Daily Inspiration Quote by Abdurrahman Wahid

Wahid is warning that religion can become a flag for bureaucracy, not a compass for ethics. The line pivots on a slippery substitution: Islam-as-faith quietly turns into Islam-as-institution, and once that swap happens, protection of the sacred gets outsourced to protection of the state. It is less a theological claim than a diagnosis of political psychology: people defend “territories” and “everything institutional” because institutions offer tangible enemies, clear boundaries, and the emotional payoff of loyalty. Faith, by contrast, is harder to police and harder to weaponize.

The intent is reformist and deliberately destabilizing. Wahid, as Indonesia’s president and a long-time Muslim pluralist, had seen how easily Islamic identity could be recruited into projects of national security, authoritarian “order,” or sectarian gatekeeping. His phrasing (“we tend to”) spreads responsibility widely; this isn’t just an accusation aimed at extremists but a critique of a common reflex inside communities under pressure. When believers feel Islam is “in danger,” the defense strategy often defaults to whatever looks solid: armies, borders, ministries, parties. The subtext is that this defense can betray Islam’s moral aims by elevating power over conscience.

Rhetorically, the sentence works through repetition (“defending…defending…defending”) to mimic the escalating logic of institutional loyalty. By the end, “Islam” is almost absent, replaced by the machinery said to represent it. Wahid is inviting a painful question: when you say you’re defending religion, are you actually defending God - or defending your preferred regime.