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163 Gladney, p. 459. 164 Polonskaya, Ludmila and Malashenko, Alexei. Islam in Central Asia. Ithaca Press, 1994, p. 31. 165 Ibid., p. 33. 166 r \ ~ Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
170 developed during the 19th century as a response to the advancing Russian colonization. The country’s new independent status after the Soviet collapse gave the Muftiyat (Muslim Spiritual Board) of the Kyrgyz republic the right to officially establish itself in 1996. Today the Muftiyat has twenty departments/divisions and four vice presidents. The country has seven provinces and each has its own kaziyat, or religious administration. Before 1991 there were thirty-nine registered mosques in Kyrgyzstan. Today there are about two thousand of them, more than half of which are officially registered. Until 1995- 1997, people built mosques by the means of ashar, volunteer work. After that Arab investors began helping to build new mosques. During the last four years, the building of new mosques has increased tremendously. In northern Kyrgyzstan, many mosques have been built with the support of foreign and local sponsors. Before its construction, every mosque must obtain permission from the Muftiyat. Permission is given on the basis of population, the number of people who actually pray, and whether they need a place to gather and pray together. If that village or town has an old existing mosque, they help to restore it. The Muftiyat approves the project only if the people themselves request a mosque, because there are some people who want to build a mosque for their own personal interests. In some places, new mosques have been built and old ones restored, however, no one goes to them. The Arabs simply leave after they finish building the mosque. As for the architecture of the mosques, it depends on the landscape. Sponsors usually propose their own projects. The size varies according to the number of people who will be using the mosque. Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
171 I interviewed two key Muslim clergy in Kyrgyzstan: Muratal'i Aji' Jumanov, i fa Muftiy of the Kyrgyz Republic, and Abdi'shiikur Narmatov, former President of the Islamic Institute in Bishkek. We discussed religious developments and renewal in Kyrgyzstan since the country’s independence. Abdi'shiikur Narmatov,168 who at the time of the interview was serving as the President of the Islamic Institute in Bishkek, described the establishment of the Institute. It is said that the idea for creating such an Institute appeared right after Kyrgyzstan became independent in 1991. Before the Muslim clergy of Kyrgyzstan used to belong to the main Tashkent headquarters, which included all of Central Asia, including Kazakhstan. During the Soviet period, there was only one medrese (from Ar. “madrasa”, “religious school”) in the whole Soviet Union; it was in Bukhara. When the Islamic Institute was established in Tashkent, the Muslim scholars in Kyrgyzstan initiated the idea of opening a medrese in Bishkek. The medrese was opened at the old existing mosque, which was being rebuilt. The medrese was opened with only eight or nine students who were Kyrgyz citizens studying in Bukhara accepted other students, and opened it in 1990. At that time, this institute did not have a building or 167 Muratal'i Aji (hajji) Jumanov was born in 1974 in the village o f Intimak o f the province of Osh, southern Kyrgyzstan. In 1991 he began his religious education at the Hazreti Uthman medrese in the city o f Kizi'l- Ki'ya, another small city in southern Kyrgyzstan. From 1998-2000 he attended the Islamic Institute in Ufa, Russia. Upon his return from Ufa, he served as an imam and later worked as a teacher in Kizil-KYya. He also served as the vice qa zi o f the Osh province for three years. In 1999 he came to Bishkek to serve as the press secretary o f the Muftiyat. Later he became the deputy o f the Muftiy. Since 2002, Jumanov has been serving as the Muftiy of the Kyrgyz Republic. 168 From 1993 to 2000 Narmatov Abdi'shiikur studied in Egypt and graduated from the department o f Law and Shari’a. Since November o f 2000 he has been serving as the President o f the Islamic Institute. He is married and has two sons and two daughters. In addition to heading the Institute, every Friday, Narmatov appears on a program called “Juma Qutbasi” (Friday Preaching) which is aired on Kyrgyz national TV and Radio Corporation. Besides these, he works in collaboration with a TV program called “Kolomto Ruh Ordosu” (Hearth [family] as the Center for Spirituality) and teaches in the Arab department of the Kyrgyz Architectural and Construction Institute. Every Friday he gives an hour o f religious talk on the Friday prayer at the central mosque here in Bishkek. Recently he translated the Quran into Kyrgyz and the copies of the publication was distributed to people free of charge, because Quran must not be sold. Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 172 enough teachers. Later in 1993 the small medrese turned into an institute with the aim of educating people about Islam in Kyrgyzstan. During the seventy or eighty years of Communist rule, as Narmatov notes, Kyrgyz people had distanced themselves from Islam and its values. Even though more than 80% of Kyrgyzstan’s population is Muslim, people had no or very little knowledge of Islam. Therefore, it was necessary to raise the level of religious education of existing imams and prepare young Kyrgyz religious scholars and revive and develop forgotten Islamic practices and values. In 2003, the Islamic Institute celebrated its ten-year anniversary. Those who graduate from the Institute as imams are sent to countryside, where there is a shortage of imams, e.g., in the Narin province of northern Kyrgyzstan. There are a total of 415 students at the Institute, of whom 130 are women. About 80% are ethnic Kyrgyz. There are also some young Russian men and women who have converted to Islam. In addition, there are Uzbek and Uygur men and women from Uzbekistan and Kazakh students from Kazakhstan. About 80% of the teaching staff is Kyrgyz. Arabic is mandatory for the students. Each week students study at least eight hours of Arabic. They study free of charge at this Institute. The Institute also has Arab teachers. Teachers’ salary is paid by the Muftiyat. Thus Islamic revival and development in Kyrgyzstan began with building of mosques and medreses. As mentioned above during the Soviet period, there were only about forty mosques in Kyrgyzstan. Bishkek had only one small mosque. Narmatov recalls that in 1990, only about forty aksakals (white-bearded elderly men) would come for the Friday prayer. All together, there would be 60 or 70 people. They were mostly Uighurs, Tatars, and Dungans (Hui), but no young ethnic Kyrgyz. Today, more than 80% Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission.
173 of the people who come to the mosque are young Kyrgyz men. Now there are nearly 2000 mosques, seven Islamic institutes, and many medreses. Narmatov also mentioned the fact that government officials who preached atheism began following basic Islamic rules and practices. He notes that during Soviet times, when the father of a government official died, he could not participate at his father’s janaza (funeral prayer before the body is taken to he burial ground). Even the former president Akayev invited official Muslim clergy for if tar (evening meal after fasting during the holy month of Ramadan) to his residency. Along these positive changes, Narmatov also points out the “negative” religious developments. Being more democratic and open society than the other Central Asian states, Kyrgyzstan has been allowing all kinds of foreign religious sects into the country. He mentioned that these different Christian sects (about forty) are creating many misunderstandings among both Muslim and Christian people, who in the past lived peacefully side-by-side. There are many cases in which young Kyrgyz people convert to other religions than Islam. Like many other practicing Muslim clergy and ulema (religious scholars) Narmatov wants Islam to fully penetrate into the Kyrgyz society. He notes “the religion of Islam is not only about going to a mosque or wearing certain clothes. It is everything. Without Islam, we cannot have good economic development or achieve moral values. Islam should play a big role in our lives. When Allah Taala created each human being, he said there is a void in their heart and that void should be filled with Islam.” Narmatov also admits that it is difficult to educate people about all aspects of Islam and make them applicable to their everyday lives in ten years. He thinks that there Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 174 should be more missionary work (iigiit-nasaat) and religious educational programs on TV and radio. One should introduce the subject of iyman [faith] into the schools. I also interviewed several Kyrgyz intellectuals, scholars and poets, on the significance of Islam for them and for Kyrgyz society in general. Since most Kyrgyz scholars and intellectual and were educated in the Soviet period and thus had none or very little religious education, their opinions vary tremendously from those of the pious Muslim clergy. Kachkinbay Artikbayev (Doctor of Kyrgyz philology, Kyrgyz State National University, Bishkek) who is a well-known and respected scholar in Kyrgyzstan, expressed the following strong opinion on the subject of Islamic renewal: We do not need new mosques. They are worth nothing. That time has passed. Today the young people do not care for them. Those who practiced religion and prayed five times a day are all gone. In our village, a young Kyrgyz man built a mosque with the help of Arabs. It is built poorly. There are only 150 households in the village and only about five or six people go to the mosque. People did not ask for a mosque. That young Kyrgyz man got rich from it. There are many young people who convert to Christianity for money. They are given $3 or $5 a day and asked to bring their friends. Mostly people who have low education and a weak personality are easily deceived.16 There are many people who violate religion even in Saudi Arabia. The Quran has gone through many changes according to the politics and interests of the people who wrote and interpreted it. I myself believe in the existence of a supernatural power. However, we misunderstand it. Islam fosters the theory that one must be content with whatever God has written on one’s forehead. (I think all presidents like this idea). In other words, one must be content with being poor or a slave. This is the harmful side of the religion (Islam). In my opinion, a person 169 According to the recent report o f the Kyrgyz Program of the Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty, in the southern province of Jalal-Abad, Christian missionary groups are targeting mostly unemployed and poor people with health problems and little or no education. It is said that there are at least thousand people, of which over 90% are ethnically Kyrgyz, who have converted to Chrsitianity. The members o f the Christian orgzanitions in Jalal-Abad, such as “New Life” (Jangi' jashoo) and “Jesus the Savior” (Isa mashayak), are mostly young men who have identity problems because they are not yet “intellectually developed and thus have not found their place in life, or who have problems in their family.” The staff o f these organizations donate one tenth o f their salary to support the needy and the orphans. According to the local journalist Anarkhan Jang'fbaeva, between one thousand to three thousand soms ($25-$70) are given per person to convert to Christianity. (RFERL, Wednesday, November 29, 2006, www.azattyk.org). Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. should do whatever he/she can do to better his/her life by getting an education and improve his/her mind. Thieves do bad things because they have a hard life. No matter how much you teach iyman (faith) to people, it will be no use if it does not feed them. There are many elderly Kyrgyz scholars and intellectuals who share similar views. Unlike the new generation of young and middle aged Muslim Kyrgyz men and clergy, most of these intellectuals lived a nomadic life in their youth and thus developed a strong attachment to Kyrgyz traditional values and practices, which they learned from their parents and grandparents. They possess a rich knowledge of Kyrgyz oral traditions and they will not tolerate any other ideology or dogma, which undermines the value of this unique oral literary heritage. Some of them have systematized this view into a set of beliefs that they call Tengirchilik, discussed in Chapter 6. One of these intellectuals, Omiiraliev explained to me what the Islamic fundamentalists oppose in Kyrgyz culture: People have been living following their own customs and traditions. What kind of process is taking place today? They [foreign and local Islamic clergy] are forcing people to adopt [Islam] fully through radio and television. The process is occurring of introducing by force everything that is taking place in Arabia. However, the culture of those people living in the desert and here is different. They are not compatible. For example, in the south (southern Kyrgyzstan), they tell people to bury their dead as soon as the person dies. Yes, the condition in hot places [i.e. Arabia] did not allow them to keep their dead for a long time. But we live in the cool mountains here, and people waited for each other and showed their last respect to the deceased. People waited for two, five and seven days until all the relatives and people arrived. They sang mourning songs in which they glorified the deeds of the deceased person, starting from his birth until his death. Such a custom does not exist in other cultures. Others think that we are just singing songs, however, the philosophy is different. If people follow what the mullahs say, they will lose their koshok, [funeral lament]. Koshok is a great world in itself. We have Kani'key’s koshok, a koshok sung in honor of Ormon Khan [19th century] and so on. These are not simple rituals, but rather people’s worldview. If we lose this tradition, we lose our essence of being a [Kyrgyz] people. Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 176 Saudi Arabia has played a major role in the rapid growth of Islamic revival and militant Islam in post-Soviet Central Asia.170 The militant groups such as the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU), attempted to overthrow the secular regime of Uzbek government and establish an Islamic state, are said to have had the backing of Saudi Arabia. The first wave of Saudi support to Central Asia came after the Soviet occupation 171 of Afghanistan in 1979, which was a “wake up call” for the entire Islamic world. Saudi Arabia was the first Islamic country to which the Afghani turned for help because “it had powerful financial resources” and most importantly was the home of “300-350,000 people who had originally come from Central Asia, mostly from Uzbekistan, as descendants of pilgrims who had settled there in pre-Revolutionary times and as
defeat in Soviet times.”172 Soon after the collapse of the Soviet atheist regime, the Saudis began sponsoring the construction of mosques in all of the newly established independent states of Central Asia. By 1994 over 15,000 new mosques had been built in the region.173 According to Mehrdad Haghayeghi “In 1990, Saudi Arabia donated 1,000,000 copies of the Koran to the religious board of Uzbekistan for distribution.”174 Local religious/charity organizations that were extremist in nature received financial support from Saudi Arabia 170 McKay, Jonathan, “Central Asia, Islamic Fundamentalism, and the Saudi Connection.” Final paper submitted for the course “Islam and Native Religion Among the Nomadic Peoples o f Central Asia, NEAR496C/596C” offered in Winter 2006 by Elmira Kochiimkulova, Ph.D. Candidate, Interdisciplinary Ph.D. Program in Near and Middle Eastern Studies, University o f Washington, Seattle. 171 Ibid., p. 3. 172 Naumkin, Vitaly V. “Militant Islam in Central Asia: The Case of the Islamic Movement o f Uzbekistan.” Spring 2003. The Berkeley Program in Soviet and Post-Soviet Studies. http://ist-socrates.Berkeley.edu/-bsp/publications/2003_06-naum.pdf. 173 Gold, Dore. H atred’s Kingdom, Washington D.C.: Eagle Publishing, 2003, p. 134. 174 Haghayeghi, Mehrdad. Islam and Politics in Central Asia. St. Martin’s Press, NY, 1995, p. 97. Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 177 to build mosques and madrasahs, religious schools, while hundreds of young Central Asian male students received scholarships to study in Saudi Arabia. It would be wrong to assert that Islamic revival in Central Asia was entirely due to the Saudi support, “but the donations and funding by the Saudi government helped accelerate the pace and provide the necessary Islamic infrastructure for the revival to happen.”175 The Saudi Arabia’s aid which went to the building of religious networks in Central Asia decreased tremendously after the 9/11 attack on the US. Central Asian states, like many other countries, fully supported the global fight against terrorism. Today Central Asia’s religious connection to Saudi Arabia is kept mainly through the holy pilgrimage to Mecca. Saudi Arabia gives a quota to each Central Asian republic as for how many pilgrims they can send per year. The main two militant groups such as IMU and Taliban in Central Asia have been destroyed, but there are some Islamic organizations, which are operating underground in Central Asia. The most active among them is Hizb-ut-Tahrir, Islamic party of Liberation. Hizb ut-Tahrir al Islamiyya (Islamic Liberation Party) The re-Islamization process or religious revival in post-Soviet Central Asia, especially in Kyrgyzstan, is associated, to a large extent, with the religious-political activities of the fundamentalist Islamic organization Hizb ut-Tahrir al Islamiyya, the party of Islamic Liberation (hereafter referred to as “HT”). I personally observed the rapid growth of religious-political activities of HT from annual visits to my hometown, Kizil-Jar, since the mid-1990s. Since that time the “HT” has been operating in Central
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 178 1 7
fs Asia with the ultimate goal of establishing an Islamic Caliphate. The Party was founded in Saudi Arabia and Jordan by a group of Palestinians in 1952 with the mission to free Palestine from the Jews. The party’s leaders dismiss both Sufi and Shi’ite interpretations of Islam and seek to return to the “pure Islam” of the “Righteous Caliphs” who followed the prophet Muhammad.177 Unlike some other militant Islamic groups such as the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan and the Taliban in Afghanistan, HT intends to achieve the establishment of an Islamic state in a “peaceful” way and considers it the 1 T O
holy duty of every Muslim to work towards that goal. HT increased in popularity among unemployed young and middle-aged men who sought to fill an internal spiritual void with the help of HTwhich was created due to socio-economic and political factors. However, in recent years, the party has also attracted educated groups of society such as college and university students, teachers, women’s groups, NGO activists, and merchants, all of whom are dissatisfied with the 170 government’s inability to deal with socioeconomic problems. Originally, the HT party was mostly concentrated in southern Kyrgyzstan, which has a large Uzbek population. Therefore, its membership was primarily composed of ethnic Uzbeks, not Kyrgyz.180 Due to the strict religious and political atmosphere in neighboring Uzbekistan since the Download 2.95 Mb. Do'stlaringiz bilan baham: 
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