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| blog.google |
It is a lovely afternoon and Yours Truly is here with you. Yours Truly is feeling like a stuck needle reminding everyone to #WearAMask. Thanks to American state governments re-opening too quickly and people flipping the double bird at local ordinances requiring face coverings in public, California is among the states having to reverse coarse and re-impose lockdown measures. Blogger loves it when people say that wearing a face covering violates their constitutional rights. Really? Where in the United States Constitution and Bill of Rights does it say a people has the right not to wear a mask? Spoiler alert: nowhere. In fact, federal, state, and local governments are allowed to enact temporary or permanent ordinances that protect public health. This includes wearing a face covering in public. Please stop have tantrums in stores, grow up, and #WearAMask. Thank you. Onward
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| Hagia Sophia Istanbul, Turkey swarajyamag.com |
Hagia Sophia is one of the most magnificent Byzantine-era buildings in the world. Walking into the interior, your breath is immediately taken away by the soaring domed ceiling and walls adorned with glittering mosaics. Hagia Sophia is the ideal of the synthesis of Ottoman Byzantine history and the long-enduring symbol of Istanbul. Last Friday, revoked the 1934 decree by the founder of the republic, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, turning the former religious building into a museum (nytimes.com; July 14, 2020). This decision has many secular Turks and architecture lovers around the world worried that President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is slowly turning his country into a theocracy. Hagia Sophia has a storied history goes back nearly 1,500 years ago in the post-Roman imperial period.
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| Hagia Sophia interior bbc.com |
Hagia Sophia (Ayasofya in Turkish) was originally built as a basilica for the Greek Orthodox Christian Church. Emperor Constantius commissioned the construction for the first iteration of the basilica in 360 CE when Istanbul was known for Constantinople.
The first iteration was not quite spectacular as it is today. It featured a more modest wooden roof. The building was burnt down in 404 CE during riots that grew out of political conflict. Emperor Theodosis II rebuilt Hagia Sophia, completed in 415. The second iteration featured five naves and a monumental entrance, covered by a wooden roof (history.com; Jan. 12, 2018; date accessed July 14, 2020). This, too, was burnt during riots against the Emperor Justinian I, who ruled from 27 to 565 CE. Unable to repair the damage, Justinian ordered the basilica's demolition and commissioned Isidoros (Milet) and Anthemios (Tralles) to build a new structure. The third and final iteration of Hagia was completed in 537 CE and remains standing today. The first religious service in the "new" basilica was held on December 27, 537 (Ibid).
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| Islamic prayer service out of Hagia Sophia cnn.com |
The next major period of change for Hagia Sophia was begun by the Emperor Fatih Sultan Mehmed, when the Ottomans captured Constantinople in 1453. The Ottomans renamed the city Istanbul. The Ottomans practiced Islam and renovated the basilica into a mosque, covering the original Christian mosaics with Islamic calligraphy designed by Kazasker Mustafa Izzet (Ibid).
The Ottoman Empire ended in 1922 when the title of Ottoman Sultan was formally eliminated. On October 29, 1923, Turkey was declared a republic when Mustafa Kemal Ataturk (1881-1938) established the Republic of Turkey (Ibid). In 1934, Kemal Ataturk declared the basilica a museum that now attracts millions of visitors every year. However since 2013, local Islamic religious leaders have sought to re-open Hagia Sophia for daily and weekly prayer service (Ibid). The Turkish court's ruling, allowing Hagia Sophia to return to a mosque, is part of the recognition of the importance of the Ottoman-era to Turkey's history and the rise of nationalism. Not everyone is so excited about it.
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| President Recep Tayyip Erdogan forbes.com |
Following Turkey's first free elections in 1950, the anti-Kemalists began to organize. The founder of the Turkish republic died over a decade before and the power of his memory was slowly fading from view. Portions of Islamic and pan-Turkic romanticists opened a campaign to re-open the Byzantine-era basilica. They argued that "the secular republic, far from having saved Turkey's sovereignty, wounded it in the deepest sense possible: It had sold its soul to Western modernity. The conversion of the Hagia Sophia was the symbol of this humiliation" (Ibid).
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| Necip Fazil Kisakurek aa.com.tr |
What the Western world had made us do inside, through its agents among us, neither Crusaders, nor the Moskof [the Soviets] nor Hagia Sophia's salacious coveters, the Greeks, have been able to do... (Ibid)
In that mid-sixties speech, he went on to say,
It shall be open in such a way that all lost meaning, like the bloodied and chained innocent, shall emerge from it weeping, in tatters,... It shall be opened in such a way that its cellars shall be found the files of the evil ones who were thought to have done the nation good, and the good ones who were thought to have done it evil (Ibid)
It is likely that President Erdogan heard the poet's rallying for reconversion as boy, growing up in the working class religious neighborhood of Kasimpasa near the Golden Horn in Istanbul. He also might have been inspired by Nihal Atsiz, a writer who promoted a pan-Turkic identity over that of the Muslims, revered the basilica and considered it an emblem of humiliation. He also might have been exposed to the socialist poetry of Nazim Hikmet, who devoted verses to the Hagia Sophia of his youth (Ibid). During his address to the nation on July 10, he cited Nazil Fazil Kisakurek's Hagia Sophia Conference and other poets. He told his nation that he "wanted the entire nation, not just the Islamists, to make the spiritual journey with him" (nytimes.com; July 14, 2020). The re-conversion has been a source of consternation for Greek Orthodox Church.
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| The Holy Eparchial Synod of the Greek Orthodox Church of America greekcitytimes.com |
His Eminence Archbishop Elpidophoros, the president of the Holy Eparchial Synod of the American Greek Orthodox Church issued an encyclical regarding the re-conversion of Hagia Sophia into a mosque. His Eminence wrote,
This egregious and unnecessary action has gravely wounded all Orthodox Christians, indeed all Christians around the world and all people of faith and good will,...
It should be allowed to retain its status quo as a place of encounter for Christian and Muslims, and for all people who desire to behold how faith in God can transform the world... (greekcitytimes.com; July 15, 2020).
Pope Francis expressed his sadness last Sunday, July 12, during improvised remarks. Following the recitation of the Angelus, the pope mentioned that July 12 was Sea Sunday, the day when the Church prays for seafarers. According to an unofficial translation of his remarks provided by the Holy See Press Office, the pope said
And the sea carries me a little farther away in my thoughts: to Istanbul. I think of Hagia Sophia, and I am very saddened (catholicnewsagency.com; July 12, 2020; date accessed July 15, 2020)
The United Nations also expressed its concerned over the re-conversion of Hagia Sophia. Hagia Sophia was inscribed onto the World Heritage List in 1985 and is part of the "Historic Areas of Istanbul" (news.un.org; July 10, 2020; date accessed July 15, 2020). The United Nations released a statement expressing concern over the lack of dialogue around Turkey's decision to implement a change of status. Ernesto Ottone, UNESCO's Assistant-Director General for Culture, emphasized
...It is important to avoid any implementing measure, without prior discussion with UNESCO, that would affect physical access to the site, and the structure of the buildings, the site's moveable property, or the site's management... (en.unesco.org; July 10, 2020; date accessed July 15, 2020)
These measure would be a breach of the rules developed at the 1972 World Heritage Convention.
In the meantime, Hagia Sophia is open for Muslim prayer services. In accordance with religious dictates that forbid iconography, the Christian image are covered with a curtain. It is still unclear whether Turkey intends to close off the main sanctuary or any portion of the complex to visitors. The United Nations World Heritage Organization is monitoring the situation and encouraging the Turkish delegation to open a dialogue over how best to proceed. Let us hope that this magnificent architectural treasure can remain open for the world to fully experience this meeting place of faith.
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