The violent acts to certain community often are caused by the lack of information available for public given by the community. This case is true for the Ahmadiyah Community here in Indonesia. Currently, members of Ahmadiyah community are suffering because of the physical attack to their places of worship, schools, and residence. This attack, some people said, was due to the misunderstanding to the teaching of Ahmadiyah movement.

As an effort to clarify this misunderstanding, an informal discussion was held in Interfidei office on Friday, April 21, 2006. The title for the discussion was: The Belief and Historical Development of Ahmadiyah Community in Indonesia. Two representatives from Ahmadiyah community in Yogyakarta were invited to speak.

The first speaker, Mirajudin Sahid, a mubhaligh (teacher) at Markazi Jemaat Ahmadiyah Yogyakarta said that basically there is no different in belief between Ahmadiyah community and Moslem in general. The attack to Ahmadiyah properties recently, he said, probably was caused by their different interpretation on Prophet Mohammed, Peace Be on Him, as khatamul anbiya. This word, in Ahmadiyah belief, is not interpreted as ‘the last prophet’, rather as a ‘ring’ or ‘ties’ of all prophets. According to Ahmadis, there are two types of prophet :first, prophet who preach the syariah (Islamic laws), the second are prophets who are not preaching the syariah. Mirza Gulam Ahmad, the founder of Ahmadiyah community is regarded as the prophet who did not bring the syariah.

The second speaker, Nur Sugianto, the secretary of Tabligh Jemaah Ahmadiyah based in Yogyakarta, described briefly the historical development of Ahmadiyah community in Indonesia. Ahmadiyah’s first mission in Indonesia was set up in 1925 by Indian missionary Maulana Rahmat Ali. The mission translated much of Ahmadiyah’s literature into Javanese and Dutch, and built the sect’s first mosque in Java in 1937. Ahmadis say many of their members “paid with their blood and money” to help Indonesia achieve independence from the Dutch. During the reign of founding president Sukarno, the Justice Ministry on March 13, 1953, recognized Ahmadiyah as a legal entity. The movement was later repressed during ex-president Suharto’s 32-year regime, which exercised tight control over all religious groups.

The explanations given by both Mirajudin and Sugianto are contrast from the understanding and views of those who against and attack the Ahmadis. The urge from some people for Ahmadis to go back to the true Islam, the statement of The Minister of Religious Affairs, that it would be better for the Ahmadis to create a new religion, therefore, was considered as a reflection of lack of understanding to the teaching of Ahamadiyah.

The discussion participants then asked critical questions, such as : why the attack and violence to Ahmadiyah community only recently happened? What are reasons behind all these phenomena? The answers for these questions would be the topic for upcoming discussion on the same topic to be held on May 11, 2006.