North Caucasus shaheedism formula: akhirah minus dunja

In this article, the author explores the foundation of Islamic religious martyrdom in the traditional and radical reading. The contents of the concepts of “shahid”, “dunja”, and “akhirah” are disclosed in detail on the basis of materials of the pseudo-Islamic communities. A particular attention is paid to understanding the physical world (dunja) and its role in the lives of Muslims. The position of belittling the worldly goods and praising of the afterlife by radical Islam theorists is noted. The author focuses on the varying nature character of using the word of shahada in Islamist vocabulary: the fact of death in one case and the evidence in its traditional Islamic understanding in the other. The inconsistency of practice of the extremist shaheedism to the tenets of Islamic faith by a number of indicators, i.e. the damage to life and property of civilians, violation of the terms of a civil contract between an individual and the state, as well as a distorted exaggerated presentation of the rules of Islam is substantiated. The article is supplemented by consideration of the concept of “shaheed belt” and reveals linguistic differences of mentions in the Russian-speaking and English-speaking sources. The perverted, redefined definitions of a broad range of values of the studied concepts are clarified, and significant differences of shaheed in the orthodox and quasi-Islamic understanding are indicated. A traditional division of shaheeds into perfect, mundane and akhirate ones according to the nature of their intentions, death conditions, etc. is presented. The author concludes that the Islamist shaheeds have nothing in common with shaheeds in the generally accepted traditional sense. The fallacy and the inadmissibility of naming those who do not fit this definition as shaheeds are emphasized.