[The Relevance of Fatwa on Zakat Distribution as a Social Assurance System for Muslim Communities in Terengganu] Kerelevanan Fatwa Mengenai Pengagihan Zakat Sebagai Suatu Sistem Jaminan Sosial Masyarakat Islam di Terengganu

The zakat institution plays an important role in preaching the rules of conducts and doctrines based on syari’ah for Muslim community lives. Among others, the zakat institution plays a vital role in explaining the community on the zakat management system. This is due to the fact that zakat, when managed wisely will help to eradicate poverty in the Muslim community. Current practise in Terengganu shows that there are a number of illegitimate ‘amil (zakat collectors) whom are not appointed by the government. Thus, this paper emphasises on the relevancy of fatwa in making the payment and management of zakat becomes much more sustainable, and thus making it more justifiable, and beneficial to the social stability among Muslims in Terengganu. The research found out that the fatwa given by the office of the mufti and his committees is very much relevant with the need of the community, which is, that the zakat (almsgiving) properties need to be managed efficiently and distributed equally to the target groups so that the sustainable of the social welfare in Terengganu is well taken care of.   Keywords: relevancy, fatwa, zakat distribution, social justifying system, community, Terengganu.     Institusi fatwa memainkan peranan yang penting dalam penyebaran maklumat hukum kepada masyarakat Islam agar kehidupan mereka berlandaskan syariah. Antara usaha yang dimainkan oleh institusi fatwa di Terengganu adalah menjelaskan kepada masyarakat berhubung pengurusan sistem pengurusan zakat. Ini kerana zakat merupakan salah satu kaedah yang boleh menyelesaikan bebanan kemiskinan yang melanda masyarakat Islam. Dalam situasi yang ada di Terengganu, pengurusan pembayaran dan agihan zakat ini bukan sahaja dilakukan oleh pihak pemerintah, bahkan terdapat juga segelintir masyarakat yang bertindak seolah-olah sebagai amil meskipun tidak dilantik oleh pihak pemerintah. Justeru artikel ini menumpukan kepada kerelevanan fatwa dalam melestarikan pengurusan pengagihan zakat agar ia dapat diagihkan kepada golongan yang benar-benar memerlukannya sekaligus dapat mewujudkan satu sistem jaminan sosial dalam kalangan masyarakat Islam di Terengganu. Kajian mendapati, fatwa yang dikemukakan oleh mufti dan jawatankuasa fatwa relevan dengan keperluan masyarakat agar harta zakat diurus dengan lebih efisyen dan tersusun serta dapat diagihkan kepada kumpulan sasar sekaligus dapat menjamin kelestarian sistem sosial masyarakat Islam di Terengganu.   Kata kunci: Kerelevanan, Fatwa, Pengagihan zakat, Jaminan Sosial, Masyarakat, Terenggan

The Role of Religion in Social Cohesion within the Contemporary Muslim Society in Malaysia: Revisited

This study reports the findings of a research involving 400 respondents from all over the country to investigate the effect of industrialisation, modernisation and urbanisation to social cohesion of the Muslim society in Malaysia. The respondents were drawn from all segments of the society, male and female from the age of 16 to 60 years old. Every respondent was given a booklet of questionnaire with statements to be responded. Each statement was provided with five choices of responses ranging from 1. Strongly agree, 2. Agree, 3. Not sure, 4. Disagree, and 5. Strongly disagree. The questions were related to social issues including the issues of social cohesion such as the relations with the neighbours. The relationship with neighbour is an indicator of the social cohesion. The respondent was given 30 minutes to respond to the questionnaire, and the booklets were collected to be analysed using the SPSS. The findings show that social cohesion within the contemporary society changes with urbanisation since the finding show that social cohesion stronger in villages where modernisation and urbanisation effect is not strong compared to those who live in towns and big cities. The finding has also shown that there was a significant difference between the rural social cohesion and the urban social cohesion. DOI: 10.5901/mjss.2015.v6n1s1p16

The Perception on the Theory of Evolution, Man from Ape: A Cross Ethnic, Education and Religious Backgrounds Study

This study was conducted to see the perception of the Malaysian on the theory of evolution with special focus on the origin of man from ape. 640 respondents, males and females from all over the country of Malaysia were obtained randomly. The respondents come from various ethnic and religious backgrounds from the age of 20 to 50. The study used the questionnaire method whereby the respondents were given a booklet containing statements on the relation between science and religion including a statement related to the theory of evolution that man originally came from ape. The statements were provided with five responses to be chosen by the respondents. The booklets of questionnaire were collected to be analysed by using the SPSS to obtain the mean response, the mean response according to the ethnic, religious and academic background. T-test were also conducted if the means responses were significantly different. The findings show that the 77% of the Muslim respondents rejected the theory of evolution that men come from apes, 22% of the Christian, 23% of the Buddhists and 36% of the Hindu respondents rejected this theory also. The mean difference between the response of the Muslim respondents significantly different from the mean responses all the other religious groups. DOI: 10.5901/mjss.2015.v6n1s1p33

Perception about God and Religion within the Malaysian Society

The study reports the finding of a study conducted on 1800 respondents on the issue of believing in god and religion. The study was conducted throughout Malaysia involving male and female respondents between the age of 18 to 50 from the different ethnics and religious groups. Each respondent was given a booklet containing questionnaire containing the statement on the issues of the belief in god and religion. The statements were provided with five choice of responses ranging from 1 (strongly agree),2 (agree), 3 (not sure), 4 (disagree) and 5 (strongly disagree). The data was analysed using the SPSS to obtain the mean of all the responses, the mean based on the religious group, the percentage of all responses, the percentages of the responses based on the religious group. The data was also analysed using the t-test to see the significant difference of the mean. The finding shows that in general the respondents have a strong belief in religion and god, but when the data was analysed according to the ethnic groups, there finding show that there was significant different between the strength of belief between different ethnic group. DOI: 10.5901/mjss.2015.v6n1s1p24