Between Certificates and Practice

I was recently in conversation with a colleague in Japan who works on the conflicts and contestations around halal practice and halal certification in East Asia. She had just returned from a research visit to Indonesia where she had met with government officials, halal certification consultants, and ulama. In addition to tracking the changing and complex world of the now globally significant halal economy, she is, as a Muslim, also interested in challenging the hegemony of halal certification reason as it pertains to everyday life and traditional foodways in the region. Her concern is that halal certification, as a mode of halal audit assurance, is introducing a definition and practice of halal that undermines local food traditions and the viability of local businesses.

Sharing her experience in Indonesia, she mentioned to me a prominent alim – religious scholar – there who had broken with the Majlisul Ulama Indonesia (MUI) over its approach to halal. One area of conflict is the alcohol content of soya sauces and other fermented ingredients common in local food. According to the MUI all sauces and ingredients used in the manufacture of food products should not exceed an alcohol content of 0.5 percent. However, soya sauce usually has an alcohol content of between 1.5-2.0 percent. The MUI fatwa of 2018, goes into further detail about soya sauce, distinguishing between the natural fermentation process which would render the product halal since it is not for drinking purposes, yet warns that the possible addition of additives in the production process may render the product haram. MUI therefore requires that halal certified businesses use halal-certified soya sauce. At stake in the fatwa is the question of the purpose or intention of the product, as a condiment or as beverage. And the risk that food technology additives and ingredients may nevertheless render the otherwise halal soya sauce, haram. Since non-halal additives may render soya sauce non-halal, then the entire soya sauce production line must be halal certified. The issue for my Japanese colleague is that the halal certified soya sauces are often up to three or four times more expensive than popular household brands, affecting household budgets and the competitiveness of small businesses.

The alim had a further critique, beyond the question of cost or intention of production as condiment or drink. He argues that the prohibition on alcohol pertains to the matter of intoxicants as substance and intoxication as a state of mind. Using the example of beer as an intoxicant, he explained that if four beers is the threshold of intoxication, then the first three beers are permissible, and the fourth becomes haram. For him the issue is not so much alcohol as substance, but rather intoxication as effect or state of mind. Following his reason, the matter of soya sauce or the question of acceptable alcohol content thresholds in fruit juices and other beverages, that has occupied halal certification practice, becomes mute.

The position that my colleague narrated to me is in fact the traditional Hanafi position on khamr, or intoxication. Historically, the dominant position of the madhahib, legal schools of thought, ruled that khamr is an intoxicant that leads to intoxication and so therefore is haram in both small and large quantities. However, the Hanafi position differed in that they restricted their understanding of khamr to alcoholic beverages produced from grapes and dates. Other alcoholic beverages are therefore permissible, nabidh, so long as they do not lead to intoxication. Hence his notion that if four units is the threshold of intoxication then the first three units are halal and the fourth haram.

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