Some Things In Life Are So Decisive

It's war zone again in Malaysia, a season to forbid this and that, with rebellions and ravage surface. We'll see how the drama unfold itself.

A few months back, I have got to know this chatty particular girl (no, not the girl above) -- a friend of a friend -- during one of the many Hartamas sessions, whom at that time were so passionate about her newly-drenched yoga class she just registered herself into. She, it seemed, happened to be so clueless during the holidays, and she thought of indulging herself into something new, plus healthy activity. My gullible self thrown away, I was still impressed by her efforts.

Until recently, I discovered that one of my female bestfriends also have taken part in yoga. Another friend, whose family was mildly conservative, caught me by a slight surprise by telling me that his mother too, practiced yoga. I never knew of a male yoga practitioner so far, however my views of yoga being practiced only by the open-minded and the liberal ones are basically proved untrue.

I've no time to label these people as heretics. Nobody did, not until recently. As if people are not preoccupied enough with the economy steering into bumpy rides, we're now served with a new controversial fatwa, issued shortly after a previously controversial one: yoga is haram. While the fatwa is issued at a federal level, it is put on hold in Selangor and Perak, with the Sultan of Selangor wanting the fatwa decision to be consulted first with the Rulers' Conference.

Things are getting hefty.

When the issue was raised nearly a month ago, I actually raised an eyebrow, chuckled. "Yoga? Haram? Pulak!" I said to a friend. Hence when the ban was declared last Sunday, we all knew it was coming along. Still, it left me stirred and intrigued. I personally think that the yoga these people are practicing are of a secular one, nothing religious.

I'm not defending yoga, nor my friends who are into it. There are lots of people already defending it now, including some very daring liberal Muslims who opened up, stood up, and challenged both of the fatwas. I believe I don't have to go against anything, as I think the men in the council, being certified ulamas, would be very well wary of what they are doing with their intelligence.

I'm more interested of what will happen to these fatwas, in the near future.

Chances are, they will be forgotten just like that as things have always do -- a characteristic particularly common in Malaysian media: sensational at first, toned down the second you know it. '[Issues just] swept under the carpet', to quote Raja Dr. Nazrin Shah, the Regent of Perak. Unsolved. That is, until a new controversy is found, to continuously distract us away from what we are supposed to be concerned of -- our quality of living, for example.

Nonetheless, controversial fatwas are not new. Coffee was haram in Islam, as haram as pork and alcohol during the times of the Ottoman Empire. Of course, what is haram and what is halal, if it was not stated in the Qur'an and the hadith, came from fatwas issued by ulamas -- 'the learned ones' whom at that time thought the drinking of coffee would 'dull one's intellect'. The ban of coffee, whom origins of the word found itself in the Arabic 'qahwah' and Turkish 'kahveh', eventually (and obviously) was lifted.

Then there was an interesting fatwa on forbidding smoking. There are many reasons to why smoking is haram to Islam, according to the issuing ulama, one of the reasons was based on a Quran's verse that 'one should not harm oneself', referring to the diseases the habit would bring. The fatwa proved unpopular. Many smokers today insist that smoking is just makruh, a degree where a habit is nowhere sinful or good, but 'God will just dislike what you're doing'.

Perhaps one of the shocking fatwa so far was the banning on TV3's event-carnival SureHeboh (present-day JomHeboh). Though the so-called carnival being lame and constantly filled with boyans, the ban on the event which was issued by the Mufti of Perak caught attentions of many parties. The reason was classic, with the 'casual mingling of members opposite sex' and 'excessive Western hedonistic influence' being the pivotal points.

But here is the most daring ignorance shown by a very big media company to the local ulama institution -- the same thing the people who are so behind the fatwas issued today are against to: they just pretend that there's no fatwa, and they just went on with the show.

So, no yoga?

From what I've carefully read regarding the issue; the opposing and rebellious ones, Muslims, especially -- whom I think are just speaking their mind at the wrong place to the wrong people -- are being counter-attacked, with statements such as "it is what God wants it to be, so be it". Or "Islam said so." And, "yang haram tetap haram!" (all in capital letters). Funnily, none of this were said before the fatwa was issued.

One thing for sure, this habit of forbidding and not explaining is driving many young Malaysian Muslims to be indifferent about their faith. Yes, it is. There's no point of praying for 'our younger generation to be at the right path' every Friday when there are no actual steps done to guide us to the right path. Fatwas cannot solve everything.

Ponder this: so what if she's a lesbian and then you condemn her for being one, issue a fatwa and do nothing else about it? So what if your buddy is flying high every night with his grass, and then you condemn him, pursue somebody to issue a fatwa and in the end do nothing else about it? Many of us youngsters are condemned, shooed away from the center of our faiths into the world of our own, given no clear solutions to our so-called strayed away lives.

In short, we don't need another set of fatwas that are merely fatwas. I don't think that the highest offices of clerics have actually asked the youngsters -- out of their realm of understanding of 'younger generations', that is -- of what they think, what do they see, what do they feel. No, I don't think so.

But a decision's a decision, and somebody, apparently, has been decisive about it. As for the meantime, to those who have chosen yoga out of decency while trying to fulfill the intention of filling the ample time you have, consider something else. Like chess? Oh wait, doesn't chess came from...

Finishing The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini while finding Soraya Yusof Talismail's potraits breath-taking. PHOTO from jason.l.ryan