The killing of the scholar

"The death of a scholar is like the death of a world," the Exalted Prophet said, and truly so.

Every scholar builds a world with his own knowledge, his own insight, his own discourse. Whichever way the course of the world is heading, he is in his own world. Scholars have problems different from the ones we take to be problems amid the worldly bustle, a different language, a separate world.

From true scholars and scientists, we expect from time to time knowledge that will make easier still the affairs of the world in which we ourselves have drowned.

In the modern age we speak of university-industry cooperation or of a dialogue between the university and everyday life, and we make our universities part of our own concerns. We strive less to have them produce knowledge that will truly benefit us than to subordinate them to our own ambitions and concerns.

Of course such efforts are not entirely misplaced; they are even necessary. But at times, in the vises of the world into which we have let ourselves be carried away, these approaches can also move us further and further from the truth that would remind us of our ultimate fate.

Perhaps the need for universities, in spite of everything, to form a whole together with theology, philosophy and the social sciences can come to our rescue in some cases. The knowledge and consciousness of the science we do, the sociology and history of the knowledge we produce, and a search for where we are heading should of course not be lacking either. But of course these departments too, within the hierarchy of the sciences, generally run a great risk, and are often in the situation, of being caught in the trap of that technological knowledge and will. Is what is expected of theology not often to legitimize this technological dimension, to religiously frame and sanctify it, to provide a theological packaging for our will to power, for the "we," whoever we are?

In this environment, who can feel the need for scholars who truly live in their own world, woven from its own time, problems and sensibilities? The death of a scholar sometimes has the effect of a shock to make one feel this. A world that you feel existed the moment it vanishes. You are seized by a feeling of deep loss that can no longer be made good.

If you are seized by it, so much the better. What if you are not even seized by this? Then we are in real trouble.

The murder of Sheikh Abdülkerim Çevik, one of the scholars of Norşin, reminded me personally of all this. Abdülkerim Hodja, who was murdered while teaching his students in his madrasa in the Norşin district of Bitlis, which has continued the madrasa tradition despite all the historical upheavals in between, was a scholar who had built his own world and who had words and knowledge to give to whoever asked. Raised within the madrasa tradition, he had fulfilled all the curricular requirements of this tradition, but was not content with that and had also studied theology and sociology, and had put forth a distinctive profile.

This meant that, although it was his own world, he was not closed to others. He had serious observations, findings and diagnoses about where the world, Turkey and his own region were heading, and, most importantly, he was someone who acted on his knowledge. To carry knowledge to people, one also had to learn people's language.

If the course of the world is rapidly moving the language of the masses away from the language of scholars, the responsibility to catch up with this changing language and to express the truths in that language belongs to the scholars, not to the masses.

Although the madrasa tradition has its frequently voiced problems in this regard, Abdülkerim Hodja was both aware of these problems and someone who made exceptional efforts to overcome them. The fact that he received theology and sociology education on top of his madrasa study, and his active approach of involving himself in current developments in the region, show this.

The mediation work that he performed in the process leading up to Abdülkerim Hodja's murder is a very interesting sociological role. Fatih Sevgili, the late scholar's cousin on his father's side, wrote at length about it in his article in Diriliş Postası. The people of the region settle many of their problems, without going to the courts, through this mediation, which carries no penal sanction. In one respect this institution lightens the burden on the courts; because it has no penal sanction, the parties are free to accept or not accept the outcome, but those who apply to this institution generally do not easily object to the results that come out of it. There is no appeal against it either; the alternative, or de facto appeal, can perhaps be going to the state's court. Until now no such murder has been committed over someone's not being content with a mediator's decision, and there has not even been a single case of the slightest violence against a mediator (sheikh, scholar, imam, agha, sayda). That is why the murder of Abdülkerim Hodja is a highly extraordinary event. Even if one goes by the most psychopathic typology, there is nothing in the course of the event that explains going as far as such a murder.

It hardly needs saying that the grounds the killer coolly put forward are not very convincing either. The likelihood that the profile Abdülkerim Hodja displayed through his own personal qualities and effectiveness was disturbing for some, on the other hand, is high.

On the 4th day, when I was able to attend his condolence gathering, floods of people were still streaming in. This large attendance alone at the condolence gathering shows well enough what sociological counterpart an institution has in the person of Abdülkerim Hodja. Within an institution that somehow continued its activity quietly and on its own, without getting much involved in political developments, Abdülkerim Hodja, with his distinctive new and dynamic personality, represented a renewal.

There are surely those who can see what might happen if this tremendous institutional tradition were more actively joined to life. Not everyone who sees it sees and approaches it with good intentions.

I ask God's mercy for Abdülkerim Hodja, and extend my condolences to his family and to the circle of learning and insight of Norşin-Tillo-Siirt. May God accept his martyrdom.