The Formation of the Centers of Muslims of the Orenburg Muslim Spiritual Assembly (the Spiritual Administration of Muslims of the European Part of the USSR and Siberia) in the 20th Century

The article is devoted to an analysis of the formation and evolution of the centers of Russian Muslims within the Orenburg Muslim Spiritual Assembly (the Spiritual Administration of Muslims of the European Part of the USSR and Siberia) during the 20th century. A significant part of the primary sources was obtained during the work on the series of encyclopedic dictionaries «Islam in the Russian Federation», published by the publishing house «Medina». It is concluded that throughout the 20th century, including the Soviet period, the old centers of Muslims within the Orenburg Muslim Spiritual Assembly (the Spiritual Administration of Muslims of the European Part of the USSR and Siberia) developed, while new centers were formed. Some Islamic centers in Russia, such as Orenburg, lost their importance during the 20th century. Some Muslim centers such as Saint Petersburg, Nizhny Novgorod, Troitsk or Tomsk had the potential to develop into full-fledged centers but were unable to achieve this. It is noted that in addition to generally recognized centers of Islam in Russia, such as Kazan and Ufa, new centers emerged, with Moscow being the main one of these centers. For the first time since the mid-16 th century, one of the centers of Islam in the country has emerged in the capital.