I - Introduction: The Cross-regional Networks of Islam

Summary

In recent years Islamic internationalism (Schulze 1983, Siddique 1985) has become a subject for analysis. There has also been much discussion about how Islam has been reshaped by local culture. In fact, it is generally understood that the elements of unity in Islam have come to be mediated by the differences and controversies between regions and various ethnic and cultural entities. Indeed, within the framework of homogeneity in orthodoxy, one is tempted to forget that there exist variations in Muslim social life which are experienced alongside regional, cultural and linguistic differences. The tendency to view homogeneity in terms of Islamic orthodoxy, and variety in terms of geographical differences leads us to forget that there have always been generational differences in the nature or character of ideal scholars and types of Islamic intellectualism. Such variations, one might argue, perhaps have denominators which lie beyond the rigid borderlines of religious beliefs and scholarly learning in Islam. We will argue here, however, that these variations result from broader societal change. Colonial rule and the introduction of capitalist relations in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the bureaucratic rule of new nation-states and their ideologies in the 1950s and 1960s, and access to the global media and information networks from the 1980s might also be considered as factors influencing the physical, psychological and spiritual attitudes of religious scholars and intellectuals. This study explores how these societal factors have shaped the variations in Islamic ideals which are to be found at the generational level.

The focus will be on three different generations of Indonesian scholars and ‘Ulama who have studied in Cairo, and in al-Azhar in particular. This form of religious exchange no doubt has been established through the cross-regional networks of “high culture” in Islam, implying an element of unity in this educational pursuit across generations. A closer look at these different generations would reveal, however, that although an ‘Atim from Morocco can understand his Indonesian colleague perfectly, ideological differences can be observed between various generations of ‘Ulama from the same country.