Comparative Approach to the Study of Policy of Tsarist and Soviet Government in Relation to Islam

Kazakhstan was not an independent, free state throughout nearly three centuries. It was a part of the Russian Empire since 1731, and it entered ‘Unbreakable Union of freeborn Republics, Great Russia has welded forever to stand’ in 1922. Islam was constantly oppressed, restrained in the period when Kazakhstan was turned into one of the national provinces of tsarist Russia and became one of the Soviet republics. There were times when a real threat appeared over the religion that it would be rooted out and eradicated from the consciousness of millions of Kazakhs. It is impossible to claim that only Islam got under propaganda of the atheistic pressure during the communism construction. The pressure was experienced also by other traditional religions. But, nevertheless, unlike Christianity, other faiths were exposed to bigger persecution during the Soviet period. Probably, it was due to, firstly, a large number the Orthodox in comparison with the Muslims. Secondly, it may be considered as the continuity of anti-Islamic activity of the previous authorities. The article covers the attitude of autocracy and the Soviet authorities towards the Muslim doctrine. On the basis of a comparative analysis to study the relationship of the Muslim religion by the autocracy and the Soviet leadership. The study is based on the logical methods of historical research, such as analysis and synthesis, induction and deduction, analogy, generalization, and special - a comparative-historical method, historical, genetic, dialectical. The actions of tsarist autocracy in the religious sphere had the purposeful and interconnected character: all support and creating favorable conditions for the distribution of Orthodoxy and its eminence, bans and oppressions concerning Muslim faith. But the pursued policy did not lead to refusal of Kazakhs from Islam. So in this regard we have come with an interesting observation and conclusion. Overall, continuous prosecution of the Moslem doctrine and its supporters by the tsarist and Soviet governments did not bring desirable results. Islam withstood under the pressure of the Russian tsarism and the Bolshevist government, and then, with the acquisition of the independence of the Republic of Kazakhstan, it revives again, and we are eyewitnesses of that.