Method of the Study

follow what her father says. She likes to compare her life to her friends’ and question about everything around her. I do not know whether it was Skip’s example or not, but at the age of thirteen I really began to question why my world was like it was. How could my life be so abusive, and so dark? Why was my spirit so crushed with drudgery? I started to question everything around me: my culture, my family, my father, my religion, and of course the abuse 2009: 61 When Hannah was 13 years old, she begins to question why her world is so abusive. She starts to ask about her culture, family, father, and the abuse that are not normal. Then, Hannah opens her mind and makes herself curious and search for the truth around her society. She asks about how her life is supposed to be and how she should deal with her problems in patriarchal society. She has learned other religions to start questioning her own family’s faith system. Hannah is curious about the equality in her society. There is a struggle in her mind that must be answered. She is being critical about everything around her. Hannah’s critical mind can be seen from the way she learns many things from Quran. When she was a child, she learns Quran from what her father says without understanding what the Quran actually says. She just reads for many times without thinking about the meaning. The family member also just believes what the Quran says by listening to Hannah’s father as their Imam. They believe what the father says without considering the truth because he is believed as a holy man. For example, when the abuse happens, Hannah’s father does it in the name of his belief and says that Hannah must get punishment to maintain honour. Because of this condition, Hannah needs to know the truth about the Quran itself. I wasn’t doing a course that I required it, but one of the first things I decided to do at university was to read the Quran in English. After years of being told by holy men – like my father – what to believe, I just needed to see what it said for myself. As a child I had memorised many of the verses of the Quran in Arabic, yet without understanding more than a few words. Now I wanted to know the truth, and to understand. Sure enough, there was the wrath and anger that my father had vented on me at every turn. But there were also many more gentle, humane verses, including ones about giving money to the poor, and looking after windows and orphans. Why had my father never told me those? 2009: 120 As Hannah reads the Quran in language that she understands, she begins to realize a lot of the things that her father has told are not included in the Quran. Hannah cannot find what her father has taught. After reading the Quran from cover to cover, and she is really angry when she discovers that there are nothing whatsoever in there that reflect what her father has taught. For example, the issue of arranged marriage. Her father has told her repeatedly that the Quran preaches that every Muslim woman should have an arranged marriage, and parents should be responsible to arrange it for their children. In truth, Hannah finds that there is no single reference to this in the entire Quran. Indeed, the Quranic view of marriage involves a legal contract with women having rights, she cannot be forced to marry against her will. Hannah finds what her father has taught to them is irrelevant to what the Quran has preached. By understanding the Quran itself, Hannah concludes that what her father has said is a total lie. The truth is that the value of religion in her society is irrelevant. This condition is not about religion, but it is all the result of culture and tradition, and of course, it is about to maintain ‘honour’. Another example is, in the Quran, there is nothing that says women should be veiled from head to toe and the request for women to have their hair and PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI faces covered. In truth, Hannah finds that the content of the Quran only says men and women should dress modestly. Hannah believes that the Quran is certainly not the Quran that is taught to her by her father. She spends much time studying what the Quran actually says. She finds that what her father has tought is more about the community’s tradition of honour and shame. Starting from her curiosity and critical mind, Hannah finds the truth about her society, the society where she lives only follows the rule of culture and tradition. They do not really understand know what it actually says. I could see the confusion among the young Muslim who actually went away and read the Quran in English. It shook their certainties. But most refused to engage with me in any way at all. They persisted in reading the Quran in Arabic only. They chose to keep their mind closed. They seemed more comfortable with the certainties of ignorance, and I suppose it was their right to remain ignorant if they chose 2009: 124 People in Hannah’s society do not want to understand the Quran with the language they understand, but they only want to read it in Arabic language. They believe that by doing so, it will distract their beliefs. They choose to keep their mind closed. Being curious about this condition, Hannah becomes a critical person. Hannah thinks that people should read the Quran in a language they understand because it is better to believe from the knowledge gained through reading their holy scripture and understanding it rather than just listening to what other people tell them to believe. Hannah must be critical to find the truth about what the society has believed. In any case, in the culture of her father’s generation, she finds that religious preaching is based on an oral tradition, where things are learnt by root.