Religion in Tajikistan: history and modernity. History of formation Flora and fauna
Of course, Tajikistan is not such a major center of tourism as, for example, Turkey. However, this does not mean that Tajikistan has nothing to surprise foreigners with. Tourists are attracted to this country by high mountains (Pamir, Tien Shan), beautiful nature, medieval cities, sights, as well as ancient traditions and customs, which have been preserved intact in secluded corners since ancient times. The descendants of the soldiers of the army of Alexander the Great, who long ago conquered this country, still live in the mountains of Tajikistan. As we see, tourists in Tajikistan have a great opportunity to get acquainted with ancient history.
Geography
Tajikistan is located in Central Asia. Tajikistan borders on China in the east, Kyrgyzstan in the north, Uzbekistan in the west, and Afghanistan in the south. This country has no access to the sea. The total area of Tajikistan is 143,100 sq. km., and the total length of the state border is 3,651 km.
Almost the entire territory of Tajikistan is occupied by mountains. Moreover, more than 50% of the country is located at an altitude of over 3 thousand meters above sea level. Only about 7% of Tajikistan are small valleys (for example, in the north of the country part of the Fergana Valley). The highest peak in Tajikistan is Ismoil Samoni Peak, whose height reaches 7,495 m.
The largest rivers in Tajikistan are the Syr Darya in the north of the country, the Amu Darya, Zarafshan and Pyanj. This Central Asian country has several beautiful lakes. The largest of them is the freshwater lake Karakul, whose area is 380 square meters. km.
Capital of Tajikistan
The capital of Tajikistan is Dushanbe, which is now home to more than 750 thousand people. According to archaeologists, an urban settlement on the territory of modern Dushanbe existed already in the 3rd century BC.
Official language
In Tajikistan, the official language is Tajik, and Russian has the status of a language of interethnic communication.
Religion
About 98% of the population of Tajikistan profess Islam (95% are Sunni and the remaining 3% are Shia).
State structure
According to the current Constitution of 1994, Tajikistan is a parliamentary republic headed by the President.
The bicameral parliament in Tajikistan is called the Majlisi Oli of the Republic of Tajikistan, it consists of the House of Representatives (63 deputies) and the National Council (33 people).
The main political parties in Tajikistan are the People's Democratic Party, the Communist Party of Tajikistan, the Socialist Party and the Agrarian Party.
Climate and weather
The climate in Tajikistan is varied - sharply continental, subtropical (in the southwest of the country) and semi-desert, arid. In summer the air temperature is +30-40С, and in winter - -8-10С. Half of the territory of Tajikistan is occupied by the highest mountains in Central Asia - the Pamirs. There is a lot of snow in the mountains of Tajikistan. The average annual precipitation in Tajikistan varies depending on the region from 700 mm to 1600 mm per year.
The best time for hiking in the mountains of Tajikistan is summer. Winter in Tajikistan is usually mild, but the passes are closed due to snowfall.
In turn, the best time to visit lowland Tajikistan is spring (March-May) and autumn (September-November).
Rivers and lakes
Tajikistan is the smallest country in Central Asia, and most of its territory (more than 90%) is mountainous. However, Tajikistan has almost 950 rivers and a large number of lakes. The largest rivers are the Syrdarya in the north of the country, the Amu Darya, Zarafshan and Pyanj, and among the lakes the freshwater Karakul Lake and Sarez Lake in the Pamirs should be highlighted.
Story
People on the territory of modern Tajikistan, according to archaeologists, lived already in the Stone Age. In ancient times, the central, southern and eastern parts of modern Tajikistan were part of the slave state of Bactria, and the areas north of the Gissar range belonged to the slave state of Sogd.
Later, these lands were conquered by Alexander the Great and his Greeks, then they became part of the Seleucid state. And this is only a small part of the states that included modern Tajikistan. After all, Tajikistan was still conquered by the Kushan kingdom, the Turkic Khaganate, the Karakhanid state, the Tatar-Mongol empire, and the Sheibanid state. In 1868 Tajikistan was annexed to the Russian Empire.
After the revolution of 1917 in Russia, the Tajik ASSR was formed on the territory of Tajikistan as part of the Uzbek SSR. In 1929, the Tajik ASSR was transformed into one of the republics of the Soviet Union.
Only in 1991 Tajikistan declared its independence.
Culture
Tajiks sacredly honor their national traditions and pass them on from generation to generation. Until now, Tajiks (especially in villages) wear national clothes. Men prefer embroidered robes and headdresses, while women prefer embroidered dresses with trousers and headscarves. Girls, according to tradition, should have 40 braids.
Tajiks celebrate all Muslim religious holidays, as well as two public holidays - Independence Day (September 9) and Remembrance Day (February 12).
Kitchen
Tajiks are rightfully proud of their national cuisine. Of course, Tajik cuisine is similar to the cuisine of other Central Asian countries, but it has its own characteristics, expressed in methods of cooking, food processing, and, of course, taste.
Tajiks are very careful about bread (flatbread). In Tajikistan, bread cannot be thrown away or dropped on the floor. Bread cannot be cut - it must be broken carefully. Be prepared for the fact that Tajik dishes contain a lot of spices, herbs and onions.
Tajiks eat while sitting around a low table - dastarkhan. Lunch always begins with tea, which is always drunk from bowls.
Meat dishes in Tajikistan are prepared from lamb or goat meat (Tajiks are Muslims, and therefore they do not eat pork). Horse meat sausage – “kazy” – is very popular among Tajiks. Before cooking, the meat is always fried until brown.
In Tajikistan, we recommend that tourists try the local lamb kebab (classic Tajik kebab is sprinkled with lemon juice after cooking and served with baked tomatoes), fried meat “kaurdak”, Tajik cabbage rolls “shakhlet” (lamb with rice, served in sour cream sauce).
Pilaf takes pride of place in Tajik cuisine. There are five most popular recipes for preparing pilaf in Tajikistan - Tajik pilaf, pilaf with meat balls (“gelak palov”), pilaf “Dushanbe” (minced lamb), pilaf with chicken, and pilaf with noodles (“ugro”). Tajiks usually add quince, dried fruits, peas and garlic to pilaf.
Traditional soft drinks are green tea, sour milk “katyk” and sorbets (fruit drinks with sugar).
Tajiks usually drink green tea in the summer, and black tea in the winter. Traditionally, in Tajikistan sugar is not added to tea. Tajiks often drink “shirchai” - tea with milk. Butter and salt are also added to shirchai. Residents of the Pamirs add goat's milk, butter and salt to tea - they get "sher tea".
Sights of Tajikistan
There are several thousand unique historical, architectural and archaeological monuments in Tajikistan. Now the authorities of Tajikistan are allocating significant funds for the restoration and restoration of archaeological and architectural monuments.
The Top 10 best attractions in Tajikistan, in our opinion, may include the following:
- Gissar fortress near Dushanbe
- Mausoleum of Khoja Mashad near Kurgan-Tube
- Buddhist monastery Ajina Tepe
- Mausoleum of Sheikh Massala in Khojent
- Ruins of the Zoroastrian temple Ak-Tepa
- Mausoleum of Makhdumi Azam in the Gissar Valley
- Ruins of the Kaahka fortress
- Ruins of the Sogdian city of Panjikent
- Sangin Mosque in the Gissar Valley
- The ancient settlement of Sarazm near Panjikent
Cities and resorts
The largest cities in Tajikistan are Khujand, Khorog, Kulyab, Kurgan-Tube, and, of course, the capital, Dushanbe.
Most tourists come to Tajikistan for the local attractions and mountains - the Pamirs are known throughout the world. In addition, tourists in Tajikistan are attracted by the beautiful nature and reserves, parks, natural monuments - Tigrovaya Balka, Dashtidzhumsky Reserve, Ramit, “Valley of Forty Girls”, Rangkul Cave.
Souvenirs/shopping
DUSHANBE, November 13 – Sputnik, Garcia Ruben. The influence of Islam, not just as a religion and the word of the Prophet Muhammad, but as a political force, is not diminishing throughout the world. Moreover, this applies not only to traditionally Muslim, but also to demonstratively secular states.
This is stated in a recent report by a whole team of researchers and political scientists who analyzed the historical experience of the region over the past 25 years.
These trends are especially noticeable in the countries of the Central Asian region, where the process of religious Islamic revival began immediately after the collapse of the USSR and has largely not been completed to this day.
Sputnik Tajikistan, based on the report, briefly recall how the attitude of the authorities of the Central Asian countries towards religion in Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan changed.
Tajikistan
Here, as is well known, the process of religious upsurge among the population and its use by some political figures in their own interests soon became one of the reasons for the bloody and destructive civil war of 1992-1997.
Democratic sentiments and demands for political freedoms were closely intertwined with demands for freedom of religion. Most residents of the young republic simply wanted the opportunity to freely go to the mosque and receive religious education.
However, some rather radical citizens did not limit themselves to demanding political and religious freedoms and wanted to create a Muslim state in the country similar to Iran, which is culturally close to Tajikistan.
The current government of the Republic of Tatarstan, of course, could not agree with such demands, and the so-called “Islamic democrats” also did not seek any special compromise with the government. A war has begun in the country.
After several years of fighting, a truce was established: armed Islamist groups laid down their arms, and in return their representatives received government positions and a certain number of seats in the parliament of Tajikistan.
This created an unprecedented situation, by the standards of the region, when the most powerful opposition force in the country was a legal religious movement represented in the government structure - the Islamic Renaissance Party of Tajikistan (IRPT).
It persisted until 2015, when Deputy Defense Minister Abduhalim Nazarzoda attempted a coup. And, according to the Tajik prosecutor’s office, the top leadership of the IRPT was directly related to organizing the rebellion.
The party, which had already had many conflicts with the authorities in recent years, was declared terrorist, and its leadership, if it did not manage to flee abroad, like the leader of the IRPT, ended up behind bars.
Today Islam in Tajikistan has completely left the legal political field; imams and muftis receive salaries and are actually civil servants. At the legislative level, the priority of national customs over religious ones has been declared, and the country's President Emomali Rahmon has repeatedly said publicly that wearing a hijab is contrary to the national tradition of Tajikistan.
However, this, alas, did not completely rid the country of the threat of religious extremism. Suffice it to recall Colonel of the Dushanbe riot police Gulmurod Khalimov and 1,094 citizens of the Republic of Tatarstan who, according to the prosecutor’s office, went to fight in the Middle East under the banners of the banned Islamic State.
Uzbekistan
A very contradictory situation has developed in neighboring Uzbekistan from the very beginning. In the first years after gaining independence, the country experienced an unprecedented religious upsurge. According to the report, from 1989 to 1993 the number of mosques in the country grew from 300 to 6000, many underground preachers came out of the shadows, and people began to go on Hajj en masse.
At the same time, the head of Uzbekistan, Islam Karimov, decided to strictly place the religious sphere under strict state control.
He had reasons for this - here was the sad experience of his Tajik neighbor, and his own militant groups, like the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan. As a result, security forces began to closely monitor the activities of imams, and thousands of mosques were closed in the late 90s without passing state certification.
The explosions in Tashkent in 1999 and the terrorist attack by the Akromiya group in May 2005 only convinced the Uzbek authorities of the justice of their chosen policy.
Today there is a dual situation in the republic. On the one hand, the government supports and even encourages religious institutions. Thus, current President Shavkat Mirziyoyev, during his visits around the country, regularly visits places of worship, mosques, and madrassas and talks about the need to increase the Hajj quota.
On the other hand, society, and especially government agencies, looks with suspicion at those who very zealously adhere to Islamic traditions, especially when it comes to appearance and clothing.
Kyrgyzstan
Perhaps, in the matter of religious freedoms, the Kyrgyz Republic is the absolute leader in the entire Central Asian region.
If the first president of the Kyrgyz Republic, Askar Akayev, was very cautious about the religious revival in the country, assigning it the role of nothing more than a cultural and historical tradition, then with the arrival of his successor Kurmanbek Bakiyev, the situation began to change.
Bakiyev does not hesitate to discuss religious issues and talk about Islam as an important component of the national spirit of the Kyrgyz people. Even despite the negative attitude towards political Islam after September 11, 2001 and the war in nearby Afghanistan (the Kyrgyz Republic provided its territories for the transfer of troops to the Western coalition), the attitude of the authorities towards Muslim institutions has not changed at all.
More and more mosques are appearing in the country, and Islam from below, from the people, penetrates to the very top of the state hierarchy, becoming an instrument of politicians. In 2011, a prayer room was opened in the parliament building; a year earlier, opposition deputy Tursanbai Bakir-uulu swore an oath on the Koran, and not on the country’s Constitution, and in 2017 he announced his self-nomination for the presidency as an Islamic candidate.
The experience of the Kyrgyz presidential fund for the development of religious culture "Yiman" is interesting, which is an attempt by the state to form a harmonious Islamic society and a loyal ummah in a secular state, as opposed to extremist preachers.
The purpose of the foundation is to develop religious culture and increase the spiritual and intellectual potential of citizens. The organization publishes books, provides support to writers and poets, and, among other things, conducts a professional development seminar for imams. Since 2017, the foundation has been paying many clergy a monthly stipend of several thousand soms, depending on the status of the clergy.
Religion in Tajikistan occupies a special place in public life. First of all, it is worth saying that this country is the only post-Soviet country where an Islamic party is officially registered, but the people of Tajikistan had to pay a very high price for this.
Ancient history
The history of religion in Tajikistan goes back to ancient times, associated with the amazing period of conquests of Alexander the Great, who brought Greek civilization and, accordingly, Greek religion, which intricately combined with local cults, to these lands far from Europe.
The most ancient cults that existed on the territory of present-day Tajikistan were associated with the assignment of various qualities to natural phenomena, elements and celestial bodies, such as the Moon, stars, and, first of all, the Sun. Subsequently, these primitive beliefs, in a highly modified form, served as a favorable substrate for the spread of Zoroastrianism in the region.
Spread of Zoroastrianism
Considering the fact that Farsi is the closest relative of the Iranian language, it is not surprising that the religion of Zoroastrianism has become widespread in this country. What it is? Zoroastrianism is one of the religions that has ever existed in the world. It is believed that the prophet Spitama Zarathustra acted as its founder, whose image subsequently became widespread.
First of all, it is worth saying that Zoroastrianism is a religion of ethical choice, requiring from a person not only external piety, but also good thoughts and sincere actions. Some researchers, discovering both dualistic and monotheistic features in Zoroastrianism, classify it as a transitional religion, which served as a kind of step towards the emergence and widespread dissemination of monotheistic religions. The most important book of this religion is the Avesta.
Religion in Tajikistan
The history of modern Tajik civilization begins during the Sasanian Empire, whose rulers, along with the majority of the population, professed Zoroastrianism. The empire arose in the 13th century and included territories in which, in addition to Zoroastrianism, Christianity was also widespread. However, Christianity in Tajikistan was represented mainly by heretical movements, whose representatives tried to move as far as possible from the generally recognized centers of Christianity with their dictatorship and dogmatism.
Manichaeism in Central Asia
Religion has always been of great importance in Tajikistan, but in ancient times, especially during the Sasanian Empire, the territory was characterized by a high degree of religious tolerance. It was this religious tolerance that became one of the reasons for the emergence of Manichaeism - a rather bizarre religion that combined in its dogmatic basis elements of Buddhism, Zoroastrianism, as well as various Christian sectarian ideas.
It was from the arid lands of Central Asia that Manichaeism began its triumphal march westward until it reached Rome. However, the fate of the followers of the teaching was sad - everywhere they were subjected to persecution and extreme pressure. Subsequently, Manichaeism became extremely widespread on the Eurasian continent, but was never able to get rid of the stigma of a world sect.
Jewish community
Since the history of the country goes back more than one century, it is not surprising that a variety of religions are represented on its territory. Judaism became one of these religions in Tajikistan, although the number of its adherents has never been large. The small number of Jews in these lands was due to the fact that the rabbis never showed any inclination towards proselytism and recruiting new supporters, limiting themselves to ideas about the exclusivity of the people of Israel.
The Jewish community in Tajikistan existed both under Zoroastrianism and after the spread of Islam, and it still exists there today, although in a very small size, since most Jews moved to Israel immediately after the liquidation of the Soviet Union. Today, the overwhelming majority of residents of Tajikistan profess Islam, and there is a political party in the country that expresses the mood of religious citizens.
To improve the religious situation in the country, law enforcement agencies of Tajikistan continue to carry out preventive work among believers, including with the involvement of representatives of the official Muslim clergy, aimed at suppressing the propaganda activities of supporters of various religious extremist organizations and movements.
Throughout the republic, law enforcement officials, with the assistance of madrasah teachers, conduct monthly explanatory and preventive conversations with imams of mosques, during which they draw the attention of clergy to the need to strictly observe ritual rites in religious education.
At the same time, imams are personally warned about the need to promptly inform the competent authorities about the facts of propaganda of radical Islamist ideology and persons who teach orthodox religious dogmas to young people. Such measures are mainly aimed at identifying adherents who received religious education in the late 1990s and early 2000s at “courses” in underground madrassas and mosques, as well as those who illegally traveled to Pakistan, Iran and certain Arab countries to study in foreign clerical centers.
Despite the large-scale effort carried out by the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the State Committee for National Security together with the Committee on Religious Affairs to identify and close illegally operating religious educational institutions and bring to justice those who taught in them, such teachers are still being identified in some regions of the republic.
In the Sughd and Khatlon regions alone, the activities of about 12 illegally functioning madrasahs and courses at mosques were suppressed. 7 graduates of Iranian theological educational institutions were identified who illegally taught in the above areas, using Shiite literature published in Iran. It was also found out that at the end of the 1990s they illegally left for the specified country, where they were trained in clerical centers.
Despite the attempts of Tajik law enforcement agencies to take control of exit channels, the outflow of young people seeking to receive religious education abroad, in particular in Iran, where favorable conditions have been created - scholarships, free education, free food and clothing - is not decreasing. Special privileges are enjoyed by citizens of Tajikistan who go to study with family members, who are additionally allocated living space and a monthly allowance of $200-250.
Against this background, the country is witnessing activity among members of the former United Tajik Opposition (UTO). In Vakhdat and a number of others
areas of republican subordination, the activities of radical Islamists, who have repeatedly acted as part of other terrorist groups in attacks against government forces, are coordinated by Khoja Akbar Turajonzoda and his brother Nuriddin, who are directly involved in sending young people to study in Iran, relying on the assistance of a number of activists of local Tablighi cells jamoat".
Of particular concern is the spread of radical ideas among teenagers. For example, due to participation in religious rituals, schoolchildren began to skip classes more often. According to official data, today in the country only 70% of girls receive compulsory nine-year education, while among boys this figure is 90%. At the same time, independent experts consider such figures to be inflated in order to hide the true state of affairs in this area. Thus, in the Shurabad district of the Khatlon region, 60% of students do not attend general education institutions, giving preference to obtaining “knowledge” in various “hujras”.
A similar trend is observed in the cities of Khujand and Dushanbe, where a significant part of young people have “abandoned” secular education, rushing to madrassas and mosques. At the same time, in order to obtain deeper religious knowledge, many of them go to the countries of the so-called “Islamic belt”, where subsequently, falling under the influence of extremist and terrorist organizations, they undergo sabotage and terrorist training in militant camps and are sent back to their homeland, where there is an economic crisis , which has long been transformed into a political one, serves as fertile ground for the consolidation of opponents to the current regime in Tajikistan.
In general, it can be noted that as the authorities lose control on the ground due to being pushed aside by supporters of non-traditional Islam, fused with terrorist groups, the situation in the country is becoming increasingly unpredictable. In such conditions, a number of high-ranking government officials, including the military, say that if the situation in Tajikistan worsens at the slightest level, they will, without remorse, break their oath and take the side of the government opposition.
Ibodullo Kokhirov
