I was googling to find inspiration for my Capital Market assignment on Sharia in Asia from my BAPEPAM's lecturer when I stranded on an interesting blog post from Hidayat Amir. He is a researcher in the Fiscal Policy Office of the Indonesian MoF. It surprised me that we work in the same office, the Ministry of Finance, but different agency. We are also graduated from the same college. Anyway, this post isn't going to be about him, but about his blog post. Pardon me, Mr. Hidayat, for my audacity, but I have to mention you because as I said before, your blog is a wake up call for my brain hibernation *grin*
okay, focus on the subject now.. Mr. Hidayat's post was about an economic model, namely the Laffer Curve. It was introduced by Arthur Laffer. The curve describes that an increase in tax tariff won't automatically increase tax revenue. Laffer himself got the concept from a Moslem scholar from Tunisia, Ibnu Khaldun. Ibnu Khaldun is famous for his book, The Muqaddimah, the book about history, science and economy. Ever since I was little, I always feel curious about Moslem scholars, because my lecturers often told me that all science and knowledge in this world is derived from the holy book of Al Qur'an. Unfortunately since the decadency of Islam when the Turkey Ottoman fell, the works of these brilliant scholars was left behind. Anyway, knowing that Ibnu Khaldun is also talk about economy in his book, I was intrigued to read his book. Try to google using several keyword, I was astounded as I found out that I can read his works online!
I read a couple essays and felt admonished by his writing on the one of the aspects of making a living about craftmanship. His sentence is "The crafts, especially writing and calculation, give intelligence to the person who practices them". It shooks me in the head. I remembered my forgotten blog. I kept on postponing writing on this blog, whereas I've already made promise to myself to start a new learning phase by writing everything I have in mind. I remembered a book from Mr. Hernowo, named Mengikat Makna. In general, the book is about how we can generate more meaningful things by writing it down, it's called binding an understanding about knowledge to our head so that (hopefully) we won't forget it forever. I've practiced it several times, and I think it really works, I just need to practice it even more.
Well, this reading and writing for me, is a must. I remember a quote from René Descartes: "Cogito Ergo Sum". Maybe this line is quite familiar for some of us. The meaning is "I'm thinking, therefore I exist". My interpretation on this quotation is reading, thinking, understanding, and writing is human's basic needs. Therefore, if someone doesn't perfom those actions, then people can consider him/her as not exist. Sounds awful? Well, maybe I'm being overreacted on this *evil grin* I have a justification for this, my overreacting behavior is a way to encourage me to read and write more, so I can bind the meaning of knowledge in my head. The goal is to have Allah's blessings, as Muslim hadith says "When a man dies, his deeds come to an end, except for three: A continuous charity, knowledge by which people derive benefit, pious son who prays for him.'' Amin. Insya Allah.