Darul Hikmah Visit, A Time to Reflect
by Timothy Adnan Alden, Ramadhan 2008

Touching down into Surabaya airport was much the same as the numerous visits to Indonesia I have made since 1991. The same airport procedures, the same look, feel and climate and temperate blend of Indonesian culture and diversity, a fledgling nation struggling to reach prosperity but for the most part brimming on the edge of poverty. The drive was the usual as well, village after dusty third world village along the road side the usual sprawling mass of bamboo huts, selling the myriad of fruits, local clove cigarettes, to homemade decanted solar fuel for the motorcycles the local mode of affordable transport, housing interspersed with basic kampong to the peppering of big modern luxurious homes. Throngs of people movement along the roads, cars swerving out against the traffic with minimal safety precautions – which always seems to flow along in it’s own turbulent jet stream of natural harmony. Despite the chaos this unique natural harmony of ‘form’ exists in this country against all chances and the people accept their way of life with an embracing contentment and composure.

After praying Musafir en-route we arrived at Ustaz Masruhans home just in time for Iftar, as if on a finely tuned plan. Coming from the developed world, the simplicity of the old kampong way of living with just the bare essentials and without modern comforts or décor always humbles me. Being amongst this simple way of life, where with the sparsely furnished accommodations meetings with the village leaders are held on living space floors, one can sense the absolute trust and support amongst them where their way of life hardship and struggle, as well of enjoyment is shared equitably. The sense of absolute justice can be experienced here where everybody is in unison to serve the community and a social order is embraced where no one seems reluctant to play their part.

We were given the choicest of the accommodation, the guest stay, right opposite the new Darul Hikmah Masjid being built. Everything was kept beautifully clean within the confines of it’s simplicity and standard. The toilet was Asian style with a Turkish style (minus the marble) water vat for scooping small plastic ladles of water as the means of showering – we suggested to Ustaz that when they can to modernize this system, as these are small relatively inexpensive comforts that could at least make small improvements to the standards of life and a means of progress towards a more developed standard, not to mention efficient and cost saving.

When one imagines the respective difference, the variety and standard of food that lays amass the living floor during iftar and Sahour matches that of a five star hotel if you were to rate your satisfaction level taking into consideration the handicap. Both diners on each level would have to work hard to afford to enjoy the food, the individual quality is really just a measure of earning and thus affordability. Ultimately a plate at a five star buffet may cost USD 30, whilst a full stomachs portion at the local Masruhan Kampong would likely cost an average of USD 1, yet the feeling of blessing derived from enjoying such a meal where nothing is taken for granted and sincere gratitude is expressed before and after the meal, makes one feel equally satiated as if you were dining five star.

Living conditions for the orphans is extremely basic. If it were not for their good health, sufficient supply of food and water, I would say really bordering on extreme poverty (when we compare the average living standards to the developed world). Given all the space in Indonesia it would be nice to see them in an environment where nature and modernity combine harmoniously without all the dust, traffic noise pollution and improvement on such basic amenities and general look and feel of the cracked un painted, unfinished walls with wire flex hanging from the ceiling attached to an energy saving light bulb. It is simple and basic; any and every luxury has been ill afforded. I pitied them having to live life in such basic conditions.

The cooking and kitchen areas may best be described as a black hole of Calcutta, there is one room where all the heat is generated for the cooking, all the walls and ceiling are totally blackened out from smoke indicating that the use of a modern cooker does not exist and the variety of pots and pans are of the standard you expect in the third world, nothing to enhance the pleasure of the eating experience. It is what they are used to and probably better utensils would not improve their happiness in life, but it makes us contemplate how all this consumerism came to be with all the importance in the West on having things such as cut glass crystal, silver crockery and fine bone china plates. This makes a statement that there is ultimate happiness in the finer things in life, yet it is hard to see this when you compare the smiles and tinkle in the eyes of these people and children with the more blustered stressed out lines of the faces of the people we see traversing the modern City’s of this world. So where are we going wrong? How do we regain this balance?

Whilst reflecting this I started to see much of the answers in Ustaz Masruhan himself. Here is this man whom has grown up amidst this poverty and strife and succeeded against the odds –at the age of 20 in Surabaya he was blessed with the ability to memorise the entire Qu’aran and is a Hafidz. He then acquired his MBA at the University of Malaysia in 2006. Now at 38 he is doing a correspondence phd in social sciences, whilst at the same time writing books of which the full proceeds go to help fund the social not for profit institute (Darull Hikmah 1 and now Darul Hikmah II – under development) that his family founded. He has written some 60 books and even his publishers have shown so much faith in him that they have funded the teacher’s room building at Darul Hikmah 2! If this wasn’t enough besides all this he is the father of six blossoming children, age ranged between 1 – 10! Yet amidst all of this he assumes such a calm low key persona that exudes serenity. Nothing ruffles him, even when at the airport his wife had mistakenly booked her ticket for a date 1 month earlier and we had to re-purchase one new ticket. Here it is that I really observe in the presence of a man who is living the Sunnah (way) of the Prophet Muhammad, someone who has placed absolute unwavering trust in God. It was absolutely clear to me that this is a man who carries out his daily work with absolute sincerity with motive for none other than the pleasure of God and his reward in the hereafter. There is not the trace of an atom to signify that he is tempted by the material reward of this worldly life, yet in his dignity he holds it in respect and never condemns it, or chastises others for consumption of the material life.

On the fourth day after witnessing a night of concrete pouring for the roof of Darul Hikmah 2 (which Ustaz Masruhan was very excited about) we flew into Jakarta for some meetings with potential donors. I gathered my thoughts and whilst writing this simply concluded that there is ultimately no better or worse in life between the developed world and the underdeveloped (or third world). This may sound strange but when we contemplate deeply there can be no ultimate perfection in material state (where will it end it is infinite) – I believe only through our spiritual state that we might attain peace. We saw some peace in these people amidst their struggle, whilst denied the privileges of modern comfort; they really don’t have the burdens that modern living has to cope with. In fact it is the modern business man that is faced with the greater undertaking ,coping with all the demands of managing business empires amidst an uncertain world of pending financial crisis. In the late 1800’s Alfed Noble the inventor of dynamite and one of the richest men of his age moved around in a horse drawn carriage from country to country writing up to 40 letters a day to manage his sprawling empire without the use of e-mail or even fax. He likened it to being “a wealthy prisoner captive of that chariot”.

On checking my e-mail at the hotel I read this piece of news article. “World leaders gather this Thursday at the United Nations to renew the fight against extreme poverty. But three countries -- France, Canada, and Italy -- are threatening to undermine the world's anti poverty efforts, by slashing their development aid budgets and breaking their international promises. Sarkozy, Harper, and Berlusconi promised to contribute 0.7% of their national income to fighting poverty -- aid money that would save millions of lives, and still leave these donor countries with 99.3% of their money. But apparently, they think 99.3% is not enough”.

Man may not be the ultimate judge of man, but instinct alone tells me that if we restore some balance, equity and justice amongst mankind there must surely be some space for reflection towards a better direction than we are heading and ultimately a path towards greater fulfillment. It seems that by reading the news today we face very challenging financial times pointing towards the possibility even of the collapse of the current monetary system, widely used in the Capitalist political model. Islam’s political model forbids the use of Riba (loaning money on interest) in the interest of maintaining a just political system that does not allow the rich to exploit the poor through financial advantage. At the same time it is removed from Communism as it permits trade, indeed encourages trade in order to provide a socio political system that will support the weaker members of society, at the same time not permitting them to exploit the hard working members of society either through laziness.

We had an excellent meeting with a prominent son of one of the main Corporations in Indonesia, who was very supportive of the idea to educate and preserve an independent Islamic way of life for the future generations - somewhat removed from the big city, material, hedonistic world and independent to some extent from overzealous secular political governance, soverignity. We resolved that through a wholesome village upbringing and education where God is the sovereign, “real” Islam would have a chance of being preserved and not led astray through the pressures and confusion of modern living in City life, led about through gross consumerism amidst the ratrace. Who knows these future generations of orphans and underprivileged children could be the future answer to modern mans problems. At the very least we should give them a chance, after all it is only money and that is the least of the problems of modern day man has to handle, we can’t seem to stop generating (printing) enough of it. So why not give some away will 0.7% of our wealth effect us, what have we got to loose? It is obligatory in Islam to give 2.5% of one’s wealth annually as Zakat to the poor and needy to purify our wealth (as a minimum) as we believe everything is loaned from Allah. In the West we are happy to gamble our money on a future outcome if there is a short term chance of gain. What if the West (or non Islamic world) developed a new philosophy and gambled some of its bountiful gains in the longer term in the chance that the preservation and protection (from the modern secular world and it’s Governments) of the teaching, of whom Muslims believe to be the last messenger of God (Allah,) – namely Muhammad (may peace and blessings be upon him) – will one day bring them dividends to our world generations. Islam is universal, open to all and whilst it does not permit gambling – if you’re going to do it anyway, why not gamble on God. Surely there has to be something behind all the chatter.