Friendship comes easy on a tour like this. We sat down to breakfast every morning with different people, weaving new stories of us like a pattern in a carpet. Omidjaan had said when we introduced ourselves at our first welcome dinner we should try not to talk about what we did for a living; it was such an obsession for Western people in particular. He hadn’t necessarily said we should keep this rule the whole time, and yet many of us did, or really didn’t talk about it much. With work like mine it’s a bit harder to avoid – we’re literally on a spiritual pilgrimage, how do I not talk about being a spiritual leader – but it was such a beautiful freedom to be largely among those who were from a totally different faith background me.
It was tentative in the beginning, as always, feeling each other out, but it didn’t take long to find the affinities, the resonance, the echoes of God within each heart that sounded most familiar: mysticism, longing, scholarship, and often, the love of Rumi, whoever we’d been told he was.
We walked along the metro line to Gülhane Park, a historical green space in the Eminömü district, where the 1839 Edict of Gülhane was proclaimed, ushering in a wave of “modernization” by the Ottomans. Where once the park contained a variety of attractions, including a zoo and fun fair, these were eventually removed to create a truly lovely and serene path through tree-lined walkways that Paul and I took more than once to return to the hotel (rather than the noisy and often crowded streets outside). As a stork circled above our heads gathering twigs for a nest, Omidjaan talked to us about the myth of the “clash of civilizations”, the Gülhane edict and the changes that came to the Ottoman Empire, as well as the legacy of Ataturk and his westernizing influences on the region – all of which continue to float through the air of the ages.
We paused for more learning at the remains of the so-called “Friendship Fountain” (a gift from Kaiser Wilhelm following a state visit in 1989) the Hippodrome, and an impressive obelisk of Pharaoh Thutmose III), dragged from the temple of Karnak by the Roman Emperor Theodosius in the 4th century because...he could, Omidjaan said, giggling.
We then turned down many twisting side-streets to Küçük Ayasofya Camii, or “Little Hagia Sophia.” As I took off my shoes, Paul untwisted the cap of our water bottle to offer a sip to some nearby kittens.
We entered into cooler temperatures and I felt intrigued as I studied the mihrab, which seemed off-kilter. It is, Omidjaan eventually explained, because this was once a church, built in the 6th century. Once I heard that, it was like putting another set of glasses on, and I could see it easily by the architecture. It reminded me so much of some of the churches I’d seen in the Holy Land, with archways and pillars and domes.
After the conquest of Constantinople in 1453, the church was left alone until the early 1500s before being transformed into a mosque.
I caught my breath as I learned something I had not truly known before: that the Ottomans, unlike my Christian forebears, would change churches into mosques rather than tearing them down and starting over.
“All empires are evil,” Omidjaan said (over and over!), “but some have more enlightened ideas than others.”
They recognized the holy echoes of what had come before.
I caught it again when Omidjaan mentioned, almost offhandedly, that it had been dedicated to Saints Sergius and Bacchus, 4th century Syrian martyrs whose deep abiding commitment to one another (and some recent interesting and heavily disputed scholarship) has led to them being adopted as an iconic queer couple in the 2SLGBTQIA+ community.
“‘When your wholeness is absorbed in God’s wholeness, and when your whole being is occupied by [God],’ it is then the time to look for [God] actively.”1
After some stories, we exited the mosque and went back up the winding road toward the next stop. I suddenly found myself blanketed with the scent of jasmine, looked up, and saw we were following a stone wall. At the far end, there was a gate, and pouring extravagantly over the top, a magenta river of bougainvillea.
This was the wall surrounding Sokollu Mehmet Pasha Camii, a masterpiece of Mimar Sinan, the famous architect, commissioned by its namesake, the grand vizier, and his wife Ismihan Sultan, in the 16th century.
“Beauty is when you see yourself, being seen by God.”2
We passed through the majestic flowerfall into a round courtyard where boys kicked a soccer ball, bouncing it off the stone walls of the attached madrasa. We were a bit nervous, as Omidjaan had called the mosque a gemstone – “and gemstones often have dragons to guard them!” We were not to antagonize or annoy the imam, who could be suspicious of visitors.
As we approached the entrance (some hanging back to perform wudu as it was getting close to the time for Dhuhr), Omidjaan pointed out the stunning Iznik tiles which rendered al-Fatiha, the first chapter of the Qur’an.
We went into blue dark, a paradoxically twilight sanctuary which would soon open for the faithful to offer Dhuhr prayers. We were enclosed in a jewel box, small pinpoints of coloured light tentatively stepping (right foot first, surely) over the threshold of stained glass windows high above.
Omidjaan, in his characteristically cheeky way, told us “There is a sign which says not to take pictures,” and then closed his mouth and smiled a tiny smile. A few were taken quite surreptitiously.
We had made it out before the adhan began. The boys were still kicking their ball, but all was punctuated by the arrival of the imam, who scolded them and returned into the mosque in time to prepare. Through the gate came men from the streets outside, putting on hats and taking off shoes.
When our friends had said their prayers, we made our exit to a nearby restaurant with a lovely roof deck, where we dined on kebap as the very rickety awning above us rattled and crashed ominously in the wind.
Later, Paul and I floated in the cold pool in the basement of the hotel I felt entranced by the echoes of Iznik in the blue pool tiles below me, lit by a gentle purple light.
“Adorn yourself with divine qualities,” I read in Omid’s book that evening. I reflected further:
“It’s like an echo of ‘Be like Shams.’ What are divine qualities? Hiddenness? Adab? Beauty. Oneness. Unity. Noor. Honour. Mercy and compassion.”
And perhaps, as well, the grace of leaving houses of worship to stand, even if altered.
The scent of jasmine as one facet of beauty, and a bubbling spring of bougainvillea for another.
Little boys laughing as they bounce their soccer ball off the walls of a 16th century masterpiece of architecture. Even the dragon who snaps at them to teach them reverence.
And finally, the deep sapphire dark of a place where the echo of majesty is laid neatly next to the echo of tenderness, in quiet contemplation of the One who, with the greatest beauty of all, contemplates us.
1Shams-i Tabrezi, tr. Erkan Türkmen
2Omid Safi
“Little boys laughing as they bounce their soccer ball off the walls of a 16th century masterpiece of architecture. Even the dragon who snaps at them to teach them reverence.”
I love this.