Paper short abstract:

In my paper I will show that some syncretic religious practises, ascribed to Muslims living in the Western Rhodopes by their Christian neighbours, are in fact questionable. Using data from my fieldwork I will analyze them in terms of cultural misunderstandings

Paper long abstract:

According to Charles Stewart and Rosalind Shaw religious syncretism may be analyzed as an adaptation strategy deployed when individuals are exposed to competing religious paradigms coexisting within a community (1994). When seen from this perspective religious syncretism reveals its ambiguous features: some actions may appear syncretic in nature, but their underlying intentions may be not in fact motivated by syncretic tendencies. This is a situation which can be aptly described using the concept of "superficial syncretism," introduced by Aleksander Posern-Zieliński (1987) to describe apparently syncretic behaviours which nonetheless involve no significant changes to religious belief (as opposed to "deep syncretism", which actually influences the sphere of belief). In practise, superficial syncretism concerns often those behaviours which are classified as syncretistic by their observers, but are not seen as such by those who perform them. In this perspective superficial religious syncretism is grounded in cultural misunderstandings and may be seen as a facet of everyday peaceful coexistence between different religious communities. I would like to analyze this problem using examples from the fieldwork conducted among Muslim-Christian local communities in 2005-2009 in the Western Rhodopes.