Ferghana Valley

In Tajikistan: The First Lessons of Jihad
Many Muslims in Uzbekistan viewed the civil war in Tajikistan as a war for the 
Faith. They had only the slightest knowledge of its clan or inter-regional context, 
and chose instead to believe, at least in the early 1990s, that the Tajik conflict 
was a jihad against the Communists. The Islom Adolati militants who had fled 
to Tajikistan were in demand in this war, especially those who had previous 
military service and training. However, the Uzbek refugees included many with 
no army background and who thus required training. By early 1993, in areas 
controlled by the Islamists from the United Tajik Opposition (mainly in Tavil-
dara), special camps were organized, where the training of young mujahideen 
began.
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Besides training in armament, topography, and other applied sciences, 
the young mujahideen learned the basics of religion. The textbook Lessons of 
Jihad
(Johod darsliklari), written in 1997, played an important role in the cur-
riculum. The Lesson of Jihad were by no means limited to abstract theology; 
they also provided practical instructions on how to conduct diversions, guerrilla 
wars, and propaganda on enemy territory, which included Uzbekistan and some 
neighboring countries.
If the Lessons of Jihad were in the end quite practical, and its presentation 
on religion conveyed on a primitive level, the penciled summaries that various 
mujahideen made of their lessons are even more elemental. Drawing on several 
such notebooks, one arrives at the following list titled “benefits Allah gives to his 
martyrs (shahid).” Each martyr’s specific status would determine which benefits 
he would actually receive:
1. The pain which a martyr experiences when he dies will be equal to an 
ant’s bite;
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2. In Paradise he will have a variety of foods in whatever quantity he 
desires;
3. In Paradise, each martyr will be married to seventy-two beautiful maidens 
(houries);
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4. With his first drop of blood, all of a martyr’s sins are forgiven;
5. At the Last Judgment he will not have to worry about himself and will be 
eligible to stand for seventy of his relatives.
All this suggests that the “benefits for martyrs” had been interpreted in such a 
way as to respond to the basic physiological needs of young mujahideen. The harsh 
conditions under which most of them lived in the camps help explain their rather 
mundane goals in the afterlife promised to them.
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Hence the first benefit above 
addresses the natural fear of physical suffering and death that any young militant 
would feel. Former IMU members insist that these simplistic propaganda tricks 
were not devoid of psychological effects, and that many young fighters sincerely 
expected to receive the listed rewards in the next world.

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ISLAM IN THE FERGHANA VALLEY 323