SHARIAsource

Constitution for Malaysia in English, published with the permission of Constitute.

This is an English translation of the 2014 fatwā issued in the Malaysian state of Selangor entitled “Fatwā Pemikiran Liberalisme Dan Pluralisme Agama,” or “Fatwā on the Thought of Liberalism and Religious Pluralism.” It is significant and controversial for explicitly naming the activist organization Sisters in Islam as "deviant" from the teachings of Islam for promoting "liberalism" and "religious pluralism." 

This is the original (Bahasa Indonesia) fatwā issued by the Indonesian ‘Ulema Council (MUI) in 2005 that declared that “religious pluralism, liberalism, and secularism are notions that are against Islam." 

This is the English translation of the original Bahasa Indonesia fatwā issued by the Indonesian ‘Ulema Council (MUI) in 2005 that declared that “religious pluralism, liberalism, and secularism are notions that are against Islam."

This document shows the ruling made by Judge Datuk Hanipah Farikullah of Malaysia’s Federal High Court that only the Syariah Court has the power to decide on the validity of the Selangor fatwā that labelled the activist organization Sisters In Islam (SIS Forum) as a “deviant group” for promoting “liberalism” and “religious pluralism.” This ruling shows the grounds on which the decision was made that the [civil] High Court does not have jurisdiction to hear the Sister in Islam’s application for judicial review to challenge the validity of the fatwā issued by the Selangor Fatwa Committee.

This 2013 case is part of an ongoing legal custody battle in Malaysia between a Hindu woman, Indira Gandhi Mutho against her former husband Pathmanathan Krishnan, who converted from Hinduism to Islam in 2009. In this case, the [civil] Federal High Court ruled that the conversion certificates of Gandhi’s children to Islam should be declared null and void because Krishnan had not converted the three children aged twelve, eleven, and eleven months to Islam in accordance with the Administration of the Religion of Islam (Perak) Enactment 2004. The Federal High Court also reasoned that the applicant’s rights were upheld through international rights and standards, and articles 11 and 12(4) in the Federal Constitution. Significantly, the Federal High Court also claimed that it held jurisdiction over the syariah courts on this matter.

In response to the decision that the Federal (civil) High Court holds jurisdiction over syariah courts on the matter of legal custody in Indira Gandhi Mutho v. Pengarah Jabatan Agama Islam Perak & ORS (2013), Pathmanathan Krishnan successfully appealed his case in 2015 to the Civil Court of Appeals in Pathmanathan Krishnan v. Indira Gandhi Mutho & Other Appeals (2015). The Court of Appeals held that first, the Judicial Commissioner had no jurisdiction to determine the issue of the children’s conversion to Islam as the validity of the conversion of any person to the religion of Islam and status of whether a person is a Muslim or not was “a matter falling under the exclusive jurisdiction of the Shariah Court under section 50 of the Administration of the Religion of Islam (Perak) Enactment 2004.” Secondly, the court held that the learned Judicial Commissioner had “committed a grave error when he approached the jurisdiction issue” by venturing into the constitutional construct of the fundamental liberties.

The Administration of the Religion of Islam (State of Selangor) Enactment 2003 establishes the fatwā legalization process in the state of Selangor, Malaysia. It also establishes and outlines the role of the mufti as the chairman of Selangor’s state fatwā committee. It is the main piece of legislation governing Selangor's syariah courts, Islamic finance guidelines, individual conversion to Islam, as well as other Islamic regulations the state has determined to regulate.