Islam in Malaysia: the modern, the foreign and the traditional

Islam is the official religion in Malaysia and some two-thirds of Malaysians are adherents. The religion is therefore a lot more visible there than in Singapore. More than that, the complexities and the contending shades of Islam are also more visible, for reasons which I will touch on at the end.

Now, in these days of religious fanatics carrying out terrorist attacks on the basis of their own warped ideas, we've all become sensitised to Islam's internal debate. It's an interesting subject to us now, even if we are not Muslims ourselves. So where previously, we might have walked right past something, today, we stop, look and think about it a little. 

The first encounter 

It was an open-air concert in the evening. On stage were 4 young men singing  what sounded like soft pop. The disconnect was in the way they dressed. They were wearing traditional Malay costumes, made of shiny cloth, complete with gold-threaded sarongs and, on their heads, songkoks. 

I thought that was strange indeed. Usually pop bands ape the West.

Here, on the other hand, was a group that was dressed more for a traditional wedding, but singing in a major key that Beethoven would have recognised, with guitar and synthesizer backgrounds. And then I noticed they were singing in English, not Malay, though the diction was so bad I had to strain to catch the words. 

But when I did, the picture became clear. The lyrics were, of course, banal, but interestingly, they consisted of phrases like, "to live the good life" and "it doesn't matter what others think". The song was the Muslim equivalent of church pop music. 

And like much of church pop, it was truly bad music. The melodic line and chord progressions were unadventurous. It kept boringly to the same AABA structure, multiplied into stanza-stanza-chorus followed by stanza-chorus and another stanza-chorus, all the while plodding along in predictable 8-bar and 16-bar formations. There was no development whatsoever. It never changed key. The pace was moderato throughout; the cadences, cloyingly sweet to the point of unbearable. Voice levels were held at medium strength, little by way of crescendo, diminuendo or anything you might call vocal effects. 

It was music for the unmusical. For the pedantic of mind. For those whose conservatism in life ruled out any experimentation in music. For those who, in believing the injunction to be chaste, could only stomach songs washed of all artistic passion. 

Despite its poor quality, this song that the 4 young men sang spoke volumes about where some Muslims stand today. Here is an attempt to make the religion appealing to a new generation of Malaysians who have grown accustomed to a modern world, whose idea of music is pop, and whose ears are tuned only to the 12-note octave from the Western tradition. It's an effort to make the religion appear "with-it" when the words are sung in English, not Malay. It's a desire to keep the religion relevant, drawn from the example of Protestant churches in the West, who themselves adopted the soft pop idiom only 30 – 40 years ago. 

Yet, the lyrics also spoke of the unique difficulties of Islam: "It doesn't matter what others think." In there is a little clue to the side-glances from not just non-Muslims, but also from non-practising Muslims, thrown at those who try to remain devout. 

Are those side-glances justified? For that we have to step beyond the medium to the message. What the values that go with being devout? 

The second encounter 

A few days after Hari Raya Aidil Fitri, I caught a glimpse of a Malaysian TV program. The scene that went by had four men (one middle-aged, three much younger) sitting around a dining table saying grace before their meal. But included in the scene was a woman. She was not seated at the table, but standing apart from the group, though she too joined in saying grace. She stood near a door, presumably the door leading to the kitchen. One would assume that she was the hostess, perhaps the wife of the older man. 

In an instant, one is reminded of the separation of sexes that Islam imposes. Moreover, from the way the woman is excluded from the table, it reminds one of the subordinate status of women, and how their role is to hover around and serve the men. 

It seems relatively easier to adopt the veneer of modernisation, through soft pop devotional songs sung to a Western beat, than to seriously examine and overturn discrimination and injustices perpetuated in the name of religion. 

The tensions that arise from clash between archaic interpretations and modern secular life can sometimes become quite acute, as my next story illustrates.

The third encounter 

The setting was the shopping mall under the Petronas Twin Towers, modern, swanky and very popular. In the centre court on the day that I was there, a fashion show was in progress. Leggy models clad in translucent gowns with low collars and high slits kept everyone transfixed. Powerful sound systems invaded the space with an obsessive beat. Glamour, hypnosis and seduction mixed together, making the moment narcotic. 

Almost right in front of the stage were two Arab men, their eyes locked, entranced by the models on the ramp. Two steps behind them, were four of their women, covered head to toe in black, faces veiled, with mere slits for their eyes. 

The Wahhabi justification for covering women up in black tents is to avoid the sin of lust. Men are believed to suffer uncontrollable urges at the very sight of women, even just their hair. To ensure an earth free of temptation, women must be imprisoned in the tightest of social rules and have their personhoods smothered by these all-enveloping cloaks. 

But what should one do when medieval habits run into a fashion show? Should good Muslim men avert their eyes? But if Muslim men have to avert their eyes to avoid falling into sin, while non-Muslims don't avert their eyes, and yet don't automatically become sex maniacs, doesn't that raise a question whether there was any need to avert one's eyes in the first place? 

And if men can safely look at women, even stunningly beautiful young women in translucent fabrics lifted high with every cantering step they make on the ramp, why can't the same men safely look at Muslim women? In which case, why do Muslim women need to be all covered up? 

In the encounter with the modern world, isn't the original justification proven false? 

But no one is asking such questions today. After the show, the Arab men wave their hands, signalling their harem to follow. The men walk ahead, the tents follow, secure in the knowledge that no one is leering at them, and all is in order under God. 

* * * * * 

The Wahhabi influence is foreign to Malaysia. Traditionally, Malays have practised a mild, tolerant form of Islam, incorporating many cultural elements from their pre-Islamic past. But, in the last 20 – 30 years, an austere, sometimes literal form of Islam, originating from Arabia, has gained more than a foothold in the country. While those 2 Arab men and their women were not Malaysians, but tourists – Malaysia woos many tourists from the Middle East – that encounter points at the difficulty reconciling the look-back-to-the-past strain of Islam with the modern world. 

The other two encounters illustrate different aspects of the struggle within Malaysian Islam. The stunning difference, to Singaporean eyes at least, is that in Malaysia, the contest is right there in the public domain. In Singapore, because Islam is a minority religion, because our government dislikes religious issues taking forestage in the media or on the streets, preferring it kept within mosques, churches or temples, we rarely get the chance to spot such interesting exemplars of our time.

© Yawning Bread 

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