Refan Aditya
‘… we hereby enquire for your participation to display Chinese New Year ornaments such as lanterns and Mei Hwa flowers in the area of your respective offices as a tribute to the devotees of the Confucian religion.’
The words above, including the bolded part, is quoted from a release issued by the Indonesian Ministry of Religious Affairs to religious institutions throughout Indonesia, including State Religious High School (PTKIN). This authorised instruction is none other than to welcome the Chinese New Year or Imlek New Year/Sincia to come. Intriguingly, the bolded word speaks volumes.
Given that the celebration of Chinese New Year in Indonesia is not necessarily confined to the Confucian believer—even fewer those who celebrate it in a Confucian manner—and many others celebrate it no other than as a Chinese tradition, the release touches on one of the long-standing debates in Indonesia: the religiosity of Chinese New Year. This article revisits Chinese New Year in the trajectory of the discourse on Chinese religion in Indonesia and situates it in the framework of religious freedom.
Imlek New Year
Although President Adurrahman Wahid (1999-2001), with Presidential Instruction No. 6 of 2000, revoked Presidential Instruction No. 14 of 1967 that prohibited the celebration of Chinese customs in public spaces and readmitted the Confucian religion (Agama Khonghucu) as an official religion, Imlek was not yet—officially—associated with Confucian religion. It was only during President Megawati’s term (2001-2004) that Chinese New Year was designated as a feast day of the Confucian religion and became a national holiday. This was attributed to the negotiating pursuit of the High Council of Indonesian Confucianism (MATAKIN), as the representation of the Confucian believers in Indonesia. However, does it mean that Imlek New Year celebrations are exclusive to only the Confucian believers then?
The Chinese calendar is based on the lunisolar system, which was first established in the Xia dynasty (2205 – 1776 BC). However, the one that is based on the birth of the Khong Zi (551 BC) as the first year was first applied during the Han Dynasty (104 BC), a dynasty that honoured the teachings of Confucianism and made it the state religion and the standard state examination system. Therefore, the lunar calendar is also called the Kongzili calendar.
In Indonesia, this version of Imlek calendar had actually been circulated since colonial periods through Chinese newspapers and inscriptions on the erection and restoration of the Chinese temple (see Imlek, Kongzili, dan Kemajemukan Komunitas Tionghoa di Indonesia). It was then promoted by Khong Kauw Hwee, a Confucian association established in the colonial period that later became the Indonesian Assembly of the Confucian Religion (Majelis Agama Khonghucu). However, besides Kongzili, another Chinese calendar, the one that is pegged to the beginning of Emperor Huang Di’s reign in the Xia dynasty in 2697 BC, was even more prevalent, especially among non-Confucian Chinese.
Contesting Imlek
Here we move from the historical recount of Imlek to its polemic of celebration in Indonesia. As is well known, during the New Order era, Chinese cultural expressions, including Chinese New Year celebrations in very public spaces, were suppressed due to Soeharto’s anti-Chinese politics.
The Confucian religion was removed from the register of official religions, and its related rituals and festivals, including Chinese New Year, were not allowed to be performed except at home or in Chinese temples (klenteng).
At home, those who are taking care of the ancestral altar may perform Imlek or Sincia prayers as a form of traditional Chinese filial piety even without the Confucian liturgy. But how about with klenteng? Is it not the place where Chinese ritual feasts are usually performed? Here is where the Imlek New Year or Sincia ritual turns into a field of contestation.
Between Tridharma and Confucian Religion
During the New Order era, klenteng-s were forced to convert into viharas or at least brand themselves as Tri Dharma Places of Worship (TITD) under the umbrella of the TITD Federation, which was formed by an ad-hoc government institution. Tridharma refers to a sort of Chinese religious institution that represents the three Chinese religious traditions (Buddhism, Confucianism, and Taoism) that are officially counted as one of the Buddhist traditions. Tridharma, thus, is Buddhism under religious authorities. It actually has existed for a long time under the name Sam Kauw. Its adherents and sympathizers are quite widely diffused in Indonesia. The politics of assimilation during the New Order sought to institutionalize it into a state-supporting institution and change its name to Tridharma to eradicate its Chinese character and assign Buddhism as its representative.
The exclusion of the Confucian religion from the recognized religions forced Chinese-Confucian believers to convert to the existing official religions in order to avoid the stigma of atheism that was closely attached to communism, the hostile ideology of the New Order regime (see Genta Rohani dalam Resistensi). Becoming a Tridharma believer with Buddhist status is the most reasonable way for Chinese to preserve Chinese traditions in the klenteng, even though later on, in 1993, WALUBI (Representative of Indonesian Buddhists) declared that Imlek New Year is not a Buddhist feast, urging temples not to celebrate it.
Months following the fall of the New Order, Imlek New Year suddenly gained recognition as a Tridharma Buddhist celebration. In 1999, a bulletin of Hikmah Tridharma titled “Sin Cia, a Tridharma Buddhist Feast” (Sin Cia Hari Raya Agama Buddha Tridharma) published by the Indonesian Tridharma Book Centre (Balai Kitab Tridharma Indonesia) pointed out that,
“Obviously, Sin Cia is a celebration of Tridharma Buddhism. In Buddhism (both Theravada and Mahayana), Sin Cia is not counted among the feast days that are related to the teachings of Sakyamuni Buddha or the life history of Sakyamuni Buddha.
However, in Tridharma Buddhism, Sin Cia is deeply religious in meaning and value. This is because Tridharma Buddhism is a Mahayana Buddhism that learns Confucianism and Taoism. Therefore, Sin Cia for Tridharma believers is a religious feast day that is meaningful in life and living. The celebration of Sin Cia from year to year, even in its simplest form, must be carried out by Tridharma followers. All Tridharma Buddhists welcome Sin Cia and celebrate it.’ (Hikmah Tridharma, February 1999)”
Worthy of note that the above claim needs to be situated in two ways. On the one hand, it asserts the monopoly of Imlek New Year as a Tridharma feast, but on the other hand, it also paves the way to ensure that Imlek can be celebrated in a religious manner in temples. Hence, the appropriation of the Imlek New Year as a Buddhist holiday was not entirely contestative but instead enabled the religious justification for the public celebration.
Entering the New Year 2004, three years after Confucian religion was re-recognised as an official religion, and a few months after the Imlek New Year was established as a religious feast day for Confucian religion, a paper entitled “Imlek, its Background and Meaning” (Imlek, Latar Belakang dan Maknanya), written by MATAKIN chairman Budi Santoso Tanuwibowo, was released. This paper provides a detailed explanation of the history of the Chinese calendar, why the Imlek calendar started with the birth of Khong Zi, and the series of rituals Confucian believers should perform during the days before and after the Imlek New Year.
‘In honour of Kong Zi, the start of the Xia Calendar, which we now know as the Imlek calendar, was set from the year of Kong Zi’s birth. From then on, even though dynasties changed, there was no change of calendar. Everyone used the Xia Dynasty calendar, which we sometimes refer to as the Kongzi, Kongli, Khongulek Calendar. It did not stop there, during the Han Dynasty, the Confucian religion was then established as a state religion, even until the Qing Dynasty, and its teachings became the main reference for those who wanted to pursue higher education.’
The paper was written at a time when the Reformasi Era had only just begun. By introducing the origins of the Confucian Imlek calendar, or Kongzili, back to the ancient Chinese empire, the author has begun to explicitly perform religious freedom for the Confucian believers by bringing up the historical narrative of Imlek New Year in Indonesia, after all things Chinese were blocked away by the New Order regime.
However, the Imlek New Year is not necessarily a celebration that is confined to Confucian believers. Tridharma believers, or those who still call themselves Tridharma sympathizers who are not Confucian, would still celebrate Sincia in a religious way, both at the temple and at home, or those who simply celebrate it as a tradition of family gathering that has nothing to do with religion. The Imlek New Year presents a phenomenon that is somewhat swaying between the religious and the cultural at the same time; flexible yet contentious as well.
Annual Controversy
Every year, issues surrounding the religiosity of Imlek New Year are always escalating as it is celebrated in the manner of other religious rituals, such as the Imlek Mass in Catholicism (see Merayakan Misa Imlek ala Gereja Katolik) and the Imlek Salat in Islam (see A controversy surrounding Chinese Indonesian Muslims’ practice of Chinese New Year Prayer in Central Java). Popular opinion holds that celebrating the Imlek New Year is simply a form of performing Chinese tradition passed down for generations, regardless of any rituals to perform. Restricting it to only the Confucian religion could be restricting non-Confucian Chinese from maintaining their traditions and therefore violating religious freedom.
There remains a popular suspicion that there are attempts made by other religions to prevent their Chinese congregations from converting to the Confucian religion or Tridharma. However, we should not overlook that the accommodation of the Imlek New Year into the rituals of non-Confucian religions presents an effort of the Chinese themselves to negotiate their religious identity with their cultural identity. Nevertheless, religious freedom seems to serve as a term of reference that can transcend the suspicion and controversy surrounding it. Whether Chinese New Year is celebrated as part of religious, cultural, or recreational practice is the sole right of the respective individuals.
Before closing this article, I would like to quote a recent statement by a Confucian priest, WS. Budi Sunarto. His remarks on the Chinese New Year controversy appear to manifest freedom of religion and belief from the perspective of Confucian religion.
“For my non-Confucian friends, please appreciate that for the Confucian, Chinese New Year is indeed a religious feast day because in welcoming the Chinese New Year, there are series of worship rituals that are carried out based on the order of the teachings of the Confucian religion. (…) So, please respect the decision that this is a religious feast day for the people of Confucian beliefs.
I would also like to advise my Confucian friends that if those of non-Confucian want to celebrate this and say that this is a cultural day, then we should also have a kind heart. Because indeed they carry out this Chinese New Year with no worship in it. For them, culture is just for celebrating and having fun, never mind. How come a feast day is for arguing, and a feast day is for fighting? It’s better for us to greet each other…”
The instruction of the Ministry of Religious Affairs earlier, “…a tribute to the devotees of the Confucian religion” must be conceived in this atmosphere.
