The Malaysian Insight

“MELAYU Baru”, or Malay modernists, have caused the Malays to lose their true identity, Dr Syed Ali Tawfik Al-Attas, former director-general of the Institute of Islamic Understanding Malaysia (Ikim) said.

He said when Onn Jaafar founded Umno in 1946, he had defined “Melayu” as one who is Muslim, who speaks the Malay language and who follows the customs and traditions of the Malays.

Now, however, modernist ideology and the adoption of foreign culture have diluted the identity of the Malays, bringing forth the Melayu Baru.

Syed Ali told The Malaysian Insight that Melayu Baru has got nothing to do with one’s chronological age, rather it refers to ideology, the way one thinks.

“They are now gradually changing the meaning of ‘Melayu’. They are gradually changing the language,” he said.

“By adopting ambiguous terminologies with ambiguous meanings, it causes the Malay language to become ambiguous.”

He said these Melayu Baru also do not have the proper understanding of Islam and have misrepresented and corrupted its meanings.

“They don’t properly understand it. They have misrepresented it and are representing that misrepresentation as true,” he said.

“These are not people who know justice as my father has defined: ‘to put a thing in its proper place in accordance with itself and in accordance with that system to which it belongs’.

“One has to understand the whole system in order to know where the right place of a thing is. If you don’t know, you cannot claim to be an ulama (scholar).”

The Malaysian Insight spoke to Syed Ali following his viral video recently where he called Islamist party PAS rude for shortening the name of Prophet Muhammad’s daughter, Fatimah, to Timah.

PAS had earlier demanded that Malaysian award-winning whiskey, Timah, change its name as it bore the nickname of the Prophet’s daughter.

Syed Ali has said no one in their right mind will ever refer to the Prophet or his daughter by a nickname.

Kuala Lumpur City Hall recently barred grocers and Chinese medicine halls from selling liquor.

Over the weekend, the Kedah state government announced that it will ban four-digit (4D) outlet operations to curb gambling.

Syed Ali said because Malaysia has allowed individuals portrayed as scholars to speak on issues they are not well versed in for such a long time, it may take an equally long time to reverse its effects.

“As a Muslim, because we have allowed people who have no right to talk about issues concerning religion to speak, they have corrupted that knowledge and it has infected the multitudes,” he said.

“Now, when you try to reverse that problem, it is a very difficult thing to do.” – November 19, 2021.