The impact of the state on Islam amongst the Uyghurs: Religious knowledge and authority in the Kashgar Oasis

Central Asian Survey

Volumn 25, Issue 3, 2006, Pages 251-265

  Waite, Edmund ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF LONDON   (United Kingdom)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

ISLAMISM; STATE ROLE; TRADITIONAL KNOWLEDGE;

ASIA; CHINA; EURASIA; FAR EAST; XINJIANG UYGUR;

EID: 33847200831     PISSN: 02634937     EISSN: 14653354     Source Type: Trade Journal    
DOI: 10.1080/02634930601022534     Document Type: Article

References (69)

1. D.F. Eickelman, 'The art of memory: Islamic education and its social reproduction', Comparative Studies in Society and History, Vol 20, No 4, 1978, pp 485-516.
2. Ibid, pp 511-512.
3. See, for example, F. Robinson, 'Technology and religious change: Islam and the impact of print', Modern Asian Studies Vol 27, No 1, 1993, pp 229-251.
4. A. Khalid, The Politics of Muslim Cultural Reform: Jadidism in Central Asia (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998), pp 9-12.
5. Ibid, p 9.
6. For example, Horvatich shows how the modern education system has fostered Islamist discourses amongst the Sama of Simunul island in the Philippines. P. Horvatich, 'Ways of knowing Islam', American Ethnologist Vol 21, No 4, 1994, pp 811-826.
7. Similarly, Eickelman argues that 'religious activism...appeals mainly to those who have benefited from modern education'. D. F. Eickelman, 'Mass higher education and the religious imagination in contemporary Arab societies', American Ethnologist Vol 19, No 4, 1992, p 646. Eickelman also cites J. Piscatori in noting that 'In 1953, for example, only 22 per cent of the Egyptian Muslim Brothers were not of the educated urban middle classes'.
8. J. Piscatori, Islam in a World of Nation-States (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1986), p 29. Masud analyses the way 'new intellectuals' (educated in westernstyle schools and universities) re-evaluate 'traditional' doctrine.
9. K. M. Masud 'The obligation to migrate: The doctrine of Hijra in Islamic law' in D. Eickelman and J. Piscatori (eds) Muslim Travellers: Pilgrimage, Migration and Religious Imagination (London, Routledge, 1990). Nagata describes how the foreign-educated intelligentsia has challenged the traditional legitimacy of the rural ulama (Islamic leaders) in Malaysia.
10. J. Nagata, 'Islamic revival and the problem of legitimacy among rural religious elites in Malaysia', Man Vol 17, No 1, 1982, 42-57.
11. J. M. Milward and N. Tursun, 'Political history and strategies of control, 1884-1978', in S. F. Starr (ed) Xinjiang: China's Muslim Borderland (Armonk/New York: M. E. Sharpe, 2004), p 72.
12. On the Jadid in Central Asia, see Khalid, op cit, Ref 4.
13. A.D.W Forbes, Warlords and Muslims in Chinese Central Asia: A Political History of Republican Xinjiang 1911-1949 (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1986), p 18.
14. I. Bellér-Hann, The Written and the Spoken: Literacy and Oral Transmission Among the Uyghur (ANOR 8) (Berlin, Das Arabische Buch, 2000).
15. Bellér-Hann, op cit, pp 61-66.
16. The newly formed Kashgar Uyghur Progress Union established a reformist newspaper, Yengi Hayat, in 1934. The newspaper's articles included features on Uyghur politics, culture and poetry, as well as international events, with a particular emphasis on Turkey and the Middle East. Circulation of the newspaper was substantial; 2,500 copies were circulated weekly over the next two years before publication was halted by the government. The Kashgar Uyghur Progress Union also engaged in an intensive construction of reformist schools which resembled the Jadid schools. By 1936, there were no fewer than 17 schools serving over 500 students.
17. See J. Rudelson, Oasis Identities: Uyghur Nationalism Along China's Silk Road (New York, Columbia University Press 1997), p 56.
18. Forbes, op cit, Ref 8, p 161.
19. This article is based on fieldwork conducted in Uyghur in Kashgar in 1993-1994 together with two shorter visits in the summers of 2003 and 2004. I am grateful to the Universities' China Committee in London (UCCL) and The Committee for Central and Inner Asia (CCIA) for financing the 2003 research and to the British Academy (Small Research Grant) for funding my 2004 research.
20. Forbes op cit, Ref 8, p 79.
21. Nevertheless, there are also documented cases of mosques having their property confiscated and of Muslims being tortured and imprisoned because of their alleged links or sympathy with the republican era. J. T. Dreyer, 'The Islamic Community of China', Central Asian Survey Vol 1, No 2, 1982, p 41.
22. M. Hodgson, The Venture of Islam: Conscience and History in a World Civilization Volume One (Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 1974), p 89.
23. L. Benson, and I. Svanberg. 'The Kazaks in Xinjiang', in L. Benson and I. Svanberg (eds) The Kazaks of China: Essays on an Ethnic Minority (Uppsala: Almquist and Wiksell International, 1988), p 66.
24. Dreyer, op cit, Ref 13, p 46.
25. T. Heberer, 1989. China and its National Minorities: Autonomy or Assimilation? (Armonk: M. E. Sharpe, 1989), p 24.
26. M. K. Whyte and W. L. Parish, Urban Life in Contemporary China (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1984), p 308.
27. According to local informants, the burial of religious texts was a common strategy for their preservation during this period.
28. T. Dragadze, 'The domestication of religion under Soviet communism', in C. Hann (ed) Socialism: Ideals, Ideologies and Local Practice (London: Routledge, 1993).
29. D. E. MacInnis, Religion in China Today: Policy and Practice (Maryknoll, New York: Orbis Books, 1989), p 234.
30. The Chinese press reported that 6,500 Uyghurs undertook the pilgrimage to Mecca between 1980 and 1987. D. G. Gladney 'The ethnogenesis of the Uighur', Central Asian Survey Vol 9, No 1, 1990, pp 12-13.
31. MacInnis (1989: 19).
32. Amnesty International 1992 'Peoples Republic of China. Secret Violence: Human Rights Violations in Xinjiang' p 5.
33. M. Dillon, Xinjiang: China's Muslim Far Northwest (London: Routledge Curzon, 2004), p 85.
34. Ibid, p 103.
35. Amnesty International 2002 (March 22). 'People's Republic of China, China's anti terrorism legislation and repression in the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region' http://web.amnesty.org/library/index/engasa170102002.
36. Ibid. Although the US State Department has sought to distinguish China's struggle against separatism with its own 'war on terror', it nonetheless designated a small and previously obscure Uyghur organisation the Eastern Turkistan Islamic Movement (ETIM) as a 'terrorist organisation' in August 2002.
37. G. Fuller and J. N. Lipman 'Islam in Xinjiang' in S. Frederick Starr (ed) Xinjiang: China's Muslim Borderland (Armonk/New York: M. E. Sharpe, 2004), p 324. State employees are also forbidden from wearing any headgear deemed to have Islamic overtones, such as a headscarf in the case of women and skull-cap in the case of men.
38. In other neighbourhoods, the rebuilding of the mosque might be financed by one or two very rich businessmen; for example in a village I visited near Artush the local mosque had been paid for exclusively by one wealthy local trader at a cost of 100,000 yuan.
39. S. P. Poliakov, Everyday Islam: Religion and Tradition in Rural Central Asia (London: M. E. Sharpe, 1992), p 77.
40. During my fieldwork in Häzrät in 1993-1994, the first imam at that time, who was in his seventies, would be transported around the neighbourhood in a specially assigned donkey cart and would elicit particularly respectful greetings from those he encountered. The customary greeting, leaning forward with hand placed on heart together with the declaration of 'salamu ǎlǎykum', would be marked by a particularly pronounced bowing motion.
41. The mädris (religious college) attached to the Apaq Khoja tomb was a major centre for religious education. On the basis of oral testimony by older men I was informed that approximately 400 students attended. Of this number, some 150-200 gained a rudimentary education which consisted principally of learning the Arabic script and memorising key verses from the Qur'an. The remainder of students went on to receive a more extensive education. According to older Uyghur informants, most of these latter students came from other areas of Southern Xinjiang (rather than the local neighbourhood of Häzrät).
42. See also G. Jarring, Materials to the Knowledge of Eastern Turki, Parts 3-4 (Lund: C. W. K. Gleerup, 1951), pp 118-119, and
43. Bellér-Hann, op cit, Ref 8, p 46, who reveal that the work of Central Asian poet Nawai, the Persian author Khoja Hafiz and the mystical poetry of Sufi Allahyar provided an important component of religious education in Southern Xinjiang.
44. The terms imam or molla are used interchangeably and do not signify any difference in religious rank. As will be seen below, the terms akhun and qari are also used to describe those of religious learning who occupy a position such as imam or who play an active role in religious duties.
45. Although women undertake prayer at the level of the household, there have traditionally been weekly religious gatherings under the leadership of a büvüm (female religious leader). See E. Waite, 'The impact of socialist rule on a Muslim minority in China: Islam amongst the Uyghurs of Kashgar', unpublished Ph.D dissertation (Cambridge University, 2003), pp 111-112 for details. However there has been a major clampdown on these religious meetings, particularly since 1996, in keeping with the government's intolerance of religious gatherings that take place outside officially sanctioned sites.
46. Ibid, pp 112-115.
47. All individual names quoted in this paper are pseudonyms apart from those referring to public religious figures.
48. A. Tokhti, Qäshqärning Yeqinqi Vä Hazirqi Vaman Maarip Tarikhi (A History of Kasghar's Past and Present Education) (Kashgar: Qäshqär Uyghur Näshriyati, 1986), p 6 reveals that this was the standard practice prior to 1949. The donated money would be called päyshämbilik.
49. See also Khalid, op cit, Ref 4, p 26 who refers to the same practice of weekly donations to the teacher, which was known as payshanbalik in pre-Soviet Central Asia.
50. Barat takes place on the nights preceding the fifteenth, sixteenth and seventeenth days of the Shaaban month of the Arabic calendar which is more commonly known as the month of Barat (from Persian) in Uyghur. It is believed, according to religious tradition, that God will take account of all the sins that each individual has committed in the previous year and will plan the events of the forthcoming year. Barat entails the staying awake for these three nights (the vigil being known as tünäk) in order to engage in prayer and other rituals. In popular usage, the terms barat and tünätend to be used interchangeably to describe the rituals that take place during this period.
51. Feuchtwang, S, The Imperial Metaphor: Popular Religion in China (London: Routledge, 1992), pp 16-17.
52. On the increasing significance of Xinjiang as a crossroads of trade, see Y. Zhao, 'Pivot or Periphery? Xinjiang's Regional Development', Asian Ethnicity, Vol 2, No 2, 2001, pp 197-224.
53. Another radical innovation was AbdulHämid's declaration that the wearing of headgear to the mosque was not an essential scripturalist requirement. Prior to this time, the wearing of headgear, whether a cap (shäpkä) or skull-cap (doppa) was regarded as an essential aspect of Muslim practice and a key indicator of belief.
54. The adoption of Hanbali rites has often been interpreted elsewhere (e.g. in Uzbekistan) as indicative of sympathy for the so-called 'Wahhabi' movement. See, for example, B. Babadzhanov, 'Islam in Uzbekistan: From the struggle for religious purity to political activism' in B. Rumer (ed) Central Asia: A Gathering Storm? (New York and London: M. E. Sharpe, 2002), p 312.
55. This is a niche in the wall of a mosque indicating the direction of Mecca, towards which Muslim worshippers must face in prayer. During my fieldwork in 1993-1994, the mosque communities in Häzrät would tend to arrange themselves in rows according to age. Waite, op cit, Ref 36, p 107.
56. Eastern Turkistan Information Centre, 11/10/97: 'Teacher in Kashgar is Deprived of his Political Rights'.
57. See also D.G. Gladney, Dislocating China: Reflections on Muslims, Minorities, and other Subaltern Subjects (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, London: C. Hurst and Co, 2004) p 257, who refers to the term 'Wahhabi' as being 'a euphemism in the region for strict Muslims not an organized Islamic school'.
58. This incident was also referred to on the internet by the Eastern Turkestan Information Centre (see ETIC 11/13/97), although this particular source attributes the conflict to an unwillingness on the part of the Uyghurs involved to pray behind a 'red molla' (i.e. who was supportive of the government) and no reference is made to the underlying doctrinal dispute.
59. E. Waite, The emergence of Muslim reformism in contemporary Xinjiang Province: Implications for the Uyghurs' positioning between a Central Asian and Chinese context in I. Bellér-Hann, C. M. Cesàro, R. A. Harris and J. N. Smith (eds.) Situating The Uyghurs between Chinq and Central Asia (Aldershot: Ashgate, forthcoming).
60. Examples of texts on Islam that are available in state bookshops throughout Xinjiang include Q. Ëkbär and A. Damollam (eds) Kishlik Munasivät Vä ädäp-äkhlaqqa Dair Sähih Hädislär (hadiths concerning social relations and moral conduct) (Urumchi: Shinjang Khǎlq Neshriyati, 2002)
61. A. Imin, Islam Dinigha Dair Soal-Javablar (Answers and Questions about the Muslim religion) (Urumchi: Shinjang Khǎlq Neshriyati, 2001)
62. A. Sabit, (ed). Islam Shäriiti (Islamic Law) (Urumchi: Millǎtlǎr nǎshriyati, 1999)
63. and Yang Chichen (ed) 'Qur'an kärim' diki pälsäpivi idiyilär (Philosophical Thought from the Qur'an) (translated into Uyghur by Obul Islam and Zahit Rähim) (Urumchi: Shinjang Khǎlq Neshriyati, 2000).
64. Interview on 10 July 2003.
65. Poliakov, op cit, ref 31, p 4.
66. E. Said, Orientalism: Western Conceptions of the Orient (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1978).
67. See for example P. Steinberger, '"Fundamentalism" in Central Asia: reasons, reality and prospects', in Tom Everett-Heath (ed) Central Asia: Aspects of Tradition (London: Routledge Curzon, 2003), p 221 who outlines the common argument that Muslims in Soviet Central Asia faced the 'near total destruction of "high" Islam' and were 'left with what may be termed "folk" Islam'.
68. On government efforts to control Sufi ritual activity around mazars (shrines) in Xinjiang, see R. Harris and R. Dawuta, 'Mazar Festivals of the Uyghurs: Music, Islam and the Chinese State', British Journal of Ethomusicology, Vol II, No 1, 2002, pp 112-115
69. see also E. Waite, 'From Holy Man to National Villan: Popular Historical Narratives about Apaq Khoja amongst Uyghurs in Contemporary Xinjiang' Inner Asia, Vol 8, No 1, 2006, pp 19-21.