Indonesia Muslim Exchange Program

Australian MADE hosted a few members of the Shia community, from various organisations and backgrounds, for a lovely lunch at the Islamic Museum of Australia to get to know the visiting delegation from Indonesia who are here as part of the Australia – Indonesia Muslim Exchange Program (AIMEP: www.aimep.com.au).

The members of the Indonesia delegation were:

Marini Sayuti – a TV presenter on the official online news channel of Muhammadiyah, Indonesia’s second largest Muslim organisation, and a member of ‘Hijaber Journalists Community’;

Ni Putu Desinthya Ayu Azhari (Dita) – a Shariah Quality Management team member at Maybank and is on the Governing Board of a Charitable Foundation for Qur’anic education;

Irfan Sarhindi – Director of Salamul Falah Institute for critical religious studies and a senior member of Nahdlatul Ulama, Cianjur branch;

Feri Firmansyah – Director of the Tanwirul Fikr Islamic Boarding School in Solo and a member of the Fatwa Commission for the Indonesian Ulama Council, Solo branch; and

Emil Radhiansyah – a lecturer in International Relations at Paramadina University who is involved in a schools-based project on Youth, Anti-Extremism and the Internet

Dr Yasser Al-Askary shared the following words with our visiting brothers and sisters from Indonesia:

Assalamu alaykum warahmatullahi wabarakatooh dear guest brothers and sisters. It is an honour and pleasure to meet Muslim community leaders from Indonesia.

We are your Muslim brothers and sisters in Melbourne and you may be away from your families and communities while you travel but we are your community and family here.

We are followers of the Jafari school of thought, also known as Shia ithna 3asheriya, or Twelvers, but I prefer simply Muslims. While we make up a minority of the larger Muslim ummah, you may be surprised to know we make up approximately 50% of Muslims in the Middle East.  For those who are unfamiliar with this branch of the Muslim ummah or those who may have heard about us from others let me briefly tell you what we believe.

We believe in “la illaha illa Allah wa Mohammed rasool Allah”. We believe in the oneness of Allah and denounce any and all forms of Shirk. We believe in His messenger, the greatest man to have ever been created, Mohammed ibn Abdullah and in the message with which He was charged and the unchanged word of Allah – the Holy Quran. We pray five times a day, towards the Kaaba and we do our prayers and duaas directly to Allah through no intermediary. We fast the month of Ramadan and we do the pilgrimage to Mecca once in our lives. We pay zakat and do sadaqa.

We firmly hold to the Sunnah of the Prophet through the hadiths and the Quran. We firmly believe, as the Quran states:

nor does he speak out of his desire.

This is nothing but a revelation that is conveyed to him,

Our disagreement is not one based on the beliefs of Islam, which as I have explained are the same amongst all Muslims, but on the issue of politics. We believe the Prophet’s famous speech on his way back from his final pilgrimage, at Ghadir Khum, was his anointment of Ali ibn Abi Taleb as his successor. Other branches of Muslims have a different interpretation.

However, in this day an age of violent extremism within our own Muslim ummah such as ISIS, and the threat of violent extremism outside the Muslim ummah, such as the events of Christchurch, New Zealand – these differences should not divide us. In these times it is far more important for us to focus on what unites us. What unites us is our submission to Allah swt and the belief in His message and His Messenger and in the day of Judgement. We will find strength and success in our unity and defeat in our division. Unity amongst Muslims is not a choice that we can decide to take or leave, it is the eternal command of Allah in the Quran:

Hold fast together to the rope of Allah,  and do not be divided.

So in conclusion I simply say, welcome in Allah’s peace, brothers and sisters in Islam.