Kunta-haji Kishiev was ChechenMuslimmystic, the founder of a Sufi branch named Zikrism, and an ideologue of nonviolence and passive resistance. He is often referred as the Chechen Mahatma Gandhi. A follower of the QadiriyyaSufi order. Kunta-haji Kishiev was born in a Chechen lowland village of Isti-Su, also known as Melcha-Khi. Later the family moved to the mountain village of Ilskhan-Yurt in the heartland of Chechnya. In his youth he was distinguished by his hard work and sharp mental senses. Kunta received a solid religious education and was a follower of shaykh Gezi-haji from the village of Zandak. Kunta started practicing Loud Zikr: prayer with dancing, singing, rolling and recitation of divine names. According to legend, Imam Shamil was worried by the unusual practice and ordered an examination of the Koranic knowledge of the youth. After Kunta passed the examination, Shamil left him alone. By another version of the same legend, Shamil forbade Kunta Zikr and promised to execute him if he continued. Yet another legend tells that Shamil exiled Kunta to Mekka and did not allow him to come back. By the end of 1850s Kunta made his Hajj. In his travel over the Middle East Kunta not only visited Mekka but also the tomb of Abdul-Qadir Gilani in Baghdad, and became a devoted follower of Qadiriyyah, the teachings developed by Abdul-Qadir Gilani. Kunta became a strong supporter of non-violence and peace. In the midst of the bloody Caucasian War he wrote to Chechnya from Mekka: and After the fall of Shamil Kunta-hajji returned to Chechnya. His teaching became quite popular among people tired by the almost fifty years of the Caucasian war. The number of his murids reached five thousand. Kunta-haji required his murids not only to perform the five required prayers during the day, but also to repeat the prayer La ilaha ill-Allah at least one hundred times during the day and participate in the ritual of Loud Circular Zikr. Despite the fact that Kunta-haji repeatedly rejected the title of imam he was seen as a threat to the Imperial authorities and the official version of Islam supported by Russian authorities. By the request of the tsar's administration, official Islamic clerics organized public theological discussions with Kunta-haji trying to prove that his teaching contradicted Islam. Still the influence of Kunta-haji only grew. Considering Kunta-haji as a threat the Governor-General of Terek ordered his arrest. Kunta-haji and his brother, Movsar, were arrested and taken to Novocherkasskprison in January 1863. The arrest caused the so-called Dagger Uprising, when three thousand of Kunta-haji's murids armed only with the ceremonial daggers tried to free their teacher in Shali. The rebels were dispersed by the regular troops of General Tumanov. 160 rebels were killed. For a long time there was no information about the fate of Kunta-haji. In 1928 documents were found confirming that Kunta-haji died in exile in the town of Ustyuzhna.
The fate of his teaching
Despite being originally persecuted and its members often sent to Siberia the Qadiriyyah Tariqah started in Caucasus by Kunta-haji became the religion of the majority of Chechens. The followers of Kunta-haji believe that their teacher is one of the 360 saints that keep the world alive and that he would return to Earth at a future time. The tomb of Kunta-haji's mother, Kheda, is considered sacred as the spring nearby that is believed to have been started by Kunta-haji pushing his stick into the earth. The tomb of Kunta-haji's mother, Kheda, became a major cause of the conflict between Wahhabi and Qadiriyyah adherents in the government of Aslan Maskhadov. The Wahhabis wanted to destroy the tomb, yet the Qadiriyyahs led by Akhmad Kadyrov were able to save the tomb, but the conflict eventually led to Kadyrov's alliance with the Russian government against Maskhadov's government.
