North Sumatra Naqsabandiyah Tarekat and Leadership Politics Polarization

DOI

10.2991/978-2-38476-436-5_27How to use a DOI?

Keywords

Naqsabandiyah; Leadership Polarization; Power

Abstract

This article contains an organizational analysis that strengthens the polarization of leadership in the Tarekat sect. In principle, organizations have goals in organizational governance, both in formal and informal forms. The Naqsabandiyah Babussalam Tarekat is one of the congregations in Besilam village (Babussalam), Langkat Regency, North Sumatra. The leadership in the Naqsabandiyah Tarekat organization is led by a Mursyid who is the highest leader of the Tarekat. The position of Mursyid is a position that is closely related to power and cannot be separated from the political dynamics within it. The legitimacy of the Mursyid’s power is so great because the followers of the Naqsabandiyah Tarekat are very obedient to their master teacher who is the Mursyid. So, the struggle for power to become a Murshid in the Naqsabandiyah Babussalam Order caused it to split into two groups, called the Upper Madrasah and the Lower Madrasah. This is what gave birth to leadership polarization within the Naqsabandiyah Order. However, in practice, there is no difference between the two. This study is the outcome of an investigation into the polarization of Naqsabandiyah Babussalam Tarekat leadership between Upper and Lower Madrasahs, as well as the pattern of Mursyid leadership changes that led to disparities in the two groups’ numbers of Mursyids. This study is qualitative research with case study research and in-depth interview methods, literature review. Historically, the Naqsabandiyah Babussalam Order was initially led by Abdul Wahab Rokan (1880–1926 H). After the fifth Murshid to lead the Babussalam Naqsabandiyah Order, Murshid Muhammad Daud (1942–1943 AD), the organization’s leadership became divided into Upper and Lower Madrasah. Eleven Mursyids have commanded Upper Madrasah to date, with Hasyim Sarwani (1997–present) serving as the most recent. There are only six Mursyids in charge of the Lower Madrasah, with Tajuddin (1972–present) serving as the final one. The tarekat, which previously ignored international issues in favor of using them as a platform for power struggles, has become disoriented as a result of this leadership polarization.

Copyright

© 2025 The Author(s)

Open Access

Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

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TY  - CONF
AU  - Heri Kusmanto
AU  - Saipul Bahri
AU  - Shahir Akram Hassan
AU  - Mohd Syakir Bin Mohd Rosdi
PY  - 2025
DA  - 2025/07/01
TI  - North Sumatra Naqsabandiyah Tarekat and Leadership Politics Polarization
BT  - Proceedings of the 9th International Conference on Indonesian Social and Political Enquiries (ICISPE 2024)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 313
EP  - 322
SN  - 2352-5398
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/978-2-38476-436-5_27
DO  - 10.2991/978-2-38476-436-5_27
ID  - Kusmanto2025
ER  -