JAKARTA - Chairman of the Indonesian Mosque Council, Jusuf Kalla invites Muslims in Indonesia to become entrepreneurs. He invited Indonesian Muslims to become entrepreneurs because the first propagator of Islam in Indonesia, one of them, was a merchant cleric. The figure of the Prophet Muhammad and his family were also traders.
Speaking at the Second People's Economic Congress on Saturday, December 11, JK said the figure who spread Islam from among traders made the character of Islam in Indonesia and generally in Southeast Asia tend to be friendly and peaceful. This is different from the spread of Islam in other areas that use the way of war.
“Why is Southeast Asia safe, there is no war between Muslim-majority countries? Because those who brought Islam were businessmen from Yemen and the Middle East. Our Islam, one of them, was brought by traders who were ulama," said JK quoted from the official MUI website.
The spread of Islam from the merchant clerics, said JK, must continue to be the material for da'wah delivered by the ulama. Every current cleric, he said, must invite the people to become traders. Rasulullah SAW also, he said, was also a merchant figure. So trading is a sunnah of the Prophet.
JK said that the condition of Muslims in Indonesia is concerning, one of which is the lack of awareness of trade. Of the 10 richest people in Indonesia according to Forbes magazine, only one is a Muslim. Of the 100 richest people in Indonesia, only 9 are Muslims.
"The national economy without entrepreneurs can cripple. I encourage Muslims to build a culture of entrepreneurship," he said.
He saw that the entrepreneurial world would test the Muslim character to become more resilient. Entrepreneurial Muslims will dare to compete, getting better, faster, and providing cheaper products.
The business world, he said, knows no religious background. When he performed Umrah, for example, he saw that 90 percent of the products traded in Saudi Arabia such as caps, belts, and the like came from China.
"Because trade is the key to compete, better, faster and cheaper," he concluded.
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