Shari'a and Politics in Modern Indonesia

8. ISLAMIZING CAPITALISM: On the Founding of Indonesia’s First Islamic Bank

148 Robert W. Hefner© 2003 Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, Singapore 8 ISLAMIZING CAPITALISM On the Founding of Indonesia’s First Islamic Bank Robert W. Hefner An anthropologist, huh? Then you must agree with what Clifford Geertz had to say about Indonesian Muslims. Do you? I had just sat down in the waiting room of the newly formed Union of Indonesian Muslim Intellectuals (ICMI), awaiting the arrival of one of the organization’s leaders, and I was startled by the unexpected appearance and questioning of this gentleman, a low-ranking officer in ICMI. It was July 22, 1992, my first day in Jakarta. I had traveled to this office among the modern buildings on Jalan Thamrin to interview a high-ranking ICMI officer about his role in the recent establishment of the Bank Muamalat Indonesia (BMI), Indonesia’s first official Islamic bank. The officer hadn’t arrived yet, so, hot, jet-lagged from my travel, and anxious about the upcoming interview, I sat down, hoping to use the minutes before his arrival to collect my thoughts. Having heard I was an anthropologist, however, this other gentleman, who had entered the waiting room and abruptly sat down beside me, seemed determined to get an answer. 148 Previously published as “Islamizing Capitalism: On the Founding of Indonesia’s First Islamic Bank”, in Toward A New Paradigm: Recent Developments in Indonesian Islamic Thought, edited by Mark R. Woodward (Arizona: Arizona State University, 1996), pp. 291–322. Reproduced with permission of the author, the editor, and the publisher. Reproduced from Shari’a and Politics in Modern Indonesia, edited by Arskal Salim and Azyumardi Azra (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2003). This version was obtained electronically direct from the publisher on condition that copyright is not infringed. No part of this publication may be reproduced without the prior permission of the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies. Individual articles are available at Islamizing Capitalism: On the Founding of Indonesia’s First Islamic Bank 149© 2003 Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, Singapore Well, uh, no, but, uh . . . Geertz said many things about Indonesian Muslims, some important and others perhaps wrong. I guess whether I agree with Geertz really depends on which of his ideas you’re talking about. My interrogator cocked his head to the side with a skeptical smile, obviously unconvinced by my feigned ignorance. He challenged me again: Anthropologists believe that Muslims, the government, and the people [masyarakat] can never work together. They must always compete, the government fearing Islam, Muslims opposing the government, and the people rejecting Islamic devotion. The purpose of our organization is to prove Geertz wrong. Rather than separate and opposed, as anthropologists believe, we want to demonstrate that the three social groupings [aliran] Geertz described — priyayi, santri, and masyarakat — can work together for the development of Indonesia and the growth of the Muslim community [ummat]. Priyayi [government officials] don’t have to fight with santri [practicing Muslims], and Islam can work for the betterment of all the people. The Geertz thesis is false, and we will show that anthropology is wrong. Startled by this criticism of my profession, I made a feeble attempt to explain that anthropologists’ views on Indonesian Islam are diverse, and that many foreign scholars, including me, strongly support Muslims’ efforts to strengthen their role in Indonesian government, economy, and society. “Indeed,” I said, “it’s because I feel that Muslims’ efforts are important and good that I have come to examine their economic initiatives.” As this example illustrates, Westerners’ and, especially, Clifford Geertz’s understanding of religion, economy, and society in Indonesia was a recurring theme of conversations I had with Muslims during the summers of 1991 and 1992.1 Though initially surprised by the passion the issue excited, I later appreciated that there are good reasons for Muslim intellectuals’ concerns about academic views of Indonesia. Many of the categories developed by social scientists have come to figure in the Indonesian government’s policies, sometimes to the detriment of Muslims. More important, perhaps, the 1980s had witnessed the beginnings of an Islamic revival of unprecedented proportions in Indonesian society. Though the impact of this deepening Islamization was apparent in the Javanese countryside and among the urban poor, it was also powerfully evident among the urban middle class.2 A significant proportion of that class had been educated in the 1970s and 1980s, and in the course of their studies many had been exposed to Western scholars’ ideas on Islam and Indonesian society. For many of...