Do imams pay membership fees to the Islamic Community or is it a democratura of clericalism?

By Edin Urjan Kukavica

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Bosnian Muslims have a central, vertical, hierarchically superior, but also inherited institution, the Islamic Community; an institution from the 19th century that was conceived, created, and inaugurated by the occupying Austro-Hungarian Empire after Ottoman Turkey, saving what could still be saved from the Sultanate, withdrew from the largest part of Europe, leaving Bosnian, Serbian, Bulgarian, Hungarian, Albanian, Greek, and all other Muslims in the former European provinces to the mercy of new occupiers and rulers. Disregarding a whole list of disqualifying historical facts, led by the one that it is essentially an occupational construct, the Islamic Community's ability to navigate through all turbulent and difficult times, various historical upheavals, political regimes, and countless authorities and rulers... speaks in favor of the claim that it has, over time, become and despite everything, still is the most significant Bosniak institution. 

However, we should not shy away from the truth, following the negative social position of Bosniaks in all historical and political circumstances, the Islamic Community (has always) been in a position and situation to serve the current authorities with a significant part of its capacities. This opportunism that the Islamic Community as an institution has shown towards every political model from Austro-Hungary to the present day does not have to be – nor is it – something bad in itself. Proof of this is the "survival" of Muslims in Bosnia and Herzegovina in a capacity significantly different from all other former Ottoman countries.
Meanwhile, the situation has changed, and we are not aware of this change. Bosniaks are no longer Muslims, nor are Muslims – a people and a religious group – in a situation to fight for cultural and religious autonomy. Today, Bosniaks are a significant factor in the governance and rule of Bosnia and Herzegovina... for the first time in history, they are in a position to decide their own destiny and have no need to adapt or curry favor with anyone on any basis in order to survive. Neither the vast majority of Bosniaks nor, it seems, Muslims are aware of these facts. Alongside this, the Islamic Community as an institution has, for the first time, the social space to be independent and autonomous, and we, as people, as Muslims, as Bosniaks, expect that from it. 

However, the oldest, fundamental, and crowning institution of Bosnian Muslims is simultaneously and consistently one of those that persistently avoid democratization and modernization. The administrative-cosmetic changes made in the last few years have only contributed to further and deeper bureaucratization, clericalization, and a more sincere separation of the Community from the jamaat, because none of these changes are felt "on the ground" in terms of improving anything that the serving religious officials should be dealing with. The problem is only definitional at first glance, but at second glance, it is substantive: "religious" and "officials" simply do not go together! The rather quiet, but still dissonant tones coming from the Community itself speak to this.

With the emergence of new Muslim winds on the rather stagnant Bosnian-Herzegovinian religious scene, several serious and interesting questions have arisen. For example, in a completely layman and rhetorical way: is the Islamic Community an administrative-leading body or a community of Muslims? ... are "religious officials" in the service of the jamaat and the jamaat members or their employer? ... and to whom does the employer, i.e., the Islamic Community, serve: God, the Community, or the jamaat? ... what and for what purpose does the Islamic Community serve? If the answer to all these questions is only one, for example: the Islamic Community serves to provide religious services, then the question follows: ... and what are religious services? Furthermore, are all Muslims members of the Islamic Community, or are only Muslims members of the Islamic Community... In other words, are those who, for any reason (either because they don't have it or because they see no benefit from this membership fee), do not pay membership fees to the Islamic Community, Muslims at all? It is not entirely clear whether it is more expensive to be born or to die in this country... but I believe that would not be difficult to calculate. Precisely because of this: why, for a funeral – let alone for Hajj – is it necessary to commit to a bank with a serious loan, even if membership fees are paid throughout one's life? How can an ordinary person, outside of Bayram, reach their spiritual leader – the Reis-ul-Ulema?

The Islamic Community should function as a moral and every other conceivable corrective to Muslim authorities or authorities over Muslims, but there is also an obvious problem here: the Islamic Community is, by all accounts, on the side of only one political option. Proof of this is countless: from the rotation of cadres between the Assembly of the Islamic Community and the party presidency, through open agitation from the minbar, to the more than obvious fact that they do not influence the improvement of the moral character and deeds of Muslim politicians at all. One might say quite the opposite: it is not uncommon and it is an open secret that religious officials adopt the inglorious and reprehensible qualities of politicians. To be clear... all of this is allowed and legitimate and part of the relationship between the slave and the Lord, but is it moral?
The fact is that a certain number of Islamic Community officials benefited from the war and the post-war period in terms of personal gain, and that is, let's say, normal. It is normal for this official and opportunistic part of the Islamic Community to fear for its social status and material privileges, and therefore fears and opposes any kind of change, declaring any kind of progress as blasphemy. This is the instrumentalization of religion, the Islamic Community, and Muslims for political and private purposes, and it is not normal for an entire nation to suffer because of the privileges of a few!

Why does the Islamic Community not share the fate of its people, or rather, why does it do nothing – or nothing visible and sufficient – to convince politics that those who are not members of the "party" are also Bosniaks and Muslims... at least, Bosnians and Herzegovinians and Muslims? Is at least part of the answer to this question found in the fact that membership fees are taken as the criterion for belonging or anything else, which, besides being an outdated concept, sooner or later – if it hasn't already caused the emergence of questions like: Do imams pay membership fees to the Islamic Community? – will cause the emergence of questions like: Do imams pay membership fees to the Islamic Community?

In Bosnia and Herzegovina, there have long been communities of Muslims who are in no way close to, let alone members of, the Islamic Community. Besides all those notorious ones that everyone knows about, there are also religious-business-political groups in close connection with foreign governments, whose influence is traded, and whose membership, favor, or mere support is proven by customs that, in the form in which they are practiced and propagated here, are the basic distinctive characteristic and sign of following and belonging to an ideology in Islam, but actually belong to Judeo-Christian and Mormon traditions... We will disregard another less known fact that such sects only nominally accept membership and belonging to domestic institutions and nothing beyond and except that... To everything else, including loyalty, they have committed themselves to headquarters in the Western world.

Therefore, the fact that there are Muslim communities or communities of Muslims outside the Islamic Community in Bosnia and Herzegovina... necessarily leads to several thoughts. Namely, the categories of "community," "dervish order," "jamaat" give these groups a certain legitimacy as a group with its own internal organization, hierarchy, and financing (!), thus a kind of autonomy that is not subject to any control, which allows them to act extra-institutionally for who knows what purpose. On the one hand, someone has enabled them to do so, and on the other hand, from the perspective of the so-called unity, this should not be overlooked or neglected, let alone categorized as "we didn't know," "we didn't expect," and "we didn't recognize the danger in time." Because, it cannot be said that there were no warnings, admonitions, and obvious indicators – there were and still are more than enough.

I know that approximations and conditionals like "what if" are an extremely unpopular category, but... What if some glory-seeking or ill-intentioned, but resourceful devil conceived of using some European law on freedom – I am sure such a law exists; there is too much freedom there anyway; for example, on the protection of minorities, freedom of association for political action, or freedom of religion(!) – and registered, for example, associations of citizens that would be called New Muslims, or, even more radically, formed and registered a new "Islamic community," a new "tarikat center," some "(con)federation of jamaats"... and thus raised the fear of "additional radicalization" or fear of fear and fear of I-don't-know-what to a level from which it can no longer be lowered, thereby irreversibly legitimizing, legalizing, and officializing another, this time irreversible, beginning of the end.

Besides, in an extremely simplified way, why wouldn't someone think of using our domestic Law on Prohibition of Discrimination, by invoking Article 1, which "ensures the protection and promotion of human rights and freedoms, creates conditions for the realization of equal rights and opportunities, and regulates the system of protection against discrimination on the basis of race, ethnicity, skin color, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion... and (discrimination based on) any other ground," and founded and registered, for example, a Bosnian supranational association of true right-wingers, Nazis, and fascists, instead of these village swindlers who present themselves as "center-right," "people's," "Christian Democrats"... 

If something like that happens, will all the previous "commitments," "sharp condemnations," protests, objections, and, since we are significantly and obviously late for prevention, repressive reactions like bans(!) have any effect? Will the answer "we didn't recognize the danger in time" be sufficient as a reaction, or will it not? Will it, even in the case of the religious community, be just a poor religious-political excuse for unpreparedness for the new challenges that time brings? Furthermore, will anyone be held responsible for the situation caused and created by this? Every action has its doer who is deserving or responsible or, indeed, guilty. (The reason why we have never found a culprit for the state and situation we are in is the simple fact that we cannot and are not guilty of anything.) So, whom shall we (else) blame for this? 

I assume that for most people, even those who have thought about it, this sounds like something from the realm of science fiction, but if a private individual can appropriate the name Isa-beg Ishaković, some other private individual (the former) flag and coat of arms of Bosnia and Herzegovina, some third (private) individual something else that is the "property" of all citizens of BiH, for example, the state(!) and/or government and/or public companies, why in a country with 63% religious population would someone, with enough followers or supporters, not establish, not a religious community, but their own religion!? Or, what if someone towards whom there is currently no particular tolerance, for example, Salafis or Ja'faris, better known as Shiites, decides to raise the question of tolerance towards Ahmadis and demand the same treatment for their own community of Muslims? Or to simply request the admission of their own community of Muslims who practice Islam according to some other, recognized legal school, into full membership of the Islamic Community in Bosnia and Herzegovina, with appropriate amendments to the Constitution and all sub-constitutional acts of the Islamic Community, equal treatment in all bodies and directorates of the Islamic Community, proportional membership in the Assembly, and whatever else they might think of, by conditioning their membership on the guarantee of rights through the change of any legal, ritual, or religious elements of "their Islam" or "their madhhab," and even on the issue of financing, leadership, internal hierarchy...? 

I am aware that, from the current perspective of all the faithful, all the aforementioned conditionals and approximations are on the verge, if not deep in the abyss of "heresy." I know that I have drawn attention so many times that "what does not exist in language, does not exist (even) in reality," that I have become tired of myself. Therefore, I am interested, if communities, dervish orders, jamaats outside the system already exist... if, or rather, when all these conditionals become reality, are those responsible ready for such a scenario, however futuristic it may seem, and to understand and accept that pluralism, political, religious, legal, or ritual, is nevertheless freedom and a guaranteed right and intimacy(!) of every individual, and will this be a cause for intra-Islamic conflict or inter-Muslim war, or perhaps the only path to peaceful coexistence of all Muslim sects, regardless of whether they recognize each other or not, under one roof, umbrella, or tent called the Islamic Community or the Community of Islamic... something, I don't even know what?

If we do not urgently find a different model of national self-relation, this small indigenous national community will turn into a religious, Muslim community in the Balkans, and as such, we will be (nationally) condemned to assimilation, and religiously to extinction. This is axiomatic, mathematical, quite certain: we lose a town the size of Sanski Most every year! Our ordinary people are leaving, young married couples are leaving, the most reproductively, productively, and intellectually potent part of society... parents are sending their children to study abroad from where they will never return... They are not going abroad for knowledge, not even for wealth, but because of the uncertainty and insecurity here that breeds fear! The existing way, the existing model of life and the perspective – rather, the lack of perspective – it offers, which does not need to be described in detail because it is more than obvious, is not something that yields results, but something that produces consequences, and we urgently need some new thinking, some new thought, a completely different step forward, a new model, a general answer to all social questions, and most importantly, the question of the relationship between secularism and Islam and their simultaneous coexistence... in order to answer the question of the future social order, social relations, and social perspective. If something new is not found, if we do not offer something new, historical practice shows that things will not go in a good direction, and there are many reasons for great, enormous concern.