Rasulia (Madrassah)

The Rasulia Madrasah was founded in 1883 in the Tatar settlement of Troitsk ^[1] . The construction of the madrasah began on July 3, 1880. Earlier in this place was a private house, donated by the son of the merchant Seyfulla Gabbasov Habibulla as a gift for worship. In 1872, a mekteb and a madrassah were opened in this house.

The founders of the madrasah are Zainulla Rasulev , a well-known Bashkir religious figure, in whose honor the madrasah got its name, and the merchant Seyfulla Gabbasov. In 1886, at the expense of the Kazakh enlightener Ibrai Altynsarin, wooden buildings of the educational building and dormitory were built ^[1] .

At the beginning of its activities, the Rasulia Madrasah was a denominational school, and in its curriculum there were mainly theological disciplines. Mudarris of “Rasulia” Zaynulla adhered to Jadidism and was an opponent of the scholasticism , which in those days prevailed in the Islamic religious school.

In the madrasah, the shakirdas studied Islam not only according to traditional logic ( mantyk ) and dogma, the Koran itself, hadiths and works of Gabdennasyr Kursavi and Shigabutdin Marjani also entered their training program.

Thanks to the activities of Zaynulla Rasulev, the city of Troitsk became an important center of education for Muslims of the Russian Empire and a base for the further spread of the Sufi brotherhood of Khalidiya-Naqshbandiya.

Tatars, Bashkirs, as well as Kazakhs studied at the Rasulia Madrasah; it gained a reputation as one of the best Islamic institutions in Russia. French historian Alexander Benigsen described the Rasulia Madrasah as “one of the best academic institutions in the Muslim world” .

Material support for the madrasah was provided by Altynsarin, a wealthy Kazakh entrepreneur who was worried about the expansion of the Russian language and culture among Muslims who were eager to get an education and who had no alternative but to study under the outdated programs of the existing madrassas or study Russian culture.

In 1893, thanks to Zaynulla Rasulev, a sound teaching method, a class-lesson system, and also the study of secular disciplines were introduced in the madrasah . At the beginning of the XX century. Madrassah was a semi-secular educational institution with an 11-year course of study. Thanks to the son of Zaynulla Rasulev - Gabdrahman Rasulev , who took over the leadership of the madrasah from his father - the educational program included creed, Russian , Arabic , Turks , calligraphy, reading, memorization and interpretation of the Qur'an and Hadith , mathematics , Russian, Turkic and general history, history Islam , sacred history, theology , Muslim law, ethics , hygiene , geography , natural sciences , physics , chemistry , zoology and pedagogy . Teaching in the madrasah was conducted in the Tatar language, Tatar history and literature were studied here ^[2] . The first printing house in Troitsk began to work at the madrasah, in which the first Kazakh newspaper Aykap (Zarya) was published.

The madrasah turned into the center of the religious life of the Trans-Ural Bashkirs ^[3] , and also became a center of Tatar culture ^[4] .

The exact number of students educated in the Rasulia Madrasah is unknown, but al-Magazy estimates at the beginning of the 20th century. there were 311. There is little information about the ethnic composition of students. By 1913 , 13 teachers worked in the Rasulia madrasah, among them Z. Rasulev, M. Mutagarov, R. Atnabaev, G. Nazyrov, H. Teregulov and others, 240 shakirs were studying. The madrassah was funded by donations. At the expense of patrons (including Zainulla-ishan himself, who contributed 19 thousand rubles) in 1905, 2 main buildings were purchased. At the beginning of the XX century. tuition was paid (8 rubles per year). At the madrasah there was a library with an extensive book fund, with which Zaynulla Rasulev bequeathed a collection of his books and a waqf capital of 3.5 thousand rubles.

After the October Revolution , the Rasulia Madrasah was closed (around 1919) and turned into a Tatar-Bashkir pedagogical college ^[2] .

In 2015, it was decided to restore the madrasah. Architects-restorers tried to return the building to its original color scheme - red-brick color of the walls and white architectural elements. During the restoration, metal shutters with a mechanism were found that covered the window openings of the first floor and wound around a metal shaft hidden in the wall above the window opening; ceramic air ducts of the heating system, as well as a window for filling coal into the basement. On July 6, 2018, the grand opening of the restored Rasulia Madrasah took place. On September 1, 2018, classes will begin in Madrasah. In the restored madrasah, the murids will receive both secular and religious instruction.

• Gizatullin R.N. Rasulia // Bashkir Encyclopedia / Chap. M.A. Ilgamov. - Ufa: GAUN “ Bashkir Encyclopedia ”, 2015—2019. - ISBN 978-5-88185-306-8 .
• Farkhshatov M.N. Madrassah "Rasulia". // Bashkortostan: a brief encyclopedia . - Ufa: Bashkir Encyclopedia, 1996. - S. 392. - 672 p. - ISBN 5-88185-001-7 .
• A. Yu. Khabutdinov. District of the Orenburg Mohammedan Spiritual Assembly: the role of madrassas as a nationwide institution