Paper long abstract:

This paper traces the intersections of Leninist-Stalinist political theology and Soviet Islam in Kirghizia, to foreground the role of political Islam in disrupting narratives of the Communist Politburo. Locating the nexus of this political contestation at the historically-prophetic mountain of Sulaiman-Too, I argue that sacral rites undertaken on the were not mere acclamations to the divine, but also disruptions to Soviet political ideology. These rites included rituals promising protection from health malaises, solutions to childbirth problems, and other everyday frustrations. Known historically as the 'second Mecca', Sulaiman-Too witnessed also visitations by Muslims pilgrims from Central Asia and beyond. These occurrences continued despite Soviet intervention that ranged from outright prohibition to rewriting the mountain's prophetic history. Building upon theoretical foundations of glory and acclamation, this paper will demonstrate that sacral rites undertaken by dwellers of the Fergana undermined Soviet atheisation attempts at castrating the mountain's sacred order - and by extension Soviet order. At the same time, this paper will reveal how sacral practices allowed everyday Muslims to insert themselves - where they otherwise could not - within authoritarian complexes of power to resist Sovietisation in Central Asia.

Building upon the scholarship of political Islam in the Soviet Union, this paper shifts attention to concerns regarding anxieties of the Communist regime in maintaining a symbolic/ideological form of power. The findings herein are based on declassified Soviet records from the Central State Archive of the Kyrgyz Republic, and photographic references from the National Centre of Photographic Archives, in Bishkek. This paper draws also from visits to the mountain of Sulaiman-Too in Osh, as well as fieldwork and interviews with ritual practitioners, mullahs, government officials and other locals.