Clothos, Atropos and Lachesis: The Three Fates of Malay Politics

An amalgam of viewpoints amongst Malay politicians in the Name of Allah.

[ This article was contributed by Apocryphalist. The original spelling and capitalization have been retained. ]


Amidst the big uproar amongst blogosphere netizens regarding the recent decision by Justice Lau to overturn the decision on the banning of the word Allah in bibles, many eyes turn towards Pas-centric blogs to gauge their views, since the Islamic party has been championing the cause of Islam from time immemorial. Since it is natural to expect their take on such a simple matter, these eyes will mostly be disappointed because these blogs either just mention the issue in passing, or hand-waive it as something relatively unimportant compared to their struggle to wrest power away from the ruling government – or just outrightly go silent altogether. Now perhaps this is because the other component parties in their unholy alliance are mainly supporters of the bible Allah, and making noise would not be in the spirit of the union’s solidarity---thereby pushing the importance of the name of Allah to a backseat position for the moment. Of course, while all these mullings are going on between the upper echelons of PAS and some lower grassroots who are unhappy with the decision, catholic printers are busy seizing the opportunity gap to print with vigor on how all of us Malaysians must calm down, be peaceful and merry and put our trust and faith in the Son of Allah who died on the cross for the sins of even us Malaysians.

Let us view what goes on inside the psyche of certain Malay politicians regarding the issue, how they base their arguments on very feeble and misplaced facts, and how they would use all sorts of circumstantial and irrelevant arguments to prop up their fragile beliefs, mostly to gain political mileage at the expense their religious sanctity.


Clothos: The Weaver of Yarns Khalid Samad

Khalid Samad is a conundric personality. He, together with PAS henchman Dr Dzulkifli Ahmad, appears to be in the forefront of supporting the Catholics’ use of the name Allah in the bibles, appearing in churches to show solidarity and very vigorous in promoting their agendas. I still remember this frail brother of UMNO MP Shahrir Samad, staunch PAS activist who appeared in every issue of Harakah with fresh new issues to be dealt with as part of his ammunition against the “unIslamic UMNO”. After being an almost unrecognized name in Malaysan Politics, his break came when the Anwar issue succeeded in convincing unsuspecting masses to vote him into power, which they did in 2008. Once sworn in as MP, Khalid almost indefatigably churns out issue after issue which almost always snub out every known policy of the previous government. However, his hopes that being such a contemptuous rebel would accord him acceptance and popularity amongst his Malay muslim constituents got dashed when they openly defy and sneer him at each of these issues. At a recent meeting with residents of the Shah Alam section to which he accorded the Temple permit, he was jeered and booed in such manner no politician had ever encountered before, in the usually-gentle and forgiving voter scenarios in Malaysia.

The recent issue of the Allah name change that he champions brought about more problems than he ever cared to admit. In his recent blog article touching the issue, a majority of comments he received (more than 100 and counting) jeered and snubbed his stand, in so far as one commenter calling him the Prostitute of Islam. His other fans, however, keep fanning him with praises, soothing him with encouragements like “YB khalid good job, insyaALLAH ,GOD ya'ni Allah will reward ur good deeds”. It is unclear, however, whether this fan had meant that Khalid should be rewarded by Allah for his fight to establish the widespread acceptance of Allah’s Son and trio of Godhood.

Of course as a defense, YB Khalid does what most wise albeit declining politicians would normally do in such straitened circumstances: maintain a vigilant silence throughout. To dispel any notion of antipathy and disregard over such an important issue, he had put out his cryptic post on the issue, something that he called Siar Ulang (Repeat Broadcast), consisting of the same canned arguments of disjointed Quranic Verses and Malapropic arguments which otherwise had been demolished elsewhere.

Khalid Samad is probably now basking in confusion and uncertainty: partly because the voters in his own constituency are openly demanding that he retract his stand on the Allah issue, and partly because his superiors in PAS are not pleased at the turn of events. It used to be sweet, yes. Before the issue had come to the courts, they had a field day clowning with the issue just because it was UMNO who was championing its cause, and because the enemy of my enemy is my friend, it seemed natural which side of the conflict PAS should be manning their armory. But now things had got too far and the courts have decided. PAS suddenly realizes the gravity of the situation. The shotgun honeymoon is over, and PAS supremo Nik Aziz makes a 360 degree turn on his support. Which leaves Khalid Samad, who had already been given a Jesus Christ Superstar Status by the churches, fazed as to what he should be doing next.


Lachesis: The Measurer of Risks Zulkifli Noordin

In Zulkifli Noordin we find a person more conundric than Khalid Samad himself, not so much because he represents a square peg of a dissenting personality in an otherwise round hole of the opposition alliance, but because what he writes and what he believes in sometimes do not tally with how he acts. Generally regarded as the more moral, the more islamic and the more critical of any politician in any age and era, the conundrum lies in why he chooses to be in an opposition party that has been quite unclear ever since its inception regarding to whom power should be transferred should the BN government were to unlikely fall one day. Is it to Anwar Ibrahim who is facing a serious sodomy trial at the moment? Is the good YB too naïve a person as to ignore the signs and rumours circulating around him, like all those zany youtube vidoes that purportedly show the confessions of many people related to Anwar’s sodomy cases, including the one involving the magnanimous Taib Azamuddin, former National Mosque imam, Nallakurappan’s testimony of “the kind of person” Anwar is, former PKR henchman Ezam Md Nor who got jailed and locked-up for his support for Anwar and yet would later leave the party for reasons “too embarassing for certain party and his family to be publicised” and many, many others? The question many people ask is why is a sanctimonious personality like Zulkifli backing the wrong horse? Heck he would perhaps be better off in an Islamic party like PAS. But upon closer scrutiny one suddenly realises this: should Zulkifli Noordin ever leave PKR, the party would be devoid of any sense of corrective morals and sanity checking.

In the recent Allah-name hiatus, YB Zul emerges as a hero. A hero in an otherwise faulty, defeated, non-victorious setting. He quickly disowns Khalid Samad and those muslims who support the catholics’ case, even going as far as to call for Khalid to remove himself from PAS for allowing such desecrations to be happening under his patronage.

It must be very painful just to BE Zulkifli Noordin. All those instances whereby your very principles on the purity of Islam are day in and day out trampled upon by your own non-muslim colleagues in PKR, and worse cases by islamophobe DAP in parliament---all in the name of solidarity based on a fragile alliance. YB Zul is an embodiment of a major puzzlement of the blues of Malaysian politics: what happens when good people join bad companies.


Atrophos: Supreme NGO Dicer Marina Mahathir

Now why is the daughter of a former Prime Minister, ardent newspaper writer, society activist who officially do not belong to any political party, be included in this analysis? Heck, is she even a politician in the first place? Well, simply because: she represents the other factor of the equation. A hidden algorithm in the malay psyche, the neither-here-nor-there-but-still-I-am-everywhere wildcard with a niche following wearing the same feathers. As such, writings from such opinionless opinions are always taken in with spoonfuls of salts, but nevertheless MM has got her own loyal followings who nod agreeingly irrespective of what issue she brings in. She might be defensive in certain issues, liberal in most but when she touches on the recent Allah name issue in her blog Rantings by Marina Mahathir (perhaps blogosphere’s most apt description of what one can expect of a blog), one is surprised at the disjointedness of her arguments, albeit bringing in certain passages of the seerah and the Quran, and how mediocre is her analysis especially regarding an issue as important as matters-of-Tauhid Allah name. It is in no way far from correct to say that MM is, in short, having shoes too big to fit in in the case of the recent Allah issue.

DPMM belong to that class of muslims who like to be labeled as pseudo-liberal, whether the connotation is used in the negative or in the positive sense dependent upon both Time and Circumstances. Her cohorts of the same feather include bloggers like Syed Akbar Ali (who makes a living spewing hatred towards ulamaks or anything that sports turbans and beards, which he hates to the core of his ulna), Anas Zubedy who is an exemplary 1Malaysia proponent and strives for a 1Malaysia, 1Religion crusade almost to the synthesis of Emperor Akbar’s Deen Ilahi and a few others of equal magnanimity. The entire Sisters-in-Islam also has leanings towards this kind liberalism.

But high brow though it may seem, the pseudo-liberal muslims’ arguments are either half-baked or, at best, pure stupid in nature. In actuality, this group’s principle could be summed by just one phrase: “We just couldn’t care less!” But because they can’t be left out in the bandwagon of opinions, they just HAD to say something. They are not the religious type, oh no sir, far from it, but let’s look at some outdated arguments by DPMM herself, and I am sure her cohorts like Anas etc parrot the same principles too:-

1. A confident Muslim is unfazed by the issue of God's name. God speaks to all of humankind in the Quran and never said that only Muslims could call him by the name Allah.
2. A confident Muslim has 99 names to choose from to describe that One God. My favourites are Ar-Rahman (The All-Compassionate) and Ar-Rahim (The All-Merciful).
3. A confident Muslim never gets confused over which is his/her religion and which is other people's. For instance, a confident Muslim knows exactly what the first chapter of the Quran is. And it's not the Lord's Prayer.
4. A confident Muslim will not walk into a church, hear a liturgy in Malay or Arabic where they use the word 'Allah' and then think that he or she is in a mosque. A confident Muslim knows the difference.
5. A confident Muslim is generous, inclusive and doesn't think that his or her brethren is made exclusive through the use of a single language. The confident Muslim is well aware that in the Middle East, all services of ANY religion are in Arabic because that's what they all speak.
6. A confident Muslim knows the basis of his/her faith are the five pillars of Islam and will not be shaken just because other people call God by the same name.
7. A Muslim believes in only One God. Therefore it makes sense that other people should call God by the same name because there is no other God.

I know, I know. We have all seen these kinds of arguments before. We would normally snicker at the immaturity of such ideas. Notice that nowhere here is a solution given of how a “confident muslim” should handle the case of a Catholic conniving an unsuspecting Mat Rempit or Kamping Bohsia into believing that the Allah that we now share since 31st December 2009 actually has a Son and that YOUR salvation, Mat and Minah, depends on your acceptance of this Son who died on the cross for all of us, Hallelujah Goddammit.

In actuality, what DPMM has done is this. She has imaginary reduced herself (and entices her readers to do the same too) to the level of the Rempits and Bohsias and try to convey to us that if such a situation comes to HER, HER faith would be strong enough to dispel all these false dakyahs. Now how conceited can one get? To not be able to rise above one’s own coccoon and think for the general ummah? To equate that the station of faith of the ummah is actually where HER station currently resides? If HER faith is as strong as she claims it is, to which I reserve my opinion, what makes her think that all others in the nation, particular our unsuspecting younger ones, are modeled according to her station too?

And there we have it. The beautiful colors of Rangoli in the Malaysian Landscape of ideas, The Three Fates that weave and yarn the fabric of the Malaysian Muslim Society, spewed forth by a simple but sensitive issue of the Allah name change. Clothos. Artropos. Lachesis.

Apocryphalist