CC BY
14
Many imams of Dagestan and especially the representatives of the Religious board of the Moslems of Dagestan thought that the graduates of the Islamic institutions of Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Egypt and the other Moslem countries promote strengthening the Islamist position of Dagestan. R. Gainutdin, the leader of the Religious board of the Moslems of Dagestan held the same point of view. Some teachers-Dagestani of the Islamic institution named by Shafii treated the activity of the Arabian teachers with the great distrust but the leadership of the institute had to be patient with their presence because of the great financing from the charitable organizations where the teachers-Arabs were from.
"Geopolitika, gosudarstvennaya bezopastpost', mezhdunarodnye otnosheniya", S-Pb, 2010, p. 2-23.
Elmira Muratova,
candidate of political sciences
(V.I. Vernadsky Tavrichesky National University)
TEACHING ISLAM IN THE CRIMEA
The traditional education system of the Crimean Tatars consisted of two types of education institutions: the secondary (mektebs) and high (medreces) schools. It is hardly possible to reconstruct a complete and authentic picture of functioning of mektebs in the Crimea for several centuries of history of the Crimean khanate. Usually the mektebs were kept and financed by the Muslim communities. Not only representatives of the local Muslim clergy but also members of their families occupied the posts of teachers. As a rule, the wives and daughters of the mullahs were engaged in education of girls at school.
Teaching in the mektebs was allowed for both the Hadjis - the people, who had gone on a pilgrimage to the sacred Islamic places, and
Sokhts - students of medreces, and the adequately educated members of local Muslim communities. Often teaching took place in mosques or in the houses of mullahs, which were not properly accommodated for it.
The Islamic high education institutions - medreces - were the places used for training of the clergy members, the teachers for mektebs and educated Muslims as a whole. Medreces appeared in the Crimea long time ago. Probably, they were founded in the peninsula in time of the Golden Horde. The spread of the Muslim culture and education was started actually after adoption of Islam as a state religion in the regions ruled by the khanate.
The restoration of Islamic education became possible from the moment of return of the Crimean Tatars to their Motherland in the end of the 1980s. One of the significant problems of Islamic renaissance in the contemporary Crimea became a great shortage of qualified imams, who would be able to read Koran, to cite khadises, to orient Muslims according to Islamic original sources. In the beginning of the 1990s, the representatives of the older generation of the Crimean Tatars assumed the functions of imams in the Muslim communities. Most of them lacked special spiritual education, and their perception of Islam was limited with the knowledge given to them by their parents and relatives. For this reason, they had to make way to the young and energetic imams, who got Islamic education.
The imams of the young generation were educated primarily abroad in universities of Muslim countries. Since the beginning of the 1990s, some Crimean Tatars started to go abroad for studies in Turkey, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon and other states of the Islamic world. The majority of Crimean Tatars received education in the theological department of Turkish universities. Out of 50 people, left for Turkey to get education, 20 persons came back, while 10 of them started their religious activities as muftis, teachers and imams, according to
A. Ismailov, the deputy mufti of the Crimea. Some young people did not graduate from theological department of the universities and chose other professions. A part of those, who received theological education, got a job in Turkey or, having returned home, are engaged in the activities, which have not been marked in their diplomas.
Those, who studied in Islamic universities of Arabic countries, usually went their by means of their personal contacts and under the private agreement with the receiving party, which had nothing to do with the leadership of the Spiritual Department of Muslims of the Crimea (SDMC). The SDMC has no information about them and their destiny. The sojourn of young people abroad and education in Arabic universities excites apprehension that they might become influenced by different "radical" trends, which hinders the Spiritual Department to invite them to be involved in the activities related to Islamic renaissance in the Crimea.
As a whole, the leadership of SDMC came to the conclusion that the external channel of receiving Islamic education by Crimean Tatars was inefficient. And the alternative to it became the idea of creating on the territory of the Crimea the Muslim education institutions, which would train the cadres according to the national traditions and with due account of the regional Islamic specificity.
At present, the formation of the secondary and the high Islamic education achieved some successes in the Crimea. The secondary (Sunday and Koran study) schools function at a number of mosques and provide for people of different age the basic knowledge of Islam and of the Arabic language. They master reading of Koran and the basics of cult service. Some Sunday schools were created with the support of association "Alraid". For the 2009, on the territory of the Crimea there functioned 23 Muslim schools directed by imams of local Muslim communities. The Koran schools coordinated by the Turkish religious
organizations carry out their function at some mosques. The Sunday and Koran schools provide for the same size of knowledge. The difference consists in the citizenship of the teachers: the Turkish teachers work in the Koran schools. They are mainly the representatives of the Department for Religious Affairs of Turkey (Diyanet). They perform functions of imams, side by side with local imams, in a number of settlements. Apart from Diyanet, the Turkish religious community "Suleimanie" arranged some Koran schools and continues to give financial support to them.
The medreces and the schools of khafises represent the Muslim education institutions at the middle level.
There are different appraisals of the number of medreces, which carry out their function on the territory of the peninsula. For instance, mufti E. Ablayev mentioned 6 medreces in his statement at the IV Curultai of Muslims of the Crimea. At the same time, the representative of the Maijilis of the Crimean Tatars in the Muftiate A. Alchikov thinks that this was an exaggerated number. According to him, not all education institutions might be regarded as medreces, since actually they were rather Koran schools than the religious education institutions of the higher status.
The activities of the Crimean medreces are officially kept under control of SDMC. The Deputy Mufti A. Ismailov is in charge of the spiritual education; however, the representatives of the Turkish religious organizations actually keep under their control the education process in medreces. The textbooks, used in the medreces, are written by Turkish authors, including O. Topbasha, who is the head of private religious foundation "Aziz Makhmud Khyudai", which coordinates the work of this medrece. The teachers' staff of the medrece consists of two parts: one half - the Crimean Tatars, who have received theological education in Turkey, the other half - the Turkish professors.
The other education institutions, which originally functioned as medreces, further changed their status. For instance, medrece "Kurman", located in Krasnogvardeisk district, was transformed in 2007 and became a khafiz school. At the initial stage education in this medrece was based on the same principles like in Azov medrece and functioned under patronage of religious foundation "Aziz Makhmud Khyudai". Medrece "Seit-Settar", which started its work in 1993 in Simferopol, later stopped to function as a medrece and was made an ordinary Koran school. The other education institution, which functioned in Simferopol since 2003, is actually a Koran school, although it is named as a Higher Islamic medrece. Its students study religious disciplines and at the same time are students of the secular education institutions. The school functions with the support of Turkish religious community "Suleimanie".
The khafiz school was opened in December 2002 in Simferopol with the support of the World Organization for Koran Education and the All-Ukrainian Association of Public Organizations "Alraid" The Spiritual Department of Muslims of the Crimea is the official founder of the school. The education institution is a boarding-school for the boys from 13 to 18 years old. The conditions for admittance to the school are as follows: the obligatory attendance of a general school, application of the parents and recommendation of the muftiyat or the imam of the local Muslim community, Ukrainian citizenship. It is preferable for the applicants to read Arabic; however, most new students, according to the director of the school S. Arifov, start to study Arabic from the beginning. The special attention in the selection of the school-leavers is paid to their successes in the general school and to the probable existence of adepts of radical trends among their relatives. The nationality of young boys is not taken into account. Although the
majority of students of the school consist of the Crimean Tatars, the Tatars of Kazan, Arabs, Uzbeks and Slaves also study at this school.
The curriculum of the school is calculated for 3 years. For the whole period of education the students learn by heart the text of Koran and master the basics of the Muslim law.
The teaching is marked by use of efficient methods of leaning by heart 1-2 pages of Koran every day, while most capable students - up to 5 pages of this text. The teaching is arranged in this way: all students are divided into small groups, and the teacher of each group loudly reads Koran, while the students repeat this text. The process goes on up to the time when the students start to reproduce the text without mistakes.
The staff of the school's teachers consists of citizens of various countries, Including Arabic countries. Unlike other Islamic education institutions of the Crimea, teaching in the school is arranged in Russian. The teachers, graduated from the Islamic university in Saudi Arabia, the shariat department of Jinan University in Lebanon, the department of the Arabic language and literature of Zarka University in Jordan, the khafiz school in Jordan as well as the graduates of the school itself.
Leaving the school, the graduates receive the diplomas analogues to the diplomas issued by the Crimean medreces. In all diplomas as the profession is mentioned "imam-khatib, the teacher of the Islamic subjects", while in the diplomas of those, who has learnt by heart the whole text of Koran, the word "khafiz" is added. Although the school has a license, its diplomas are recognized, as a rule, only by Muslim structures of the Crimea, for instance, by muftiyat or other Islamic education institutions. Outside Ukraine the diplomas of the school are recognized by its sponsor - the World Organization for Teaching Koran and by the universities, which have concluded agreements with "Alraid" about further studies of the school's graduates.
These agreements were concluded with some universities of Jordan and Yemen. And 8 graduates of the school study in these universities. Their study is financed either by the recipient university or by a private sponsor, assumes the obligation to cover the expenses according to the recommendation of association "Alraid". Three graduates of the khafiz school continued to work there. Others do not work by profession, although some of them unofficially teach in mosques of the Crimea.
The director of the school S. Arifov is concerned about the financial difficulties and of the troubles of the students, which are caused by the excessive education burden for the students, since they have to combine the study in the khafiz school with the studies in the general education school. Not all students endure such burden: some of them leave the school themselves, others are sent down due to lagging behind. Some students may be discharged for "unworthy" behavior, for instance, smoking or watching "obscene" magazines.
One other problem, which is confronted by the students due to their inadequate knowledge of the Arabic language, is as follows: it prevents them to understand the sense of the learnt texts of Koran. Even the most capable graduates, citing by heart Koran, are hardly able to clarify the sense of this text.
As S. Arifov thinks, the other painful problem is a rather low level of religiousness of the Crimean Tatars, who are not in a hurry to send their children to his school. Responding to the appeals to study the Islamic holy text, they often pragmatically say that their children after graduating from this school will hardly be able to get a prestige work and the adequate salary. As a result, the number of those, who wish to enter the school, is not big, the competition among aspirants is small and the level of the graduates is not high.
There is no higher education Islamic institution in the Crimea, although the idea of its creation is being discussed periodically. For instance, in the course of the World Congress of Crimean Tatars, held in May 2009, Deputy Chairman of Majilis R. Chubarov expressed the idea of creation of an Islamic university on the basis of Zindjirli medrece in Bakhcisarai. This initiative is supported by the leadership of muftiyat of the Crimea.
At present, the only Islamic higher education institution functions in Ukraine - the Islamic University of the Spiritual Department of Muslims of Ukraine (SDMU). It was established in Kiev in 1993 and consists of two departments with different status - the "valuable" department of shariat and basics of religion and the "partially acting" department of pedagogy and oriental linguistics. Teaching of Islamic subjects is based in this department on the materials provided by the Association of Islamic Charitable Projects. The list of recommended for the students contains the long list of works, ascribed to Lebanese sheikh Abdallah al-Kharari al-Khabashi (1910-2008). The materials published by SDMU newspaper "Minaret" provide a great help for the education process. Due to significant discords between SDMC and SDMU, the education of Crimean Tatars
in this education institution is not welcomed.
* * *
Summing up the review of the present process of Islamic education in Crimea, it is possible to make some conclusions and generalizations. First of all, it should be noted that the activities of Islamic education institutions are characterized by the lack of their coordination and regulation according to the united standard. The absence of connections between various sections of Muslim education and unconformity of their actions has a great negative impact on the
attempts to arrange structuring of the hierarchy of the Islamic education institutions.
Realizing the complexity of the situation, the Spiritual Department of Muslims of the Crimea took the initiative of putting in order Islamic education in the peninsula and drafted the project for the planned development and standardization of spiritual education-enlightenment process. The project provided for the three-level education system with the main stages - the secondary, the high and the high special education. To the mind of the authors of the project, standardization of the Muslim education system in the Crimea should promote the rise of its efficiency.
The dominance of Turkish religious organizations is the evident feature of the Muslim education institutions in the Crimea. The leaders of the Crimean Tatars definitely prefer the "Turkish" education model and regard it as the most efficient model, which promotes renaissance of "traditional Islam for Crimea". The term "traditional Islam for Crimea", despite its non-scientific characteristic, has been fixed in the propaganda vocabulary of the leaders of the Crimean Tatars, who share a rather ambiguous perception about specifics of the Islamic religious complex. Up to the present time, it is impossible to say to what extent the education system with the evident Sufi component, incorporated today in the Crimea by private Turkish foundations, corresponds to the education traditions of the Crimean Tatars. This theme is a subject to a separate profound study.
Nevertheless, it is impossible to negate the fact that the economic dependence of SDMC on religious foreign organizations limits its abilities to keep under control the functioning of education institutions, to invite self-dependently the teachers and to determine the curriculum. At present, muftiyat is not a sponsor of any Islamic education institution functioning in the Crimea.
Finally, as one of the difficulties endured by the Islamic education centers in the sphere of teaching process the author should stress the lack of the text books of new generation, written with due account of traditions of the Crimean Tatars and the specifics of their mentality.
Teaching Islam in the secular education institutions of the Crimea. It is hardly possible to say that teaching disciplines related to Islam in the secular education institutions of the Crimea is a widely spread practice. The students receive general information about Islam in the course "religious knowledge", which is included in the curriculum of all higher education institutions of the peninsula. The professors of the humanitarian departments of the Crimean higher education institutions include information about history of Islam in their lectures devoted to the history of Asian and African countries or in the lectures devoted to the oriental history. The author himself reads the course "Islamic world in contemporary politics" in the philosophical department of V.I. Vernadsky Tavrichesky National University. This course is addressed to the students-political scientists of 5 years studies. In the same department professor A. Tsvetkov reads the course "Islamic fundamentalism", where the main attention is devoted to perception of this phenomenon from the philosophical point of view. The course "Islam" is lectured in the department of the Crimean Tatars and eastern philology of the TNU for the students, who study the Arabic language and literature. The list of subjects includes the classical knowledge of Islam, history of origin of Islam, the main stages of biography of Prophet Muhammad, the trends in Islam etc.
The program of educating specialists in the Arabic language and literature is provided in the Crimea only in one higher education institution - in the TNU in the department of the Crimean Tatars and eastern philology. The Arabic language is studied by students of 3-5
courses in the Crimean Engineers-Pedagogical University in the department of the Crimean Tatars and Turkish philology.
The described general contours of Islamic education in the Crimea have a long history. The formation of the contemporary system of Islamic education goes on under complicated conditions of repatriation of the Crimean Tatars, which has an evident impact on this process and to some extent explains its chaotic and thoughtless characteristic. Probably, as soon as the other essential problems of the Crimean Tatars will be solved the process of the Islamic education will attract the intent attention of national leaders and will get a new impulse for its development.
"Izuchenie prepodavaniya Islama v Evrazii", M, 2010, p. 288-310.
Gusein Bakhar Vagif, political scientist (Azerbaijan) AZERBAIJAN IN THE SPHERE OF WORLD DIPLOMACY
The Yalta-Potsdam system, being a result of the Second World War and the basis of the contemporary world, was formed like a bipolar system constructed on the balance of two contradictory systems. The sphere of two opposing poles was determined even if formally. However, the world socialist system was doomed to retreat in this confrontation. The collapse of the Soviet Union as a moving force and locomotive of socialism determined the fall of the socialist system as a pole, and in this way the political map of the world, forming after the Second World War, was renewed, while the Yalta-Potsdam system became history.
