FROM WESTERN AZERBAIJAN TO KARS: THE RELIGIOUS AND SOCIO-CULTURAL LEGACY OF AKHUND MALIK MAHAMMAD ISHIGLI

The city of Kars, located at the crossroads of Anatolia and the Caucasus, is inhabited mainly by three Turkic-speaking groups: local Anatolians, Azerbaijani migrants from Western Azerbaijan, and Terekeme. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, wars, revolutions, and Soviet occupation prompted mass migrations of Azerbaijanis to Kars and other provinces, significantly reshaping the city’s demographic structure. In the early 20th century, the prominent Islamic scholar Axund Malik Mahammad Ishigli, fleeing Soviet persecution, settled in Kars and engaged in religious and social activities. In 1952, under his leadership, the first Ja’fari-Shi’a mosque in Turkey, the Yeni Mahalle Mosque, was constructed. He also promoted religious education through his work Doğru Yol, emphasizing Islamic unity and distancing from sectarianism, acting as a unifying figure across different religious and ethnic communities.