‘Akidah’ is neither gold nor silver, nor credit card – Ravinder Singh

Certain words that I heard as I drove by a couple of mosques last Friday afternoon (10 Jan 2014) are still reverberating in my ears. These were: “umat Islam” (Muslim community); “bersatu” (unite); “mempertahankan akidah” (defend the faith).

Akidah, or faith, is not a material possession like gold, silver or credit cards that can be stolen by people. When something cannot be stolen, what is danger is there to it?

Faith is something that is in one’s heart and mind. It is knowledge that one has acquired, just like knowledge about a thousand and one other things – engineering, medicine, or simpler things like cooking. Some of this knowledge is acquired with the help of books, others without the need for any books. The kampong people know so much about “ulams”, (plants, tubers, berries, etc.  that are eaten raw), but they did not learn this from books. This knowledge leads to belief.

Children are born without any akidah pre-programmed in their hearts and minds. So it is something that is acquired during the growing up process from their parents and communities.

Just like fear,  children can be taught to fear something, or not to fear anything. It is easier to inculcate fear of something invisible that than of something visible. Most school children today do not fear the cane, even if they can see it, as its use to discipline them has been banned.  

However, the same children can be taught to fear darkness and the imagined invisible creatures of the darkness. Show them a “hantu” (ghost) movie when they are young, impressionable and innocent, and see how you can scare them. Even in the house, the can be scared to go to the toilet alone, as it is a very lonely place. And it takes just one hantu film to do this damage.

On the other hand, take other similarly young, impressionable and innocent children to the graveyards at night and tell and show them that graveyards are very peaceful and safe places, and they will have no fear of ghosts in the graveyards, until they are shown a hantu film! But if they are well matured by the time they see a hantu film, they will just laugh it off as pure fantasy.     

The umat, or general population, is like the innocent children. Their religious leaders who have spent years learning about the religion are their teachers. So they respect and revere these learned leaders and believe that what they teach, or preach, is the correct thing.   

Thus, when the leaders go about teaching, authoritatively, that the akidah is under threat, the simple minded who are not as learned in religious matters as the leaders, would take that at face value without questioning how it can be under threat as the akidah is in their hearts and not their wallets? 

Thus all the rhetoric about a threat to akidah is but fear-mongering. As stated by Isma (Malaysian Muslim Solidarity organisation), president Abdullah Zaik Abdul Rahman , PAS and Umno should unite for the sake of Muslims in the country. This speaks volumes of the motives behind the fear-mongering. What is under threat is the continued power-hold by Umno. So, it is Umno that the Muslims are being asked to save, not the akidah.

Akidah is but the Achilles’s heel in the game to create visions of attack on the Muslim faith to produce the likes of Don Quixote who came upon large windmills and attacked them believing them to be ferocious giants. The game is being played according to Dr M’s philosophy that if you tell a lie and repeat it often enough, people will believe it is the truth. So the Muslims who do not jump onto the akidah bandwagon are also labelled as enemies of Islam!

The whole idea is that all Muslims must unite to support Umno, as if Umno is Islam and Islam is Umno. Thus if Umno fails to retain power, akidah is destroyed! So the only way to save akidah, is to save Umno.

That is the game plan, not that akidah can be destroyed by non-Muslims using the word “Allah” in their prayers which are out of bounds to Muslims, or having it in publications which are also haram for Muslims to read.

The hype is about mind-conditioning, about hypnotising through repetition with increasing volume of something that is non-existent. I wonder whether the prophets of akidah’s doom really believe what they are trying to make the masses believe?      

How come the pantang-larang (taboos) of the Muslims have not been destroyed although there is so much non-halal food all around and easily available to them if they choose to have it? Keeping away from non-halal food is also a question of akidah, isn’t it?

*Ravinder Singh reads The Malaysian Insider.