Dzhemal's maternal grandfather, Igor Shapovalov, was a professor of German philosophy, as well as the director of the Maly Theatre and First Deputy Minister of Culture of the Soviet Union.

[5] In 1965, after graduation from school, Dzhemal entered the Institute of Oriental Languages at Moscow State University, but a year later was expelled for "bourgeois nationalism".

Some members of these groups had access to secret collections of the All-Russia State Library for Foreign Literature and brought works by a number of mystics and philosophers (including well-known esoterists Julius Evola and Alain de Benoist) to these discussions.

[5] Under KGB pressure, the organisation disbanded; to escape compulsory military service, Dzhemal claimed to be schizophrenic and was sent to a psychiatric institution.

[5] During the Tajik Civil War of 1992, he was appointed as a political advisor to Vice Premier of the Islamic Democratic Coalition Government led by Davlat Usmon.

[citation needed] From 1996 he became advisor to Alexander Lebed[5] and cooperated with him and the Union of Patriotic and National Organisations of Russia to support a block on General Lebedev's presidential campaign.

[5] In May 1994, Djemal's documentary, Islamic Republic of Iran, was broadcast by the Russian channels Pervij and The First creating a political scandal which resonated with anti-Iran sentiments in Russia.

[9] Jamal himself said on his official website in 2008,[10] "To once and for all remove any questions that arise in the brothers," that he supported "the Quran and the authentic Sunnah of the Prophet" and "the complete and inseparable theological and political unity of all Muslims on the platform of jihad in the path of Allah until all religion on earth belongs to Him Alone," that he did not follow any living Shiite Mujtahids, that he rejected "pantheism and the Sufi Aqeedah based on it and the teachings of Muhammad ibn al-Arabi, which is the basis of the Irfan of the Kum theological school" and that he did "NOT curse any of the Rashidun" and that Dzhemal's political analyses have been characterized in various ways.