Purifying Ritual, Reworking Tradition: Muhammadiyah and the Transformation of Local Religious Practices in Indonesia

Abstract

This article examines how Muhammadiyah's purification movement transformed local religious rituals in Indonesia without assuming that reform simply eliminated tradition. Using qualitative historical-anthropological document analysis, it interprets organizational texts, classical ethnographies, historical studies, and local case research published no later than 2022. The findings identify five recurrent modes of change: removing sacral claims considered incompatible with tawhid; simplifying ritual sequences; substituting communal recitation or social service for contested ceremonies; reinterpreting cultural symbols; and selectively accommodating practices classified as social custom rather than worship. Ritual transformation varied by region, generation, organizational authority, and the social functions performed by particular ceremonies. Purification strengthened scriptural authority, reduced costly obligations, and standardized worship, but it could also weaken reciprocal solidarity, aesthetic expression, and local legitimacy when implemented through categorical denunciation. Since the early 2000s, cultural da'wa has partially recalibrated this approach by distinguishing theological correction from cultural erasure. The article concludes that Muhammadiyah's historical impact is best understood as ritual reconfiguration: local traditions were contested, displaced, translated, or reproduced within a new reformist moral order.