Epistemic Tensions and Curricular Agency in Hybrid Islamic Religious Education
This study addresses the profound legal-bureaucratic and epistemological dualism in Indonesian Islamic education by exploring how practitioners navigate the structural friction between state-mandated standard curricula (Kurikulum Merdeka) and traditional Kitab Kuning requirements. Moving beyond macro-level policy descriptions, the study investigates how frontline educators draw on religious values as active symbolic resources to negotiate educational modernization without eroding institutional identity. Employing a qualitative dual-lens phenomenological design, this study systematically integrates Transcendental Phenomenology (Husserl-Moustakas) and Interpretive Phenomenology (Van Manen). Data were generated through participant observations and in-depth, semi-structured phenomenological interviews with seven purposively sampled co-constructors of meaning—comprising Islamic Religious Education teachers, diniyah instructors, and students—at Pondok Pesantren Nahdlatut Ta’limiyah, Pamekasan, Madura. Transcripts were analyzed using epoche, phenomenological reduction, and thematic clustering. The analysis revealed four essential themes: (1) theological appreciation vs. practical burden; (2) situational-substantial epistemic hierarchy prioritizing Kitab Turats for ‘ubūdiyyah and state textbooks for formal exams; (3) prioritization of adab and barakah over neoliberal academic grading metrics; and (4) the execution of a “middle path” (tawassuṭ). Top-down synchronization functions as a violent “curricular addition” (additive curriculum), causing extreme spatial-temporal compression, severe neurocognitive fatigue, and chronic psychosocial strain. Students build a dual-axis validation system where state textbooks undergo epistemic secularization, while adab serves as a lens for axiological resistance against educational marketization. This research provides substantial value by re-conceptualizing “spiritual-professional curricular agency” driven by moral commitments to adab and barakah, rather than linear legal-rational autonomy. It moves the curriculum integration discourse from administrative layering to an ongoing site of active cultural mediation.