Religious issues affecting their Faith are normally hypersensitive to Muslims any where in the world. We well remember about “castration” of Salman Rusdie for his publication of “The Satanic Verses”, the Muslim world’s up roar from the publication of the depicting cartoons of the Prophet (PBUP) by the western media and more recently the atrocious Dutch film “Fitna”.
As an ordinary Muslim with most of his/her spent time having to make ends meet to survive in the hard and harsh world, where would one seek guidance on contemporary issues such as the likes of the use of the word Allah by non-Muslims, the predicament on the conversions of non-Muslims in embracing Islam and the establishment of a multi million up-to-date high technology production facility for pig production. Even Datuk Seri Ong Ka Ting, the president of the MCA, had recently brought out about “controversial cases such as the late Moorthy, Gan Eng Hor, Lina Joy, the detention of Ravathi or even the custody cases for Shamala and Subashini continue to be heard” in calling on the government to be more transparent in the process to avoid a repetition of religious conflict. See http://themalaysianinsider.com/mni/bridging-the-religious-divide.html
In the past, Muslims in this country had confidence in the Government making the appropriate decisions regarding the Faith but at present such confidence seemed to have eroded because of the recent developments
- The Government under the present leadership seemed aggressive on getting through certain promised reforms including the better inter-racial and religious relations. Whilst the attempts may be good, the fear is the Government may not be handling such issues in the betterment of Muslims in this country. This is particularly true when the PM, having been severely battered from the last elections, is perceived to be conceding such reforms with a covert objective of winning public confidence in wanting to stay longer in office.
- A most recent proposal by the Government for those converts to the Muslim faith to secure their family consent via a form prior to their conversion was welcomed by non-Muslims. However when all quarters of the Muslim faith out rightly rejected or condemned such reforms as being impractical and not in the best interest of the converts, the Government officials had to retract the proposal and commented that the consent via the completion of the prescribed form is only required after conversion in order to mitigate the problems arising from burial.
- Then there is the issue of the ultra modern Pig facility supposedly approved by the previous state government and to be implemented under the present state government. And the fact is there were those named Muslims working in association with the previous state government and those Muslims from the PKR and PAS parties in the present state government advocating for the proposed implementation. In fact the President of PAS while confirming the right for the
- The word “Allah’ can be used by non-Muslims because it is used in the Arab world by non-Muslims referring to their god was a comment made by a Pas assembly man while he visits a church upon his rejoice in having won in the election. See http://themalaysianinsider.com/mni/the-day-catholics-welcomed-a-man-from-pas-in-shah-alam.html
There are plentiful of books on Islam as a religion, its tenants, the Quran & the Hadith as well its interpretation, the life history of the Prophet (PBUH) etc in both Bahasa Malaysia and English languages in the bookshops. Also from Friday sermons we get to hear the imans talk on a variety of religious issues but rarely on issues sensitive to the congregation. There are also plenty of comments posted but none are considered authoritative, some with political leanings.
In searching for an authoritative source for such guidance, I finally found a website by Dr Mohd Asri Zainul Abidin, the Muthi Kerajaan Perlis at http://drmaza.com/. Muslims seeking further guidance on contemporary religious issues in
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