<i>Talfīq</i> as liberation: encountering ‘Alī al-Ghumuqī and global Islam in twentieth-century Dagestan

Abstract An Arabic-language tract crafted in in Makhachkala in 1949 offered an abrasive critique of ‘Alī al-Ghumuqī (1878–1943), ostensibly the father of the Dagestani modernist milieu ( al-firqa al-jadidiyya ). Who was ‘Alī al-Ghumuqī, what was his oeuvre, and why did the most prominent ulama of Dagestan despise him to the extent of publishing an original pamphlet cursing his legacy? In this article we set out to answer these questions and attempt to show that at the beginning of the Soviet century, the North Caucasus represented an important conduit for the circulation and further refinement of Islamic scholarship. We contend that the absorption and reproduction of modernist thinking among Dagestani ulama was not halted by the October Revolution and the Bolsheviks’ takeover. Indeed, we set out to show that in the North Caucasus between the 1920s and the 1960s, scholars continued to cultivate interest in Islamic jurisprudence, in fact unencumbered by the secularist policies adopted by the Soviet state. As we shall see, in this environment ‘Alī al-Ghumuqī morphed into what could be termed an epic figure and became so popular as to personify either the virtues or the evil aspects of modernist Islam.