POSITION PAPER 2

“Of course religion is important. But I am a Malay first before become a Muslim"

NOR FAZELA CHE HASIM (0724448)

Bismillahirahmanirahim…

Thanks to Allah s.w.t because give me a chance and opportunity to give my own opinion about this topic. Deep down in my heart, I’m really thankful and grateful because I was born as Muslim and also Malay. I love my religion same like I love my race. The statement above takes a lot of time to think. My friend said either the chicken egg come first or chicken? (ayam dulu or telur ayam dulu?). Sound funny right? Hehe… But after think for a while, actually we need to understand and explore our self through learning, experience, environment and so on.

Yes, of course religion is important. “But I am a Malay first before become a Muslim”. It is true; I am first Malay, then Muslim, because a religion can, at will, be rejected. One can’t deny oneself being Malay just as a Chinese can’t deny himself/herself being Chinese regardless of what religion he/she subscribes to. And this is the same with the other races. You could bleach your skin, colour your hair, speak ‘mat saleh’, but you are still Malay - "Melayu tetap Melayu". But in a flash, you could reject your religion. You could eat pork, consume alcohol, get baptized and deny the syahadah (affirmation) and zap! You are not Muslim. But ethnically, you are still 'Melayu' - neither you nor anyone else can take that away.

Anyway, that is my approach if we define “comes first” as in lifestyle practice. What if I ask you “Who would you help? Malays or Muslims?” In this case, I choose “Justice”. We have to help everyone that is in need. Not just our race or religion. If I were to choose between Malay and Islam, without any doubt I will choose Islam because it’s the only thing that could help me in Hereafter. Call me kolot or conservative, but if you were to choose between 80-year of life compared to eternity, the choice is obvious.

Maybe sbb terlampau ramai orang yg telah melakukan suatu2 perkara yg memburukkan nama Islam dan juga Melayu and it has been human’s nature to associate the bad things (and also the good things) with the general people(in this case, the race & the religion) due to lack of information and understanding of the culture itself. It’s true that we should see the mistakes as personal mistake, not as a culture/race identity. However, due to lack informational and educational (or just pure laziness to do research), it is easier to observe and conclude about a race/religion. That is what happens nowadays. Even people always say to use Malaysian students “jaga tingkah laku, anda duta kecil malaysia” because people will see what we are doing and they will conclude that all Malaysians are like us. If we’re good, they’ll think all Malaysians are good - if we’re not, and vice versa.

The question which arises here is, "How can all people be expected to believe in Allah given their varying- backgrounds, societies and cultures? For people to be responsible for worshipping Allah they all have to have access to knowledge of Allah. The final revelation teaches that all mankind have the recognition of Allah imprinted on their souls, a part of their very nature with which they are created. Islam is very clear in that it preaches universal brotherhood. The Quran laments against being unjust to anyone due to hatred. Yet Islam clearly recognizes diversity of races and cultures as a blessing, for mankind to get to know and mutually respect one another.

Fortunately for me, Malay and Islam have a long history together. Almost all things in Malay culture are compliant with syarak. So there is no need to choose except in small number of matters. For that matter, I’ll try my best to choose Islam.