Female Religious Authority, Religious Minority and the Ahmadiyya: the Activism of Sinta Nuriyah WAHID

In the present-day Indonesia, cases of discrimination and violence towards minorities are still prevailing. A number of Indonesian personages who play a strong role in defending minorities have been observed, most particularly Muslim minority groups such as the Shi'ism and the Ahmadiyya. One of these personages: Sinta Nuriyah Wahid (b. 1948). One may say that Sinta is a female Muslim scholar-activist who is rooted in tradition­nalist Islam, and accordingly is considered a figure of authority in speaking in the name of Islam. This article is dealing with the role and authority of this female scholar-activist in promoting the rights of the Ahmadiyya in contemporary Indonesia. The first concern of this paper is dealing with Sinta's roles in protecting the Ahmadiyya in Indonesia. The second concern is dealing with the ways in which Sinta and her ideas on protecting the Ahmadiyya wield authority on present-day Indonesian Muslims

New Religious Authority of Islamic Millennial: A Study of Rohis Community in Medan City

Teenagers, or today mostly known as millennial generation, is transition phase from the child to the adult category. They look for identity through various activities such as Rohis community. This research focuses on how Rohis community of Madrasah Aliyah Negeri (MAN) in Medan city determines religious authority. The study also discusses how this spiritual community organized the group, built the network strategy, strengthened solidarity, and constructed an Islamic identity. The object of research is Muslim millennial generations who are member of Rohis of Madrasah Aliyah Negeri. This study results in a fact that this group does not follow the conventional religious authority but populism. The culture of populism with gadget as part of the life style including social media applications has constructed the spiritual identity especially in choosing and sorting out religious teachings to practice. The religious authority shifted form conventional to a new determining power, such as to determine patterns, shapes, styles and ways of practicing Islamic teachings. Their religiosity suggests symbolic identities, such as dressing, religious rituals and Islamic jargon can recognize among teenagers in the public sphere. Referring to the revealed they can be identified as groups inclined to the "culture of Wahabism". Culture "New Wahabism" is appearing in a new form in strengthening the network of “da'wah” through social media

First Person and Third Person Reasons and Religious Epistemology

In this paper I argue that there are two kinds of epistemic reasons. One kind is irreducibly first personal -- what I call deliberative reasons. The other kind is third personal -- what I call theoretical reasons. I argue that attending to this distinction illuminates a host of problems in epistemology in general and in religious epistemology in particular. These problems include (a) the way religious experience operates as a reason for religious belief, (b) how we ought to understand religious testimony, (c) how religious authority can be justified, (d) the problem of religious disagreement, and (e) the reasonableness of religious conversio

Authority and Trust: Reflections on Linda Zagzebski’s Epistemic Autohrity

Our modern egalitarian and individualistic age is suspicious of authority, and in recent times there have been almost daily reports in the press of cases where trust in various authorities, including financial, governmental, political and religious, has been found to have been abused or misplaced. Such disappointments seem to bolster the case for withholding trust in external authority and falling back on one’s own resources. But if the lessons from Linda Zagzebski’s groundbreaking work are accepted, 1 self- reliance turns out to be a confused and probably incoherent ideal ; and the rational and self-reflective person is committed to believing and acting on authority. In the second half of this short discussion paper I shall raise some possible concerns about Zagzebski’s positive case for reliance on authority, focussing on the moral and religious spheres. First however, let me say something about the negative part of Zagzebski’s work, her critique of self-reliance. Since I find this wholly convincing, I shall confine myself to some supplementary observations, mainly to do with the historical context in which her critique is located

Challenging Religious Authority: the Emergence of Salafi Ustadhs in Indonesia

With Muslims as majority population, religious authority plays important roles in Indonesia. This paper tries to show the map of religious authority in Indonesia both in history and the recent development. The paper shows that, in the past, religious authority in Indonesia were possesed by the kyai and other traditional religious leaders. However, there is an emergence of the new religious elites in Indonesia, the muballigh, the dai and the last is the salafi ustadhs. In addition, this paper also discusses the contestation between the established power of religious authority and the the newly emerged salafi ustadh. Feeling threatened by the changging trend and the influence of the salaf, there are various responses from the existing authorities. The responses vary from discussion to violence. One example is the mubahathah held between Persis and Salafi. Through the event, both parties tried to contest and challenge each other's authority. Using religious arguments and using some religious symbols, both parties actually try to maintain their religious authority

Religious and Political Authority in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia

Alfred Stepan’s “twin-tolerations” thesis (2000) is a model for explaining different ways that religious and political authority come to be reconciled. In this paper, we investigate some obstacles and challenges to realizing a reconciliation between religious and political authority in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) that might result in a transition away from a theocratic monarchy to a more consultative form of political authority. Whereas most analyses of religion and politics in KSA focus on geopolitics, the rentier state model, or economic and military aid from the United States, we also consider local factors that emphasize the agency of political and non-political actors within KSA, focusing in particular on education policy and how this policy is a barrier to political reform. Our position is not meant to replace the standard models, but rather to supplement them by offering a multi-variable perspective on the challenges and prospects for meaningful political reform in KSA

Contestation of Religious Authority in Study Groups: Between Religious Authority and Mass Authority in Aceh

This article examines the religious authority contestation among study groups in Langsa City, Aceh. The existence of a diversity of study groups does not mean the people there accept the existing plurality. Apart from the growth of religious authority from the Traditional Islamic community, several things also influence it. So the diversity phenomena in religion often become a mass struggle. This research is included in field-library research with qualitative analysis. Data were collected through interviews, documentation, and observation in the study groups. The data were analyzed using a sociology approach and social theory. This article presents two significant findings, including scientific contestation developed by each study group and mass struggle as a confirmation of the authority holder. These two pieces of evidence show that the spread of religious authorities does not necessarily make people accept plurality in religion. Furthermore, Islamic law in Aceh tends to always be in religious contestation

Zagzebski, Authority, and Faith

Epistemic Authority is a mature work of a leading epistemologist and philosopher of religion. It is a work primarily in epistemology with applications to religious epistemology. There are obvious applications of the notion of epistemic authority to philosophy of religion. For, on the face of it, the notion of some kind of ”epistemic authority’ may serve as a conceptual anchor for our understanding of faith. Indeed, there is ample historical precedent for this. Faith, says Locke, is ”the assent to any proposition... upon the credit of the proposer, as coming from God, in some extraordinary way of communication’. 1 In later Lockeans, ”credit’ is often rendered ”authority’, and the terms were used synonymously at the time of his writing. 2 One of the beauties of Locke’s view is its reductionism, that is, it’s parsimony, which is a species of elegance and therefore beauty. Zagzebski’s notion is more high-octane than Locke’s. In this essay I will do four things. In Section 1 I will describe two kinds or notions of authority or at least two usages of the word ”authority’. In Section 2 I will describe Zagzebski’s use of one of these notions, the non-Lockean one, to ground the reasonableness of religious belief. In Section 3 I will give four arguments against her view. In section 4 I will reply to her critique of Locke. The upshot, in my view, is that though we learn much from Epistemic Authority, a more Lockean approach to the nature of faith is still preferable