Islam was brought to the region by the Arabs in the 7th century. Since that time, it has become an integral part of Tajik culture. Tajikistan is a secular country,[2] but the post-Soviet era has seen a marked increase in religious practice in the country.[3] The majority of Tajikistan's Muslims adhere to the Sunni branch of Islam, and a smaller group (mostly in Gorno-Badakhshan in the east) belong to the Shia branch of Islam. The Russian Orthodox faith is the most widely practiced of other religions, although the Russian community shrank significantly in the early 1990s. Some other small Christian groups now enjoy relative freedom of worship. Tajikistan also has a small Jewish community.[4]
Sunni Islam is, by far, the most widely practiced religion in Tajikistan. According to academics in 2022, the population of Tajikistan is 96% Muslim (mainly HanafiSunni with a small population of IsmailiShia).[5] The Sunni branch of Islam has a 1,200-year-old tradition among the sedentary population of Central Asia, including the Tajiks with some Sufi orders.[6] A small minority group, the Pamiris, are members of a much smaller denomination of Shia Islam, Ismailism, which first won adherents in Central Asia in the early 10th century. Despite persecution, Ismailism has survived in the remote Pamir Mountains.[4]
During the Soviet Era
During the course of seven decades of political control, Soviet policy makers were unable to eradicate the Islamic tradition, despite repeated attempts to do so. The harshest of the Soviet anti-Islamic campaigns occurred from the late 1920s to the late 1930s as part of a Union-wide drive against religion in general. In this period, many Muslim functionaries were killed, and religious instruction and observance were curtailed sharply. After the German invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941, official policy toward Islam moderated. One of the ensuing changes was the establishment in 1943 of an officially sanctioned Islamic hierarchy for Central Asia, the Spiritual Administration of the Muslims of Central Asia and Kazakhstan. Together with three similar organizations for other regions of the Soviet Union having large Muslim populations, this administration was controlled by the Kremlin, which required loyalty from religious officials. Although its administrative personnel and structure were inadequate to serve the needs of the Muslim inhabitants of the region, the administration made possible the legal existence of some Islamic institutions, as well as the activities of religious functionaries, a small number of mosques, and religious instruction at two seminaries in Uzbekistan.[4]
In the early 1960s, the Khrushchev regime escalated anti-Islamic propaganda. Then, on several occasions in the 1970s and 1980s, the Kremlin leadership called for renewed efforts to combat religion, including Islam. Typically, such campaigns included conversion of mosques to secular use; attempts to re-identify traditional Islamic-linked customs with nationalism rather than religion; and propaganda linking Islam to backwardness, superstition, and bigotry. Official hostility toward Islam grew in 1979 with Soviet military involvement in nearby Afghanistan and the increasing assertiveness of Islamic revivalists in several countries. From that time through the early post-Soviet era, some officials in Moscow and in Tajikistan warned of an extremist Islamic menace, often on the basis of limited or distorted evidence. Despite all these efforts, Islam remained an important part of the identity of the Tajiks and other Muslim peoples of Tajikistan through the end of the Soviet era and the first years of independence.[4]
Identification with Islam as an integral part of life is shared by urban and rural, old and young, and educated and uneducated Tajiks. The role that the faith plays in the lives of individuals varies considerably, however. For some Tajiks, Islam is more important as an intrinsic part of their cultural heritage than as a religion in the usual sense, and some Tajiks are not religious at all.[4]
In any case, Tajiks have disproved the standard Soviet assertion that the urbanized industrial labor force and the educated population had little to do with a "remnant of a bygone era" such as Islam. A noteworthy development in the late Soviet and early independence eras was increased interest, especially among young people, in the substance of Islamic doctrine. In the post-Soviet era, Islam became an important element in the nationalist arguments of certain Tajik intellectuals.[4]
Islam survived in Tajikistan in widely varied forms because of the strength of an indigenous folk Islam quite apart from the Soviet-sanctioned Islamic administration. Long before the Soviet era, rural Central Asians, including inhabitants of what became Tajikistan, had access to their own holy places. There were also small, local religious schools and individuals within their communities who were venerated for religious knowledge and piety. These elements sustained religion in the countryside, independent of outside events. Under Soviet regimes, Tajiks used the substantial remainder of this rural, popular Islam to continue at least some aspects of the teaching and practice of their faith after the activities of urban-based Islamic institutions were curtailed. Folk Islam also played an important role in the survival of Islam among the urban population. One form of this popular Islam is Sufism—often described as Islamic mysticism and practiced by individuals in a variety of ways. The most important form of Sufism in Tajikistan is the Naqshbandiyya, a Sufi order with followers as far away as India and Malaysia. Besides Sufism, other forms of popular Islam are associated with local cults and holy places or with individuals whose knowledge or personal qualities have made them influential.[4]
By late 1989, the Gorbachev regime's increased tolerance of religion began to affect the practices of Islam and Russian Orthodoxy. Religious instruction increased. New mosques opened. Religious observance became more open, and participation increased. New Islamic spokesmen emerged in Tajikistan and elsewhere in Central Asia. The authority of the official, Tashkent-based Muslim Board of Central Asia crumbled in Tajikistan. Tajikistan acquired its own seminary in Dushanbe, ending its reliance on the administration's two seminaries in Uzbekistan.[4]
By 1990 the Muslim Board's chief official in Dushanbe, the senior qadi, Hajji Akbar Turajonzoda (in office 1988-92), had become an independent public figure with a broad following. In the factional political battle that followed independence, Turajonzoda criticized the communist hard-liners and supported political reform and official recognition of the importance of Islam in Tajikistani society. At the same time, he repeatedly denied hard-liners' accusations that he sought the establishment of an Islamic government in Tajikistan. After the hard-liners' victory in the civil war at the end of 1992, Turajonzoda fled Dushanbe and was charged with treason.[4]
Muslims in Tajikistan also organized politically in the early 1990s. In 1990, as citizens in many parts of the Soviet Union were forming their own civic organizations, Muslims from various parts of the union organized the Islamic Rebirth Party. By the early 1990s, the growth of mass political involvement among Central Asian Muslims led all political parties—including the Communist Party of Tajikistan—to take into account the Muslim heritage of the vast majority of Tajikistan's inhabitants.[4]
Islam also played a key political role for the regime in power in the early 1990s. The communist old guard evoked domestic and international fears that fundamentalist Muslims would destabilize the Tajikistani government when that message was expedient in fortifying the hard-liners' position against opposition forces in the civil war. However, the Nabiyev regime also was willing to represent itself as an ally of Iran's Islamic republic while depicting the Tajik opposition as unfaithful Muslims.[4]
Recent developments
After the Soviet era, the Tajik government closed hundreds of unregistered mosques, drawing locals to believe that the crackdown is actually against the religion of Islam.[7] According to reports, some mosques have been destroyed while others have been converted into beauty parlors.[7] Some have speculated that the crackdown is a result of governmental concerns of Mosques being "unsafe," or that the Imams may not act "responsible".[7]
In 2009, the Assembly of Representatives attempted to make the Hanafi school of Sunni Islam the official religion in Tajikistan, but this measure failed.[8] Tajikistan also marked 2009 as the year to commemorate the Sunni Muslim jurist Abu Hanifa, as the nation hosted an international symposium that drew scientific and religious leaders.[9] The construction of one of the largest mosques in the world, funded by Qatar, was announced in October 2009. The mosque is planned to be built in Dushanbe and construction is said to be completed by 2014.[10] In 2010, Tajikistan hosted a session of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference with delegations from 56 members states gathering at Dushanbe.[11]
In April 2020 as a part of efforts to prevent a coronavirus pandemic in Tajikistan, although there were no confirmed cases in Tajikistan, President Rahmon urged Muslims in the country to forego fasting for Ramadan saying that fasting would make people more susceptible to infectious disease.[12][13]
The next largest religious community is Russian Orthodox as practiced by the Russian minorities of Tajikistan. A cathedral in Dushanbe, St. Nicholas, serves the Orthodox community. By the end of the Soviet era, Tajikistan also was home to small numbers of people belonging to other Christian denominations, including Roman Catholics (originally most of them were from German origins, but also Tajiks), Seventh-Day Adventists, and Baptists. There also was a small Armenian minority, most of whose members belonged historically to the Armenian Apostolic (Gregorian) Church.
The territory of Tajikistan forms a mission sui iuris. According to the most recent figures in the Annuario Pontificio, there are 326 Catholics in Tajikistan on a population of over 7.1 million. There are three parishes in Tajikistan.
Other religious groups included Zoroastrians, Buddhists[14] and small numbers of Jews and Baha'is. The number of adherents to these minority religions probably decreased sharply in the 1990s because of the wave of emigration from Tajikistan in the early independence period.[4]
The Constitution provides for the right to adhere to any or no religion.[15]
The status of respect for religious freedom eroded during recent years. Government policies reflected a concern about Islamic extremism, a concern shared by much of the general population. The Government actively monitored the activities of religious institutions to keep them from becoming overtly political. There were no closures of officially registered mosques, although the Government closed several unregistered mosques, prayer rooms, and madrassahs, and made the registration process to establish new mosques difficult. A Ministry of Education policy prohibited girls from wearing the hijab at public schools. The Government used the registration process to hinder some organizations' religious activity. Some religious organizations and individuals faced harassment, temporary detention, and interrogation by government authorities.
As of 2013, Tajikistan was unique in the world because it was illegal for people under age 18 to practice religion publicly, which includes attending mosques.[16] Women are not allowed by the government to enter certain mosques.[17] Additionally, the government places strict limits on hajj visits and reportedly harasses devotees by forcibly shaving their beards after rounding them up.[16]
In 2023, the country was scored zero out of 4 for religious freedom.[18]
Tajikistan, officially the Republic of Tajikistan, is a landlocked country in Central Asia. Dushanbe is the capital and most populous city. Tajikistan is bordered by Afghanistan to the south, Uzbekistan to the west, Kyrgyzstan to the north, and China to the east. It is separated from Pakistan by Afghanistan's Wakhan Corridor.
The politics of Tajikistan nominally takes place in a framework of a presidential republic, whereby the President is both head of state and head of government, and of a multi-party system. Legislative power is vested in both the executive branch and the two chambers of parliament.
Tajiks are a Persian-speaking Iranian ethnic group native to Central Asia, living primarily in Afghanistan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan. Tajiks are the largest ethnicity in Tajikistan, and the second-largest in Afghanistan and Uzbekistan. They speak varieties of Persian, a Western Iranian language. In Tajikistan, since the 1939 Soviet census, its small Pamiri and Yaghnobi ethnic groups are included as Tajiks. In China, the term is used to refer to its Pamiri ethnic groups, the Tajiks of Xinjiang, who speak the Eastern Iranian Pamiri languages. In Afghanistan, the Pamiris are counted as a separate ethnic group.
Emomali Rahmon is a Tajik politician who has been serving as the 3rd President of Tajikistan since 16 November 1994. Previously he was the Chairman of the Supreme Assembly of Tajikistan, as the de facto head of state from 20 November 1992 to 16 November 1994. Since 18 March 1998, he has also served as the leader of the left-wing People's Democratic Party of Tajikistan, which dominates the Parliament of Tajikistan. On 30 September 1999, he was elected vice-president of the UN General Assembly for a one-year term.
Khujand, sometimes spelled Khodjent or Chudzjand, and formerly known as Leninabad from 1936 to 1991, is the second-largest city of Tajikistan and the capital of Tajikistan's northernmost Sughd province.
Gorno-Badakhshan, officially the Badakhshan Mountainous Autonomous Region, is an autonomous region in eastern Tajikistan, in the Pamir Mountains. It makes up nearly forty-five percent of the country's land area but only two percent of its population.
Islam is a major religious minority in the Russian Federation, which has the largest Muslim population in Europe excluding Turkey. According to the US Department of State in 2017, Muslims in Russia numbered 14 million or roughly 10% of the total population. One of the Grand Muftis of Russia, sheikh Rawil Gaynetdin, estimated the Muslim population of Russia at 25 million in 2018.
According to a 2009 Pew Research Center report, 93.1% of Turkmenistan's population is Muslim. Traditionally, the Turkmen of Turkmenistan, like their kin in Uzbekistan and Afghanistan are Sunni Muslims. Shia Muslims, the other main branch of Islam, are not numerous in Turkmenistan, and the Shia religious practices of the Azerbaijani and Kurdish minorities are not politicized. The great majority of Turkmen readily identify themselves as Muslims and acknowledge Islam as an integral part of their cultural heritage, but some support a revival of the religion's status primarily as an element of national revival.
Islam is the largest religion practiced in Kazakhstan, with estimates of about 74% of the country's population being Muslim. Ethnic Kazakhs are predominantly Sunni Muslims of the Hanafi school. There are also small numbers of Shias. Geographically speaking, Kazakhstan is the northernmost Muslim-majority country in the world, and the largest in terms of land area. Kazakhs make up over half of the total population, and other ethnic groups of Muslim background include Uzbeks, Uyghurs and Tatars. Islam first arrived on the southern edges of the region in the 8th century from Arabs. According to the Constitution, The Republic of Kazakhstan proclaims itself as a democratic, secular, legal and social state whose highest values are a person, his life, rights, and freedoms.
The vast majority of people in Kyrgyzstan are Muslims; as of 2020, 90% of the country's population were followers of Islam. Muslims in Kyrgyzstan are generally of the Sunni branch, mostly of the Hanafi school, which entered the region during the eighth century. Most Kyrgyz Muslims practice their religion in a specific way influenced by shamanic tribal customs. There has been a revival of Islamic practices since independence in Kyrgyzstan. For the most part religious leaders deal only with issues of religion and do not reach out to communities, but rather offer services to those who come to the mosque. There are regional differences, with the southern part of the country being more religious. Kyrgyzstan remained a secular state after the fall of communism, which had only superficial influence on religious practice when Kyrgyzstan was a Soviet republic, despite the policy of state atheism. Most of the Russian population of Kyrgyzstan is Russian Orthodox. The Uzbeks, who make up 14.9 percent of the population, are generally Sunni Muslims.
Islam is the largest and the state religion of the People's Republic of Bangladesh. According to the 2022 census, Bangladesh had a population of about 150 million Muslims, or 91.04% of its total population of 165 million. Muslims of Bangladesh are predominant native Bengali Muslims. The majority of Bangladeshis are Sunni, and follow the Hanafi school of fiqh. Bangladesh is a de facto Islamic country.
Islam is the majority and state religion in Algeria. The vast majority of citizens are Sunni Muslims belonging to Maliki school of jurisprudence, with a minority of Ibadi Muslims, most of whom live in the M'zab Valley region. Islam provides the society with its central social and cultural identity and gives most individuals their basic ethical and attitudinal orientation. Orthodox observance of the faith is much less widespread and steadfast than is identification with Islam. There are also Sufi philosophies which arose as a reaction to theoretical perspectives of some scholars.
Sunni Islam is, by far, the most widely practiced religion in Tajikistan. Sunni Islam of the Hanafi school is the recognized religious tradition of Tajikistan since 2009. According to a 2009 U.S. State Department release, the population of Tajikistan is 98% Muslim,, with some Sufi orders.
Islam in Central Asia has existed since the beginning of Islamic history. Sunni branch of Islam is the most widely practiced religion in Central Asia. Shiism of Imami and Ismaili denominations predominating in the Pamir plateau and the western Tian Shan mountains, while boasting to a large minority population in the Zarafshan river valley, from Samarkand to Bukhara. Islam came to Central Asia in the early part of the 8th century as part of the Muslim conquest of the region. Many well-known Islamic scientists and philosophers came from Central Asia, and several major Muslim empires, including the Timurid Empire and the Mughal Empire, originated in Central Asia. In the 20th century, severe restrictions on religious practice were enacted by the Soviet Union in Soviet Central Asia and the People's Republic of China in Xinjiang.
The Turkmen of Turkmenistan, are predominantly Muslims. According the U.S. Department of State's International Religious Freedom Report for 2022,
According to U.S. government estimates, the country is 93 percent Muslim, 6.4 percent Eastern Orthodox, and 0.6 percent other. There are small communities of Jehovah's Witnesses, Shia Muslims, Baha’is, Roman Catholics, the International Society for Krishna Consciousness, and evangelical Christians, including Baptists and Pentecostals. Most ethnic Russians and Armenians identify as Orthodox Christian and generally are members of the Russian Orthodox Church or Armenian Apostolic Church. Some ethnic Russians and Armenians are also members of smaller Protestant groups. There are small pockets of Shia Muslims, consisting largely of ethnic Iranians, Azeris, and Kurds, some located in Ashgabat, with others along the border with Iran and in the western city of Turkmenbashy.
Freedom of religion in Tajikistan is provided for in Tajikistan's constitution. The country is secular by law. However, respect for religious freedom has eroded during recent years, creating some areas of concern.
Islam is the predominant religion in Uzbekistan.
Anti-Sunnism is hatred of, prejudice against, discrimination against, persecution of, and violence against Sunni Muslims.
Hizb ut-Tahrir is a pan-Islamist and fundamentalist group seeking to re-establish "the Islamic Khilafah (Caliphate)" as an Islamic "superstate" where Muslim-majority countries are unified and ruled under Islamic Shariah law, and which eventually expands globally to include non-Muslim states. In Central Asia, the party has expanded since the breakup of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s from a small group to "one of the most powerful organizations" operating in Central Asia. The region itself has been called "the primary battleground" for the party. Uzbekistan is "the hub" of Hizb ut-Tahrir's activities in Central Asia, while its "headquarters" is now reportedly in Kyrgyzstan.
Bozor Sobir was a preeminent Tajik poet and politician, known as the national poet of Tajikistan and 'the conscience of the nation'.
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