III - Religious Officialdom in a Secular State

Summary

A comparison between Indonesian President Soekarno and Egyptian President Nasser reveals fascinating similarities in the common search for legitimacy of a modern state, based on both religious and historical traits rather than on communal and traditional patterns of solidarity. In this respect, an analysis, for instance, of the discursive level of the Bandung conference would be much more significant to understanding political rule in post-colonial countries than “anthropologistic” interpretations (for the discourses of the Bandung conference, see Bennabi 1956). Both Soekarno and Nasser referred strongly to Islam as well as to Afro-Asiatism as a form of nationalism. Both men often stated that they were believers. Yet, it is interesting to note that, as they matured, they developed a growing suspicion towards the intermingling of religion and politics. Islam, thus, remained in the rhetoric to enhance the idea of secular nationalism (cf. Lacouture 1971, p. 166; and Legge 1975, p. 251). Both leaders then played an ambivalent role in the use of religious symbols for the purpose of etatization.

It is important to mention here that as in colonial times, the bargaining over the legitimacy of Islamic discourse was divided between Egypt and Saudi Arabia. Nasser claimed an Islam which entailed an Arab dimension but also “with Socialist principles of Justice and Equality” (Vatikiotis 1965, p. 123), whereas Saudi Arabia claimed a more Salafi, and capitalistoriented type of Islam. In the sixties, Nasser and Soekarno tried to establish a coalition against the Salafi-oriented movement. This led in 1965 to the creation of the Islamic World Organization in Jakarta. In turn, in 1962, 111 of the Salafi ‘Ulama politicians and intellectuals of thirty-one Muslim countries met to oppose the Soekarno/Nasser alliance and to enforce the Wahabi vision of Islam (Schulze 1983, p. 35). It is in the context of the creation of these new nation-states and their attempts to manage Islam that we should understand the institutional exchange between Egypt and Indonesia.