Islam in Russia
– Part 2
By Dr. Rizwana Rahim
Chicago, IL
Islam first entered Russia across
the Caucasus in the 7th century, but it took two
centuries for it to reach Russia’s heartland,
between the Volga river and Ural mountains, through
Central Asia. It was introduced in a peaceful
way through economic and trade relations with
Arab merchants and through missionary contacts,
unlike armed conflicts across the Caucasus region.
By 674 AD, Arab forces had crossed the Amu Darya
(Oxus River) and taken over Bukhara, and fanned
out. By 750 AD, Islam had spread from the Atlantic
Ocean to the Indus River, a 6,000-wide area. Considerable
evidence of Islamic presence has been found around
Itil (Attil), the Khazar capital in the Volga
delta, and Great Bulgar: mosques (including a
cathedral one with a minaret) from 9-10th century,
madrassahs, Sufi cloisters, mausoleums and tombstones.
However, since most of it was wooden construction
(unlike stone as in Dagestan), what did survive
in good condition wasn’t much. This is in
addition to what Ivan the Terrible caused.
The earliest archaeological evidence of Islamic
presence here dates back to 8-9th century. What
was unearthed at the Levashovsky burial site,
an early Muslim cemetery in the Ishimbay region,
Southern Bashkorostan, included three silver dirhems
(one silver dinar from 712 AD) and a gold dinar
(from 706 AD) from the Umayyad and Abbasid caliphates.
The Volga-Ural region and its Muslims get no significant
international media coverage, by comparison with
North Caucasus, even though theirs (Tatars, Chuvash
and Bashkirs) is by far the largest population
in Russia, with a combined total of about 9 million,
or about 45% of Russian Muslims (compared to about
a million Chechens and 2.1 million Dagestanis).
Tatars form the largest group at 3.8% of the total
Russian population, followed by Chuvash at 1.2%
and Bashkir at 0.9%. These descendants of Volga
Bulgarians accepted Islam in 922, facilitated
by Ahmad ibn-Fadlan of Baghdad Caliphate legation,
who spread the religion further, and even changed
the ancient Turkic runic to Arabic script. In
Uzbek Khan’s reign (1312–42 AD), Islam
became the official religion of the Golden Horde.
Among the earliest Bulgar literature is the long
poem by Kul Gali entitled “Kyssai-Yusuf”
(1212) written in a language similar to the modern
literary language of the Kazan Tatars. Before
the 1917 Revolution, according to Robert Landa
(Institute of Oriental Studies, Moscow), 17% of
Russian aristocracy had Islamic roots. “Scratch
a Russian,” Napoleon is reported to have
said, “and you’ll find a Tatar underneath.”
Muslims always served, traditionally over the
centuries, in the Russian army.
Kazan (cauldron, in English) is Tatarstan’s
capital city of 1.5 million people, about 500
miles south-southeast of Moscow. It is the northernmost
Islamic capital and Islamic culture center in
the world (however, Muslims also live in Udmurtia,
a republic on its northern borders, and have mosques
etc., albeit on a much smaller scale). Kazan is
the birthplace of Leo Tolstoy and at Kazan State
University he and Lenin (whose father had Tatar
ancestry) were also students. Kazan, a center
of Tatar culture and power for centuries, is also
home to over 70 ethnic groups and nationalities,
with a slight majority (49% over 44%) of Muslim
over ethnic Christians. A similar ethnic mix exists
in its eastern neighbor, Bashkortostan, where
Muslims form 50.3% of the population.
During the pre-Mongol period (10th to 13th century),
Kazan was key to military and commercial Russia;
from then on till the 15th century, it was part
of the Golden Horde territory. Under Uzbek Khan’s
reign (1312–42 AD), Islam became the official
religion of the Golden Horde; he had educated
Bulgar Muslim preachers sent on missions to the
Bashkirs.
Kazan was an independent Khanate from 1438 AD
on till Ivan the Terrible conquered it in 1552
after several highly destructive onslaughts. His
forces burnt the two-story, eight-minaret Kul
Sharif Mosque, within Kazan Kremlin, named after
the last Imam of Kazan Khanate, Seid Kul Sharif,
who had fought against Ivan. The Khanate was absorbed
in tsarist Russia, which was followed by the Soviet
Union. After 1991, there were some tense moments
when Tatarstan demanded more autonomy and Yeltsin
threatened to send in troops. However, because
of some subsequent agreements, Tatarstan remained
a Russian republic.
Kazan Kremlin on the Volga, the only Tatar fortress
in Russia and a pilgrimage place for the Tatars,
is another UNESCO World Heritage site, recognized
in 2000 (three years before the Derbent citadel).
It is a testimony to synthesis of diverse cultures,
from Bulgar, Mongol (Golden Horde), Tatar, Russian
to Italian, with architectural and religious influences
dating back to the 10th century. Ivan and his
successors tried to eradicate Islam and impose
Christianity on many occasions. Though they failed,
the Tatars, in the past 450 years, have neither
forgotten nor forgiven the Russians for it. Kazan
Kremlin is still a sore rallying point for the
Tatars. In the 1774 revolt, Kazan was destroyed,
but it was rebuilt during the reign of Catherine
the Great who in 1788 permitted the Tatar to freely
practice Islam that resulted in Islamic revival
that continued till the early 19th century.
In 1996, reconstruction was started on Kul Sharif
Mosque, which includes a library, a publishing
center, and Imam’s Administration block,
in addition to the mosque. It stands about 100
yards from the Blagoveschensky Cathedral, both
in Kazan Kremlin. Such religious tolerance prevails
traditionally in most of Tatarstan. The newly
established Union of Muslims of Russia, led by
Imam Khatyb Mukaddas of Tatarstan, began in 1995
a movement to improve interethnic understanding
to remove misconceptions about Islam. After the
Soviet era, Islam seems to have found a base among
the young. According to the Imam of Kazan City
Mansour Zalialetdinov who presides over the area’s
oldest stone mosque, Al Marzjani, close to one
thousand people now visit Al Marzjani every day,
many of whom are in their twenties and thirties.
For young Muslims in Tatarstan, Islam is believed
to represent “a way of living, not just
a cultural code,” says Orkhan Djemal, the
Press Secretary for Eurazes Party, which holds
a small number of seats in the Tatar Parliament.
However, in this spirit of tolerance, there is
also some irony: Just a short distance from the
Kremlin is a huge entertainment center ‘The
Pyramid’, complete with bars and gambling
places and an assembly hall where ‘Ms Tatarstan”
beauty competition is held.
As another indication of the vigor of Islamic
renaissance there stands in Kazan the first Russian
Islam University, established in 1998 for students
from the city’s many existing madrassahs
who do not now need to go elsewhere or be influenced
by foreign extremism. The Ash-Shafii Islamic Institute
in Dagestan is perhaps the only other Islamic
research institution in Russia.
Unlike radical extremism, local or exported as
seen in Chechnya and other Caucasian republics,
this Volga-Ural region has a tradition of moderate
and even a progressive approach to Islam. Crimean-Tatar
has been the source and center of a reform cultural/religious
movement (Jadidism, or also called ‘Euro-Islam’)
that has, since the later half of 19th century,
emphasized education as a way to bring Islam into
the modern world. The concept was introduced by
the Crimean-Tatar journalist, Ismail-bey Gasprinsky
in late 1880s and publicized through his newspaper,
‘Terjuman’. In essence, it rejects
religious fundamentalism and extremism. Tatar
President Shamiiyev has been one of its great
promoters in recent years. This movement later
entered and spread far into Central Asia. Adeeb
Khalid’s book “The Politics of Muslim
Cultural Reform: Jadidism in Central Asia”
(1999) is a scholarly treatise on the movement.
Bashkortostan is probably the only place in Russia
where Islam is not a threat or the issue/source
of socio-political, religious or ideological conflicts.
It’s just a way of life in a stable society,
as has been the case since 16th century -- protected
and preserved in the agreements when this state
voluntarily joined Russia, which avoided forced
conversion to Christianity. During the 16th to
18th century, Muslim waqfs were practically helpless
, but with the establishment of the Muslim Spiritual
Assembly in Orenburg in 1789, the ukase (state-appointed)
mullahs had some additional powers. Islam in both
Republics has been functioning under an overall
Orthodox state, which makes Russian Islam substantially
different from other countries of the Muslim world.
Despite some unwelcome incursions, both Republics
reflect a degree of tolerance that comes from
flexibility in a multi-ethnic society.
In the post-perestroika era, Islam’s reawakening,
in a non-threatening manner to the State or other
faiths, stands in pleasant contrast to other regions
in Russia and elsewhere.
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