Love of Qur’an kept their spirits high

But the faith fell on hard times during soviet rule when religion was discouraged and atheism propagated by the state. The flame of Islam was, however, kept burning even in the most difficult times by some courageous adherents of the faith. Among them was the family of Yakub Chishir who is represented Kazakhstan at the just-concluded Dubai International Holy Qur'an Award (DIHQA). Chishir was one of the youngest competitors of the 13th session of the award. This 11-year-old's mellifluous voice, perfect punctuation and riveting recital of the Qur'an provided little evidence of his family's historical struggle to keep alive Islam in Central Asia.

Chishir hails from a small village 40 km from Astana, the capital of Kazakhstan. He studied the Qur'an at the hands of his father, who works as a farmer in addition to being the village's Islamic teacher. "My father has only memorized parts of the Qur'an and not the whole book because it was very dangerous for him to study Islam when he was a child. As a result he was adamant that I memorize the whole book because he wanted one of his children to be a hafiz," said Chishir.

The 11-year-old, who only speaks Russian and Persian, started memorizing the holy book from the age of six. It took him two years to complete memorizing the whole Qur'an, said Omar Mousa, who is Chishir's guardian and translator at the awards.

Speaking flawless Arabic, which he learned in Jordan, Mousa revealed that his family also suffered persecution for their religious beliefs during the Soviet era. Mousa who works for the Al-Ihsan Association, a charity that runs Islamic schools and mosques in four Central Asian countries, said his grandfather was forcibly exiled from his native Daghestan to Kazakhstan because he came from a religious family. Despite the danger to their lives, Mousa's family insisted on practicing Islam, albeit in secret.

"I remember when I was a child my father would wake up late at night around 2 a.m. to go to a scholar's house to learn about Islam. They would study until the morning prayers, which they would do in congregation and then go to work.

"The danger they faced was immense for if they had been arrested they would have been sent to prisons in Siberia, which meant a sure death for some of them," he recalled.

However, after the fall of the Soviet Union, the situation in Kazakhstan improved dramatically. Restrictions on religious practice were lifted and mosques flourished.

"Nowadays we see more and more people coming back to Islam. The mosques on Friday are packed with people for jumuah prayers. Even though some of them do not know how to pray they still come to observe the ritual," he said.

Mousa points out that when they opened their first Islamic school in 1998 they had to go out in the community to recruit students and barely filled classes. But now the number of students is overwhelming and the schools cannot cope with the increasing numbers and are forced to turn people down.

Mousa urged Arab countries to help Islamic organizations in Central Asia. "We need to build more Islamic seminaries, mosques and orphanages. Our people need to be educated about their rich Islamic heritage," he said.

See www.arabnews.com .