After Ulus Baker

Ulus Baker passed away as quietly as he came into this world on a July day. Quietly and softly… Perhaps because a climate of thought of the quality capable of appreciating his level had not been formed… Perhaps because of this great distraction, this deep heedlessness that has gradually alienated all of us from the thought of death…

I myself only heard of his death on the day he was to be buried in his homeland, Nicosia—that is, three days after his passing. It was as if the "stranger" in Yunus Emre's famous poem, "They shall say a stranger has died, they shall wash him with cold water, they shall hear of it three days later," was describing Ulus this time… Forgive me if it sounded a bit melodramatic, Ulus.

Ulus Baker never had any personal account to settle with the world. To the extent that it would anger many people around him, his loved ones, and his friends. If only he had taken a little better care of himself, thought of himself a bit more.

Moreover, he never had any political ambition to change or transform the world either. He possessed a "God-given" wisdom when it came to understanding the world. In one of his articles, quoting Thales, considered the first Greek philosopher, he said: "Everything is common among friends; since the wise are friends of God, everything belongs to the wise." Although he never laid claim to such wisdom either—on the contrary, he thought wisdom was something that could never be reached—just like all wise people, this was the only guiding thought for him. When he didn't care a fig for the world, the world already belonged to him.

He had an extraordinary ease in the face of the world. This ease, which turned into a ruthless indifference toward his own body, was reflected as a cynic attitude that demanded nothing from the world or from anyone. If the concept of Diogenic freedom had a desire to recur, it had found its best chance with Ulus. Moreover, in a way so authentic that he himself would never carry such a claim… For years, while wearing his single-lensed spectacles, he neither succumbed to a complex nor made the slightest effort to remedy it.

I suppose he never avoided pain coming to infect him—not aiming for the flair that would suit his soul, but on the contrary, to expose the sham of this condition.

He did not much favor the idea of "philosophers who do not settle for interpreting the world, but transform it" as a lifestyle. He was too deep in thought to do that. But his efforts to understand and interpret the world within these depths certainly had an impact on the world. In the eyes of people well-versed in the connoisseurship of thought, Ulus will always hold a special value.

The title of an article he wrote for *Tezkire* magazine was "Distorters of God." In this article, drawing from Spinoza, he criticized the religiosity formed by the crowds who wanted to see God in their service and the theologians trying to respond to this desire. According to him, there was always a shrewd eagerness in popular religiosity aimed at deceiving God. This could have been a very apt starting point for a critique of political and cultural discussions on Islam.

Despite his quiet and modest personality at the METU Sociology Department, he had a weight that no one could remain indifferent to. Although he had not officially worked in this department for quite some time, he could still provide a strong reference of thought and science even for those currently studying there.

There was an interesting story behind his name being Ulus. If I remember correctly, "Ulus" was a code name or password developed by the mujahideen in Cyprus in the late fifties for a weapon or an operation. That's why the name Ulus was very common among children born in those years.

With the death of Ulus, unfortunately, another star—already thoroughly thinned out—in Turkey's sky of thought, both left-socialist and broader, has slipped away.

I offer my condolences to all his loved ones, especially his close friends Tanıl Bora, Ahmet Çiğdem, Hasan Ünal Nalbantoğlu, as well as Birikim-İletişim Publications and the METU Sociology Department.

Indeed, to Allah we belong and to Him we shall return.

Note: You can follow many of Ulus Baker's writings on the following website:

http://www.korotonomedya.net