<p>Scholarly works on the way Indonesian Muslims perceive and respond to a pandemic—including Covid-19—have left an untouched theoretical gap. Works on pandemics or plagues mostly consist of sporadic and preliminary brief reflective pieces. This article endeavors to fill the academic gap concerning this theme. This article seeks to portray the dynamics of the religious disputes among Indonesian Muslims about the Covid-19 pandemic that affects the entire world. Using a qualitative method of analysis based on data derived from various sources - such as social and non-social media like newspapers and such - the paper argues that the public sphere serves as an open stage to contest ideas among society members where ideas based on sacred and scientific texts are publicly tested. While the majority of Muslims comply with the official disease prevention protocol, others resist it on the grounds that the protocol might undermine the spirit of Islam and the quality of the faith. Their resistance to some degree indicates the dominance of the deductive paradigm that religious authority is endangered in the public sphere.</p>

Social transformation carried out by the New Order government through the development program resulted on the emergence of various face of Muslim intellectuals in Indonesia. They are divergent and located in a great variety of institutional settings as well as in the interstices between a number of institutional orders. This paper aims at analysing the production and dynamics of Muslims intellectuals within the largest Muslim mass organisations in Indonesia, Nahdlatul Ulama (NU/The Awakening of Muslim Scholars). It begins with the discussion of scholarly perspectives of the correlation between Islamic organisation and Muslim intellectuals. It then examines the production of Muslim intellectuals within NU, questioning the issue of young and old generation, and finally analysing the relationship between institution and the development of intellectualism within NU.

Muslim intellectuals and `ulama> ' are two notions necessary for attempts to get deep understanding of particularly Indonesian Muslim scholars. This paper analyses the discourse of Muslim intellectuals and `ulama> ' in Indonesia before the independence period. The focus is on the practices and vectors which paved the way for the Muslim intellectuals and `ulama> ' to come to the forefront in socio-political and cultural arena of Indonesia. The paper argues that the emergence of Indonesian intellectuals was not only influenced by Muslim organisations but also by Study Clubs. It further argues that irrespective of the diverse identification of Muslims intellectuals, those with secular educational background dominated the public spehere of Indonesia in the pre-independence period than those trained in pesantren or traditional Islamic education. This codition was a result of the nexus of the colonial contribution through so-called ethical policy, the rise of socio-political and cultural association, and the emergence of study club, which gave rise to Muslim intellectuals with secular educational background.