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Burkhanism
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Burkhanism
Burkhanism, known endonymically as Ak Jang (Altay: Ак јаҥ [ɑq t͡ɕɑɴ]; lit. 'White Faith'), is an indigenist new religious movement that flourished among the Altai people of Russia's Altai Republic between 1904 and the 1930s. The Russian Empire was suspicious of the movement's potential to stir up native unrest and perhaps involve outside powers. The Soviet Union ultimately suppressed it for fear of its potential to unify Siberian Turkic peoples under a common nationalism.[citation needed]
Originally millenarian, charismatic and anti-shamanic, the Burkhanist movement gradually lost most of these qualities—becoming increasingly routine, institutionalized (around a hierarchy of oral epic singers) and accommodating itself to the pre-existing Altaian folk religion. It exists today in several revival forms.
On the whole, the Burkhanist movement was shown to be a syncretistic phenomenon combining elements of ancient pre-shamanist, shamanist, Tibetan Buddhist and Eastern Orthodox Christian beliefs. According to a professor of Tomsk State University Liudmila Sherstova, it emerged in response to the needs of a new people—the Altai-kizhi or Altaians who sought to distinguish themselves from the neighboring and related tribes and for whom Burkhanism became a religious form of their ethnic identity.
Burkhanism is the usual English-language scholarly name, which has its origin in the Russian academic usage. One of the Burkhanist deities is Ak-Burkhan, or "White Burkhan". Burkhan is the Turkified version of the name Buddha —derived from Middle Chinese 佛 (MC bjut, “Buddha”) and Old Turkic 𐰴𐰣 (qan, “ruler, king”)— yet Burkhanism is not considered Buddhist, as the term is also used in shamanistic nomenclature. For example, in Mongolian shamanism, the name of the most sacred mountain, the rumored birthplace and final resting spot of Genghis Khan, is also Burkhan Khaldun. Ak-Burkhan is only one of a pantheon of deities worshiped by Burkhanists (see list below), but Ak-Burkhan nevertheless provides the name of the religion in Russian, and hence into other languages.
The Altaian name for the religion is Ak Jang "the White Faith". "White" refers to its emphasis on the upper world in the three-world cosmology of Tengrism. Alternatively, the name may also allude to Ak Jang's rejection of animal sacrifices in favor of offerings of horse milk or horse-milk alcohol. Jang means authority; faith; custom; law or principle; and canon or rules of ensemble. In more colloquial settings, the term may also be used as a "way of doing things" and is used in reference to religions as well as political systems.
In April 1904 Chet Chelpan (or, Chot Chelpanov) and his adopted daughter Chugul Sarok Chandyk reported visions of a rider dressed in white, and riding a white horse. This figure, whom they called Ak-Burkhan ("White Burkhan"), announced the imminent arrival of the mythical messianic hero Oirat Khan who was actually a real historical figure—Khoit-Oirat prince Amursana. The central figure in the research of Burkhanism in the past forty years, however, has demonstrated that Oirot-khan is a mythologized image of the Dzungar past of the people of Altai-kizhi. Chet and Chugul gathered thousands of Altaians for prayer meetings, initially in the Tereng Valley. These were violently suppressed by mobs of Russians, instigated by the Altaian Spiritual Mission, who were afraid of the potential of the competing religion to decrease the Orthodox Christian flock in Altai. Chet and Chugul were arrested, Chugul was released, and after a prolonged trial Chet was fully exonerated by court and released in 1906.
Researcher Andrei A. Znamenski compares the Burkanist movement to other indigenous revitalizing movements around the world, such as the Native American Ghost Dance or the Melanesian Cargo Cult. An exhaustively detailed treatment of the comparisons and comparability of Burkhanism with the Melanesian Cargo Cult, the Mennonites, the Dukhobors of Georgia, the Mariitsy of Nizhnii Novgorod, and many other movements, is provided in Sherstova's dissertation from the 1980s.
Znamenski says, the prime motivating factor was Altaians' fear of displacement by Russian colonists, Russification, and subjection to taxation and conscription on the same basis as Russian peasants.
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Burkhanism
Burkhanism, known endonymically as Ak Jang (Altay: Ак јаҥ [ɑq t͡ɕɑɴ]; lit. 'White Faith'), is an indigenist new religious movement that flourished among the Altai people of Russia's Altai Republic between 1904 and the 1930s. The Russian Empire was suspicious of the movement's potential to stir up native unrest and perhaps involve outside powers. The Soviet Union ultimately suppressed it for fear of its potential to unify Siberian Turkic peoples under a common nationalism.[citation needed]
Originally millenarian, charismatic and anti-shamanic, the Burkhanist movement gradually lost most of these qualities—becoming increasingly routine, institutionalized (around a hierarchy of oral epic singers) and accommodating itself to the pre-existing Altaian folk religion. It exists today in several revival forms.
On the whole, the Burkhanist movement was shown to be a syncretistic phenomenon combining elements of ancient pre-shamanist, shamanist, Tibetan Buddhist and Eastern Orthodox Christian beliefs. According to a professor of Tomsk State University Liudmila Sherstova, it emerged in response to the needs of a new people—the Altai-kizhi or Altaians who sought to distinguish themselves from the neighboring and related tribes and for whom Burkhanism became a religious form of their ethnic identity.
Burkhanism is the usual English-language scholarly name, which has its origin in the Russian academic usage. One of the Burkhanist deities is Ak-Burkhan, or "White Burkhan". Burkhan is the Turkified version of the name Buddha —derived from Middle Chinese 佛 (MC bjut, “Buddha”) and Old Turkic 𐰴𐰣 (qan, “ruler, king”)— yet Burkhanism is not considered Buddhist, as the term is also used in shamanistic nomenclature. For example, in Mongolian shamanism, the name of the most sacred mountain, the rumored birthplace and final resting spot of Genghis Khan, is also Burkhan Khaldun. Ak-Burkhan is only one of a pantheon of deities worshiped by Burkhanists (see list below), but Ak-Burkhan nevertheless provides the name of the religion in Russian, and hence into other languages.
The Altaian name for the religion is Ak Jang "the White Faith". "White" refers to its emphasis on the upper world in the three-world cosmology of Tengrism. Alternatively, the name may also allude to Ak Jang's rejection of animal sacrifices in favor of offerings of horse milk or horse-milk alcohol. Jang means authority; faith; custom; law or principle; and canon or rules of ensemble. In more colloquial settings, the term may also be used as a "way of doing things" and is used in reference to religions as well as political systems.
In April 1904 Chet Chelpan (or, Chot Chelpanov) and his adopted daughter Chugul Sarok Chandyk reported visions of a rider dressed in white, and riding a white horse. This figure, whom they called Ak-Burkhan ("White Burkhan"), announced the imminent arrival of the mythical messianic hero Oirat Khan who was actually a real historical figure—Khoit-Oirat prince Amursana. The central figure in the research of Burkhanism in the past forty years, however, has demonstrated that Oirot-khan is a mythologized image of the Dzungar past of the people of Altai-kizhi. Chet and Chugul gathered thousands of Altaians for prayer meetings, initially in the Tereng Valley. These were violently suppressed by mobs of Russians, instigated by the Altaian Spiritual Mission, who were afraid of the potential of the competing religion to decrease the Orthodox Christian flock in Altai. Chet and Chugul were arrested, Chugul was released, and after a prolonged trial Chet was fully exonerated by court and released in 1906.
Researcher Andrei A. Znamenski compares the Burkanist movement to other indigenous revitalizing movements around the world, such as the Native American Ghost Dance or the Melanesian Cargo Cult. An exhaustively detailed treatment of the comparisons and comparability of Burkhanism with the Melanesian Cargo Cult, the Mennonites, the Dukhobors of Georgia, the Mariitsy of Nizhnii Novgorod, and many other movements, is provided in Sherstova's dissertation from the 1980s.
Znamenski says, the prime motivating factor was Altaians' fear of displacement by Russian colonists, Russification, and subjection to taxation and conscription on the same basis as Russian peasants.
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