Khasavyurt, Center of Arabic Publishing in Russia, Begins Reprinting Pre-1917 Tatar Islamic Thinkers

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Mar. 10 – A major problem for Tatars interested in their national history as a center of Islamic thought and especially its modernist variant, Jadidism, is that most of the works of the late 19^th and early 20^th century authors of this movement are extremely difficult to gain access to.

            Many were destroyed by the Soviets and are almost impossible to find even in major libraries. A few have been scanned and are available online, but only a handful have been republished, something that limits their accessibility and hence influence. But now that appears set to change.

            The publishing arm of the Khasavyurt University of Al-Shari Muhammadsaid Yahya ad-Dagistani, the leading center in Russia of the publication of Arabic-language and Arabic-script works like those of the pre-1917 Tatar intellectuals, has taken up this challenge by publishing Ahmadkhadi Maksudi and hopes to publish more (milliard.tatar/news/axmadxadi-maksudi-kak-dagestancy-vozrozdayut-nasledie-tatarskogo-ucenogo-1430).

            Maksudi (1868-1941) was a Tatar polymath who was associated with the Crimean Tatar enlightenment figure Ismail Gasprinsky and who published a wide range of books that made him a central figure in the intellectual flourishing of Tatarstan before the Soviet crackdown against Tatar modernism.

            In 1932, the Soviet authorities arrested him on the basis of a false accusation that he was a leader of the All-Union Socialist Fascist Party, a group that did not exist. The charges brought with them a three-year exile in Vyatka. While there he continued to write. But in 1938, he was arrested again and accused of being a Sultan-Galiyevist involved with the Idel-Ural movement.

            This time, the courts found him not guilty; and he lived until the age of 73. He is buried in the Tatar cemetery in a place of honor. The republication of his books in Daghestan will ensure that he gets more attention not only in Tatarstan but across the Muslim and especially Muslim Turkic worlds.