Fasting in a Socio-Political Perspective
By Aceng Syamsul Hadie, S.Sos.,MM.
The fasting month of Ramadan is an annual cycle that is always awaited by Muslims because it is a means of forming themselves into muttaqin people and getting forgiveness and erasure of sins that have been committed previously, so the fasting month is a holy month full of blessings and forgiveness. Can the implementation of this fast be a bridge connecting the hearts of the people who have been scattered and divided into bonds that knit back together the unity and togetherness in the nation and state, where the fasting month of Ramadan is now carried out after Indonesia has completed its political agenda, namely the election, where the hot political atmosphere from the impact of the event and political battle is still thick, there is still a sense of disappointment from the losing party and a sense of arrogance from the winning party. So the author will examine in depth the essence of fasting in a socio-political perspective.
According to Muhammad Abdul Azim az-Zarqani, an Islamic scholar and scholar from Egypt, he explained that the dimensions of fasting worship have several very important aspects, in his book “Al-Fiqh al-Muyassar”, az-Zarqani explained that fasting has several very important benefits, including; increasing spiritual and moral awareness, improving physical and mental health, increasing social awareness and empathy for others, increasing self-discipline and the ability to control oneself. Thus, az-Zarqani explained that fasting has very broad and complex dimensions, which include spiritual, physical, moral and socio-political aspects.
From the explanation above, fasting has broad wisdom in a socio-political perspective, including increasing social awareness, building social justice, increasing political participation, building tolerance and harmony, and improving the quality of the rule of law in upholding justice.
The implementation in socio-politics that must be prioritized is so that the Ramadan fast can be used as a medium for national introspection, as a means of self-control from all parties, both government officials including law enforcement and all elements of society.
This means that in the context of personal political morality, fasting should be a laboratory to control and restrain oneself from actions that are paradoxical to human nature, namely restraining and controlling oneself from hedonistic, materialistic, arrogant, haughty and arrogant behavior.
While collectively and collegially, fasting is a medium to control and restrain excessive worldly love and paradoxical to the values and principles of justice, such as making policies and legal products that do not side with the weak, contradict public morality, and do not pay attention to the welfare of the general public, then fasting must be able to be a medium to free humans from actions and actions that are counterproductive to the values of human nature, such as the occurrence of oppressive structural domination, discrimination, hegemony, tyranny, persecution, intimidation and criminalization.
Fasting and politics have the same philosophical correlation where the output of fasting is to increase piety to God which gives birth to commendable morals, namely honesty, sincerity, humility and caring for each other so that they have polite behavior to improve harmonious social relations, as well as politics, the output is to give birth to justice and human welfare which can give birth to an honest, trustworthy, tolerant, and caring attitude so as to create a peaceful and prosperous life, so fasting and politics are one path to peace in human life. (***)
Majalengka, March 14, 2025
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