A profile of a changing
I have never left my family
I was born in a family who strongly holds Islamic traditions. My father graduated from an Islamic boarding school. For more than seven years he learned Islamic studies especially Arabic language, Islamic jurisprudence, and Islamic history. After his graduation from the Islamic boarding school, he started teaching Arabic language and Islamic jurisprudence. He met my mother for the first time when he was a teacher in a basic Islamic school where my mother was one of the students of the school. At that time, my father was 21 years old and my mother was 15 years old. They decided to get married a year later. Four years after their marriage, my older sister was born and I was born four years later.
Five-times prayer, reading the Koran, one-month fasting in Ramadhan, the 9th month of Islamic year, and participating in many religious gatherings are obligation for all members of my family. However, my parents only directed their children not to leave these religious activities in term of fulfilling religious rites and divine obligations. They didn’t teach my sister and me how to correlate my religion to our daily activities when we interact with people. In this situation, I was a very pious kid to do all the ritual activities of Islam but I had lack of concern of some humanitarian problems around me.
Although my parents pay more attention to the ritual activities of religion, they have an open view in some of religious teachings. In this regard, they treat my sister and me in an equal caring. They have not decided a lot of gender roles based on sex. They give the same opportunity of education for all of us. In addition, even though my father considers as the main bread-winner and my mother is a housewife, they do not define this role division based on sex. Further, my father and my mother do not agree with polygamy while some Muslims who have a strong position in their society like my father usually support the polygamy. This situation significantly influenced me to have a sensitive view of gender relations and a concern to violence and inequality against women.
I enjoyed my childhood with my family in a small village in the western part of the island of Java. Javanese people which I am a part of them have very a strong familial relationship among others. In the past, they believed that it is better to live together with all members of family even though they are starving. They even acknowledge their far neighbors as members of their family. In this regard, all members of the society are considered as a member of a big family. They take many advantages from this situation. They can take care of the children whose parents immigrate to search jobs in other places. My parents took care of more than 5 children of my immigrating neighbors and my parents were not paid for this activity. This condition gave me a lesson how to interact generously with people around me. Further, this situation inspired me to be aware of and concerned to a lot of social problems around me.
When I was 12 years old, after my graduation from the elementary school, I had to leave my beloved family to continue my studies in an Islamic boarding school. The school was located in a small city and took 10 hours to get there from my hometown. It was the first time for me to live far away from my family. I was so sad and I thought that my parents were so cruel to sent me to a far place and made me live separately with them. For a couple of days, I was crying until finally I realized that I had to be strong emotionally and started to focus on my study. My sister also often advised me to be psychologically stronger to face the situation. I realized that I had chosen to study in the boarding school and it was for the sake of my future.
In the boarding school, I began to have a “new family”. I live in a dormitory where more than 30 male students lived together in a big place. We slept, ate, studied, chatted, and sometimes took bath together. We often shared foods and dresses. We lived as if we were in a big family. My social solidarity grew up significantly when I was in the boarding school. In addition, day-by-day, my memory toward my family became weaker and I then changed to be more independent, including in the way I was thinking. However, because we lived separately with female students, my view of gender relation tended to be gender-insensitive. I often look female students down and discriminated them as the second-lower group of Islamic society. This view became stronger after I studied some Islamic lessons in gender-biases methods of learning. My teacher in the Islamic boarding school often explained some Islamic teachings based on patriarchal view. Fortunately, when I was in the last level of my study, one of my teachers attracted me to have a critical thought even in religious teachings. He supported his students to study philosophy to have such critical and analytical view. For me, this was a blessing-in-disguise that finally led me to choose philosophy at the State Islamic University in Jakarta to pursue my bachelor degree.
My parents had never rejected my idea to study philosophy, even though they know that some students studying philosophy consider it as a religious dissident. It was a big blessing to get the approval from my parents to study philosophy because for a long time I religiously believed that parent’s approval indicates divine’s approval as Prophet Mohammad said. However, my mother often warned me not to leave all of the ritual activities of my religion especially 5-times prayer and reading the Koran. She often said that I can do everything I want as far as I do both rites. I am usually worried not to be able to fulfill my mother’s hope and afraid of the risks to be seditious child because of denying my mother’s warning.
Studying philosophy was a very crucial experience as it supported me to be more critical when I studied my religious teachings. It opened and broadened my Islamic views. I tried not to focus on the ritual activities as my fundamental religious piety and changed my focus on social-humanitarian activities. Additionally, I continued to live together with my friends in one house. My interaction in a close-relationship when I was in the University also sharpened my social sensitivity and solidarity. Further, I began to apply the critical thought that I got from studying philosophy to approach some Islamic teachings, including women’s issues. I usually discussed my new opinion on Islamic issues with my roommates. I often questioned some Islamic views regarding women’s right issues that I think are unequal, especially for women such as being a leader of prayer and preacher of Friday prayer, polygamy, leader of the family, etc.
When my parents then knew the changing of my views, they were so shocked and surprised. They felt that they failed to educate me to be a pious Muslim. However, they gave me an opportunity to discuss and share my new opinion on some Islamic teachings, and finally they understood my thoughts. I am so proud of them who trust me to have my own religious thoughts. Being trusted to have my own thoughts is the biggest blessing for me that I get from my parents and I feel to be the luckiest child to have such wonderful parents and family while a lot of children in my hometown do not get this blessing from their families. In this regard, even though I live far from my family, I used to feel that we still live together; I have never felt to live separately I have never left my family….
