr. Haji Abdul Malik Karim Amrullah (Hamka)
• Prof. Dr. Quraish Shihab
• KH Mustofa Bisri
• Habib Rizieq Shihab
• Felix Siauw
• Zainuddin MZ.

Once the list above was presented, one of the students came up with her own choice which was Ulil Abshar Abdala, so I let her go with it. One class period (around 45 minutes) was allocated for students to collect the relevant information and prepare the PowerPoint (PPt) slides. The presentation started in the following week. 

Ulil Abshar Abdalla was first presented. The student shared one of Ulil's writing Menyegarkan Kembali Pemikiran Islam. Unfortunately, I did not take some notes on it. 

After that, another student shared some information about Habib Rizieq starting from his family background to his educational background. 

Next, it was Haji Abdul Malik Karim Amrullah (HAMKA) presented. The student presented well with a lot of information about him and his contributions to Indonesia. From the presentation, I could see that the student was excited about Hamka's excellence and intelligence especially knowing that not only did he study Islam but also western cultures. 

The next scholar was KH. Mustofa Bisri. The student mentioned that according to this scholar, the Islam religion is not a political party. This scholar had always believed to be gentle to others no matter what their religion was. 

Last, the student talked about Felix Shiauw. 

Once, I had a concern that the information collected by the students might be coming from not valid resources. On the internet, anyone can say anything. However, the point that I wanted to make through this discussion was that to introduce my students to different opinions, especially in this religious tolerance issue, among the Muslim scholars who have a lot of knowledge and experience in Islam. During the class, I did not tell the students to agree or to disagree with some specific views of the scholars. I let them decide by themselves. Everyone is entitled to her and his opinion and what we all can do is to respect one another.