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participate in an activity relating to that thing. The
intention to conduct a particular activity will
eventually determine to a considerable degree
whether the activity is actually carried out. The
activity carried out is known as attitude or behaviour.
2.2 Religious Tolerance
Religious tolerance refers to an attitude accepting
diversity and freedom to practice religions/the beliefs
of other people or groups. This can happen because
the existence of a group, religion or belief is respected
by other parties. The acknowledgement is not only
limited to equality both in the setting of state, society
and in the sight of God, but also in differences in
religious instilling and worship which is in line with
a civilized and just humanity (Emmanuel, 2003,
Rahman and Khambali, 2013, Fios and Gea, 2013).
Religious tolerance however can be said to be
ability of a religious group to appreciate and accept
other religions’ beliefs and practices without
necessarily involve or practice it. It is respecting and
relating with other peoples’ religious beliefs and
values (which is quite different from personal faith
and beliefs), without enforcing personal interested
religion on others who are not adherent followers
(Alao, 2017).
According to Osborn (1993) aspects of religious
tolerance consist of: (a) acceptance, (b) appreciation,
(c) patience, (d) freedom and (e) cooperation. The key
to tolerance is accepting another person the way
he/she is. In line with the above viewpoint, Eisenstein
(2008) states that tolerance manifests itself in a
person’s willingness to accept the opinion, values,
behaviour of another person which is different from
his/her own. Therefore, it could be understood that
acceptance is a person’s willingness to accept another
person the way he/she is.
In addition to acceptance, another important thing
relating to tolerance is a person’s willingness to
appreciate everything rejected or defied by someone
(Sullivan et al., 1993). Ananda (2015) states that
tolerance manifests itself in a person’s willingness to
respect another person’s faith even though he/she
does not approve it. The willingness to respect should
be based on the belief that it is not right for anyone to
force his/her will on another person or group. No
person or group should monopolize truth, and this
conviction is based on the belief that faith is a
personal matter.
Every religion practitioner should respect the
existence of other religions with the understanding
that they respect the diversity and differences in
religious teaching of each respective religion and
belief whether the religion is sanctioned or not yet
sanctioned by the state. Confronting this reality
requires that every religion practitioner should always
be able to instill the values of diversity and position
themselves in the context of diversity based on the
spirit of mutual respect and appreciation among
different faiths. They are not supposed to defame
other religions or force their faith on to other people.
Another important thing relating to religious
tolerance is patience which constitutes a sympathetic
attitude towards different point of views and attitudes
of other people. Neufeldt (1999) states that tolerance
manifests itself in a person’s willingness to be patient
towards other people’s philosophical belief and moral
which are supposed to be different, debatable, or even
faulty. Such attitude does not mean that one shows
approval towards other beliefs. Nor does it mean that
one is indifferent towards truth and goodness, and one
should not be agnostic and sceptical. Instead, one
inclines to have the attitude of respect towards
diversity and different human dignity. Patience in the
context of religious tolerance could be taken to mean
the ability to refrain from the things disapproved or
disliked, in the framework of building better social
relationship (Khisbiyah, 2007).
Another aspect of tolerance is to give freedom to
fellow human beings or fellow residents to practice
their faiths or regulate their lives and decide their
respective destiny (Walt, 2014). The most essential
human rights are the right to freedom/independence,
both freedom to think, freedom to have their own will,
and freedom to practice their religions/ faiths.
Freedom is such a fundamental human right that it is
capable of differentiating humans from other
creatures. Religious freedom is often misunderstood
to mean freedom to practice more than one religion.
Here religious freedom means freedom to choose and
practice a faith or religion which they think is the right
way to salvation without being forced or intimidated.
In the context of Indonesia, the 1945 Constitution
article 29 section 2 states that “The state guarantees
the freedom of every citizen to profess their
respective religions and to worship according to their
religions or faiths”. It is clear that the state itself
guarantees the freedom of their people in choosing
and professing their respective religions or beliefs, as
well as guarantees and protects their people in
carrying out worship according to their respective
religions or beliefs.
Yusuf (2013), states that understanding religious
tolerance entails two interpretation towards this
concept. Firstly, there exists negative interpretation
which states that religious tolerance only requires the
attitude to let someone have their own way, and not
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