HARRY HARUN BEHR INTERFAITH III MANADO 2013 TEXT
GERMANY – INDONESIA INTERFAITH DIALOGUE III
Advancing Religious and Cultural Cooperation through Education
Manado, April 7th to 13th, 2013
Prof. Dr. Harry Harun Behr
Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg (FAU)
Department of Islamic-Religious Studies (DIRS)
Interdisciplinary Center of Religious Education (IZIR)
Tolerance as a Theological and Pedagogic Challenge
GERMANY – INDONESIA INTERFAITH DIALOGUE III
Advancing Religious and Cultural Cooperation through Education
Manado, April 7th to 13th, 2013
Prof. Dr. Harry Harun Behr
Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg (FAU)
Department of Islamic-Religious Studies (DIRS)
Interdisciplinary Center of Religious Education (IZIR)
Tolerance as a Theological and Pedagogic Challenge
Indonesian and German dialogue partners have been discussing the issue that the lines of
societal (economic, political, social, cultural) problems, and their solutions, too, are being
drawn increasingly along religious demarcations. That circumstance, on the one hand, entails
the risk of a secondary religious enhancement of primarily non-religious conflicts. On the
other, it provides the opportunity to precisely reach people by the religious ethos when the
initiation of attitude changes is necessary for conflict solutions.
Especially religious representatives deplore a drift of the younger generation into informal,
alternative and religious networks. That younger generation, however, increasingly does not
feel understood by the established religious institutions and their passed-down doctrines. They
complain about the insufficiently attractive reformulation of theological standards. Therefore,
religious institutions face two interrelated challenges: social dynamics within a new religious
framework, and the relevance of the religious tradition for the solution of today’s problems.
All actors identify the need both to sensibilize their religious education staff in institutions
and schools for this challenge and to agree on a transreligious common ethos.
This leads us to the pressing need to develop shared standards in the training of the respective
religious education staff together with the future religious opinion leaders. This discourse
shall be initiated by both the particular and common dimensions of the training. Theological
expertise shall be explicitly incorporated into this process.
Because of its unique cooperation in terms of interculturalism and interreligiosity, Indonesia
plays a central role in this process. Indonesia is of special interest for various reasons,
especially its secular constitution with the decisive reference to religion, its religious
heterogeneous society, and its long tradition of cooperation with the Federal Republic of
Germany. Since 2010 this cooperation has been shaped within the Interfaith Conference. The
Indonesian partners have expressed their decisive interest in the new Islamic theology in
Germany and their will to invest in the exchange on different levels.
Synopsis of the Idea of Education
Tolerance exhibits religious as well as a non-religious signatures. It is as less the privilege of
religious communities as intolerance is their fault. However, the question of tolerance gains
particular explosiveness through the increasing religious inclination of primarily non-religious
conflicts. Tensions evolve between religions, between different doctrines and traditions within
religions, and between religious and secular currents within societies. In order to prevent
further social polarization based on religion, focused programmes considering the following
aspects seem to be necessary:
• Information and elucidation on controversial topics
• Communication in the sense of an open exchange on shared perceptions, interests and
areas of responsibility
• Publicity with the inclusion of the media
• Willingness to take effect on society
In the framework of formal education scenarios such programmes have to be conceptualized
with regard to these horizons and describe the announced competences (as far as the
programme is education-oriented) and the announced results (as far as the programme is
activity-oriented) more specifically.
Especially for the realms of religion three directives play a leading role and help to enhance
the relevance of the religious for social action and thereby increase the credibility of religious
ideas, which often stand in stark contrast to their followers’ deeds:
1. The world must not be interpreted in the light of religious traditions only. Instead,
religious traditions have to be reformulated in the light of the given realities. It is the
task of theology to save religion from the hostile takeover by groups which follow
particular interests and construct their own exceptional position through the
construction of hostile perceptions of the other. Therefore, theology has to bring
traditions and contexts into a reasonable balance with the religiosity of the
autonomous subject and religious systems of interpretation.
2. Willingly or unwillingly, people learn from each other, with or without respect to
religion. Beyond normative religious systems and institutions, too, learning has a
religious, a spiritual signature. Often religion can rather be found outside the holy
places than within them. However, people do not learn from scripture to scripture or
from institution to institution but from heart to heart. Learning happens in encounters.
Learning beyond the borders of communities or systems therefore does not only mean
to learn something about another religion, but from it.
3. The fundamental humanistic idea of human solidarity must not be bound to the narrow
borders of a confessional brotherhood. The Qur’an itself takes this notion of human
solidarity as a basis of a spiritual community, too, and it also occurs in many other
traditions, not only in mysticism. The idea of the transformability of a narrowly
thought concept of solidarity is based on the conviction that in some sense religions
and their heritage are inhabited by an instrumental character (without derogating the
particular heritage and aesthetics). They regard themselves being indebted to a higher
idea, to something actual. The Qur’an does not demand being a Muslim from every
human, but it demands being a human from every Muslim. It is obvious that this bears
consequences for the hermeneutic and exegetic approach to the holy scriptures and
that theology has to prove its value sailing against the wind here.
Hence, those young people of both our nations should be brought together who qualify
themselves outstandingly in the field of theology and are expected to lead opinions in their
respective religious community in the future. Discussions should focus on the question to
which extent new challenges for the respective doctrines will emerge in this context, how
traditions and scriptures can be dealt with then, and how both common standards for the
various fields of education (curricular basic principles) and standards in the sense of
recommendations to other social protagonists (media, economy, politics, etc.) can be found.
Here the challenge lies in finding commonly accepted standards to present the religiously
different and to deal with it. Both of these are attained and formulated through communication
about joint experiences and the agreement upon shared interests. For part of the theologians,
the challenge is that apart the traditions present day aspects develop their own normativity
focused on problem-solving.
The experience with similar encounters during the exchange between German and Indonesian
experts (with the German Foreign Office in summer 2010 and fall 2011) showed: The
experience of geographic distance from the well-known discourse milieu, the engagement
with almost identical, but mirrored problem horizons in both countries and the academic
exchange within the mixed group enhance the potential of innovative theological thinking.
An example of the interpretation (intentional reading; ta’wīl, تأوﻭﯾﻳل ) of the Qur’an in the light
of human solidarity
Verse (āya, 177 (آﺁﯾﻳة of the second chapter (sūra, سورﺭةﺓ ) of the Qur’an reads als follows (the
segments a.-h. serve as a reference to further discussion):
a. It is not righteousness that ye turn your faces towards east or west
b. But it is righteousness to believe in God and the Last Day and the Angels and the
Book and the Messengers
c. And to spend of your substance, out of love, for your kin, for orphans, for the needy,
for the wayfarer, for those who ask, and for the ransom of slaves
d. And to hold on regular prayer and regular charity
e. And to fulfil the contracts which ye have made
f. And to be firm and patient, in pain (or suffering) and adversity, and throughout all
periods of panic
g. Such are the people who make things come true
h. Who look forward to meet God
Texts like these can be found at random within the Qur’an. In general, they are read as
examples of the true Islamic idea: true belief, prayer and charity, keeping words and promises,
patience and a God fearing attitude. Especially words like taqwā ( تقوىﻯ , h) are often being
translated with the emotional connotation of fear, but actually the word means „taking
precaucions“ or „provisions“. It is more or less a cogntitive term.
Which leads us to the importance of the philological basis (tafsīr, تفسﯿﻴر ) as the major
hermeneutical access toward the exegesis (ta’wīl, تأوﻭﯾﻳل ) of the Qur’an. In Muslim eyes and
ears the crucial keywords of this verse refer to Islam as a body of religion in terms of
systeamtic theology with its own symbols and teachings: imān ( إﺇﯾﻳمانﻥ , belief, b.), cibāda ( ,عبادﺩةﺓ
religious acts, a., c., d.), mucamalāt ( معملاتﺕ , worldly acts, c., e.) and ihsān ( إﺇحسانﻥ , attitudes, c.,
f., g., h.).
However, the initial it is not (laysa, لﯿﻴس ) puts a question mark behind this. What exactly is
negated here? The translation offers „righteousness“ as the core meaning of the Arabic term
al-birr ( اﺍلبر ). To be precise, birr does not mean that. The word has to do with stock or funds as
well as firm grounds – all in all something you can rely on, something that enables you to
stand on. The word connotes to security and certainty in the sense of the true religion man can
trust in. It is related to the Arabic term barr ( بر ) for land as an antonym of bahr ( بحر ) for sea.
Verse 17:70 in the Qur’an may serve as an illustration to this:
We have given dignity (karramnā, كرمنا ) to the children of Adam
And borne (carried; hamalnāhum, حملناھﮪﮬﻫم ) them over land and sea
And provided for them sustenance out of the good things of life
And favoured them far above most of Our creation
The word hamalnāhum ( حملناھﮪﮬﻫم ) in this verse connotes to the carrying of a baby during
pregnancy. Here the Qur’anic picture of God shows motherly and less fatherly traits. It is
similar to the Arabic term rahma ( رﺭحمة ) which refers to the motherly lap or womb. To Muslim
listeners who are familiar with its Arabic tongue, the Qur’an sounds like a mother talking to
her children.
In this light the verse 2:177 reveals a deeper meaning:
It is not the religious acts as such that fulfill religion. There’s something of higher value
behind which points more to human nature in general than to Muslim attitude only. Islam, like
other religious systems, can be understood as a surface, a tool or a limited and scaled
emanation of an underlying idea that is unlimited an unscaled, a kind of objective truth
despite individual or collective clusters of creeds, convictions, traditions and lifestiles which
are labelled with the Arabic word dīn ( دﺩﯾﻳن ). This verse indicates those indispensable
dimensions of good life which Aristotle would subtitle as ethics and metaphysics.
The logic behind, to stick with the third classical Aristotlelic item, is the human heart, here
indicated by the word hubb ( حب ) in c. The early commentators (mufassirūn, مفسروﻭنﻥ ) of the
Qur’an understood the term cala hubbihi ( على حبﮫﻪ ) in three different ways: out of love for God,
out of love for man (i.e. the recipients of charity mentioned in the verse) or despite the love
for the worldly possessions someone calls his own (Arabic al-māl, .(اﺍلمالﻝ
Some of my sisters and brothers surely would tend to argue: No, Islam is more than a tool, it
is the complete way of life to achieve exactly these higher aims and targets. Islam to them
appears to be a system in terms of shirca ( شرعة ) and minhāj ( 5:48 ,منﮭﻬاجﺝ ) – a system of ways
and means. They would most probalby quote verse 5:3 (al-yauma akmaltu lakum dīnakum ...
wa atmamtu calaikum nicmatī ... wa radītu lakumul-islāma dīna):
Today have I perfected (akmaltu, أﺃكملت ) your religion for you
And I have bestowed upon you the full measure of My blessings
And I willed that self-surrender (islāma, إﺇسلامﻡ ) unto Me shall be your religion.
But this is not being denied here – on the contrary: It is not possible to rip the idea of Islam
off its cultural and ritual face, just as it is not possible to eliminate the good spices of a
chicken curry after it has been cooked. Anyway, who wants to eat without spices? However,
the argument of the metaphysical, ethical and logical uniqueness of a religious system applies
to each and every religion that turns toward the three Aristotelic criteria of good life –
spirituality, good behaviour and reason.
Furthermore, in this verse, the term islām ( إﺇسلامﻡ ) is not to be understood as the name of the
religion of Islam, but as the qualitative criteria of a human attitude, a religious disposition
which in Islam is called fitra ( فطرةﺓ , see 30:30) – an attitude that is not limited to the adherents
of Islam and not even restricted of religious thought. It is fundamental to human nature in
terms of man who, according to a wisdom of Muhammad, was shaped in likeness to God ( خلق
لله آﺁدﺩمﻡ على صورﺭتﮫﻪ , khalaqal-lāhu ādama calā sūratihi; # 58 in the as-Sahīfa as-Sahīha of
Hamam ibn Munabbih, also to be found in the collection of Muslim).
The sentence al-yauma akmaltu lakum dīnakum has a deeper meaning, too: The word-group
of kamila ( كمل ) refers to things that still need to be completed by man, its connotations are not
static but dynamic, they have to do with movement. Thus, with verse 5:3, Islamic theology
does not come to an end, it’s the starting point for mankind to come to terms with God, with
the world and with each other:
Today have I given your religion to you to be perfected by you ...
In current theories, learning is defined as change in behaviour. To bring this change about,
movement is necessary. This may be a travel from Germany to Indonesia. About 20 verses of
the Qur’an appeal to this: sīru fil-ardh ( سﯿﻴروﻭاﺍ في اﺍلارﺭضﺽ ) … Why don’t you travel around and
look and learn? The Qur’an mentions the travel on the land or on the sea. That refers to the
physical topography. But as it was lined out above, both terms also refer to the spiritual
topography: The movement of the bodies entails the movement of the hearts. The fragile
security in terms of common grounds (birr) may quickly turn into the prospect of drawning in
confusion and falsehood (bahr). We are in need of God’s caring hands in both spheres, land
and sea, and both physically and spiritually (jasadī wa rūhī, .(جسديﻱ وﻭ رﺭوﻭحي
That airplanes are not mentioned in the Qur’an may pass as a tribute to the early biography of
the book and must not be read as a limitation posed by the sharīca. On the contrary: As one of
my staff put it in one of her recent publications: Religious education should aim at providing
the youth with wings – we must teach them to fly. That was after she had come to Indonesia
for the first time in her life …
