The Wrongologist

What’s
Wrong Today:

According
to Turkish media, on May 29, Prime Minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan will attend a
symbolic prayer in the orthodox temple of Hagia Sophia,
on the anniversary of the siege of Constantinople by the Ottomans.

From
the Economist:
Prime Minister Erdogan plans to lead prayers in the building to mark the 561st
anniversary of the conversion of the Sophia to a mosque:

Bulent
Arinc, a deputy Prime Minister, has already overseen the conversion of two
other Hagia Sophia churches: one in Iznik in 2012 and another in Trabzon in
2013. The Economist quotes Arinc:

Since
1935, the Hagia Sophia in Istanbul has been a museum, not a church or a mosque.
This was the solution devised by Kemal Ataturk, one of the 20th century’s great
statesmen, to resolve competing claims by the Muslim and Christian communities
in Turkey. The Sophia was built by the Romans in 360. The dome visible in the
photo below was added in 537. Constantine made it the home of the Roman church
(and named the city, Constantinople). It was an Eastern Orthodox Church for a
short period, and from 1453 to 1931, it was a mosque. Here is a photo of the Hagia
Sophia taken last March:

Photo by the Wrongologist

The
Sophia shows the additions and subtractions as its religion changed from
Christian to Islam. Following the building’s conversion into a mosque in 1453,
many of its mosaics were covered with plaster, due to Islam’s ban on
representational imagery:

Photo by the Wrongologist

This is one of the Deësis mosaics that date from 1261. It was commissioned to mark the
end of 57 years of Roman Catholic use and the return to the Orthodox
faith. It is the third panel situated in the imperial enclosure of the
upper galleries. It is widely considered the finest in Hagia Sophia,
because of the softness of the features, the humane expressions and the
tones of the mosaic. Here is a detail from the mosaic:

Photo by the Wrongologist

These mosaics were uncovered in the 1930s by a team from the Byzantine Institute of America led by Thomas Whittemore. The team uncovered all major mosaics. Since
then, there has been a continuing effort to partially restore the provenance of
the building.

The threat to the
Sophia’s museum status emerged in December 2012 when a local court ruled in
favor of the General Directorate of Pious Foundations, the government body
responsible for the country’s ancient mosques. It declared that the mosque was
an “inalienable” part of the legacy of Mehmed II, who conquered Istanbul in
1453 and converted the church to a mosque in 1453. The Sophia was the personal
property of Mehmed II (the title deed survives). And in his will, Mehmed II
decreed that it should remain a mosque “until Judgment Day.”

The court held that
the Ministry of Culture that manages the Sophia, had been “illegally occupying”
the building.  

However,
the recent push for conversion back to a mosque seems to be another game playing
out between Mr. Erdogan, his AKP party and Fethullah
Gulen, the Pennsylvania-based preacher whom Mr. Erdogan has accused of
seeking to overthrow his government.

According
to Al-Monitor,
several columnists from the Fethullah Gulen community had launched a campaign
calling for the Sophia to be turned to a mosque and opened to Muslim
worship. Apparently, they are using Twitter intensively to spread the message.
From the Turkish paper Hurriyet, an article by Ertugrul
Ozkok:

Some think
that with this move, the Gulen Movement is trying to restore its political
credentials. Mr. Gulen had tried to discredit the government through a
corruption probe launched by his disciples in the judiciary. Regardless of the
truth of that, you can read the Wrongologist’s report here.

Now it may
be that Mr. Gulen is attempting to wedge Mr. Erdogan by putting him into
difficulty about his religious position, which previously had been against any
change in the Sophia’s status. Even Mr. Arinc, who wants the Sophia to be a
mosque, did not take the bait, declaring that a conversion of the Sophia was “not
on the government’s agenda”. Bulent Turan, an AK deputy said: (brackets by the
Wrongologist)

Here is a
photo taken inside today’s Sophia that demonstrates the multicultural history
of the building:

The medallion on the right
represents Allah, while the medallion on the left is for Mohammad.

Behind the
medallions is the nave of the original church, with the middle window pointing
to Jerusalem. The lighted arch in the nave was added when the building became a
mosque, and it points toward Mecca.

Turkey
currently has about 85,000 mosques, around 10,000 of which have been built
since the AKP came to power in 2002. A huge mosque is currently being
constructed on the highest hill overlooking Istanbul.

But there
have been no efforts to take working churches away from Christian communities
and turn them into mosques.

Photo
by the Wrongologist

In 2011, the government ordered the return of
property confiscated decades ago to the dwindling Christian and Jewish
communities in Turkey, which number less than 200,000 people in a country of 75
million.

Turkey has been
held up as proof that the Islam is perfectly compatible with multiparty
democracy, a pro-Western foreign policy, and healthy economic growth.
Re-converting the Sophia to a mosque would make many in the West rethink that
view.

Yet today, politics
may lead the Sophia, and Turkey, in that different direction.

This magnificent
temple that was designated a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1985, inspires
its 3+million annual visitors as an example of tolerance and pluralism in a world
rapidly moving away from these concepts.

It should
remain open to all.