Published in 1985, Mystics and Commissars has long been a reference work among scholars and aficionados of things Muslim in the history of the USSR. Its author, Alexandre Bennigsen (1913-1988) was born into a family of emigres from the Soviet Union and received formal academic training in Paris where he studied Persian, Ottoman Turkish and Central Asian languages. He was intimately convinced that Islam, and above all Sufism, represented a threat to the integrity of the Soviet Union, for the “Muslim nationalities” never fully assimilated to the Soviet (i.e., Russian and secularist) culture.

It has been repeatedly noted that his predictions proved ill-founded. And more recently, historians have paused to reflect on the fact that Bennigsen’s prophecy was premised upon a flawed understanding of Sufism, one which assumed that “Sufism’s naturally clandestine nature enhanced its potential disruptiveness to the political system.[1] It is of course true that to consider Sufism a clandestine phenomenon is to miss that devotional practices informed by Sufi culture were hidden in plain sight both in the North Caucasus and in Central Asia.[2] And yet from the archives of Socialist Dagestan there emerges a strange story of violence that complicates the lessons we have learnt so far about Sufism in the Soviet context. It is a story about Sufis that has to do less with political dissent (let alone with Islamic renunciant culture!),[3] than with a degree of anti-state violence beyond even that envisaged by Bennigsen and his ilk. Here below we quote from a booklet titled The Amay and Kunta-Hajji Religious Movements published in 1965 in Makhachkala.[4] The author, Ilshat Makatov, had access to the Dagestanskaia Pravda where local reporters chronicled the exploits of violent “murids,” i.e., Sufi disciples, in deference to a verbiage current in the Tsarist period and gesturing at the exploits of Imam Shamil:

“Many in Makhachkala remember well the recent trial of the murderous murids that took place in the Supreme Court of the Dagestani Autonomous Socialist Republic. As it turned out during the course of the investigation, the murderers belonged to the religious community of the so-called Sheikh Amay, they were followers of a Naqshbandi tariqa, and acted on the instructions of the leaders of the community. The example of this community of murids, its emergence, short-lived activity and downfall shows clearly the anti-social character of Sufism. The origin of the group itself dates back to the thirties of the twentieth century. [….] The founder and organizer of the group was one Arsanukai Khidirlezov, [a landowner] who had a wealthy farm in the village of Germenchik, in the district of Khasavyurt. Of course, the Soviet authorities aimed at building the foundations of collective-farm life and eliminating poverty and exploitation in the village; and Khidirlezov the kulak did not like them. Soon […] Khidirlezov organized a religious group of murids and declared himself a sheikh of the Naqshbandi order under the nickname Amay. The Amay's group mainly united those who were dissatisfied with the Soviet power. The religious group [of the Amay],however, disintegrated after the death of Khidirlezov in 1936.  Many years passed, but in 1958-1959 new followers of Sheikh Amay came to the fore: Alauddin Temirbulatov and Beibulat Kaskuraev. According to the laws of the Sufi order, i.e., the funding rules of the Naqshbandi order, the right to be a sheikh and to have followers rests officially with the sheikh. And it is well known that Sheikh Amay did not give his permission to any murid to continue his work. So, according to the rules of the Sufis themselves, after Amay's death no one had the right to confer the title of sheikh and recruit murids-disciples. But this situation did not dissuade new charlatans [from doing so]. With the participation of Amay's daughter Hava, the group appeared under a new guise: conspiring with Alauddin, Hava began to spread rumours that, while visiting her father's grave, his spirit talked to her, and in one of the last conversations he allegedly said: “There is a very good man, a prominent man; he’s tall and robust, he wears a hat of folded sheepskin (karakulevaia papakha). His name is Alauddin. Tell everyone that I'm appointing him as my successor. Let everyone know that he is a holy sheikh.” Meanwhile Kaskuraev was even more resourceful. He stated in his entourage that the spirit of Sheikh Amay appeared to him and instructed him in a dream to continue his work. And to make the version sound even more convincing, Beibulat persuaded his colleague Alauddin to spread it. Who are these newfangled sheikhs? What is their true face and morality? Beibulat Kaskuraev is completely illiterate. In the early years of Soviet power, he worked for some time as a watchman, and after becoming Amay's murid, he stopped working altogether. His main occupation was to hold suhbats (“gatherings”) of like-minded people in his house almost every day, on whose alms he lived. Alauddin Temirbulatov was born in 1924 in the village of Tarki. Until 1949 he worked in different places, and each time he was dismissed for drunkenness. In 1949 he was sentenced to 12 years in prison for embezzlement of grain products from the Bureau of Grain Procurement (ZagotZerno). Released from prison, he suddenly became a believer. In 1953 Alauddin fell ill and was treated in a psychiatric hospital for a long time. Having obtained a state disability pension, he began studying Sufism with Amay’s murids and, convinced of the profitability of this business, organized his own group of murids. When he became a sheikh, Alauddin received like-minded people at home by teaching them not to come to visit him empty-handed, but with carpets, handicrafts, and to bring money and foodstuffs. He liked to live in luxury, and so he told his cronies: “attract people with big pockets.” Who were the members of these groups of murids and what did they do? The most plausible picture is conveyed by Magomed Khiderlezov, Amay's grandson, who, despite the efforts of the murids, did not fall under their influence. Among the murids, so says Khiderlezov, there was one Abdulvagab Ibragimov, who lives in the village (aul) of Aksai. His fellow villagers know him not only as a murid, but also as a quack-physician. However, the residents of Aksai do not resort to his services, but residents of other villages do and use his “medicines.” Assek Adjigulov from Babayurt is no different. Also, the former kulaks, the brothers Hasan, Akhmed and Magomed Ezerkhanovs from Gerseli, have clothed themselves in the dignity of murids. All these impostors brazenly deceive and rob people who have fallen under their influence. There was, for example, such a case. Last year, the newly-appeared sheikh Alauddin Temirbulatov came to the mother of Magomed Khiderlezov and said that she, as the daughter-in-law of Sheikh Amay, should contribute 20 roubles for the restoration of his shrine (ziiarat). Her mother at first refused to give the money, explaining that her father-in-law was not a saint and therefore there was no need to build a shrine for him. Alauddin started cursing his mother and calling on Allah to punish her. To get rid of the insolent sheikh, Magomed’s mother gave him the money […]. The activities of these people were not limited to robbing believers. Under the guise of outward piety, they not only carried out illegal anti-social work, but also committed criminal offenses, encouraging their murids to commit heinous acts, including murder. For example, Magomedrasul Kasumbekov raped a girl, and then his brother and murid Kasumbek Kasumbekov brutally murdered Isa Alypkachev, a resident of the village of Tarki, a worker and father of seven, on April 22, 1962. Magomedrasul then demanded that Kasumbek marry a girl, a relative of Isa, who had been defamed by him. The criminal murids became particularly dangerous during the trial of the Kasumbekov brothers and their accomplices. During illegal meetings at the homes of Khabibulla Mutalimov and Nasrulla Salataev, which were held under the guise of prayers, the murids, under the direction of their leaders, devised a plan to assault the court and the guards in order to forcibly release the Kasumbekovs. The defendant Makhtubek Mizamutdinov said at the trial:

“At the gatherings they said that Kasumbekov and others had done the right thing to kill Alypkachev and they should be released. In fact, the defendant Salimgerey Dzhumagulov confessed: “I was a murid and had been a member of the Amay sect since 1961. On May 27, I brought all the murids to the house of my uncle Mutalimov where Bashirov told us: “We will fight today. If the court does not release Kasumbekov, we will release him. The spirit of Sheikh Amay will help us, no bullet will take us”.”

The story about the Amay Sufi group stops here in the book by Makatov with a surprisingly hasty reference to a case heard in a Soviet court in 1963. What was the matter at stake? And what happened? What emerges from the records produced by the prosecutor’s office[5] is a picture of relentless violence and one to be expected more from a boevik (or the Italian TV series The Octopus, for that matter) than from the proceedings of a Soviet court: the members of the Amay Sufi group showed up at the courtroom with guns and shot to kill several guards. Unable to free Kasumbekov, they rushed out of the court of justice and seized a car they found in front the building. A shootout with the police in the centre of Makhachkala ensued. All the followers of Sheikh Amay were apprehended and prosecuted. Here is what the prosecutor recorded:

“After that, Godichev fired at the officer in charge of the guards; then many of the defendants and persons present in the room ran away. Meanwhile, having killed the guard Rustamov in the courtroom, Magomed Salataev hid behind the barrier for the defendants and opened fire at the other guards who were on the stage of the courtroom. A lawyer by the name of Dogits was forced to return fire, as a result of which Salataev was wounded by a bullet. The latter swiftly left the courtroom as soon as his pistol ran out of bullets. After that Bashirov, Magomed Salataev and the defendants B. Mirzautamov and Nasrulla Salataev left the court building and went along [....]. While Bashirov and N. Salataev pointed guns at people near the building of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the Dagestan ASSR, the others seized a “Volga” car assigned to Party employees and tried to drive it. Bashirov sat next to the driver Rizvan Khasaev; the brothers Salataev and the brothers Musalutdinov were in the back seat. Under the threat of a gun, Bashirov demanded the driver to take them to the 5th poselok, [a district] of Makhachkala. When Khasaev did not fulfil this demand, Bashirov fired several shots in the car. The driver then tried to disarm him, but the Salataev brothers, Hamidulla and Magomed, began beating Khasaev. The police officers surrounded the vehicle, and Bashirov fired at the policeman A. Bagoikov. The policemen were forced to return fire and Bashirov was seriously wounded. […] The assault against the court and the guards with the purpose of freeing Kusumbek Kasumbekov from custody had been prepared in advance and was carried out by all the defendants prosecuted in the case. Bashirov and other “sectarians” constituted a group of outlaws united by common religious views. All of them were murids belonging to the religious sect of Sheikh Amay, which had a reactionary, anti-social character. As a result of this outrageous criminal attack, the guard Rustamov and the policeman Bagomedov were killed, three other servicemen were wounded, including one of them seriously. In repelling the attack and apprehending the criminals, two of the attackers were killed and others were also injured.”

Eight disciples of Sheikh Amay were prosecuted and sentenced to the firing squad. Today we are told that the Amay Sufi group lives on in Dagestan. Their followers reside in various villages, primarily in Kumyk and Dargin settlements. They maintain close ties within their community, yet they deliberately distance themselves from other Sufi groups. At present, this community is so reclusive that neither scholars nor journalists have been able to pierce the veil of secrecy about them. Only hearsay about the Amay Sufi group circulates among their fellow villagers. Indeed, neighbors often speak of them with a touch of irony, yet at the same time, they consider them completely harmless – as if the events of the 1960s had never occurred – and, in many ways, even regard them with a certain sympathy. The Amay Sufi affiliates do not consume alcohol, preach honesty in their dealings with others, and display frugality as well as generosity in public: they remain entirely apolitical and distance themselves from the state to the greatest extent possible. Their guiding principle is the belief that a Muslim should earn a living solely through physical labor. Many of their followers are carpenters and builders.

Published online March 14, 2025

[1] Eren Tasar, “Sufism on the Soviet Stage: Holy People and Places in Central Asia’s Socio-Political Landscape After World War II,” in Devin DeWeese and Jo-Ann Gross (ed.), Sufism in Central Asia: New Perspectives on Sufi Traditions, 15th-21st Centuries (Leiden: Brill, 2018), pp. 257. See also, Devin DeWeese, DeWeese, Devin. “The Soviet Union in Islamic Studies: Some Reflections on Envisioning the USSR as a Religious Space,” in Ron Sela, Paolo Sartori, and Devin DeWeese (eds.), Muslim ReligiousAuthority in Central Eurasia (Leiden: Brill, 2022), pp. 17-68.

[2] Stéphane A. Dudoignon and Christian Noack (eds.), Allah’s Kolkhozes: Migration, De-Stalinisation, Privatisation and the New Muslim Congregations in the Soviet Realms (Berlin: Klaus Schwarz Verlag, 2011); Paolo Sartori, A Soviet Sultanate: Islam in Socialist Uzbekistan, 1943-1991 (Vienna, Austrian Academy of Sciences Press, 2024).

[3] Stéphane A. Dudoignon, “Gnosis as Dissent? In Soviet and Present-Day Tajikistan,” Journal of Central Asian History Vol. 1 No. 2 (2022), pp. 273-308.

[4] I’lshat A. Makatov, Religioznye gruppy Amaia i Kunta-Khadzhi (Makhachkala: Dagknig, 1965)

[5] Central State Archive of Dagestan, f. 1234, op. 4, d. 27, ll. 20-41.