Modernity in Ismail Gasprinski's Thoughts and its Influence on Russian Muslims

In the nineteenth century, the European countries were developing and progressing rapidly. Russia had turned into a vast empire striving to join the European countries. In this period, the Islamic world was undergoing a process of modernity and reformation. Russian Muslims were under subjugation and Russianization and Christianization were enforced in their society. They attempted to modernize their social life. Ismail Gasprinski (1851-1914) was a Muslim intellectual thinkers, who being aware of backwardness of Muslims compared to the rest of the world, and with his reformist ideas, tried to offer solutions to save his religious and national identity and at the same time modernize his society. The present paper answers the following question: What are the main components of Ismail Gasprinski’s thoughts and what was its influence on Russian Muslims? This paper underscores that Gasprinski with his modern endeavors like publishing periodicals, presenting modern pedagogical principles, building modern schools based on European models, and holding conferences for Muslims in Russia, paved the way for Russian Muslim modernists. In a way, he caused a movement called Jadidiye in Caucasia and Central Asia.