Kyrgyzstan

Kyrgyzstan is a predominantly mountainous central Asian country bordered by Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, and China. Two thirds of the 5.5 million population are ethnic Kyrgyz, with Uzbeks and Russians constituting the largest ethnic minorities; more than three quarters of the population identify with Sunnā Islam of the Hanafi school. After independence was declared in 1991, much of the sizable Russian population emigrated; the remaining Russians concentrate in the cities and identify with Russian Orthodox Christianity. Uzbeks constitute the largest ethnic minority and live primarily in the southern part of the country, along the Uzbek border in the fertile Fergana Valley.

The Kyrgyz are associated with a nomadic past—where seasonal migrations link sacred places (mazars) with ancestors and Islam—that remains an active part of the contemporary imagination. While Kyrgyz traders and merchants have interacted with the Islamic world since the 10th century, conversions to Islam continued until the 18th century. Despite identification with Islam, cultural customs remained more influential in regulating social behavior than Shari'a.

Annexed to Russia in 1876, Kyrgyzstan became a Soviet Socialist Republic in 1936. The Soviet experience significantly affected Kyrgyz culture through forced collectivization, mandatory education, and the creation of a new Kyrgyz political elite. Religion was institutionalized, regulated, and discouraged, and in turn, it became increasingly privatized and relegated to tradition. Religious expression became associated more with traditional life cycle rituals rather than with religion itself. Nonetheless, Islam continued to be a relevant aspect of Kyrgyz life, increasingly used as an aspect of culture that distinguished central Asians from Russians and other non–central Asian ethnic groups.

Since Kyrgyzstan gained its independence, Islam has been promoted as an aspect of Kyrgyz national identity, and in some instances, this has been contested by differing visions of what constitutes proper Islamic practice. With Islamic groups from abroad—such as Tablighi Jama'at, Hizb ut-Tahrir al-Islami, and followers of M. Fettulah Güllen—encouraging different paths for the religious life, there has arisen both a revitalized traditionalist movement advocating a more orthopraxic understanding of Islam, which has a knowledge base centered on the Arabian peninsula, and a smaller, re-culturalist movement privileging Kyrgyz culture and the role of ancestors and mazars, which fosters a locally relevant interpretation of Islam. Also, since independence, there has been a rise of Protestant missionary activity, resulting in not only an increase of religious diversity but also creating tensions and bringing together the Russian Orthodox and the Kyrgyz Muslims who see these missionaries as threats to the unwritten agreement that Russians belong to Orthodoxy and central Asians belong to Islam. These dynamics of religious diversity and multiple interpretations of religious practice challenge the emergence of religion in the public sphere.