Invitation to Dialogue (about S.I. Gabiev’s book “Arabs, Islam and Arab-Muslim Culture”)

Abstract

The article is devoted to the analysis of the book of the Dagestani educator Said Gabiev “Arabs, Islam and Arab-Muslim culture” (1915). Its relevance is due to the fact that many of its provisions can be used in the modern process of spiritual and moral education. This work has practically not been studied since its publication, the events that followed after 1915 did not contribute to this. The article states that S.I. Gabiev is a European educated intellectual who has absorbed the democratic values of Russian culture, and at the same time is a Muslim believer, an expert on Islam. The book is the first experience of Islamic-Christian dialogue in public thought in Russia at the beginning of the 20th century, where the task is to acquaint the reader with the history and culture of Islam, to overcome negative stereotypes, prejudices and prejudices about Islam characteristic of the public consciousness of Europe and Russia. Ignorance of Islam, a prejudiced attitude towards it was, according to the author, especially destructive for Russia, which included a multimillion Muslim population. S.I. Gabiev analyzes the Islamic dogma of predestination (fate), which, in his opinion, was the cause of the stagnation that reigned in contemporary Muslim society. The author insists on the need for modernizing transformations in society, for cleansing Islam from historical social and cultural “stratifications” that contradict Islam. Pointing to the exceptional vitality of Islam, the author is confident in the revival of Muslim culture and thought, in the political independence of the Arab-Muslim states. S.I. Gabiev proceeded from the fundamental possibility of mutual understanding of the country’s two religious and cultural universes: Christian and Muslim, in the process of which a new Russian culture would be created. The author believes that, taking into account the above material, an interreligious and intercultural dialogue is necessary in Russia, which should become its original civilizational idea.