Alevism: The Sacred Tradition of Ali and the Ancient Cult of Angels

Alevi religious life is expressed strongly through communal gathering.

The Jamkhana and the Ayini Jam provide a setting in which religious tradition is performed collectively rather than experienced only as individual belief.

The major annual Jam brings the community together around ritual, sacrifice, and religious observance.

The continued presence of these communal practices gives Alevism a social structure in which religious identity is reinforced through participation.

Women also have a significant place within these gatherings.

Alevi communities allow full participation of women in religious rituals and gatherings, particularly during the major Ayini Jam.

This position distinguishes the Alevi tradition from the social and religious systems of many surrounding communities.

Alevism played an important role in the religious and political movements of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries.

The reverence for Ali became one of the most visible religious signs of the Qara Qoyunlu and early Safavid dynasties.

The rise of the Alevis was supported by the participation of Kurdish and Turkmen communities.

Among the Kurdish tribes involved in the Safavid Alevi revolution were the Shamlu, Shaykhawand, Shadlu, Khajawand, Zafranlu, Stajlu, and Quvanlu.

These movements helped carry Alevi religious ideas beyond individual communities and into the political struggles of the period.

The red headgear worn by the Qizilbash became the visible symbol from which the name “red heads” was derived.

The same red headgear continued among Alevi Dimila Kurds of east-central Anatolia.

Alevism experienced periods of serious persecution.

Under the Ottoman Empire, the Alevis were a disfavored religious community in a state dominated by orthodox Sunni Islam.

Following the Ottoman annexation of eastern Anatolia from Persia under Sultan Selim in 1514, Alevis were exposed to massacres and state-sponsored persecution.

Their larger numbers allowed them to survive in greater strength than some other branches of the Cult of Angels.

The tradition also experienced pressure during the Turkish Republican period.

The historical suspicion surrounding their Persian connections continued, while Alevi Kurds experienced discrimination both as Kurds and as Alevis.

Despite these pressures, Alevism continued to survive across eastern Anatolia and among Kurdish communities.

At the time of the demographic estimate associated with this account, followers of the religion were estimated to constitute roughly 20 percent of all Kurds.

A Wider Alevi World

Alevism is not limited to Kurdish communities.

Many Turkmens of Turkey, particularly those living near the Kurdish regions of the Taurus and Pontus Mountains, are also adherents of Alevism.

The Shabaks living south and southeast of Mosul also practice a form of Dimila Alevism.

In Syria, another branch developed as Nusayrism.

Nusayrism emerged when the Cult of Angels entered the Syrian coastal regions through Kurdish migration and encountered Arabian cultural influences.

Unlike Alevism, Nusayrism places Salman, the Persian companion of the Prophet Muhammad, as the most important avatar of the Spirit after the Lord God.

The two traditions therefore share the broader religious framework while developing different expressions.

Nusayrism and Alevism

Nusayrism is closely related to Alevism but differs particularly in its social structure and treatment of women.

The religious traditions share important theological features, including the presence of Islamic figures among the manifestations of the Second Epoch.

Nusayri communities developed primarily along the Syrian coast, centered around Latakia and Tartus.

The tradition also retained a calendar of celebrations corresponding closely with those of other branches of the Cult of Angels, including New Ruz and Mithrakan.

Alevism is a religious tradition in which the reverence for Ali reaches beyond historical memory and becomes part of a wider understanding of divine manifestation.

Ali stands at the center of the Second Epoch as a primary avatar of the Universal Spirit, while the joining of Ali and Muhammad as Alimuhammad gives the Alevi tradition its distinctive understanding of sacred identity.

Yet Alevism is expressed through more than theology.

The rising sun and moon, the hymns, the Jamkhana, the Ayini Jam, the sacrifice of the lamb, the participation of women, and the red headgear of the Qizilbash all form part of a religious culture that developed across the mountains and communities of Anatolia and Kurdistan.

Its history is also tied to the Qara Qoyunlu, the Safavids, the Kurdish and Turkmen communities that supported the Alevi movements, and the long periods of pressure experienced under Ottoman and later state rule.

From the Dimila Kurds of Anatolia to Alevi Turkmens, Shabak communities, and the Nusayri tradition of coastal Syria, Alevism developed into a wider religious world while remaining connected to the ancient Cult of Angels.

Its story is therefore one of sacred manifestation, communal ritual, historical struggle, and continuity across generations—a religious tradition whose identity was shaped by both the mountains of Kurdistan and the changing world around them.