Given the characteristics of leader and follower, the interrelationships between them are quite different to those of either kyai-santri relationships at other pesantren, or social relationships in general. In this section I will describe three typical relationships between leader and follower to be found at Daarut Tauhid.
The first I call the cognitive-rational relationship. By this I mean the relationship through which knowledge is transmitted in Daarut Tauhid. There are two kinds of knowledge transmission at Daarut Tauhid: formal and informal.
In the case of formal knowledge transmission, which is common to any teacher-student relationship, Aa Gym functions as the source of knowledge while the follower (the jemaah and the santri) acts as his students. Aa Gym’s knowledge is transmitted at the twice-weekly Taushiyah Penyejuk Hati, the taushiyah following every congregational shalat, and various workshops and training courses.
In this formal relationship, the followers tend to play a passive role in that they just listen and then practise what they have learned. They believe that what Aa Gym says comes from Allah and is thus absolutely true. Although followers did raise questions during the pengajian, I never heard any question that put Aa Gym’s preaching in doubt. Most, if not all, of the questions simply asked Aa Gym’s advice on problems faced by followers. One woman asked, for example, how to cope with her anger towards her unfaithful boyfriend while Islam, as Aa Gym often preaches, teaches Muslims not to hate anyone.
Informal knowledge transmission is more typical than formal transmission of knowledge. Here, the process of knowledge transmission is viewed as timeless, and both the Aa Gym and the follower become at once the “teacher” and the “student.” Concerning this, Aa Gym said:
In this system, all of us play the role of the teacher and the student. There is no time without learning. I learn as many lessons from others as they from me. Similarly, the santri here always try to learn from each other and from the system itself. Thus the learning process happens all the time.
Not all followers have access to the process of informal transmission of knowledge because not all of them have personal relationships with Aa Gym. This informal relationship happens exclusively with santri followers, because they live in or work for Daarut Tauhid. Thus only they have the relatively constant, close contact with Aa Gym necessary to evolve personal relationships. Jemaah followers are less likely to have this relationship with Aa Gym, because they only visit Daarut Tauhid either twice weekly, to attend the pengajian, or daily, to attend the pengajian and the study of classical Islamic texts, or periodically to carry out workshops and retreats.
The second interrelationship within Daarut Tauhid is what I would call the affective-emotional relationship. In discussing this, three notions are relevant: charisma, barakah, and fellowship.
As is almost always the case with local grass-roots leaders, such as the Javanese kyai, Aa Gym is highly charismatic. The dreams involving the Prophet Muhammad, the miraculous power of ma’unah, and his extraordinary ability to gain the ilmu laduni provide the core of his charisma. This is compounded by his managerial leadership and religious piety. Having those charismatic qualities allows Aa Gym to be conceived of as a channel for barakah (divine blessing), not the other way around, as Dhofier (1980c:53) suggests: “…being a source of barakah allow[s] kyai to develop charismatic leadership.”
The relationship between Aa Gym and his followers is therefore similar to that between the murshid and the murid of the Sufistic traditions or between the holy men and the laity among tribal traditions. Besides being the source of religious knowledge and advice, Aa Gym is viewed by his followers as a channel of barakah. [Note that he is a “channel”, rather than a “source” of barakah (see again Dhofier above), since, for them, only Allah can be the source of divine blessings, humans can only be a channel.] Followers kissing his hand, in the hope of receiving barakah, was a phenomenon I witnessed either following every pengajian or on personal encounters. Aa Gym once told his audience, in which I was a member, the same phenomenon occurred in Singapore after he delivered a pengajian there.
The notion of barakah also allows followers to ask Aa Gym for specific do’a, for it is believed that offering a do’a to Allah through Aa Gym is most likely, if not definitely, to be attended to by Allah. This is supported by the well-known recommendation of K. H. Khoer Affandi: “Go to Aa Gym as often as you can because I find his do’a to Allah highly attended.”
This notion of barakah seems to be often spoken of by Aa Gym. That Aa Gym publicly told his audience about his experience in Singapore suggests this inclination to highlight barakah. He also claimed that his extensive knowledge of Islam was partly gained via the barakah generated from his deep respect for the ulama, particularly those who personally guide him, such as K. H. Khoer Affandi. He seemed to suggest that his acquisition of ilmu ladunni is in part a result of barakah. At a pengajian I attended, he told the audience a story exemplifying this aspect of barakah.
A santri, it was said, of a great kyai used to serve and help the kyai. He went wherever the kyai went, helping him with everything such as bringing the kyai’s bag. He also washed his clothes and other items such as shoes and thongs. In short, he acted as the servant of the kyai instead of studying as a santri. This was all he did during his stay at the kyai’s pesantren. After several years the kyai asked the servant santri to leave the pesantren and found a pesantren of his own. When the santri, being aware that he had never studied and thus had no competent knowledge, did not believe him and told the kyai that it was impossible, the kyai replied: “Just go and rely upon Allah. I am convinced you have much Islamic knowledge to teach.”
The knowledge of this santri is held to be Allah-given and generated from barakah by serving the kyai.
Needless to say, this kind of story has a considerable impact, intended or not, on his followers’ attitudes towards him. This leads an observer to judge that some followers demonstrate a sort of kultus individu (the cult of the individual) towards Aa Gym (Karim 1993:63). While this judgement may be true to a certain extent, any cult of the individual tends to be the result of the follower’s awe at the personal qualities of Aa Gym, and it is actually kept to a minimum both by the modesty of Aa Gym and by the friendly relations he promotes with his followers.
The third relationship I want to mention is therefore that of fellowship. Aa Gym tends to view his followers, particularly those of the santri category, as his colleagues in developing the pesantren and in orienting the jemaah and Muslims at large. They work together on the basis of give and take. Interestingly, this fellowship does not minimise the follower’s respect for Aa Gym, perhaps because of Aa Gym’s aweinspiring personal qualities. There is thus a balance between the tendency to create a cult around the personality of Aa Gym and the relational intimacy he promotes. In this way, the intimate fellowship is part of Aa Gym’s charisma. (Compare Guinness 1986:180-181.)
In order to promote this intimacy, Aa Gym appears to feel free doing things that other kyai never do. For example, he has his weekly turn at sweeping the pesantren environment. Note that Daarut Tauhid has also taken the initiative to perform opsih (clean up activities) in the area around its complex. Daarut Tauhid takes the initiative to place rubbish bins throughout the streets and to clean the streets daily. Aa Gym takes his turn at this every Friday. Another example is that Aa Gym himself once called Adzan, which other kyai never do, to mark shalat maghrib time. At that time, his followers, as well as myself, were breaking the fast since it was Ramadhan. After saying Adzan, he broke the fast with his followers, as though he were one of them. These examples illustrate the extent of fellowship relations.
Finally, there exists what can be termed an entrepreneurial relationship. As briefly mentioned earlier, Daarut Tauhid runs a number of businesses ranging from computer rental and selling handicrafts, to a mini-market and a mini-bank. The entrepreneurial relationship between pesantren Daarut Tauhid and its followers is vital to the economic endeavours of the pesantren.
The followers, first of all, are the best clients of the pesantren’s entrepreneurial activities. They are the best customers of Daarut Tauhid’s mini-market, which provides daily needs and services, as are they of the rental services provided by the pesantren, such as sound systems, transportation, and so on. They are also the potential nasabah (customers) for Daarut Tauhid’s mini-bank, Data Baitut Tamwil.[13] It was only founded in June 1994 and, within six months of development, it had gained national recognition as the best mini-bank run by a pesantren. Its fast growth owes much to the followers’ perception: that taking part in it is, besides a way of saving, a form of charity because Daarut Tauhid promises to spend the profit mainly in helping poor people develop ways of earning income, and that helping the mini-bank grow is a communal effort in developing the Muslim community. This perception applies to other aspects of Daarut Tauhid’s economic ventures. Daarut Tauhid thus provides, and benefits from, an economic engagement with its followers that has religious meaning, an added value to other, more purely secular, economic activities.
Seen from another angle of economics, the followers function for Daarut Tauhid as a very effective instrument of advertisement. When returning home, followers bring with them oral, sometimes printed, information about what Daarut Tauhid has to offer and what is going on there. In fact, the distribution of information by followers on behalf of the pesantren applies to all sorts of activities of Daarut Tauhid. For example, the massive attendance at pengajian and short-term workshops and training courses also owes much to these distribution activities. The dissemination of information by the followers becomes an information network that spreads wider and wider in accordance with the increasing number of followers.
Finally, the followers are deeply concerned contributors of both ideas and critiques on the development of Daarut Tauhid. Suggestion boxes by which they can air their thoughts have been provided. Aa Gym said that Daarut Tauhid is a Muslim owned centre, and that they are all involved in making it better.
[13] Data stands for Daarut Tauhid, while Baitut Tamwil is an Arabic term for banking, literally meaning the store of wealth. Data Baitut Tamwil is Daarut Tauhid’s bank that operates savings and loans, just like usual banks. However, it attempts to implement an Islamic banking system that is based on Islamic principles of cooperation. It offers, for example, an equal division of benefits, instead of offering interest that is considered to be forbidden riba (usury).