The quote about God’s empowering grace was attributed to Nyai Masriyah Amva, the widowed leader of a religious school in West Java, Indonesia who took over the school’s reins from her husband after he died.
Her story is told in Norhayati’s latest 40-minute documentary, “Bangkit Dari Bayangan” (Rising From The Shadows), which will be screened at the Freedom Film Fest, a human rights film festival, on Aug 22.
“Bangkit Dari Bayangan” started filming last year and took nearly a year to produce, after which it was first screened during the Tokyo Docs documentary film festival in Japan.
According to Norhayati, Nyai Masriyah was at a crossroads after her husband’s death, since students were leaving the school and there were no other ulamas to be found.
Nyai would go on to challenge both the Indonesian public and her own long-held assumptions by deciding to take her husband’s place as the head of the school.
“That was what she would then say when people opposed the idea,” Norhayati recalled.
“‘My husband was great because of God’s grace. Why can’t I, a woman, achieve that same greatness by God’s grace?’,” Noryhayati said, quoting the words of Nyai.
“Not only does she continue to maintain the school, the school has grown much bigger under her leadership. The number of students have doubled.”
The school, located in the port city of Cirebon, has 700 male students and 500 female students, and is staffed by 20 to 30 teachers.
Norhayati commented that the prejudices Nyai had faced can also be found here in Malaysia, especially in the context of the shariah and high courts.
“There has been no real evidence that female judges in civil courts have any disadvantages,” Norhayati said.
“So, why are there so few female judges in the high courts and shariah courts? After all, the percentage of female judges in the lower civil courts is amazingly high!”
The underlying assumption, Norhayati noted, is that women are simply not fit to preside over courts due to their “unstable” emotional makeup, which is susceptible to being influenced by their menstrual cycles.
“Which is wrong. There is no real evidence to that. There are so many female judges in civil courts who try cases of murder and so on,” she said.
The Freedom Film Fest will run from Aug 20-27 at the PJ Live Arts Theate, Jaya One, in Petaling Jaya.