Erdoğan's meeting with Islamic scholars

In recent days President Erdoğan hosted at the Külliye a delegation made up of well-known Islamic scholars from around the world. The meeting took place at the request of the Islamic scholars. The first purpose of the request was, above all, to congratulate Erdoğan, who was re-elected to the Presidency on 28 May, to present and explain to him some of the issues on the agenda of the Islamic world, and in particular to thank him for the sensitivity and policy Turkey has shown toward the issues of the Islamic world. This request, conveyed through Prof. Dr. Mehmet Görmez, President of the Islamic Thought Institute, was organized by the Institute.

It was very clear that almost all of the Islamic scholars gave Erdoğan very open support in Turkey's presidential elections and attached a very special meaning to his winning. Before the elections, on various occasions, they did not refrain from announcing this support, as advice and prayer, to the people who would vote in the elections. For Islamic scholars Erdoğan means far more than any ruler in any Islamic or Arab country. It is possible to see this very clearly in their discourses, addresses and prayers. I know most of those who attended the meeting personally. I constantly witness everywhere that almost all of them have their eyes light up when Erdoğan's name is mentioned, and that the most sincere prayers for his worldly success and his fate in the hereafter immediately pour from their lips.

The meaning that, for example, the 80-year-old Prof. Abdulmajid al-Zindani, founder of the Yemen University of Faith (Iman University), who has pioneering works on the Miraculousness of the Qur'an and Prophetic Medicine, attributes to Erdoğan and Turkey, and the affection he displays, cannot be expressed in words. Among the scholars who attended the meeting were the secretary-general of the World Association of Muslim Scholars, Prof. Ali al-Qaradaghi, who has very important works on Islamic Economics; the former Sudanese Minister of Endowments, Prof. Esam al-Bashir; from Syria Osama al-Rifai and Muhammad Hasan Heyto; from Lebanon Muhammad Ratib al-Nabulsi, author of the 14-volume Nabulsi Tafsir; from Egypt Omar Abdulkafi; and from Libya Ali Sallabi. The symbolic meaning of these scholars, each a star in his field, being hosted by Erdoğan at this level is undoubtedly very great as well.

Scholars are the heirs of the prophets. Without doubt, in the relationship between rulers and scholars, scholars have the responsibility of telling and advising rulers the right and the truth and not bending and twisting their knowledge before authority. Rulers, for their part, have the duty of listening to these figures who are the heirs of the prophets, and of taking their advice without harming their scholarly dignity. Most of these scholars are people who do not hesitate to tell the truth to their rulers in their own countries; but because their rulers and politicians did not care to hear the right, and were even disturbed by the right and truths they heard, not only did they not listen to these scholars, they made it impossible for them to live in their countries.

They either threw into prison these scholars, whom they should have honored and listened to, or forced them to flee their countries. This is proof that the affection these scholars show toward Erdoğan is not simply submissiveness or attachment to authority. These scholars are people who have already proved that they do not bow to authority. They support Erdoğan because they truly find him right and truly love him very much, and so they support him, his assembly,

...being present at, they feel great happiness.

Looking at the reactions in the media of some countries that deem every kind of pressure, imprisonment, torture and persecution fit for scholars, to Erdoğan's hosting of scholars, one more difference became even more clearly apparent. These heirs of the prophets, on whom they inflict these persecutions and ordeals, receive in Turkey from Erdoğan exactly the respect they deserve. This is precisely the secret of the favor, affection and prayers Erdoğan receives throughout the whole Islamic world.

At the meeting, the problems faced by the Islamic world were voiced by the Ulema, and Erdoğan was thanked both for his current stances and policies and other paths to be followed in this regard were mentioned.

Along with the support Turkey gives to oppressed refugees, the problems they experience were also voiced; the policy it follows on the Palestinian issue, the struggle it has waged against Islamophobia, and especially the measures to be taken against the recent attacks on the Qur'an were mentioned.

Erdoğan also said to the scholars: "Just as much as we have cared about our country's issues during our 20 years in power, we have cared in the same way about the issues of Muslims in the world." In this, Erdoğan, saying that the noble hadith of our Prophet (peace be upon him), "Whoever is not concerned with the troubles of Muslims is not one of them...", has always been their guide, explained that they have not remained indifferent to anything that has befallen Muslims in Africa, in Sudan, in Somalia, in Myanmar/Arakan, in Gaza, Palestine and Jerusalem, in Iraq, in Syria. He explained that we have always treated the struggle against Islamophobia in the Western world as a part of our international policy, that in Libya and in Azerbaijan we put our hand under the stone and stood by our brothers, and that, as long as God grants health and means, we will continue to work for the welfare and peace of all humanity along with Muslims, and for the well-being of humanity at this point. Saying that we will resolutely continue the struggle for right and justice that we have made a banner with "The world is bigger than 5," he expressed that with this intention and longing we will stand by the African and the Palestinian and the Bosnian and the Syrian and the Arakanese and the Turkestani, and that we will continue this struggle until oppression ends in the world, until the faces of the innocent smile, until the tears of the wronged are stilled.

In return for this role of Turkey, Erdoğan also expressed that, as the Islamic ummah, our brotherhood has the power and resolve to overcome every kind of dispute and every kind of difference of opinion. However, saying that the matter that really saddens us, the issue we are struggling with, is the Muslim world's own internal disputes, ignorance, disunity and inadequacy in the fight against poverty, and saying that the greatest power that will resolve these internal disputes is the power of the scholars who are heirs of the Prophet, he continued as follows:

"If scholars too take sides in these matters and do not work for unity, then the real disaster will be experienced. Today we are here with the leading scholars of the Islamic world. Very great duties fall to you. I am not going to remind the scholars who are heirs of the Prophet of their duties. I know that each of you knows this best... Building the future without suffering a problem of belonging to the Clear Religion of Islam depends on your efforts. In particular, presenting Islam as a whole, from education to culture, from science to technology, from economy to trade, from family to social life, from literature to art, from security to confidence and stability, from governance to international politics, from agriculture and animal husbandry to urbanization, to the people of this age in every field, offering it to the minds and hearts of future generations, is the most important responsibility upon all of us. For this we need to employ common reason more and to spread the culture of consultation more. We are obliged to benefit more from our trained human power. We must be rid of dispersion and fragmentation. We have to unite our energy and our strength. We are obliged to increase mutual aid, solidarity and cooperation. We must abandon selfishness, egoism, the claim of self, arrogance and pride. We have to display the most beautiful examples in individual and social life and be a model to be emulated."