The Use of Poetic Narratives in Hamka's Qur'anic Exegesis Books
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Advances in Social Science, Education and Humanities Research, volume 492 Proceedings of the 1st Raden Intan International Conference on Muslim Societies and Social Sciences (RIICMuSSS 2019) The Use of Poetic Narratives in Hamka’s Qur’anic Exegesis Books, Tafsir Al Azhar 1* 2 1* 3 Rahmad Hidyayat Ihsan Nul Hakim Agita Misriani Sri Murti Syafrimen Syafril4 Faisal Faisal5 1 Faculty of Education, Institut Agama Islam Negeri Curup, Bengkulu, Indonesia 2 Faculty of Ushuluddin, Institut Agama Islam Negeri Curup, Bengkulu, Indonesia 3 Language and Literary Education, Sekolah Tinggi Keguruan dan Ilmu Pendidikan, PGRI Lubuk Linggau, Lubuk Linggau, Indonesia 4 Faculty of Tarbiyah and Teacher Training, Universitas Islam Negeri Raden Intan Lampung, Bandar Lampung, Indonesia 5 Faculty of Syariah and Law, Universitas Islam Negeri Raden Intan Lampung, Bandar Lampung, Indonesia *Corresponding author. Email: [email protected] ABSTRACT Hamka is a multitalented religious scholar, and one of the prominent cultural figures in Indonesia. Hamka holds scholarly authorities as a mufassir (Qur’anic interpreter) and a man of letters. These capabilities are proven by a number of his writings in both fields. Likewise, Hamka has tried to combine these two competencies in his commentary books, Tafsir Al Azhar. Description of interpretation and explanation of Hamka in Tafsir Al Azhar displays handful elements of Malay literature. Yet, little has been done to study the literary dimension of Hamka's interpretation of the Qur’an, while such study is scholarly important, since it would help us understand the extent to which literary work could influence the production of religious authority. This paper tries to fulfill this gap. Thus, it is focused on discussing the use of poetry narration in Hamka's Tafsir Al Azhar, and the extent to which such use is significant to how he has acquired his authority in the field of Qur’anic interpretation. This research belongs to the type of library research using a qualitative approach. The data gathered are analyzed through theory of literary science and linguistics. This research finds out that the poetic narrative in Hamka’s Tafsir Al Azhar strictly follows the convention of Malay poetry structures. As such, this research concludes, has many to do with both his effort to strengthen and elucidate his interpretation about the Qur’anic verses, and his mission and interest in spreading Malay cultural identity and moral values. Keywords: Tafsir Al Azhar, Hamka, poetry, Qur’anic interpretation talented figure. Aside from being a Muslim scholar, 1. INTRODUCTION Hamka is also known as a writer, a historian and a politician who wrote around 120 books of various Tafsir (Qur’anic exegesis) is a human effort to understand disciplines, such as sufism, literature, philosophy, history, the Qur'an revealed to the Prophet Muhammad by sociology, politics and Qur’anic interpretation. explaining its meanings and issuing laws and wisdom.[1] As a poet or a man of letters, Hamka has proven his Qur’anic exegesis becomes one of the efforts to realize the authority by producing a number of literary works. He function of the Qur'an as a source of Islamic teachings and wrote several novels, biographies and collections of short as a guide that provides welfare and happiness for humans, stories. Most of his literary works were romances, many of both individually and in groups.[2] Tafsir as one of the them have received wide attention and enjoyed popularity, Islamic disciplines presupposes a set of interpretation not only in Indonesia but also in other Southeast Asian methods in order to achieve a correct understanding of countries, such as Malaysia and Singapore. Slamet what Allah intended in the verses of the Qur'an.[3] Muslim Mulyono, an Indonesian literature expert, referred to scholars have developed several methods of interpreting Hamka as Hamzah Fanshuri of the new age (Hamzah the Qur'an.[4] Fanshuri is a Muslim Sufi scholar of the 17th century Hamka is one of the Indonesian Muslim scholars who have Islamic Aceh). made important contribution in the field of the In the field of tafsir, Hamka shows his authority by interpretation of the Qur’an. Hamka, an abbreviation of producing books of the interpretation of the Qur’an, most Haji Abdul Malik Karim Amrullah, is known as a multi- which have received high appreciation from many Muslim scholars in Indonesia. Abdurrahman Wahid, former leader Copyright © 2020 The Authors. Published by Atlantis Press SARL. This is an open access article distributed under the CC BY-NC 4.0 license -http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/. 37 Advances in Social Science, Education and Humanities Research, volume 492 of the biggest traditionalist Muslim organization in poems, the writer will do a serious investigation of Tafsir Indonesia, for example, views Tafsir Al Azhar as the most Al Azhar. monumental work of Hamka's. The strength of this work This study employs a qualitative approach. Data analysis is lies in the broad knowledge that Hamka uses to support presented in the form of description and explanation of and explain his interpretation. In other word, his deep words. To analyze the selected poems, in order to see the knowledge reflected his authoritative ability to write a structures, rules and kind of poetry, the researcher will complete interpretation of the Qur’an. employ to the theories of literacy.[12]–[16] Having in mind Hamka’s expertise in literary, the Then, to examine the meaning of Malay poetic narratives researcher assumes that his literary skill is more or less used by Hamka, the researcher refers to the theory of influential to his exegetic work of the Qur’an. In fact, critical discourse analysis (CDA). In this regard, the Hamka had included literary elements in his Tafsir Al researcher uses Teun A. van Dijk's critical discourse Azhar as supplementary commentaries to the meaning of analysis model. CDA, according to van Dijk, deals with the verses of the Qur’an. The literary narration in his social power or social control from the community. A exegetic work adopts certain poetic elements characteristic community is considered to have power if they are able to of both Arab-Islamic and local-Indonesian literary works, control the actions and thoughts of members of the including poetry, proverbs and Malay maxims. The literary community. Mastery of the public mind is called social language in his commentary is extracted from his own cognition, that is, how a text (both verbal and non-verbal) recitation, Malay treasury and Arabic excerpts. is produced. This is because the process of meaning The case in point is Hamka’s commentary on chapter Ali making production of a text contains the knowledge Imran verse 158.[5] Although the number of poems behind the text, and under the conditions by which the text included throughout his exegesis books is not massive, the controls the public mind. This condition is known as three kinds of literary language are enough to color context .[17] Hamka's interpretation style. Hamka’s Tafsir Al Azhar, which consists of 30 volumes (Juz I - XXX), has become an object of many researches. 3. HAMKA TAFSIR AL AZHAR AND There are a number of research results and scientific works MALAY POETRY in the form of theses, dissertations and journal articles that examine this interpretation the Qur’an, either to examine Hamka lived in the period between 1908 and 1981. He was their interpretation methods or to investigate various born in Maninjau West Sumatra and died in Jakarta. He is interpretive thoughts.[6]–[10] Yet among them, there is no the son of a great and famous ‘ulama named Abdul Karim research that specifically discusses the production of Amarullah (Hajj Rasul). His formal education only religious authority of Hamka in the field of Qur’anic reached elementary school, but he learned by himself a lot exegesis, especially through the use of the literary (autodidact), especially in the field of Islamic studies. elements in his Tafsir Al Azhar. A research by Lukman, It seems that scholarship is a predicate that has been entitled Study of Malay Proverbial Discourse in Hamka's inherited by Hamka geologically, which was brought into Al Azhar Interpretation, indeed discusses the literary his subconscious, so that this scholarship was also chosen elements in Hamka's Tafsir Al Azhar, but only in general by Hamka as an obsession to present himself in a variety terms and only briefly alludes to Malay proverbs[11]. of activities, namely as a literary man, cultural producer, To fill this lacuna, this paper is intended to examine the Islamic scholar, preacher, educator, and politician. His use of poetic language in Tafsir Al Azhar for the expertise in Islam received international recognition, production of religious authority of Hamka in the field of evidenced by his Honorary Doctorate degree from the Al- Qur’anic exegesis in Indonesia. To avoid broad discussion Azhar University in 1958 and from the Kebangsaan or to limit this study, not all literary elements are discussed University of Malaysia in 1974.[18] here. But this research is only focused on the use of the The Malay proverb says that tigers die leaving stripes, Malay poetry. The research questions to be answered here elephants die leaving ivory, and human dies leaving are as follows: What is the quality of the poems used by names. Hamka has left a popular name through his written Hamka in explaining the interpretation of the Qur'an in works. Tafsir Al Azhar is his greatest and monumental Tafsir Al Azhar? What are the values contained behind the work. The presence of the works complements and adds to poetry narratives displayed in Hamka’s Tafsir Al-Azhar? his authority as an Indonesian Muslim scholar. These exegetical works originally came from his commentary lectures which were delivered routinely every 2.