«Live with faith»: archive sources About unknown I. Altynsarin

Abstract

The research topic actualizes the spirituality and mental traditions of the Kazakhs, on the example of the little-known book of I. Altynsarin. The purpose and main directions of research are dictated by the content of the Head of State’s article «The Seven Facets of the Great Steppe», the program «Rouhani Zhangyru», which gave impetus to the idea of studying the sacral values of the people and the works of predecessors who left a noticeable trace on their preservation and synthesis. About the scientific and practical significance of the work «says» our choice of an artifact created by Arabic graphics as a subject
of research and related social connections as its object. The Soviet period excluded the development
of historians associated with religion; the study will replenish this sector of scientific research. The textbooks
on the basics of Islam and translations published now in the republic will be possible in practice
to be compared with their forerunner. The research is based on the methods of historical science, dialectical
method, historicism, comparative analysis, verification of sources, quantitative, applicable in
general and separately to each source and historiographical work, as well as ethnology and anthropology
methods: accumulation and systematization, visualization; sociological methods: observations and
sampling. The main results of the source analysis, against the background of foreign historiography, were
the conclusions about the undoubted authorship of Altynsarin for the first official textbook on the basics
of Islam, which corresponded to the cultural needs and ethnicity of Kazakh students. The value of the
conducted research is consistent with the world historiography of the theme of missionary work and the
preservation of local cultural traditions; the study for the first time reveals the stages of creating the first
Kazakh textbook for secular education on the basics of religion, created in the second half of the 19th
century.