The guest of the portal Islam-Russia.com is Associate Professor of the Department of Religious Studies in the Kazan Federal University, Anton Gorin
-How has a role of the religion changed in the post-modern era?
Actually, in the second part of the 20th century the main country with rationalistic worldview used as the state ideology was USSR. Unfortunately, after the dissolution of the USSR in 1991, rationalism bore rather serious losses and fell behind. As a result, the question concerning the ideology in the Russian Federation is raised, and not even the state one as now it is impossible according to Article 13 of the Russian Constitution. I want to believe it will be changed later. As a proverb says – “Nature abhors a vacuum” and in this regard, the question about people’s self-identity and their belonging to something more common is raised. As a result, state ideology is replaced by the time-tested ideology that is religious self-identity.
Thus, in the 20th century the principle “friend or foe” worked in a traditional way – the same language, territory where you live and sacred symbols. Nowadays, territory is not a criterion – some compatriots have two or three citizenships. Language is not a criterion now as well – it is not uncommon to speak two or three languages. Those sacred symbols are left.
Sacred symbols are determined by either state or spiritual ideology. State ideology, as I have already said, is restricted by the legislation. In this regard, cultural ideology is left. Like it or not, it is based on a religion that means Russian culture cannot be separated from Orthodoxy, Tatar culture – from Islam. That’s why it is natural that religion is one of the common criteria of self-identity for a modern person.
-What is the main reason of the fact that so many extremist interpretations of a religion have emerged?
-The situation is the following: traditionally it was believed that extremist interpretations of religious dogmas had a social basis. If we look through works of some Russian religious scholars like Damir Shagaveev, Denis Sokolov, Roman Silantev, we will notice that almost in all their descriptions one of the main factors in the emergence of extremism in religion, in their opinion, is certain social injustice. It can be, for instance, social dislocation among young people or certain social factors. However, the situation nowadays has definitely been changed to the better.
One cannot say that the lack of upward mobility or its limitation has stopped being a reason for the emergence of extremist groups of religious nature. Another power has appeared, another segment. Not so long ago your humble servant did a social research that helped to find out a very interesting fact within the territory of the Russian Federation: the majority of people are of extremist religious views, to some extent. Moreover, the matter is not even about Islam – there are always such representatives almost in all the confessions that are present in the territory of the Russian Federation.
They are no longer hungry people, they are well-fed. This is the generation that does not know what survival means; that has got used to have a roof over their heads, a workplace, and guaranteed income. They are young people who are focused on higher or applied education and their integration into society. The choice of an extremist religious ideology for them has some another background.
I touch upon state ideology once again. The thing is that the existence of certain ambitious targets made the Soviet Union, the Abbasid Caliphate, the Russian Empire more powerful. A person lives not only having some personal goals and interests; a person is a strange creature that wants not only to be loved but also who wants to make history at a certain period of his life.
One can make history having a goal that comprises the common good. Speaking about the Soviet Union, the Russian Empire, and the Arabian Caliphate - there that goal was the formation of a unified space which is not equitable, but at least comfortable for living of all the society and which is based on a certain religious and political ideology. Moreover, in the Caliphate religious and political ideologies, roughly speaking, were combined, but in the Caliphate of a later period, in the Russian Empire and Soviet Union spiritual and political components were separated rather seriously.
No matter how strong we stigmatize the Soviet Union as a totalitarian state, some freedom in a creative self-expression still existed. Nowadays this great goal is absent. Young people’s urgent problem nowadays is to acquire this very goal, to find the true meaning of life. I do not want to scold our new generation, but they are well-fed and they aim to see the outcome of their activities right away. Anyway, young people have always been the engine of changes.
In earlier, more spiritual forms of statehoods people were ready to work for the wellness of their grandchildren and great-grandchildren, nowadays the modern society wants to see their results during their lifetime. Speaking about Western Europe, the situation there is complicated by the fact that the collapse of the multicultural policy actually led to the distortion and domination of the outer-cultural and outer-religious component, instead of co-existence among representatives of different cultures in the territory of Western Europe.
-How should we resist the spread of extremist interpretations of a religion?
One of the main problems of the modern religious society in the territory of Russia is the absence of a legal concept regarding the traditional religion. There were several attempts to formulate a Bill about the traditional religion (the end of 90-s – the beginning of 2000-s). But still there is no understanding of the traditional religion in the legal space of Russia. I have been asked many times what traditional Islam and traditional Orthodoxy are. Honestly speaking, I cannot give the answer on this question. The most I can do is to share my personal opinion. There is nowadays no concept that is objectively affirmed by the law.
What is the main problem? The issue is that what a “traditional religion” stands for us. Usually when we speak about traditional religion, we imply the period of time within which this or that confession exists in the territory of the Russian Federation. This approach has a rather serious problem.
Firstly, the Soviet Union existed in the territory of the modern Russian Federation for 70 years that means it was a state where religion was principally removed from the active social communication. Secondly, how should we interpret it? Within the Russian Empire, the Soviet Union, the Russian Federation there are different boundaries. And, finally, one more nuance. What is religion if people practice certain religious beliefs through two-three generations? Is it a tradition or not? Indeed, more than a quarter of a century has passed since 1991 that means more than one generation has changed. Therefore, the issue is rather problematic here.
The second question that is raised while discussing the phenomenon of traditional religion is how much this religion belongs to the culture of people who live in the territory of the Russian Federation. We come across rather serious moments here.
Firstly, for the last quarter of the century we can see the rise of neo-pagan groups and good funding including funding from abroad.
Secondly, there is no mechanism in traditional Islam that could declare a Muslim as a non-Muslim, no matter how sinful he is.
Thus, the problem is that if within the Ummah someone begins to practice a religion that formally is Islam but is different in some dogmas, he does not stop being a Muslim in terms of a tradition. The same is in Orthodoxy. I express my personal opinion when I say that one cannot find a mechanism in any traditional religion that would exclude a person from the number of believers.
One cannot forbid a person to believe. A stranger cannot declare a person a believer or non-believer, at least in traditional religious confessions. The moment missed by our legislators, is that many religious confessions are inseparable from ethnocultural identity of a person, they are the part of a person’s ethnocultural identity. It means that if a person identifies himself as a Russian, he has to accept the fact that the Russian culture is based on Orthodoxy. If a person identifies himself as a Tatar, he is obliged to respect Islam because the Tatar culture is based on Islam.
But every medal has its reverse – Islam is traditional, it is spread among the Tatar, it allows and obliges them to be Tatar. Orthodoxy is widely spread among Russians that obliges them to be Russians. But when a religious doctrine starts to put the priority of religious self-identity over ethnocultural one, we can doubt its traditionalism…
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