JULY 11 -- A puppet master is a person, group or country that covertly controls another. The person being controlled thinks that he is making the choices but in fact it is the puppet master that is pulling the strings.

The person being controlled must either be ignorant or has been indoctrinated somehow for the puppet master to succeed. You may not be able to stop the puppet master trying to achieve his agenda by way of violence, deceit, propaganda, or ideology.

The ideological tool used by the puppet master may be anything from nationalism, racist supremacy, religious supremacy, a conjured up enemy or threat, democracy, socialism, communism and so on. 

The puppet master who is hell bent on wanting to achieve his agenda of control and power or simply to cause anarchy will do so. However, we seem to miss a very important point in this game — the puppet master is helpless and ineffective without the puppets.  It also helps the puppet master if the society itself has an environment, culture or value system that encourages non-thinking and non-inquiry belief systems, attitudes and behaviour.

Hence, to combat violence in the name of any ideology, we need to cut off the ready supply of puppets in the society. In the fight against Islam-related terrorism, every Muslim country must ask whether their system has been guilty of producing ready supply of puppets who are easily influenced by something that sounds "Islamic”, especially when it is couched in Arabic.

Having experienced the world thus far, I can better appreciate why Allah keeps emphasising the use of common sense and thinking in the Quran. Allah forbids us to accept any news or information without our own verification, research and evaluation. We are not expected to behave like the domesticated cows who are at the command of the cowherd because we have been given eyes, ears and thinking capacities which the cow does not possess. 

The reality I recall, however, is very different in the agama classes that I have attended. You are expected to accept everything without question and without thinking. I doubt if the situation has changed much today.

To make matters worse, many Muslims have delegated their understanding of their faith to "experts” without even verifying it with the Quran. Let us be honest and appraise one question — do we encourage enquiry when it comes to religious matters or do we expect blind acceptance because "everything has already been sorted out for us by scholars of the past?’’

Do we get frenzied and condemn a person to hell when he espouses a view contrary to the general views or do we engage him in intelligent and civilised discussion? 

The events in our own country especially in the past 10 years show that we have become a very intolerant society when it comes to differing views in Islam. Hence, public discourse is shut off and differing ideas goes underground. These makes it easier for the devious puppet master to pick and choose his readymade puppets for indoctrination and manipulation.

Violence and aggression can only be born out of intense hatred or a misguided sense of duty to an ambiguous supernatural being based on false and fantastic theological premises. Fantasy is powerful on the

mentally sick. Puppets that are prepared to kill others or blow themselves up based on a certain ideology must have grown up on ideas that veer towards hatred, exclusivity, and extremist interpretation of religion.

I believe that a society that does not have zero-tolerance to racial hatred, zero-tolerance to religious bigotry, especially the kind that condemns other religions and discussions that go beyond academic inter or intra religious faith, are preparing the future ground for extremist culture which may ultimately manifest itself in the form of violence.

Muslims should be taught to mingle with other Malaysians of different faith and even with those of different understanding of Islam. Exclusivity or religious supremacy should give way to inclusiveness on the basis of the human race and diversity of faith.

Civilised discussions of theological and scriptural analysis is not the same as insulting and downgrading each other. Within such a context, one can politely agree to disagree or, as the Quran puts it, "to you, your way and to me, mine”.

Possibly, many of the Islamic law maxims or "fiqhi’’ maxims, developed under a different socio-political era centuries ago, should be reexamined to reflect current socio political realities.

The applicability and relevance, for example of the term "kafir harbi” within the context of a modern nation state with citizenship and laws ought to be reexamined. These kinds of terms have been used against both Muslims and non-Muslims to justify political and ethnic ends. It must always be remembered that while scholars are mortal and will pass away, the Quranic message of mercy and justice is immortal and eternal.

Muslims must be courageous and honest enough to give effect to the eternal message of the Quran and not the time constrained interpretation of scholars. For this to happen, a strong political leadership that will allow intelligent academic discourse in matters of Islam is needed.

There also needs to be democratisation of faith so that we do not create puppets for the puppet masters of religion. By this, we create a culture of knowledge-seeking and enquiry — free from an authoritarian approach. This is because an authoritarian approach, when it goes underground, will be the approach used by the puppet masters of violence.

However, for rethinking on how Islam should be taught and presented in schools, we require a political leadership that not only understands Islam but also the socio political mechanisms of religion. The government ought to be serious in addressing this escalation in violence in the name of religion at its root — the ideological level.

Undoubtedly, this is a major challenge but a challenge that ought to be faced.

*Jahaberdeen is a senior lawyer and founder of Rapera, a movement which encourages thinking and compassionate citizens. He can be reached at rapera.jay@gmail.com.

**This is the personal opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of Malay Mail Online.