Posted by rampak naong - -

I am happy living in small village where people are very hamble and very strong in keeping their tradition. They never put tradition vis a vis religion. They believe, Islam –as religion— can dialoque with thier tradition. They can enrich life. They become life peacefull and harmony.
Although not registrated, but all people in my village is NU’s follower. NU— as the bigest religious organizations in Indonesia— is known as moderate orginization. Its follower is spread out on this country especially in vilages. For them, life is very “simple”. It is not rigid like radical religius groups that always interprete religion literally. So, their Interpretation is always out of the context.
As villagers they are councious that “good traditions” must be kept as long as not contrast with islamic teaching. It is not simplification. It is believed as heritage developed by ulama al shaleh a long time ago. They are counciuous that they are not expert. So, it is very rational if they follow those are expert in islamic teaching. It is different with radical religious groups. They teach Islam over convidently. Although they know little, they confident claims as ustadz. Unfortunetly, they always interprete Islam literally and fall in rigid and radical understanding.
For villagers, life is very simple. They just lay their life on God. They only do live so hard but the final result depend on God. What ever they do based on God’s consiousness that is known in Islam as iman. Living in this world is planting amal shaleh and we will get “the benefit” of it tomorrow after.
They assume, tradition does not mean “primitive” like the view of western society . It also can not be catagorized as bid’ah like the view of wahabi. For them,tradition means the life vitalizer or bases for transformation of their culture. To be civilized they must not addopt “other culture”. They can be civilized by transforming their tradition and their culture themselves. How smart they are!