ACCORDING to PAS president Abdul Hadi Awang at a recent seminar, any Muslim who wants religion to become an exclusively private affair is a “deviant”, someone who does not follow the tenets of Islam, going so far as claiming that his party is divine and prophetic (which in itself could be considered sacrilegious, but hey, I’m no Islamic scholar).

We all remember RUU355, the Private Member’s Bill proposed by the PAS party that strove to amend the Shariah Courts (Criminal Jurisdiction) Act; a hudud-esque amendment that desired to completely remove the restrictions regarding the nature and extent of the punishment that the state assembly may assign to the shariah court.

This bill created one of the biggest divides in Malaysian politics, with PAS censuring any Malay politician who did not blindly support the bill, leaving both sides of the chasm in a screaming match while still not reaching a conclusion to this day as the parliamentary debate on the bill is perpetually delayed.

Hadi and PAS have, for decades, been trying to implement Islamic rules in Malaysia’s legal system. Its ruling stronghold in Kelantan implements strict shariah laws that ridiculously punishes insignificant and harmless conduct such as “wearing tight clothing” and not donning the tudung.

The most recent affront the Kelantanese government has imposed upon its people is the state-wide ban on karaoke and shisha; dovetail that with the lack of cinemas in the state due to its strict gender-segregation policies, and the Kelantanese people are left with very little freedom, leaving those coveting basic privileges to venture across its bordering neighbour of Thailand. Suffice to say, the party’s main goal is guerrilla warfare on freedom of religion, a phrase and concept that irates the party as a whole.

Now, because “freedom of religion” causes such ire to certain quarters, I will be using the phrase extensively henceforth. The basic concept of freedom of religion is that a person is able to choose which faith to follow based on what they genuinely believe in their heart of hearts. The very idea of a forcing a person to follow the rules of a religion is not only nonsensical from a logical point of view but also from a religious one.

If one were to truly have faith in their religion, they would not require any man-made law to mandate their behaviour and devotion, but would voluntarily follow every tenet to the letter. While freedom of religion could cause some to stray from “the right path” once in a while, those who have genuine faith in the teachings of their religion will always repent by and by without any extrinsic influence.

On the other hand, if a person were to be devoid of faith in their heart, then forcing them to do ostensibly arbitrary rituals is pointless as God would surely recognise his insincerity. You could force a person to pray five times a day every day until he dies, but would he not still end up in damnation if there was no belief in his prayers to begin with?

Religious freedom would allow followers with splinters of doubt to find God on their own path and allow those without belief to find happiness in some other form; forcing every person to follow a blanket set of rules will only put off those seeking faith and maybe even cause those who have faith to lose it.

PAS’ forlorn concept of an Islamic state can bring nothing but pain and sorrow in society, both in the short term and the long term.

* Ikmal Rozlan reads The Malaysian Insight.

* This is the opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of The Malaysian Insight. Article may be edited for brevity and clarity.