MUSLIM COMMUNITY OF NORTH OSSETIA IN THE POST-SOVIET ERA. INSTITUTIONAL ASPECTS

Abstract

In our work, we attempt to describe the events that impacted the life of the Muslim community in the multi-confessional republic of North Ossetia-Alania at the end of the 20th – beginning of the 21st century; to analyze their causal link, the influence of Caucasian and global trends on them. During the study, we applied descriptive-narrative and historical-genetic methods. We have come to the conclusion that at the end of the 20th – early 21st century the Ossetian Muslim community turned out to be receptive to global trends, while the Ossetian “neophytes” – to the ideas of radical Islamic movements. However, by now the split of the Muslim community of Ossetia into supporters of moderate Islam and supporters of radical views has been overcome. The terrorist attack in Beslan in 2004 had unprecedented consequences for the Muslim community in Ossetia and noticeably changed the attitude towards Islam within the Ossetian society. It has also become evident that if in the first decade of the 21st century tension between the Islamic clergy of Ossetia and representatives of the Russian Orthodox Church were dominant, then in the second decade of the century the conflicts of Muslims with passionate adherents of the traditional Ossetian religion were actualized.