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form of Georgian state organization. Several influential political parties sided with the Church. This means that if and when the project is realized the Church will gain even more authority.
Those who insist that this will cripple the country’s democratic development are wrong: today, the man-in-the-street is looking for familiar cultural landmarks—without them democratic development will remain a mere formality.
C o n c l u s i o n
The developments in Georgia’s religious life designed to match the global processes and meet the challenges facing human values have not always been straightforward. So far they cannot be described either as democratic or as consistently religious and nationalist. This is what can be expected of a small nation living in an uncomfortable historical environment and working hard to save its identity by preserving its traditional forms of life. The two trends manifested in the Georgian Church—the attempt to preserve its religious and cultural identity, on the one hand, and the need to take the global processes into account, on the other—faithfully reflect the major trends obvious in Georgian society.
Irina BABICH
D.Sc. (Hist.),
leading fellow at the Department of the Caucasus, Institute of Ethnology and Anthropology, Russian Academy of Sciences (Moscow, Russia)
RUSSIA
IN THE NORTHERN CAUCASUS (LATE 18TH-EARLY 20TH CENTURIES): STATE AND LEGAL ASPECTS OF ITS RELIGIOUS POLICIES
Abstract
The author investigates the so-called peaceful ways to fortify Russia’s position in the Northern Caucasus, which include, among other things, special relations with the local Muslims, as well as Orthodox missionary activities wherever possible. She
relies on archive materials, written sources, and regulatory acts relating to the later 18th-early 20th centuries to conclude that, on the one hand, the Russian state in the Northern Caucasus created favorable conditions for the nationalities who became part of the
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empire and, on the other, set up a state security system that undermined the resist-
ance of those newly acquired Russian subjects who strove for state independence.
I n t r o d u c t i o n
Throughout the 19th century the sociopolitical and cultural development of the Northern Caucasus was largely determined by Russia’s consistent and purposeful efforts to inculcate an imperial identity and self-awareness in the mountain dwellers (mainly the local military and Muslim spiritual elite). Out of the varied and numerous tools, the authorities preferred to rely on peaceful ways to cement Russia’s presence in the region. The Russian Empire was inclined to act in all spheres of life: military, administrative, judicial, land and estate relations, educational, religious, and cultural.
The Russian authorities concentrated on the mountain-dwelling elite and also turned their gaze both to the Muslim clergy among the mountain dwellers and to those North Caucasians who could potentially be converted to Christian Orthodoxy. Below follows a discussion of the legal aspects of Russia’s regional religious policies based on archive materials relating to the Northwestern and Central Caucasus.
A New Status for Islam and the Islamic Clergy in the Northern Caucasus (the 18th-First Half of the 19th Century)
Since the mid-16th century Islam remained an object of Russia’s legal activities, yet it was later, between the 18th and the first half of the 19th centuries, that they started yielding the first fruit in the form of organizational achievements.
By the time they became part of the Russian Empire a large number of the North Caucasian mountain dwellers were Muslims with a period of Christian Orthodoxy behind them (numerous traces of Orthodoxy are found in Kabarda). The Ossets were the only exception: some of them left Islam for Christian Orthodoxy due to the missionary activities of, first, the Georgian state and, later, the Russian Empire.
It should be said that before the Russian authorities came to the Northern Caucasus the so-called Muslim clergy enjoyed a certain legal status formulated within the norms of customary law—the mountain adat.1 Let us look at the materials in the collection of the mountain adats compiled by Lieutenant Colonel Kucherov in 1845: a complete collection of the Kabardinian ancient adats (1844) and the adats of the Malkars, Uruspievtsy, and Karachais was the product of his cooperation with highly educated local people Shore bek Murzin, Davlet Girey, and others.
The Russian authorities decided to collect the norms of the mountain adats in 1841; the correspondence between civilian officials and the military clarifies the reasons: “Your Excellency knows that all disputes among the mountain peoples, with the exception of criminal cases, are judged by the adat, the court of justice that proceeds from the customs, or the Shari‘a based on the Al Quran. The rules of the adat and the Shari‘a might not be sufficient in many cases, they might be biased or even
1 See: “Adaty cherkes byvshey Chernomorskoy kordonnoy linii,” in: Adaty Kavkazskikh gortsev. Materialy po obychnomu pravu Severnogo i Vostochnogo Kavkaza, compiled by F.I. Leontovich, Issue I, Odessa, 1882, p. 116.
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contradictory. Without clear and positive information about them it is impossible to say which of them (the adat or the Shari‘a) should be preferred. We can prefer the former only because there is certain information about it based on hearsay. As for the Shari‘a, it still remains terra incognita. It is unwillingly accepted only because when introduced among the mountain Muslims it was, and remains, an instrument of the mullahs and the Muslim clerics in general who interpret the Shari‘a as they see fit. Fully convinced that the weakening of the Shari‘a and introduction of another body of law would deprive them of their political power, they are doing their best to stick to it.”2 “There is no doubt that if there is the possibility of introducing, sometime in the near future, the Russian laws among the mountain people, there would have been no need to look for ways to familiarize ourselves with one of the codes of law mentioned above and accepted by the mountain peoples. Since the government is rightly convinced that this measure was untimely, we have to let the mountain dwellers sort things out for themselves according to adat and the Shari‘a.. .”3
In 1842, in his memorandum, Bibikov pointed out that “today it is too early or even hazardous to change the now accepted legal procedure because this would have set one of the social groups—the princes and the nobility or the clergy—against us.”4
This suggests that the Russians saw the legal status of the Muslim clergy in the Northern Caucasus as firmly attached, first, to the planned changes in the judicial system and, second, to the purely political and military aims formulated by the military and civilian authorities in the Northern Caucasus. They acted hand in glove, which produced, in the early half of the 19th century, enough formal and hypocritical statements, instructions, proclamations, and secret instructions while there was an obvious shortage of legal documents needed to regulate the life of the North Caucasian Muslims.
The collection of mountain adats contains a section “On Different Social Estates, the Different Rights They Appropriated, and Different Priorities; On Obligations and Mutual Relations among the Social Estates,” which said in part: “All these tribes are Muslims and in fact accept no authority over themselves. Yet, living in communities, they are following the rules of aristocratic and democratic governance. This explains why none of the estates have firmly formulated rules, advantages, and obligations, yet these rules have somehow been accepted through folk legends—they have been accepted as guiding principles in their social life, therefore all the members of any of the estates enjoy the rights their estate appropriated, with the following limitations.”
Points 26-37 of the third section “About the Clergy,” which identify the status of the Muslim leaders among their own people, are of key importance. Point 29 says: “Despite their origins, the ef-fendis and mullahs are respected and trusted not only by the common freemen and peasants, but also by the nobles and princes. They have the right to share a meal with princes, which the nobles cannot do unless specifically invited by the prince.” Section Six looks at the rules of the customary law of the mountain people;5 Section Seven, “On Inheritance and Last Wills and Testament”, describes the rights and responsibilities of the clergy (Points 72-85),6 according to the Ada [adat in Arabic] Code of the Adats of the North Caucasian Mountain Dwellers” (1847).
The regulatory acts that in the 18th century regulated the legal status of Islam in the Russian Empire as a whole are represented by the decrees of the Russian emperors, the Senate and, most important, the Orthodox Synod. These legal documents envisaged the rights of the Muslims of the Russian Empire in general and of the Northern Caucasus in particular.
2 “Perepiska kavkazskogo gorskogo upravlenia po sobiraniu svedeniy ob adatakh kavkazskikh gortsev v 40-kh go-dakh nastoiashchego stoletia,” Adaty Kavkazskikh gortsev. Materialy po obychnomu pravu Severnogo i Vostochnogo Kavkaza, pp. 87-88.
3 Ibid., p. 88.
4 Ibid., p. 91.
5 See: “Adaty cherkes...,” p. 138.
6 See: “Svod adatov gortsev Severnogo Kavkaza 1847,” in: Adaty Kavkazskikh gortsev. Materialy po obychnomu pravu Severnogo i Vostochnogo Kavkaza, pp. 242-243.
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In 1767, Art 494 of a regulatory act dealt, for the first time, with religious tolerance and the right of the peoples of the Russian Empire to religious freedom: “In a great State that extends its power over a great number of different peoples, a ban on or prohibition of their various beliefs would have damaged citizens’ peace of mind and security.”7 This gave the Russian Muslims the right to protect and defend their faith. In 1783 the manifesto “On Accepting the Crimean Peninsula, the Isle of Taman, and the Entire Kuban Area into the Russian State”8 declared the freedom of religion for the Muslims of the Russian Empire. The document said: “.we promise, in holiness and steadfastness, Ourselves and in the name of the Descendants on Our Throne, to keep them in the same conditions as Our native subjects, to protect and defend them, their temples, and their native faith; the right to freely follow it and perform all lawful rites will be protected forever.”
On the whole, the 17th century produced no regulatory acts that envisaged the right of the North Caucasian mountain peoples to freedom of religion. It was late in the 18th century that Russia took a more active position in relation to the North Caucasian Muslims. In 1786 the Decree of Catherine the Great to the Senate set up the Caucasian Vicegerency. In 1792 the Enactment of Catherine the Great for the Kabardins said in part: “.anarchy and chaos, impudence and plunder are the real reasons why these people, who are our subjects, have so far remained useless to the Empire. We are convinced that its cruel habits can be improved according to the rules of our humanity and concern for the well-being of each and everyone.”9
“We should not rely only on the force of arms when dealing with the people living high up in the mountains and being safe there. We should try to draw them to our side by justice and fairness, by improving their habits with meekness, winning their hearts, and teaching them to communicate with the Russians. We should:
“(1) demonstrate kindness and attract the best of their members. give them high posts, money, and other distinctions according to our choice; our royal kindness will be showered most abundantly on those who have adopted the Christian faith. This munificence will encourage others to act accordingly.
“(2) determinedly see to it that neither our troops nor the Cossacks living on the Line infringe on the rights of the mountain dwellers and offend those of them who come to our fortresses. We resolutely confirm that our military commanders, both in the field and in garrisons, do not allow their subordinates to deal dishonorably with the Kabardins and other mountain peoples by stealing horses and other property, or in any other way. They should be brought to court and cruelly punished as criminals, as well as everyone else who might act in this way.”
The document further said: “To better promote this and to reassure the local people, we believe that you should invite Major-General Gorich or someone else from among their own people; you should also rely on their faith to convince them of the same. To achieve this you should invite several mullahs from among our Kazan Tartars to help him (Gorich.—Ed.), who will open mosques in Greater and Lesser Kabarda. We allow them to do this. To produce a better impression and to encourage more friendly feelings toward us among the mountain people, do you think it will be useful to send you, for some time, the Orenburg mufti, who was used to promote order in that area and better organize the life of uncivilized Kyrgyz peoples.”10
This is one of the first administrative documents of Catherine the Great that deals with the status of Islam among the Kabardins. On the one hand, the Russian authorities recognized the right of the
7 Islam v Rossiiskoy imperii (zakonodatel’nye akty, opisania, statistika), Compiled, introduced and commented by D.Iu. Arapov who also authored the appendices, Moscow, 2001, p. 44.
8 ]
9 N.F. Dubrovin, Istoria voyny i vladychestva russkikh na Kavkaze, Vol. 2, St. Petersburg, 1886, p. 292.
! Ibid., p. 47. N.F. Dubrov 1 Ibid., p. 294.
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Kabardins, one of the numerically largest mountain peoples of the Northern Caucasus, to freedom of worship, to religious life, and to Islam. On the other hand, they regarded the Kabardins as people with “savage habits,” thus denying them an ethnic culture and morals of their own.
The quoted document testifies that as early as in the late 18th century the Russian state armed itself with religious freedom and Islam to socialize the local mountain dwellers: from that time on the regulatory acts that envisaged religious freedom for the mountain dwellers (later complemented with the right to ethnic culture) served as instruments of Russia’s policies in various spheres.
From the very beginning of shaping the legal status of Islam in the Northern Caucasus Russia was concerned not only with the local people’s rights, but also with their obligations; religious freedom for the local people was enforced by circumstances rather than chosen freely as a deliberate policy. At the same time, Russia was engaged in Orthodox missionary activities not only in Ossetia, but also in other regions of the Northern Caucasus. According to archive materials, in the 1760-1770s numerous Christian Kabardins and other North Caucasian mountain dwellers lived in Kizliar.11
Late in the 18th and the first half of the 19th century the Russian authorities issued regulatory acts relating to the position of the Muslims within the Russia Empire. There were two kinds: general, dealing with all the Muslims living in the empire, and local, enforcing the status of Muslims within certain areas. The Northern Caucasus was seen as a very special territory, obviously because of the hostilities that took place during the first half of the 19th century. At that time, and earlier, in the late 18th century, it was for the military authorities to enforce the “local” statuses of Muslims in each of the areas. The Imperial Decree of 1805, for example, On Rules for the Muslim Clergy of the Elisavet-pol Okrug,12 was based on the report supplied by Prince Pavel Tsitsianov, Commander-in-Chief in Georgia and the Astrakhan Military Governorship.
The “Prayer for the Czar for the Muslims of the Caucasus” of Russian General Alexey Ermolov to be read on Fridays in mosques is an important source of knowledge about the Islamic practices among the North Caucasian dwellers in the first half of the 19th century.13 In the 1820s General Ermolov submitted his draft of 7 points relating to the Muslim clergy:
1. control of the government over “those people whose religious convictions often lead to enmity in relation to it;”
2. opposition to stronger corporate bonds among the clergy;
3. prevention of penetration of clerics from Persia and Turkey;
4. limitations, “to the extent possible, on the influence of the clergy among Muslims without encroaching on their religious convictions;”
5. dependence of a large part of the clergy on the government by making material incentives contingent on their service to the government;
6. control, as strict as possible, over religious schools;
7. finding out what part of religious property is used to support clergy abroad.14
At the same time, the Proclamation General Ermolov gave to the Kabardins on 26 June, 1822 said the following: “I shall preserve religious freedom and the old customs and shall accept the owners and the uzdens who came down from the mountains with their old titles and regalia. I shall form a court of justice from the owners and uzdens according to Russian laws and shall indicate when the
11 See: Dokumenty po vzaimootnosheniam Gruzii s Severnym Kavkazom v XVIII v., Tbilisi, 1968.
12 See: Islam v Rossiiskoy imperii..., pp. 62-63.
13 See: D.Iu. Arapov, Sistema gosudarstvennogo regulirovania islama v Rossiiskoy imperii (posledniaia tret’ XVIII-nachalo XIX vv.), Moscow, 2004, p. 70.
14 State Archives of Military History of Russia (SAMHR), Record group 821, Inventory 78, File 610,sheets 4-5.
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clergy should be invited. I shall not alienate those who want to become Christians, but I shall not permit people to be lured into Christianity.”15
The instructions of the Minister of War to Head of the Caucasian Region Lieutenant-General A. Vel’iaminov, Commander of the Troops on the Caucasian Line and in the Black Sea Area, that appeared in 1837, ordered him to inform the people under the command of the Sunzha, Kabarda, and Kuban lines that “they can count on preserving their right to the land, faith, and customs of their ancestors.”16 In the Rules for the Administration of the Loyal Mountain Dwellers of the Caucasus, A. Vel’iaminov wrote: “All loyal mountain dwellers are allowed to profess their Muslim or any other faith. Nobody should urge them to change their faith or oppress them for religious rea-sons.”17 The Russian military authorities were expected to monitor fulfillment of the rules. Russia officially recognized the right of the local people to remain Muslims, however, while trying to win the Muslim clerics over to their side, the Russians never abandoned their Christian missionary activities.
To cope with the former, the Russian authorities created a social group of Muslim clerics patterned on the Orthodox hierarchy. They formulated the “Muslim clergy” concept with a legitimate status in all corners of the empire in general and in the Northern Caucasus in particular.
In the first half of the 19th century, the Muslims of the Caucasian Area were granted more rights and obligations.
■ From that time on, under the imperial decree of1834, the honorary Muslims of the Caucasian Area could send their children to military schools1
■ Under the imperial decree of 1842 On Fixed Salaries of the Mullah of the Fortress of Anapa,19 the mullah acquired the right to draw a state salary. He served in the newly built mosque in Anapa to meet the needs of the Muslim mountain amanats who studied in the Russian school there. This was done to ensure that they remain loyal to their faith and to Russia.
■ According to the 1829 Rules for Teaching Mountain Dwellers trained for the service in the Regiment of the Nobility, Muslim students had the right to use the services of the mullah.20
■ Under the imperial decree of 1850 the Russian military extended the right of the Muslim military of the Daghestanian Irregular Cavalry to use the services of a mullah and a Muslim medic hand-picked by the Chief Commander from among the members of the Avar tribe “who distinguished themselves by their loyalty and devotion to the government.21
In the early half of the 19th century the Russian administration set up the main controlling and supervisory bodies designed to monitor the activities of the Muslims of Russia. In 1810 the Main Administration of the Spiritual Affairs of All Faiths was set up to be transformed in 1817 into the Ministry of Spiritual Affairs and People’s Education; A. Golitsyn22 was appointed the first minister. In 1824 the Ministry of Education left the structure, which was later (in 1832) transformed into the Department of Spiritual Affairs of All Foreign Faiths (as part of the Ministry of the Interior) that survived until 1917. The department had a group of experts who specialized in Islam and Is-
15 “Proklamatsii, dannye kabardinskomu narodu byvshim glavnokomanduiushchim generalom Ermolovym,” in: Adaty Kavkazskikh gortsev. Materialy po obychnomu pravu Severnogo i Vostochnogo Kavkaza, p. 259.
16 SAMHR, Record group 13454, Inventory 2, File 281, sheets 1-1rev.
17 A.A. Vel’iaminov, “Pravila dlia upravlenia pokornymi gortsami severnykh pokatostey Kavkaza, Published by D.Iu. Arapov,” Istochnik, No. 5, 2003, pp. 17-18.
18 See: Islam v Rossiiskoy imperii., p. 111.
19 See: Ibid., p. 132.
20 See: Ibid., p. 262.
21 Ibid., pp. 150-151.
22 See: D.Iu. Arapov, Islam na territorii Rossiiskoy imperii, Moscow, 2005, p. 21.
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lamic law (at one point they were Kazem bek, an ethnic Azeri, a prominent Russian Orientalist who headed the Department of Oriental Languages at St. Petersburg University, and Russian ethnographer
S. Rybakov).23
In 1857, under Emperor Alexander II the Charter of Spiritual Affairs of Foreign Faiths related, among other things, to the lifestyle of the Russian Muslims and established control over them. This task was entrusted to the newly set up regional spiritual administrations (the Orenburg Spiritual Administration and the Taurida Muslim Spiritual Administration that united the Muslims of the Crimea); the Shi‘a and Sunni Administrations of the Transcaucasian Muslim Clergy were also created.24 The best results were achieved in the Volga area where the Russian authorities actively promoted their ideas among the local Muslims through the Orenburg Spiritual Muftiat.
In the Northern Caucasus the Russian authorities were seeking control over the form and content of the sermons preached on Fridays at all the village mosques. Those imams who permitted themselves direct or indirect criticism of the Russian policies in the Northern Caucasus were deprived of administrative support.
Not all local people could aspire to become an imam or a mullah; to become a candidate for mullah the aspirant had to present “confirmation of his moral qualities and reliability” supplied by the local police, as well as a document from the qadi who vouched for the claimant’s adequate knowledge. Those private mosques that refused to obey were banned. Mullahs could preach only in main mosques in the presence of elders whose task was to supervise the content of what was said. At the end of the 1840s, anyone in Kabarda wishing to become an effendi or a mullah should pass an exam before a commission of three members: the chief qadi (the judge of the Kabarda Interim Court) and two permanent effendis selected, according to an archive document, “from among knowledgeable people who know Muslim law.” The claimant had to demonstrate his knowledge of Islam and vow allegiance to the Russian state. Those who passed received a document that allowed them to become a village effendi or a mullah.25
The military were involved in settling cases relating to the Muslims of the Caucasus. In 1859, for example, the emperor issued a decree based on the materials submitted by the Viceroy of the Caucasus Alexander Bariatinskiy (1856-1862) On the Procedure for Selling the Possessions of Orphaned Muslims Supervised by the Muslim Shariats of the Transcaucasus.26
Religious Policies of the Russian Empire in the Latter Half of the 19th-Early 20th Centuries
On the whole, the regulatory acts adopted in the latter half of the 19th-early 20th centuries continued the policy started in the early half of the 19th century: first, they fixed certain rights and obligations of the Russian Muslims and, second, they granted the Russian Muslims new rights and formulated their new obligations.
It should be said that, very much as before, many of the regulatory acts were based on discussions of and rulings relating to individual cases, that is, on precedents that made them applicable either to a large group of Muslims or to all Muslims of Russia.
23 See: S.G. Rybakov, Ustroystvo i nuzhdy upravlenia dukhovnymi delami musul’man Rossii, Petrograd, 1917.
24 See: Islam v Rossiiskoy imperii..., pp. 210-246.
25 Central State Archives of the Kabardino-Balkarian Republic (CSA KBR), Record group 23, Inventory 1, File 48, pp. 125, 151.
’ See: Islam v Rossiiskoy imperii., pp. 161-162.
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Besides the special regulatory acts proper regulating the Muslims’ legal status—the Codes of Institutions and Rules of the Administration of Spiritual Affairs of Alien Faiths of both Christian and Alien Believers (1896),27 the Law on Religious Tolerance (17 April, 1905), and the Statute of Alien Faiths (1912)—there were legal acts that treated the situation in Russian Islam and the position of the Muslims in an indirect way: the Code of Gubernia Institutions, the Code of Compulsory Military Service or the Construction Rules (1900).28 The regulatory acts issued in the latter half of the 19th-early 20th century were supplemented with all sorts of instructions issued by ministries (Ministry of the Interior, Ministry of Education, etc.).29
These regulatory acts confirmed some of the rights and social privileges of the Russian Muslims while maintaining control over their lives. S. Rybakov, a Russian expert in Islam, wrote in the early 20th century: “The Russian law created the Muslim clergy as a social group, mullahs with rights and duties.”30 He went on to say that “in the Northern Caucasus—in the Kuban and Terek regions and the Stavropol Gubernia—as well as in the Dagestan region, the system of administration of the spiritual affairs of the Muslims was set up through the practice and instructions of the local administrations. The mullahs are elected by the people and confirmed by the regional and gubernia officials.”31
■ Under the Conscription Regulations (1897, Code of Laws of the Russian Empire), “in Muslim families where polygamy is allowed all children of the same father are regarded as one family, therefore the son who is the only male offspring in the entire family is treated as the only son,” who had the right to be exempted from conscription.32
■ Caucasian Viceroy Vorontsov-Dashkov pointed out that in the Northern Caucasus “the Muslim population, in addition to the taxes enumerated above, pays a special military tax as a substitution for conscription.”33 The obligation to pay the military tax was introduced in 1887 for all Muslims of the Transcaucasus, Terek and Kuban regions, and Stavropol Gubernia, as well as for the Christian Abkhazes of the Sukhumi area.
■ The Rules of the Military Council On Paying Travel Money to Mullahs and Rabbis Sent to the Troops for Spiritual Services, as well as Oath Taking from Rank-and-File Muslims and Jews (1855) established the right of the Muslim military of the Independent Caucasian Corps to Muslim services payable from the state treasury.34
■ After setting up a judicial system in the Northern Caucasus in the form of mountain people’s courts, the Russian administration secured the right of the local Muslims to use the Shari‘a in divorce and inheritance cases.35
The memorandum of Caucasian Viceroy Grand Prince Mikhail Nikolaevich “On Measures Designed to Improve the Standard of Civilian Well-Being and Spiritual Achievements of the Peoples
27 See: Ibid., pp. 190-254.
28 See: Ibid., pp. 254-260.
29 See: Sbornik zakonov o musul’manskom dukhovenstve v Tavricheskom i Orenburgskom okrugakh i o Mago-metanskikh uchebnykh zavedeniakh, Kazan, 1902, p. 1.
30 S.G. Rybakov, op. cit., p. 267.
31 S.G. Rybakov, “K voprosu ob ustroystve dukhovnogo byta musul’man v Rossii. Obzor russkogo zakonodatel’stva i pravitel’stvennoy politiki v otnoshenii musul’man. Voprosy upravlenia ikh dukhovnymi delami. Aprel’ 1917,” in: D.Iu. Arapov, E.I Larina, S.G. Rybakov i ego “Obzor organizatsii dukhovnoy zhizni musul’man Rossii (Aprel’ 1917)”, Moscow, 2006, p. 13.
32 See: Islam v Rossiiskoy imperii., p. 184.
33 I.I. Vorontsov-Dashkov, Vsepoddaneyshaia Zapiska po upravleniu Kavkazskim kraem, St. Petersburg, 1907, pp. 99-100.
34 See: Islam v Rossiiskoy imperii., pp. 159-160.
35 See: I.L. Babich, Pravovaia kul’tura adygov, Moscow, 1999.
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of the Caucasian Area” dated 187936 played an important role in the later developments in the region. It was submitted for approval to the Caucasian Committee (1845-1882) set up to rule the Transcaucasian area and the Caucasian region. The structure, which was accountable directly to the emperor, performed the function of legislative discussion and administration. The committee, which was staffed with top bureaucrats, was set up at the same time as the Caucasian Vicegerency to serve a link between the local Caucasian administration represented by the viceroy, the highest state structures, and the emperor personally. The following, to put it in a nutshell, was suggested by the viceroy and the Caucasian Committee: to have a civilizational impact on the locals, establish strong contacts with the empire, and ensure civilian well-being in the area.37
The Instructions of the Head of the Kuban Region and the Appointed Hetman of the Kuban Cossack Army of 30 July, 1892 formulated additional rules for mosque-building in the Kuban Region (part of the Northern Caucasus) to supplement the all-Russia principles for organizing new Muslim communities and new mosques. New mosques could be built under several conditions: (1) if the faithful of a certain settlement asked for a mosque and (2) if the governor agreed. The document appeared because the general rules of mosque-building were violated by those who built privately owned mosques without the consent of the local people. “Having enlisted, through relatives and friends, a congregation for their mosques, such people are conducting services and delivering sermons in a spirit frequently undesirable for the government thus stirring up enmity and strife among the locals, etc.” The head of the Kuban Region demanded that the construction rules be observed and took the process under his personal control.38
The Russian authorities kept strict tabs on visits to the holy places. The Central State Archives of the Republic of Kabardino-Balkaria contain any number of documents in Arabic in which local people requested permission from the head of Kabarda to make a trip to Turkey or to perform hajj to Mecca and Medina.39
In the Terek Region the Nalchik Mountain Oral Court of Justice introduced exams for those contending for spiritual posts and corresponding commissions under a qadi of the court entrusted with the task of examination. One of the archive sources contains information about certificates for village and quarter effendis of the 1st-3rd degree.40 At that time those who filled spiritual posts were duty bound to obtain approval from the Russian administration. Under the draft Rules of the Administration of Auls of the Terek Region dated 1862, the aul mullah was the head of all the village clerics. He was elected by the head of the district “from among those who have demonstrated the greatest loyalty to the government, are known for their intellect, honesty, and fairness, and have adequate knowledge of the Shari‘a.”41 The Commander of the Caucasian Line had the right of their final endorsement. The Rules were confirmed in the early 1890s; on 8 January, 1893 head of the Terek Region ruled that “the village mullahs in the Muslim villages should in future be chosen by the regional qadi and approved by myself.”42
In the Kuban region everyone contending for the post of mullah had to pass an exam in full conformity with the Instructions of the Head of the Kuban Region of 30 July, 1982 On the Exams for the Title of Mullah. The qadi issued certificates of adequate knowledge of Islam.43 The exam consist-
36 “Mikhail Nikolaevich, velikiy kniaz’, namestnik Kavkaza. Zapiska “O meropriatiiakh k vozvysheniu urovnia grazhdanskogo blagosostoiania i dukhovnogo preuspeiania naselenia Kavkazskogo kraia” (1879),” Kavkazskiy sbornik, Vol. 2 (34), Moscow, 2005, p. 147.
37 See: Ibid., p. 161.
38 See: N.M. Reynke, N.M. Agishev, V.D. Bushen, Materialy po obozreniu gorskikh i narodnykh sudov Kav-kazskogo kraia, St. Petersburg, 1912, pp. 63-64.
39 CSA KBR, Record group I-2, Inventory 1, File 564.
40 CSA KBR, Record group I-6, Inventory 1, File 841, sheets 44-44rev.
41 CSA KBR, Record group I-2, Inventory 1, File 656, sheets 2-3.
42 CSA KBR, Record group I-6, Inventory 1, File 271, sheets 45-45rev.
43 N.M. Reynke, N.M. Agishev, V.D. Bushen, op. cit., p. 21.
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ed of two levels: theoretical and practical (the latter required knowledge of prayers and songs). To be examined the claimant had to obtain from the local police “a certificate of high moral qualities and loyalty,” as well as certificate from the qadi confirming his adequate level of knowledge. The local civilian authorities could ban services in private mosques that disobeyed the above rules and also supervised services in mosques. The mullahs could preach only in the main mosques in the presence of elders.
Early in the 20th century the Russian authorities never slackened their grip on Islamic life in the Northern Caucasus; while shaping their official treatment of Islam they tended to limit the pre-Islamic faiths and traditions based on the adat in preference of the Shari‘a. In 1911, for example, a meeting chaired by the hetman of the Ekaterinodar Division of the Kuban Region discussed measures designed to do away with the tradition of bride kidnapping (practiced among the mountain people according to the norms of customary law). The meeting was attended by the qadi of the local Mountain Court, the superior effendis (mullahs) of all the mountain communities of the Ekaterinodar Divisions, and members of the mountain communities well-versed in the Shari‘a. “After discussing the problem from all sides and taking into account that the frequently practiced method of bride abduction is based neither on the Shari‘a nor on folk customs but is done contrary to the girl’s will and without the consent of her parents,” the meeting ruled that offenders should be punished according to the laws of the Russian Empire.44
Not all measures designed to create a social group of Muslim clerics friendly toward Russia proved successful; some of its members remained hostile. In 1883 Tari Melkhaunov, an effendi of the village of Khaptsevo in Lesser Kabarda, organized opposition to pro-Russian elder Misost Boriev. The confrontation developed into large-scale troubles that attracted the attention of the military. The investigation revealed that Melkhaunov had abused his power by convening a village meeting at which he incited those in attendance to disobey the elder and the rules established by the Russian authorities. The rebel lost his post.45
The Law on Religious Tolerance adopted on 17 April, 1905 that declared freedom of religion and lifestyle for the followers of alien confessions proved to be the high point in the process through which the status of the Muslims in the Russian Empire was determined. The Russian authorities followed up with rules binding for all Muslims that finally unified the legal statuses of the Muslims living in various parts of the empire.46
The general regulatory acts of the latter half of the 19th and early 20th centuries were related to the status of the Muslims realized through the system of spiritual administration: in 1896 the Codes of Institutions and Rules of the Administration of Spiritual Affairs of Alien Faiths of both Christian and Alien Believers47 said the following about the sphere belonging to the Muslim clergy: “The local administration of the spiritual affairs of the Muslims belongs to their clergy at the higher and local levels” (Art 1342).48 By that time two spiritual administrations had been actively functioning: in Taurida and Orenburg. The time had come for the North Caucasian Muslims to set up a single Islamic governing body patterned on the Orenburg Spiritual Muftiat. The same document identified the principles for the functioning of the Transcaucasian Spiritual Administration (1872) that, as distinct from the principles of the Taurida and Orenburg administrations, had certain purely political functions: on the one hand, the state still tightly controlled the Muslim clergy (Section 3, Chapters 1-2); on the other, the Transcaucasian Muslims retained some of the privileges that the Muslims of other parts of the
44 Ibid., pp. 68-69.
45 CSA KBR, Record group 6, Inventory 1, File 25, sheets 252rev.-253.
46 See: Islam v Rossiiskoy imperii., pp. 176-182.
47 See: “Svod uchrezhdeniy i ustavov Upravlenia Dukhovnykh Del inostrannykh veroispovedaniy Khristianskikh i inovernykh (1896 g.),” in: Islam v Rossiiskoy imperii., pp. 190-254.
48 See: “Zakony ob upravlenii dukhovnykh del magometan,” in: Svod Zakonov, Vol. XI, Part 1, St. Petersburg, 1896, p. 1.
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empire had lost: the Transcaucasian Muslim clergy was exempt from payments, they could not be subjected to corporal punishment, and, finally, the rules of the Transcaucasian Administration contained a section absent in the rules relating to Taurida and Orenburg, namely “On the Obligations of the Transcaucasian Shi‘a Muslims.”
For a long time the North Caucasian Muslims remained beyond the reach of the newly set spiritual administration. S. Rybakov, an official of the Ministry of the Interior, wrote: “In the Northern Caucasus—in the Kuban and Terek regions and Stavropol Gubernia—as well as in the Daghestan area, the administrative system of the Muslims’ spiritual affairs evolved through the practice and decisions of the local administrations. The mullahs are elected by popular vote and approved by the regional and gubernia heads.”49 The same author described how in 1912 the Muslims of the areas under the Muslim spiritual administrations of the Kuban and Terek regions were organized: “The village mullahs were selected by decisions of the village communities and approved by the Viceroy of the Caucasus or the regional head.”50 Permission from the regional heads was required to open a Muslim religious school (maktab or madrasah). S. Rybakov pointed out: “Investigation revealed that, according to the local military and civilian power, the system of spiritual administration of the Muslims based on practice was, on the whole, acceptable. It would have been advisable, however, to legally attach these mountain dwellers to one of the functioning Muslim spiritual institutions.”51 Early in the 20th century the State Duma actively discussed the possibility of setting up a spiritual administration of the Muslims of the Northern Caucasus.52
A. Dondukov-Korsakov, who commanded the troops of the Caucasian Military District, put forward this idea in the late 1880s: he suggested that a spiritual administration of the Muslims in the Kuban and Terek regions could be set up on the strength of the existing Regulations of Administration in the Steppe Regions (1891, Arts 97-100). The central military structures (the General Staff, the Ministry of the Interior, and the War Ministry) were dead set against the idea. Similar attempts were repeated later with equal success. Early in the 20th century the newly appointed viceroy in the Caucasus repeatedly pushed forward the idea.
Between 1907 and the 1910s State Duma deputies also made several attempts; in 1913, in particular, 39 deputies drafted a law on the spiritual administration for the Muslims of the Northern Caucasus,53 which was declined by the Russian government. The fundamental work by D. Arapov offers a detailed analysis of the numerous projects designed to change the spiritual life of the North Caucasian Muslims.54 Pan-Islamism was the main reason why the Russian authorities did not hasten to set up a North Caucasian Muftiat. As the memorandum of Caucasian Viceroy I. Vorontsov-Dashkov “On the Spread of Ideas of Pan-Islamism in the Caucasus” (1912)55 (a product of the joint efforts of the viceroy and officials of the special department of his Tiflis Chancellery for the Department of Spiritual Affairs of Alien Confessions of the Ministry of the Interior) testifies the top Russian authorities had the fears of Islam of the early 20th century.
On the whole, pan-Islamism was not very popular in the Northern Caucasus. Caucasian Viceroy Vorontsov-Dashkov wrote: “There are no direct indications that pan-Islamism is promoted among the Muslim population of the Terek Region, however, according to information supplied by our agents, there are traces of agitation.”56 And further: “When talking about the Muslim population of the
49 S.G. Rybakov, “K voprosu ob ustroystve.,” p. 13.
50 S.G. Rybakov, Ustroystvo i nuzhdy upravlenia dukhovnymi delami musul’man Rossii, p. 276.
51 Ibid., p. 277.
52 See: Ibid., p. 283.
53 See: Ibid., p. 312.
54 See: D.Iu. Arapov, Sistema gosudarstvennogo regulirovania islama v Rossiiskoy imperii (posledniai tret’ XVIII-nachalo XIX vv.), pp. 219-220.
55 See: I.I. Vorontsov-Dashkov, “O rasprostranenii idey panislamizma na Kavkaze (1912),” Kavkazskiy sbornik, Vol. 2 (34), Moscow, 2005.
56 Ibid., p. 183.
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Caucasus I should say that we would do best to fear separatist sentiments among certain Caucasian nationalities in the future.”57
The Muslim congress convened in 1914 in St. Petersburg drafted the Statute of the Administration of the Spiritual Affairs of the Muslims of the Russian Empire.58 The delegates were convinced that new spiritual administrations with the institution of muftis, including the Administration of the Northern Caucasus (the North Caucasian Administration—Stavropol Gubernia, the Kuban and Terek regions), should become the pivot that would change the legal status of the Russian Muslims. The Ministry of the Interior, in turn, insisted that the already functioning institution of muftis was accepted as “a means promoting Islam and shows that the state, by appointing the muftis by imperial power, has recognized the special status of this religion. New muftiats would create new centers of Islam the heads of which might prove responsive to progressive ideas incompatible with the interests of the Russian state.”59
Christian Missionary Activities of the Synod in the Northern Caucasus
Russia launched its Christian missionary activities in the Northern Caucasus back in the 17th and 18th centuries. On 21 January, 1752 the Senate of the Collegium for Foreign Affairs issued a decree On Christianization of the Mountain Peoples of the Northern Caucasus which specified measures conducive to Christianization of the Ossets: first, to reward those elders who convinced their neighbors to be baptized and, second, to grant privileges to the newly converted Christian Ossets who traded with Russians.60
In the first half of the 19th century the Russian Empire stepped up its missionary involvement among the Ossets with several important aims in view:
(1) limiting the impact of Islam seeping in from Kabarda;
(2) encouraging Ossets to become Russian citizens, and
(3) adding vigor to the process of Russification of the North Caucasian peoples.
Together with the missionary activities in the Northern Caucasus Russia actively developed the Christian education system, one of the most effective ways to draw the mountain peoples into the public spirit of Russian life. The Ossets, with a greater share of Christians, were the main target of the Russian state’s educational zeal. The Society for the Restoration of Christian Orthodoxy in the Caucasus operated on money supplied by the Holy Synod and the state.
Until the mid-19th century Orthodox missionary activities in Ossetia were not involved in the primary education system; starting in the latter half of the 19th and early 20th centuries primary and secondary Orthodox schools appeared.
During the reform of the military and civilian administration system, in 1860 Viceroy of the Caucasus Alexander Bariatinskiy set up the Society for the Restoration of Christian Orthodoxy in the Caucasus based in Tiflis to coordinate the efforts of academics, the Orthodox Church, and missionaries.
In 1861 the St. Olga school for girls was opened in Vladikavkaz. By that time all the primary schools in Ossetia belonged to one of three types: either run by the Zemstvo, by the Ministry of
57 Vsepoddaneyshiy otchet (namestnika Kavkaza) za vosem’ let upravlenia Kavkazom, St. Petersburg, 1913, p. 9.
58 See: S.G. Rybakov, “K voprosu ob ustroystve.,” p. 31.
59 Ibid., p. 29.
60 See: Russko-osetinskie otnoshenia v XVIII v., Orjonikidze, Vol. 1, 1976, pp. 332-335.
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Education, or by the Holy Synod. The parochial schools in which Osset and Russian teachers (mainly graduates of the Tiflis Alexander Teachers Seminary) pooled their efforts to teach the Scriptures, the fundamentals of Christianity, the Holy Bible in Russian, and the history of the Old and New Testament showed the best results. Popular Osset priests Alexey Gatuev, Alexey Koliev, and others taught at the Missionary Religious Seminary opened in the Osset village of Ardon; there was a fairly popular Religious Orthodox College in Mozdok. All the Orthodox schools of Ossetia functioned under the supervision of Bishop Leonid Alaverdskiy, an ethnic Osset. The educational frenzy of the latter half of the 19th and early 20th centuries was supported by the no less active publishing activities. The Ir Publishing Society of Ossetia published Orthodox books in the Osset language and created the Osset alphabet presented in 1891 in the form of the Osset ABC compiled by Inal Kanukov.
Early in the 20th century the ideologists (N. Il’minskiy and R. Ostroumov) of Orthodox proliferation (in the form of missionary work and education) in the empire’s ethnic margins came forward with the idea of reforming the process: parochial schools were not very popular across Russia and had shown no spectacular results. The new methods were widely discussed at numerous Orthodox and missionary congresses held at the turn of the 20th century: the 3rd All-Russia Missionary Congress in Kazan in 1897; the missionary congress in Nizhniy Novgorod in 1907, the 4th All-Russia Missionary Congress in Kiev in 1908; and the missionary eparchial congress in Kazan in 1910. Those who insisted that religious and secular education should be divided favored the idea of developing education in Russia on the basis of public parochial schools. This was finally accepted in the early 20th century: in the 1910s the system of primary education in Ossetia was transferred from the Holy Synod to the Ministry of Education. The parochial schools were replaced with the Ministry’s; priests were gradually replaced with Osset teachers trained at the secular Tiflis Alexander Teacher’s College (later transformed into the Alexander Institute). The Society for the Restoration of Christian Orthodoxy in the Caucasus was replaced in 1883 with the Society for the Proliferation of Education and Technical Knowledge among the Mountain Dwellers of the Terek Region, which was an instant success.
The Muslim religious elite of the region was obviously concerned about the growing popularity of secular education in the Russian language. The Russian administration was less than enthusiastic about the Muslim religious leaders’ efforts to set up village schools at mosques using their own money. The process became extremely complicated: those wishing to start such a school on their own initiative had to convene a village meeting, obtain its consent, then mail the document for approval and financial support to the Ministry of Education, which never declined such requests but never funded the projects.
C o n c l u s i o n
In the Northern Caucasus the Russian state worked toward favorable conditions for the local peoples who became part of the empire, on the one hand, while it strengthened state security in order to undermine the efforts of those who wanted state independence, on the other. An analysis of the main vectors of Russia’s policies toward the mosque and the church suggests that the structures of both the state and the Synod saw their task as formulating the basic rights and duties of the North Caucasian Muslims as subjects of the Russian state, on the one hand, while they spared no efforts to change the local peoples’ religious preferences, on the other. This was largely accomplished in Ossetia. In fact, the Russian government fully tapped the potential of religion as a way to shape Russia’s identity in the Northern Caucasus and cement its position in the region.
An analysis of the factors that affected religious policies in the Northern Caucasus has revealed that in the latter half of the 19th and early 20th centuries (when the Caucasian War finally ended in 1864) the military retained their central role in cementing Russian statehood in the region. They acted
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much more harshly than secular power could have done within the secular Russian laws. This explains why the legal status of the North Caucasian Muslims was determined mainly by military instructions and regulations of indefinite duration.
In fact, the rights and duties of the Muslim clergy and Russian Muslims were determined by two mechanisms:
(1) the Russian secular laws that took into account the norms of the adat and the norms of Muslim law (the Shari‘a) and
(2) temporary instructions and rules.
The legal status of the Russian Muslim population was determined by civil laws, however Muslim laws remained applicable in issues relating to marriage and family relations, as well as to inheritance.
It took the Russian secular legislation that regulated the legal status of the Muslims of Russia a long time to develop from scattered legal documents reflecting the decisions made in individual cases (that created precedents) to general legal foundations relating to all the Muslims of the Russian Empire (the Northern Caucasus included). On the whole the process remained incomplete: until 1917 the local Muslims were still subordinated to the local military authorities while Muslims elsewhere lived under their own spiritual administrations that served as a link between the Russian (mainly civilian) government and the Islamic communities.
Israpil SAMPIEV
Ph.D. (Philos.), associate professor, head of the Department of Political Science and Sociology,
State University of Ingushetia (Nazran, Russia)
RUSSIA’S ISLAMIC POLICIES IN THE NORTHERN CAUCASUS: HISTORICAL PARALLELS
Abstract
The author tries to reveal the meaning of Russia’s Islamic policies in the Northern Caucasus by looking back at imperial and Soviet times. His diachronic comparative analysis brought to light clear parallels created by the inner continuity of the aims and close ideological kinship of
the twists and turns in its political line. This suggests that the religious-political radicalism in the region is a manifestation of the worldwide anti-colonial trends and a response to outside pressure at a time of sharp social and cultural crises amid the Muslim communities.
