Religion & Society

 I recently saw “The Eternals”, one of the latest Hollywood blockbusters in the cinema. The movie is part of the “Marvel Universe” series, with that title itself suggesting something supernatural. Expecting an entertaining challenge to my faith, I was not disappointed, though I came away somewhat disturbed. The basic plot has elements that resonate with Christian viewers. It features a god-figure, Arishem, sovereign creator of good and evil. Arishem has created the Eternals as his agents to combat the Deviants, forces for evil. But the Eternals are deceived by Arishem, not realising that they are implementing his ultimate plan to destroy the earth as part of a re-creation process. Read on here ...

 The Islamic Sultanate of Brunei is the wealthiest nation per capita in Southeast Asia and one of the wealthiest nations in the world. Its rich oil reserves, expected to run out in less than 20 years, have enabled it to become highly industrialised and developed. Yet in spite of those trappings of modernity, it remains an absolute monarchy under Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah. Since gaining independence from the United Kingdom on 1 January 1984, it is slowly becoming one of the least-enlightened former British colonies, principally in terms of one feature: its increasing embrace of Sharia law. On 1 May 2014, Sharia law was enacted, to be implemented in stages in following years (Brunei:The Sharia Surprise, en, June 2014). Initially, offences were punishable by fines or imprisonment, but in April 2019 the complete Sharia criminal code came into effect, to the consternation of liberally-minded Bruneian Muslims. However, Sharia law encompasses much more then criminal codes. It is in the area...

  Today Indonesia is home to the largest Muslim population of any nation on the planet. But when, and how, was this region converted? And how were Islamic ideas and texts translated into the Malay language that became a regional lingua franca for Muslims across Southeast Asia at large?  In this episode of Akbar's Chamber , hosted by Prof Nile Green of the University of California Los Angeles and in discussion with Prof Peter Riddell, we’ll survey over a thousand years of Southeast Asia’s religious history, from the arrival of early Arab merchants to the emergence of sultanates ruled by local Muslim rulers and the subsequent dynamics – and disputes – between mystical and legalist visions of the faith. We’ll also look at the overarching process of translation, both of cultural practices and particular texts, by taking a look at the emergence of the ‘Jawi’ literary tradition and the first complete commentary on the Quran in Malay. Bringing the story up to the present, we’ll final...

 In his latest book, Studying the Qur’ān in the Muslim Academy , Majid Daneshgar sets out to cast the spotlight on methods and priorities in the study of the Qur’an within what he describes as “the Muslim academy.” The Introduction maps out core arguments of his book. Daneshgar identifies Muslim apologetics as the device used to ensure that “Muslims are not given access to critical non-Muslim writings about the Qurʾān and Islam while guaranteeing that a customary sectarian divide insulates Sunnis and Shiʿi from each other’s ideas and works” (2). Read on here .

The High Court of Malaysia has passed a ruling allowing non-Muslims to use the term “Allah” for God in their Malay-language worship services and literature. On face value, this should appear uncontroversial as Christians in that region have referred to God as “Allah” for 400 years, including using the term in translations of the Bible into Malay. Lond-standing dispute However, this development masks a 35-year dispute that has undermined Christian-Muslim relations in Malaysia in substantial ways. In 1986 the Malaysian government prohibited the use of “Allah” by non-Muslims. This policy is unique to Malaysia. In today’s Arab world,  “Allah” is the standard term for God among Arabic-speaking Christians of different denominations. In neighbouring Indonesia,  “Allah” is commonly used by Christians; the 1974 New Translation of the Bible in Indonesian renders the Old Testament Hebrew terms for God with  “Allah”. These usages occur in their different locations witho...

Muhammad Rizieq Shihab, hardline leader of Indonesia’s notorious Islamic Defenders Front, is no friend of Christians and Christianity. So when he returned on November 10 to the world’s most populous Muslim nation after a three year self-imposed exile in Saudi Arabia, there was a sense of foreboding among Indonesia’s 30 million Christians of what was to come. Rizieq was nurtured on a diet of religious extremism with a Wahhabi flavour. He attended mainstream Indonesian schools before studying at the Islamic and Arabic College of Indonesia (LIPIA), an overseas campus of the Imam Muhammad ibn Saud Islamic University in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. This prepared him for further studies at King Saud University (1990-92), topped off by a year of study at the International Islamic University in Malaysia. In August 1998, Rizieq established the Islamic Defenders Front (FPI). This organisation quickly embarked on its hardline ideological program of violent rioting and attacking opponents. Rizieq’s notor...

An inaccurate reference to ‘Biblical corruption’ has sparked a storm of protest in Malaysia’s Parliament. The dispute erupted after comments by Muslim MP Nik Muhammad Zawawi Nik Salleh during a debate about increasing fines for drink-driving offenders. Nik Zawawi asserted that religions other than Islam forbade their followers from drinking alcohol. A Christian Member of Parliament, Datuk Ngeh Koo Ham, corrected him, adding that Christians are allowed to consume alcohol, but not to the point of intoxication and debauchery. Nik Zawawi replied curtly that Datuk Ngeh should check his facts as the original Bible, before it was changed, forbade any consumption of alcohol, adding that he had read about Christianity in documents written by Christians. Christian apologists who engage with Muslim critics of the Bible and Christianity are very familiar with the common claim by Muslim polemicists that today’s Bible has been changed. According to this claim, Jesus received an original Gospel which...

     As with the United Kingdom, the Black Lives Matter protests which have swept across the United States have overflowed to Australian society. The tangle of BLM issues with the reality of the COVID-19 pandemic has triggered bitter debate and some social dislocation.      The weekend of June 6–7 was a particular focal point. Black Lives Matter protest organisers announced plans for significant gatherings in Australia’s major cities to draw attention to the deaths in custody of Aboriginal Australians arrested for various reasons. There have been at least 432 indigenous deaths in custody since a royal commission examined the issue in 1991. This has been a simmering matter for decades, erupting into protest action at various point in time, and almost predictably piggybacking onto the worldwide BLM activism presently underway.      When the plans for the early June protests were announced, most state and federal governing authorities banned the...

In this edition of The Interview, Fair Observer talks to Peter Riddell , vice-principal at the Melbourne School of Theology in Australia. The interview was conducted at the end of 2018 via a written transcript, which has been edited for clarity. Kourosh Ziabari: How serious is Islamophobia in the modern world? What are the root causes of growing prejudice and bias against Muslims in the West? Peter Riddell: Any discussion about prejudice should aim to reduce or, ideally, eliminate it. In that context, prejudice by one community toward another needs also to take account of similar prejudice in the opposite direction. So to discuss Islamophobia, namely prejudice against Muslims in the West, without also considering “Westophobia,” or prejudice against Westerners by Muslims, is like looking at a painting and deliberately covering one eye. There are many causes of mutual prejudice between Muslims and Westerners. History is a factor. Simply put, wars between Christian Europeans and M...

On 17 April Indonesia underwent a uniquely complex democratic process, when around 190 million citizens cast their votes in national elections at both presidential and legislative levels of government. The presidential election was a repeat of the 2014 race for the presidency. The incumbent, Joko Widodo (known as Jokowi), was standing against a former army general Prabowo Subianto. Each was supported by a coalition of political parties represented in the national parliament. Jokowi’s support came from both nationalist and moderate Muslim parties, the largest party being the multi-religious Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) which is led by Indonesia’s first female President Megawati Sukarnoputeri, who held office from 2001-2004. Prabowo , as the former general is commonly known, was supported in his bid for the presidency by a coalition of activist Islamic parties, as well as more notorious community groups such as the Islamic Defenders Front. During the six-...

Terrorism takes diverse forms and attracts different levels of attention. The New Zealand city of Christchurch is reeling from an attack on Muslims by what appears to be a white supremacist. The death toll currently stands at 50, with dozens of injured being treated in hospital. The targets were innocent Muslims taking part in Friday worship at two mosques in Christchurch, who were mown down by a man with semiautomatic weapons and evidently supported by certain accomplices. The international news agencies have been hot with reports of the Christchurch attacks. Britain’s Sky News and BBC World are covering the situation in detail, as are the American chains CNN, CNBC and Fox News. Al-Jazeera from Qatar is reporting in similar vein, interviewing witnesses, drawing on the perspectives of commentators worldwide, broadcasting certain images of ambulances rushing victims to hospitals, giving a voice to the New Zealand Prime Minister and police authorities, and a host of other details of ...

Australia conjures up images of sun, beaches and a relaxed lifestyle. As with most stereotypes, there is a kernel of truth to such perceptions. For example, in the annual list of the world’s most liveable cities produced by the Economist Intelligence Unit, Melbourne gained first place for seven years in a row between 2011 to 2017. This year, Melbourne came second, with Sydney and Adelaide also placed in the top ten. In this context, considerations of terrorism seem somewhat anachronistic. However, Australia is steadily increasing its prominence in another list: that of targets for Islamist-inspired terror plots. In November, images went global of a lone terrorist attacking police and bystanders with a knife. Hassan Khalif Shire Ali, a Somali born immigrant to Australia, was shot dead by police after killing one 70-year-old civilian and wounding several others, as well as trying to blow up his car filled with gas canisters in Melbourne’s central business district while reported...

On 15 August Melbourne School of Theology (MST) hosted the visit of Baroness Caroline Cox from the British House of Lords. Baroness Cox has been a fearless campaigner for many years, advocating on behalf of the marginalised and the persecuted around the world as part of her work for the Humanitarian Aid and Relief Trust (HART), which has an active branch in Australia. In her presentation to a sizeable audience at MST, Baroness Cox gave attention to the drift towards secular liberalism in western societies and resulting challenges to minority groups, including Christians. She pointed out that “one of the effects of aggressive secular humanism in the UK is that many Christians now feel they suffer from discrimination and intimidation.” The same is true in Australia. Baroness Cox also referred to the co-existence of aggressive secular humanism’s assault on Christian faith and the growth of Islamist ideology.  While noting that the majority of the world's 1.2 billion Muslims, inclu...

This dialogue between Christians and Muslims could have happened in virtually any Western English-speaking country: Britain, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, as well as the USA. In actual fact, it took place at a suburban mosque in Melbourne. A colleague and I took a group of 15 of our students for the purposes of exposure to Islam and meeting Muslims in the flesh, rather than just reading about them. On arrival, we were greeted by the local Sheikh, a Pakistani by origin, his son, who is born and bred in Australia, and another Sheikh who was visiting from Egypt We were all led into the prayer room where we sat in a large circle, with all eyes trained on our Muslim hosts. After introducing ourselves by name, the Sheikh and his son addressed us for 15 minutes, presenting the basic information about Islamic belief and practice: the Five Pillars and the Core Articles of Faith. However, this seemingly gentle introduction included a sting in the tail, as we were informed that the Bible we h...

It’s not every week that the Prime Minister of a Western nation stands before a church congregation and leads spontaneous community prayer. But on September 30, new Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison did just that. While visiting Planetshakers, a large Pentecostal church in Melbourne, Mr Morrison ascended the worship platform and led prayers for the victims of the Indonesian earthquake and tsunami and also for Australian farmers locked in the grip of drought-induced financial crisis. Refugee debates Scott Morrison replaced Malcolm Turnbull as Prime Minister in late August after Mr Turnbull lost the confidence of his governing Liberal Party. Mr Morrison has served a number of roles in recent Australian governments, but was especially prominent in enforcing the “Stop the Boats” policy under former Prime Minister Tony Abbott. This policy involved the detention on the Pacific Islands of Nauru and Manus Island of thousands of newly-arriving asylum seekers who had sought refuge i...

     In a dramatic turnaround, the LGBTI lobby in Australia is proving to be a significant source of support for faith-based schools, including Christian schools.      In 2010, the government of Australia’s southern state of Victoria rolled out the Safe Schools program. The purpose of Safe Schools, according to official government speak, was to develop a mechanism to limit bullying within Australian schools of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and intersex (LGBTI) students. This program included professional development activities for school teachers accompanied by materials and recommended activities for the training of students to eliminate discrimination against LGBTI students.      The Safe Schools program was the brainchild of the Australian Research Centre in Sex, Health and Society at Melbourne’s La Trobe University. Its best-known advocate is Dr Roz Ward, a former faculty member at the University, who has been reported as declari...

I n the wake of World War II, as the world emerged from devastating conflict and entered the post-colonial era, some commentators predicted that rising prosperity would herald a new, post-religion age. The secularizing tendencies that were carving huge slices off religious allegiance in the West would be replicated across the world, according to this view. Such commentators also anticipated that religion, in its surviving form, would be rationalist, liberal and concerned with the here-and-now rather than the Hereafter. Read on here . This article first appeared in Renewing Minds: A Journal of Christian Thought , Jackson: Union University, Issue 2 (2012).

   A COURT decision in Malaysia on 29 January has challenged the application of sharia by Islamic religious authorities in this Muslim-majority country.    A panel of five judges in Malaysia’s highest legal tribunal, the Federal Court, ruled in favour of a challenge by a Malaysian Hindu, Indira Gandhi, to her ex-husband’s conversion of their three children to Islam, in 2009, without her consent.    Her ex-husband, K. Pathmanathan, left his Hindu faith that year to embrace Islam, adopting the Muslim name Muhammad Riduan Abdullah. His marriage to Mrs Gandhi broke up, and, shortly after his conversion, he changed the religious status of the three children to Muslim.    At the time, their eldest daughter was 12, their son 11, and the youngest daughter, Prasana, was barely one year old. Riduan Abdullah took Prasana from the family home, and disappeared.    A series of court battles ensued. In 2013, Mrs Gandhi brought the matter bef...