Ramadan Day 10 - Zaza in Turkey

30-Days of Prayer for the Muslim World

The Zaza in Turkey

The Zaza in Turkey The Zaza live in the Eastern part of Turkey, in East-Anatolia, with their own language, history, and culture, but have never been recognized as a separate people group. They are a people with an oral culture, without a written language. Their stories are passed on orally from generation to generation, and because of this, they suffer considerable disadvantages inside the political state of Turkey.

The Zaza are not a homogenous group but are divided into two groups by religious orientation. The Northern Zaza are followers of the Alevi branch of Shiite Islam, which many Sunnis do not consider to be truly Islamic. The Southern Zaza, like their neighboring Kurds, belongs to the Sunni branch of Islam.

This religious division is mirrored also by their ethnic-cultural differences. Each group speaks a different dialect, with the differences in vocabulary and grammar being so significant that they have difficulty understanding each other. For the Northern Zaza, the Jesus film has already been made available; work is being done on the version for the Southern Zaza. This type of film ministry is especially important for oral cultures because many people do not know how to read and write in their own language. Some immigrant families have become believers in Jesus Christ.

Let’s Pray:

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* May God help the Zaza people to discover the identity that He has planned for them in Christ.

* Pray for culturally appropriate means of proclaiming the Gospel among this people.

* Pray for a wide acceptance of the translated Jesus film among the people from the northern group and the completion of the film translation for the southern group.

* Pray for the growth and strengthening of the few existing Christians and the establishment of new congregations.

* Pray for the existing work of Bible translation in the southern dialect.


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