Religious Revival and Secularism in Post-Soviet Azerbaijan Read online

  Dobrosława Wiktor-Mach

  Religious Revival and Secularism in Post-Soviet Azerbaijan

  Religion and Society

  Edited by

  Gustavo Benavides and Kocku von Stuckrad

  Volume 71

  ISBN 978-3-11-053462-7

  e-ISBN (PDF) 978-3-11-053646-1

  e-ISBN (EPUB) 978-3-11-053463-4

  ISSN 1437-5370

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  A CIP catalog record for this book has been applied for at the Library of Congress.

  Bibliographic information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek

  The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data are available in the Internet at http://dnb.dnb.de.

  © 2017 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston

  www.degruyter.com

  ikhtilāf al-umma raḥma

  (Difference within the Islamic tradition is the sign of God’s mercy)

  – the Prophetic tradition

  Acknowledgements

  I would like to express my deepest gratitude to Dr. Elnura Azizova from the Khazar University in Baku, who invited me to her Department of Eastern Languages and Religious Studies, and to all of the people of this university who facilitated my research stay. I would like to thank Sofie Bedford who helped me in the initial phase of the project. I wish to offer my sincere thanks to scholars from Baku State University, the Caucasus University, Azerbaijan National Academy of Sciences, and Azerbaijan Diplomatic Academy for their inspiring insights to my research problems.

  I would like to convey my gratitude to the people whom I have interviewed in Baku, who have devoted their time to share with me their experiences and opinions, and to those who have assisted me on various phases of my research. Special thanks are owed to the akhunds and imams of various Baku mosques for their kindness and willingness to answer my questions.

  My special appreciation is also due to my supervisor Professor Maria Flis, as well as to my colleagues at the Department of Social Anthropology of Jagiellonian University. During seminars I had opportunities to present and discuss my work at its various phases.

  I am also grateful to the Bratniak Foundation of Jagiellonian University which covered some of the costs of the field work.

  Last but not least, I would like to express my sincere thanks to my friends and family for their support and encouragement.

  Contents

  Acknowledgements

  List of Tables and Figures

  Note on Transliteration

  Introduction

  Chapter 1: Religion as a Field of Competition

  1.1Studying Religious Pluralism

  The Concept of Pluralism

  The Concept of Religiosity

  The Impact of Pluralism

  1.2Theoretical Propositions about Religious Economies

  Unclear Correlation Between Pluralism and Religiosity

  Regulation and Competition as Key Mechanisms

  Problems with Market Theory

  Implications for Future Research

  1.3Applying Economic Theory to Islam

  1.4Capital and Strategies: Insights from Bourdieu

  1.5Fieldwork Research in Baku

  Chapter 2: Islam in the Caucasus: Historical Contexts of Religious Pluralism

  Religious Identity and History

  2.1Islamization of the Land of Fire

  2.2Turks and Mongols

  2.3State Shiism

  The Career of the Safavid Order

  Politics and Religion under Safavid rule

  Chapter 3: Islamic Modernism and Secularism

  3.1The Emergence of a “Modern” Understanding of Islam

  Jadidism – Modernist Reform Movement

  3.2Secularization

  3.3Soviet Influences

  Chapter 4: The Lived Islam

  4.1“Cultural Muslims”

  Socialization into a Muslim society

  4.2Secularized Muslims

  Religious Attendance

  4.3Religiosity of the Shrines

  Eclecticism

  4.4Am I a Shia or a Sunni? The blurring of sectarian division

  4.5Cultural Muslims in post-Soviet states

  Chapter 5: Religious Revival and the Plurality of Choices

  Islamic Revival in the former USSR

  5.1Shiism

  5.2Sunnism

  Salafism: Between Piety and Fundamentalism

  Modern Orthodoxy in Turkish Islam

  5.3Reformism

  Conclusion

  Chapter 6: Choosing Religion: Strategies and Discourses

  6.1Pluralism and Religiousness: The Peculiarity of Azerbaijan

  6.2From Fate to Choice

  Tradition Taken for Granted

  6.3Choosing Religion

  The Miracles of the Koran

  Becoming a Convert

  Hesitation

  6.4Choosing among Alternatives

  “Market” Choices

  Sunnism Versus Shiism

  6.5Plausibility and Legitimacy

  Why Islam is the only true religion?: Overcoming the Problem of Plausibility

  Exclusivist and Inclusivist Approaches

  Chapter 7: Religious Competition

  7.1Official and Unofficial Islam

  7.2Demand for Piety and Change

  7.3New models of Islam

  Iranian Clerics

  Independent Shiism

  7.4The Process of Sunnitization

  Salafism

  Turkish Islam

  Reformist Intellectuals

  Conclusion

  Chapter 8: State control: Heretic-Hunting

  8.1Post-Soviet Religious Policy

  Initial Free Market

  Towards Restrictions

  War on Terror

  8.2Impact of State Regulations

  Glossary

  Bibliography

  Index

  List of Tables and Figures

  Tables

  2.1 An outline chronology of Azerbaijan

  4.1 11 Least Religious Countries

  4.2 Importance Azeris attach to religion

  4.3 Attendance of religious services in 2011

  4.4 The percentage of people in Azerbaijan following religious practices

  5.1 Numbers of Friday mosques in Central Asia and Azerbaijan

  5.2 Turkish high schools in Central Asia and the Caucasus

  Figures

  2.1 Zoroastrian Fire Temple

  4.1 The pir of Mir Movsum Aga

  4.2 The tomb of Imamzade in Gandja

  5.1 Juma Mosque in Baku

  5.2 The tomb of a Sufi Sheikh

  7.1 Taza Pir mosque in Baku

  7.2 A mosque in Baku’s Old City and a donation box

  7.3 Muhur. A Shia ritual object used during prayer

  7.4 Nariman Qasimoglu delivering a lecture on Islam and environment

  8.1 Hijab worn by some Azerbaijani women

  Note on Transliteration

  Arabic terms related to Islam have been transcribed into English using the standard scientific transliteration system devised for the Deutsche Morgenländischen Gesellschaft. Following the recommendation of the Chicago Manual of Style (1982) that “familiar words and phrases in a foreign languages should be set in roman type,” Arabic words that can be found in a standard English dictionary are treated as belonging to international English. The words such as Islam, Koran, jihad, sharia, for instance, are written as they are, instead of Islām, Qurʾān, ǧihād, and šarīʿah. Since familiarity is rel
ative, in some cases I have made a decision about transliteration in an arbitrary way. Some terms and concepts employed in this work have Arabic roots but in Azerbaijan are used in their Turkic or Persian variants; in that case I adhere to a simple transliteration. The plural of more familiar Arabic words is formed by adding ‘s’ to their singular forms (e. g., “fatwas” and “hadiths.”) Most of these words with short explanations are included in the glossary at the end.

  Transliteration of Russian has been done in the system developed by the United States Board on Geographic Names and by the Permanent Committee on Geographical Names for British Official Use.

  Names of public figures, places and organizations are written according to their most common English spellings. For instance Aliyev, Baku, Caucasus Muslim Board. In some cases my choice was rather arbitrary as there is not one accepted form, in other individuals changed their names themselves and are referred to by both names as for example Nasib Nassibli, born as Nasibzade, who worked as Azerbaijan’s ambassador to Iran.

  Introduction

  This book came into being as a result of an interest in a world religion that has over 1.6 billion adherents, or 23% of the world’s entire population. Despite the enormous geographical, social and political diversity of the Muslim world, Islam is commonly perceived as a cultural monolith in which Arab perspective on religion prevails. There is a great need in our time to shed more light on the inner complexities and nuances that are typical of each major religion, as they again, since the 1970s, reemerge as significant social and political forces. The revival of religion and its deep impact on the public life is a phenomenon characteristic of our times. At the beginning of the 21st century Islam is surrounded by numerous stereotypes and prejudices, even on the part of elites. In the West, Islamophobia is on the rise and the knowledge of Islam superficial. Few associate Islam with democracy and modernity, even fewer with secularization.

  This book focuses on the phenomenon of competition inside Islam in Azerbaijan. Shia and Sunni Muslim movements and groups try to attract people to their religious branches. Salafis promote the “pristine” Islam with a global appeal. Shias, on the other hand, underline rationality in their faith tradition. There’s a growing popularity of the Turkish model of Islam. Sufism, although not as powerful as before, finds also a committed audience. Competition requires at least a minimum level of pluralism and an active engagement of religious actors. Even though during communism there were more forms of religion than officially allowed by the state, it was not until the end of the Soviet Union that Islam revealed its variety in the Muslim-majority republics. After seventy years of imposed secularism and atheism, religion could eventually find its place in the public sphere. Novel possibilities were quickly exploited by many groups, communities and individuals proposing their interpretations of religions. The inner struggle between various branches and their representatives became a fascinating account of power relations grounded in political, economic and socio-cultural contexts. Also symbols play a significant role. Forms of religions are in a constant flux, they emerge under certain conditions, evolve, face challenges from political power, from science and other ideologies and also from other religious actors ready to take part in the game. New religious movements and groups challenge existing practices, ideas and structures, offering believers additional choices, novel ideologies, as well as services, and social networks. Some religious communities give up, losing adherents, some adjust to meet the changing demands for religion and its forms, others flourish and gain fervent supporters. The contemporary Islamic resurgence offers a living laboratory of religious change, its determinants and effects. Islamic movements and communities act not only in a particular socio-economic context but, what’s equally important, they respond to each others’ moves and actions. They operate in a common religious market, propose reinterpretations of Islam responding to the needs of post-communist societies. Global religious movements adjust to the local context and experiences. Their actions are not independent, but take place in a constant, more or less conscious, process of interaction and mutual inspiration, or conflict.

  The competitive process does not help us understand all the aspects of religious transformation or evolution. It must also be acknowledged that a religious revival may result from various factors, not only those postulated in the religious market theory. When the cold war eventually finished, hundreds of local conflicts appeared. In the Caucasus, since the early 1990s there were Chechen-Russian wars, which also spilled to other neighboring republics. Radical Islam appeared and was a powerful factor in the military conflicts. The Northern Caucasus was destabilized, filled with violence, cruelty and terror. Georgia has experienced a loss of a large part of its territory and a war with Russia in 2008. Ethnic conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan led to a bloody war over the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region. The ceasefire which was signed in 1994 began a new era of hostile relations between those two countries, and the so-called “frozen conflict” lasts till now. Mass displacements of people followed the war and the problem of hundreds of thousands of refugees and IDPs remains unsolved. They lack perspectives for the future for them and their children and live often in poverty. The road to capitalism was also steep and turbulent, and for many people in the region the economic transformation hasn’t brought benefits. Unemployment and low salaries are only some of the large number of socio-economic problems in the post-Soviet Caucasus. In many studies of religion such harsh conditions of living and the constant feeling of anxiety and uncertainty are regarded as factors conducive to the rise in religiosity.

  This book, however, focuses on other issues and scrutinizes inter-religious competition as a force which inevitably leads to a better understanding of religious change. Other topics, although equally important and interesting, would make this project too vast, so I had to make a decision to limit my research into specific areas which are less known. Competition between religious groups and their leaders is in the market theory of religion one of the key factors in explaining the evolution of religion, its doctrines and institutional forms. If we want to be able to better understand our times, or predict how the religious landscape will look in the future, we shall closely monitor which religious actors gain popularity and authority among believers (or un-believers), and which lose. And why is it so, what are the reasons behind these processes. The outcome of an ongoing competition determines to a large extent the evolution of religion and societies.

  Among the biggest global challenges in the 21st century is the rise of Islamic fundamentalism. The Salafi movement, although it is heterogenous and encompasses various attitudes, in the West is widely regarded as a serious threat to security and stability. It is seen as an undermining of liberal democracy and the rule of law. As radicalization among some Muslim groups is on the rise, the Western world is looking for “moderate” or “liberal” Islam to engage with in countering fundamentalist ideologies. There is an increasing appreciation of pluralism inside Islam among public opinion and journalists, especially after September 11, 2001, but the essentialist view of Islam and Islamic law is prevailing. Huntington’s thesis of the clash of civilizations has found many supporters who use his idea for political gains. A closer scrutiny of Muslim civilization reveals, however, how divided in many aspects this world is. One of the most spectacular ideological splits is among the Islamic modernists and fundamentalists who have had a long history of debate on the interpretations of Islam, compatibility of sharia with liberal democracy and modernity. Globalization with more intense social communication has only intensified intra-religious encounters, discussions and often conflicts.

  Azerbaijan is the main focus of the book. One may wonder, why this particular country. There are at least two reasons for exploring the inner transformation of the Islamic world on the basis of this small Caucasian state. First of all, research on this country provides an excellent opportunity to study the process of reinforcement of Islam in the social space. This post-Soviet country is considered to be
one of the most secularized in the Muslim world. According to a Pew Research Center estimate, Azerbaijan has the lowest percentage of Muslim citizens supporting sharia out of 38 Muslim countries surveyed. Only 8% of Azerbaijani Muslims are in favor of making Islamic law the official law in their country. Even among some Central Asian countries, such as Tajikistan or Kyrgyzstan, support is significantly stronger. On the other hand, the overwhelming majority of Muslims in Sub-Saharan Africa, MENA, South and Southeast Asia generally accept sharia and would agree to be governed by it (The World’s Muslims: Religion, Politics and Society, 2013). Thus, all aspects of religious activity, especially in the public sphere, are clearly visible against this background, and that is the starting point for modern pluralism in that region. The landmark change in the religious situation took place with the fall of the Soviet Union. When Azerbaijan regained independence in 1991, freedom in religious law enabled numerous missionaries and religious groups mainly from Iran, Turkey, Russia, and Arab countries to establish their presence and promote their traditions. Soon, Islam in the South Caucasus became extremely diversified, and the struggle over the meaning and practices that can be called Islamic began.

  Another reason for choosing Azerbaijan as the focus of the study is that, unlike Arab countries, the post-Soviet Muslim sphere remains relatively understudied. While most debates on Muslim religion today draw heavily on the Arabic Islamic “heartlands,” a lot of important developments take place in the non-Arab Muslim world, e. g., in Indonesia (a country with the largest number of Muslims in the world), Asia, or the Caucasus. The focus on Arabs as the main actors in contemporary Islam is unjustified in social sciences from the demographic point of view. Only about 20% of the global Muslim umma is located in the Middle East-North Africa region. The major region inhabited by Muslims is Asia-Pacific, with over 60% of the global population of Islamic believers (Mapping the Global Muslim Population, 2009). It is thus probable that the features of contemporary and future Islamic culture are being determined mostly in non-Arab Muslim societies.