The Revitalizing Aspect of the Tatar Reform Movement*

Ahmet KANLIDERE

While Tatar reformism, one of the best-known Islamic reform movements in the
modern period, has attracted many scholars, its religious aspect has been neglected. A
misleading portrait of the Tatar reformers has been conveyed by either
underestimating their impact or overlooking their religious concerns. This study,
therefore, first briefly considers the nature of the misleading portrayal of the Tatar
reformers and then considers the revitalizing aspect of the Tatar renaissance and the
effectiveness of the reformist Tatar ulem in the transitional period of Tatar society
from about 1850 to 1917.

Misconceptions, distortions and misrepresentations concerning the early phase

of this reform movement appear in the works of Soviet historians as well as nationalist
writers. The Soviet historians tended to deny, underplay or misrepresent the religious
reformers. The early Soviet historians attacked such religious reformers as Shihb al-
Din Marjan (1818-1889), `limjan Barud (1857-1921), and Msa Bigiyef (1875-
1949) by saying that they had contributed nothing and made no impact on people's
life.1 In the 1930s the religious reformers had completely disappeared from the scene.
Only after the 1950s did Soviet historiography rehabilitate these reformers one by one
(but not all) and include them in the group of "enlighteners" whom Soviet
historiography favored. As an example of such an approach, in 1976 a Tatar historian,
Yahya Abdullin devoted significant space to minor reformers but treated the major
religious reformers such as Fakhr al-Din and Msa Bigiyef with silence. 2 Today, Tatar
authors vigorously write and reprint the works of the religious reformers, but their
approaches still carry traces of this Soviet historiography.
Soviet historians favored and singled out non-religious intellectuals and called
them "enlighteners" (ma`riftchilr) or "democratic and progressive intelligentsia"3
(not to be discussed in this paper). These Tatars were usually teachers of the Tatar
language in Russian missionary schools. They fit into the Soviet frame of reference
because they were friendly with Russians and kept themselves away from nationalist

*
This paper was presented at University Seminar for Studies in the History and Culture of the Turks,
Columbia University, New York, 17 November 1995.
1
Bekir obanzde, Din Islahat ve Mdn Inqlb (Aq Masjid: Qrm Dvlt Nshriyat, 1927), 58.
2
Yahya. G. Abdullin, Tatarskaia prosvetitel'skaia mysl' (Kazan, 1976).
3
Tatarstan ASSR Tarikhi (Kazan: Tatarstan Kitap Nshriyat, 1970), 236-37.

1
separatism.4 Their early representative was `Abd al-Qayyum Nsir (1825-1902). He
was followed by Ibrahim Khalfin (1778-1829), Muhammad `Ali Mahmudov (1824-
1891), Husayn Fayzkhanov (1821-1866), and Muhammad Zhir Bigiyef (1870-1902).
According to a Soviet history book, jadidists (or "ideologues of liberal bourgeois
nationalism") seemed to be the followers of these progressive-democrats. The same
source argued that jadidists differed from the "enlighteners" principally regarding their
class basis; it asserted that while jadidists served the bourgeois class, "enlighteners"
served the people's interests.5

On the other hand, several immigrant Tatar, Turkish, and Western scholars have
had a tendency to glorify the reformers or to put these reformers into a nationalist
context. This type of interpretation pushes them into overlooking the religious aspect
of the subject. Therefore, my criticism focuses upon their writings regarding the very
origin of the Tatar reform.
What is missing in both the Soviet and nationalist picture is the revivalist phase
of Tatar reformism and the religious reformers who constitute the main body of the
reformist intellectuals. One of the main sources of the Tatar reformism described the
emergence of the reform movement as follows:
For two or three hundred years, there had been stagnation (durgunluk) in our
situation. However, in the nineteenth century signs of awareness (intibah srlri)
began to appear among our religious scholars. A small group of theologians such as
Abu al-Nasr al-Qursav pointed out the deviation of our people from the path of the
Qur'an and Sunnah as well as from earlier religious, scientific, and other practices.6
As indicated above, the revivalist phase was begun in the early nineteenth
century by a small group of Tatar theologians. It was a movement of purification
within Islam. The best representatives of the Tatar religious thinkers are `Abd al-Nasr
Qursav (1771-1812), Shihb al-Din Marjan (1818-1889), Riza al-Din b. Fakhr al-Din
(1858-1936), and Msa Jr Allah Bigiyef (1875-1949).
Qursav, the real "father" of the theological reform, represents the pure revivalist
phase of Tatar reformism. We know that he interpreted some religious issues
differently than the Muslim ulem of his time. Contrary to the claims of some
historians,7 Qursav did not attempt to modernize Islam by bringing "new thoughts."

4
Ibid.
5
Ibid., 238.
6
Shahar Sharaf, "Marjanning Trjm-i Hli," in Marjan, ed., Slih b. Sbit `Ubayd Ullin (Kazan:
Ma`arif Matba`as, 1915), iv-v.
7
For example, Tamurbek Davletshin, in his Sovetskii Tatarstan (London: Our Word Publishers, 1974,
29), claimed that Qursav brought new thougts that shook the basis of the domination of centuries-old
dogmatism and scholasticism. Furthermore, Davletshin believed that Qursav arrived at these thoughts

2
What he brought was a sort of revival of some of the thoughts of the classical Muslim
thinkers such as Ibn al-Arab and Ghazzal. In addition, Qursav was very much
against Muslim scholastic theology known as kalm. It was because he believed that
in the Muslim world the place of scientific culture had been taken by exclusively
theological questions and this caused decline and corruption in the Islamic educational
system. I think Qursav's defending of such ideas attracted criticism from the
contemporary ulem of Central Asia, not because they were "modern," or "unheard
of." It was because Qursav was attacking the most favored science of the madrasahs,
that is kalm.
Because of Qursav's theological stand a conflict took place between Qursav
and the conservative ulem of Central Asia. This is the first known conflict, and it
occurred in 1808 in the city of Bukhara. According to a Tatar historian, Qursav
charged the conservative ulem with deviation from the way of the early Muslims.
After hearing of this controversy, the ruler of Bukhara, Amir Haydar (1800-26),
summoned Qursav and other scholars into his presence. A big public debate arose
between Qursav and the conservatives. In the end, almost all the conservatives united
to charge him with holding heretical beliefs. They threatened Qursav with execution
if he did not repent of his wrong beliefs. Finally, they made him read a text of faith
saying "my belief and school is such and such." From then on, all of his writings were
burned and the holders of Qursav's writings were threatened with execution.8
Like Qursav, the most important figure of Tatar reformism, the theologian and
historian Shihb al-Din Marjan,9 faced opposition from the conservatives because
some of his theological interpretations diverged from those of contemporary Tatar
ulem. None of these interpretations were "new" or revolutionary. They were just
different and these different interpretations outraged the conservative ulem. Here, the
rift between the conservative `ulem and Qursav and Marjan becomes clear. Both
reformers probed deeply into Muslim thought and discovered diverse approaches in

independently.
8
Shihb al-Din b. Bah al-Din al-Marjan, Al-Qsm al-awwal min Kitb Mustafd al-Akhbr fi Ahwl
Qazan wa Bulghar (Kazan: Dvlt Matba`as, 1885),168.
9
Marjani was born in 1818 in a village near the city of Kazan. He was from the lower-middle class, as
were most of the Muslim clergy at that time. He studied in a maktab and madrasah, and then in 1838 he
went to Bukhara in order to broaden his religious knowledge. Bukhara was, at that time, the magnet for
those Tatars who had the ambition to become Islamic scholars. He was aware of Qursav's ideas and
opposed them, like many other mullahs of his time.

3
the Muslim classics,10 but the conservative ulem were satisfied with the current
interpretations and considered any other interpretations to be "heretical innovations."
Qursav and Marjan rejected th1e later additions and foreign cultural influences
on Islam when they attacked kalm. Thus, they did not bring a new approach to Islam,
but simply reintroduced a very well known Islamic trend into their Tatar context. This
trend is known as "traditionalism" or Salafiyya in Islamic religious history. The first
"traditionalist" trend, the Sunn theological school of Hanbaliyya, was founded by
Ahmed b. Hanbal who lived in the nineth century. This theological school is known
for its hostility to the theology of kalm as well as to Islamic mysticism. Hanbaliyya
insisted on following only the Qur'an and the Sunna. Unlike the other Sunn schools
which became occupied with kalm disputations, Hanbaliyya remained free of the
kalm schools' influence and has maintained its "traditionalist" position to the present
time. The most prominent traditionalists were Taq al-Din ibn Taymiyya (1263-1328)
and Ibn Qayyim al-Jawziyya (1292-1350) of the fourteenth century. The Hanbaliyya
doctrine provided inspiration for the modern reformist tendencies in Islam, such as the
Wahhabism and the neo-Salafiyya.
It was this anti-kalm attitude of the reformers in particular that angered he
contemporary conservative Tatars. Therefore, conservatives concentrated especially
on defending kalm and kalm scholars. They considered the reformers the same as
Wahhbis. For them, Wahhbism was a contagious disease whose microbes penetrated
the minds of those who never appreciated kalm.11 Their accusation of a reformist-
Wahhb connection was not unfounded. At least one Tatar reformer, Msa Bigiyef
openly praised the Wahhbs and called Wahhbis "the purest and the most mature
believers." Moreover, he regarded the government of Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhb
as an exemplary Islamic government like that of the first four caliphs.12
This evidence shows clearly that the reformers' main concern was to remove
kalm from the educational system. They were opposed kalm because they believed
that kalm scholars had corrupted the "purity" of Islam and because they thought
kalm kept Muslims from the direct study of the Qur'an and the Sunna. They also
believed that the time-consuming and impractical disputations of kalm made their
educational studies pedantic. There were no classes on history, geography,

10
Sharaf, 51-52. According to his own account, in the libraries of Bukhara and Samarkand he found
classical Islamic works written by the Muslim scholars before the fifteenth century what he called "the
salaf books." These books attracted his attention, inspired him, and began a transformation of his
attitudes. It is obvious that he was influenced by Muslim scholars such as al-Ghazzl, Jalal al-Din al-
Dawwan (1427-1501/02), Ibn Sina (980-1037), Ibn Hazm (944-1064), Ibn al-`Arab, and Suhraward
(d. 1191).
11
Din v Ma`isht 4: 46 (December 1910): 732.
12
Msa Jr Allah Bigiyef, "Son Zaman Vahhablrinin Siyas-Din Ghaylri," `Asr Mslmanlq 7
(1925): 157-58.

4
mathematics or other sciences in the curriculum of the madrasahs in Central Asia and
Tatarstan. Reformers fought to remove the study of kalm and replace it with the
direct study of the Qur'an and the sunna as well as modern sciences.
Despite some similarities with Wahhbism, Tatar reform had its own
characteristics due to Tatarstan's specific historical and geographical situation. First,
the Tatar reformers differed from the Wahhbs given their tolerant attitude toward
Sufism. The major reformers such as Qursav, Marjan, Fakhr al-Din and Msa
Bigiyef had Suf contacts and tendencies. We know that the earliest Tatar reformer
Qursav attended the lectures of a Suf shaykh. In the same way, the leading Tatar
reformer Marjan expressed his respect for the great mystics in his writings and
counted Sufism a branch of Islamic sciences. During his education in Bukhara,
Marjan occupied himself with spiritual training and Sufism. He even attached himself
to a Suf shaykh.13
Tatars had a very special geographical location compared with other Muslim
communities. They were not isolated from the outside world since they had interacted
for a long time with a Christian power, Russia. Naturally, this special location gave a
distinct characteristic to the Tatar Islamic reform movement. The reformers were not
antagonistic to Western ideas and values. They expressed their willingness to change
their society along Western lines in order to strengthen it.
Some observers proposed that the Tatar reform movement emerged as a reaction
to the Russian missionaries.14 I wouldn't go so far as to agree completely with this
claim, but I would point out that Russian Orthodox missionaries provoked the Tatar
ulem. The missionaries attacked Islam by pointing out polygamy, unregulated
divorce, and the status of women. These attacks motivated the Tatar ulem to print
books, and establish newspapers and journals to defend Islam. Of course, the help of
wealthy Tatar merchants also played an important role in supporting these activities.
While the ulem were defending Islam, some of ulem reconsidered these issues and
concentrated their efforts on the improvement of the status of Muslim women. Also,
missionary institutions provided a model for the reformers to imitate. For example,
some of the reformers openly admired Christian missionary activities such as opening
schools, orphanages, reading houses and libraries.
The establishment of Kazan University in 1804 was another event that affected
Tatar life profoundly. The University had a strong department of Oriental Studies.
There German and Russian scholars engaged in historical, archeological, and
linguistic study of the Tatars and other Turkic peoples. These studies drew the

13
Sharaf, 71.
14
Alexandre Bennigsen and Chantal Lemercier-Quelquejay, Islam in the Soviet Union (New York:
Frederick A. Praeger, 1967), 13.

5
attention of some educated Tatars including members of the Tatar clergy. One of them
was the leading reformer Shihb al-Din Marjan. He contacted and established close
friendships with some Orientalists and government officers. This was an unusual
event and therefore invited harsh criticism from the conservative Tatar clergy and
people. It is important to keep in mind that Tatar society was very conservative at that
time and the Tatar clergy exerted a strong control over the people.
Marjan's contact with the scholars of Kazan University marks the beginning of
the modernist phase. His concern was, however, with Islamic revivalism, not
modernist ideology. He was only using modernism in the service of his Islamism.
Unintentionally, though, he opened the way to more modernist and secular reformism.
So the modernist phase began with the penetration of Western ideas and institutions
among the Tatars. This happened approximately after the 1860s.
Marjan became a member of the Society for Archeology (Arkheologicheckoe
obschestvo) of Kazan University. He was the first among the Tatar clergy to do so. He
had long discussions with famous Orientalist scholars Alexandre Kazim Bek (1802-
1870), Vasilii Vasil'evich Radlov (1837-1918), and Joseph M. E. Gottwaldt. As a
result of these contacts, Marjan wrote his famous Tatar history and promoted a
historical consciousness among educated Tatars. He also urged Tatar youth to learn the
Russian language in order to use their rights in the interests of their own community.
He believed that Muslims should be aware of what was going on in Russia.
We should also remember the contribution of the Tatar merchants to the
awareness of the Tatars. A strong group of Tatar merchants had existed since the time
of the Tatars' earliest settlements in the Middle Volga area. Beginning with the late
eighteenth century, Tatar merchants dominated trade between Russia and Central Asia
and as a result they accumulated great wealth. There were Tatar merchants who were
very active in the towns of Russia, Turkistan, Caucasia, Iran, and China. Because of
their extensive travel opportunities, these merchants most likely recognized the
differences between the more developed aspects of Russian life and the more
traditional Tatar society. Again we have to keep in mind that most of these Tatar
merchants were pious and not very educated. It seems that a feeling of devotion to the
interests and culture of their community developed among them and motivated them
to give financial support to Tatar students studying in Central Asia and in the Middle
East. They also built schools, established printing presses, supported Tatar periodicals,
and founded philanthropic societies.
As for Jama al-Din al-Afghan's (1838/9-1897) influence on the Tatar reformers
some sources exaggerated it as if he were the leading figure in the Tatar movement.
For example, one article claimed that Al-Afghan influenced jadidists such as Abd al-

6
Nasr Qursav, Husayn Fayzkhanov, and Ismail Gaspirali. 15 I think this is an idea to be
disregarded. First of all, al-Afghan's influence on Qursav is historically impossible
because Qursav died (in 1814) before al-Afghan was even born (in 1838). Also, there
is no indication that al-Afghan influenced either Fayzkhanov or Gaspirali.
It is true that al-Afghan's ideas were known among Tatar intellectuals. Tatar
sources report that al-Afghan came to Russia in 1887 and that he stayed in St.
Petersburg for eighteen or nineteen months. There he met with Tatar reformers such as
Riza al-Din b. Fakhr al-Din, Muhammad Fatih Kerimi (1871-1945), and `Abd al-
Rashid Ibrahimov. Fakhr al-Din admits that it was al-Afghan who drew his attention
to the ideas of Ibn Taymiyya, the 14th century Muslim thinker who inspired the
Wahhb movement of the eighteenth and nineteenth century Arabia. But Fakhr al-Din
did not agree with al-Afhghan all the time.16
It was Ismail Gaspirali, a very well-known reformer in education, that gave
Tatar reformism a great boost. His educational activities started in the 1880s, but it is
important not to confuse and identify his educational movement with the Tatar reform
in general. He achieved two important things. He established a newspaper which was
the longest running and the best newspaper for the Muslims of Russia. It began
printing in 1883 and continued until 1918. Another of his achievement was his reform
of the Muslim elementary schools (maktabs) in Russia, but he did not reform high
schools or madrasahs.
Upon this success, Gaspirali opened his model schools in many places. These
schools grew up so rapidly that by the early twentieth century there were about 5000
of these new method schools spreading from Crimea to Kazan, Central Asia, and
Caucasia. He even attempted to open such schools in India. He went to Bombay and
tried to explain that it was possible to read and write in Urdu in 40 days. It seems that
he was not very successful there.
The new method was called in Tatar usl-i jadid. From then on, this name
"jadidist" was applied to all reform-minded people. In fact, there were conservative
people who opposed this new method of teaching calling it "usl-i yezid" or "the
impious method." They believed that Ismail Gaspirali turned Muslim schools into
Russian shkoli. About the rapid and effective teaching in these schools, they said
"abuk gretilen ilim abuk unutulur" which means "the quickly-learned knowledge
will be forgotten quickly". Even the physical appearance of these schools was enough
to upset the conservatives. Children no longer sat on the floor and chanted their

15
Pinar-Batur-Vander Lippe and John M. Vander Lippe, "Young Ottomans and Jadidists: Past
Discourse and the Continuity of Debates in Turkey, the Caucasus and Central Asia." The Turkish
Studies Assciation Bulletin 18: 2 (Fall 1994): 71.
16
Riza al-Din b. Fakhr al-Din, "Mshhur Adamlar v Ulugh Hdislr: Shaykh Jamal al-Din," Shr
10: 23-24 (December 1917): 516-17.

7
readings together. They sat in chairs as in Russian schools. These opponents gained
their name "qadimist" because of their stand to preserve the old method which was
called the "usl-i qadm."
In 1905 anew page of change was written in the realm of politics. The reformers
used the liberties gained in the 1905 Revolution as best as they could. The major
reformers acted reasonably and cautiously in the realm of politics. Even the "radical"
ones such as Abd al-Rashid Ibrahimov and Hadi Atlas did not promote any
disobedient or violent acts against the czarist regime. Their efforts in general
concentrated on strengthening and unifying the Muslim community without alarming
the Russian government. Despite the Turkic groups' awareness of their tribal and
linguistic differences, they organized a unified body of political action under the
umbrella of Islamic identity. Although of brief duration, this political experience
demonstrated to the participants the continued importance of cooperation.
One important aspect of their program was to give Muslim women the same
rights as men so that their society would be able to exploit fully its human resources.
Regarding womens equality, the reformers succeeded in making the greatest advances
compared to their counterparts in the rest of the Islamic world.
It is true that Tatar reformism had a varieties of consequences. While some
continued to be involved with revitalizing Islam, others did not. For example, famous
Bashkort historian professor Zeki Velidi Togan's (1890-1969) career shows how this
young jadidist grew up with the works of both religious reformers and Russian and
European scholars, while eventually he became a secular nationalist. In his early
youth he had been influenced by the Tatar religious reformists Marjan and Bigiyef as
well as the Egyptian reformists Muhammad Abduh and Farid Wajd. At that point, he
appeared to be a religious reformer.
Togan also immersed himself in the works of European intellectuals such as
Ernest Renan, John William Draper, and Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860). 17 He drew
inspiration as well from the works of Russian scholars. 18 Under these influences,
Marjan's formulations no longer satisfied Togan: He wrote, "although I liked the fact
that Marjan's ideas point out the evils of theocracy, I realized that they could not
apply to real life and to the present age." These mental journeys brought him first to
socialism, then to secular nationalism.
In conclusion, nineteenth century Tatar reformism set an example in reconciling
modernization with tradition. It has also its parallels elsewhere in the modern history
of the Muslim world, but it has distinctive features. As a result of their exposure to the

17
Zeki Velidi Togan, Htralar: Trkistan ve Dier Mslman Dou Trklerinin Mill Varlk ve Kltr
Mcadeleleri (Istanbul: Tan Matbaasi, 1969), 29.
18
Togan, Htralar, 49.

8
West, domination by Russia, and awareness of the reformist ferment that swept
through the nineteenth-century Islamic world, the Kazan Tatar reform movement
acquired a distinct nature that was affected by various influences. Also, the very
special location of the Tatars and their long interaction with a Christian power, Russia,
gave a distinct character to the Tatar Islamic reform movement.

We have seen that it was the religious reformers who initiated Tatar reform as a
revivalist movement and then took big steps toward the modernization of Tatar society
in the later phase. Their reformist legacy had a lasting influence on future generations.
The Soviet regime had to make great efforts to eliminate the remnants of the reformist
intelligentsia. Long after the regime had erased the names of major reformers from
Tatar history books, the collapse of the Soviet empire began the process of returning
the principal religious reformers such as Marjan, Fakhr al-Din, and Bigiyef once
more to national and cultural prominence as heroes.

9
1