This volume has two goals. One is to explore the life and the thought of Fethullah Gulen and the important educational and peace-inducing activities in which he and those inspired by him have been engaged for several decades. The outcome of those effortsof creating schools and providing diverse social and cultural services that bring people together people from diverse backgroundshas been to provide the face of civic and civil Islam as an antidote to the uglier side of political Islam. The second goal has been to make clear how the accusations against Mr. Gulen by the minions of Recep Tayyip Erdogan could hardly be more false: that what Gulen and the hizmet (service) movement that he has inspired are ultimately about is improving the world and saving it form its uglier inclinations. A brief discussion of his life and thought has been supplemented by the voices of more than 70 interviews conducted over several years, with individuals intimate and more distant but all inspired to be part of the process of serving humanity.
Ori Z Soltes teaches at Georgetown University across a range of disciplines, from art history and theology to philosophy and political history. He is the former Director of the Bnai Brith Klutznick National Jewish Museum, and has curated more than 85 exhibitions there and in other venues across the country and overseas. He has authored or edited 25 books and several hundred articles and essays.
With an encyclopedic understanding of Fethullah Gulen, erudite empathy, and rarely documented in-sights, Soltes sorts out the tensions between secular and spiritual values shaping modern Turkey. From the woods of Pennsylvania to the muezzin's call from the minaret of the newly established Grand Mosque [Hagia Sophia] of today's Istanbul, we are swept into the narrative of Anatolia of past and present. As a historical interpreter of golden threads binding the Hizmet movement, he reveals the difficult path-ways for approaching Man and God. Soltes' refined narrative spans the origins of Ottoman-Turkish politi-cal hegemony from the Great Powers era to the quarrelsome realities of the moment. Along the way, Soltes voice engages in a respectful quest for dialogue, harmony and faith-based humanity. -- Philip Eliasoph, PhD, Professor of Art History & Visual Culture Fairfield University, CT For those familiar with the Hizmet movement and those not, Ori Soltes has laid out a broad and concise overview of Fethullah Gulen and the movement. He describes Gulens fascinating spiritual and intellectu-al journey and his idea of civic Islam to serve the community. Perhaps the most moving section of the book is the chapter with seventy plus interviews of Gulens followers, sympathizers, and those who col-laborate with hizmets community work of dialog and service. These real-life testimonies and many others from around the world have converted one-time skeptics like Soltes (and myself) into true believers. The last section of Soltes excellent book assesses Erdogans authoritarian war on Gulen, which Erdogan takes to such an obsessive extreme as to severely damage Turkeys civil society and reverse its gains, in-cluding the shuttering of hizmet schools, medical facilities, and eleemosynary projects. -- James C. Harrington, Founder of the Texas Civil Rights Project and author of Wrestling with Free Speech, Religious Freedom, and Democracy in Turkey: The Political Trials and Times of Fethullah Gulen. This is a compelling, thoroughly-researched and presented portrait of a Turkish-Sufi sage of our times. A charismatic yet modest figure who has inspired a large international charitable and educational organiza-tion called Hizmet, Fethullah Gulen and his movement have become a target of what appears to be an unwarranted vicious campaign by the current Turkish government, for reasons that remain unclear. Soltes, a Georgetown University-based scholar with dozens of books under his belt, has interviewed nu-merous individuals in places ranging from the Republic of Georgia to Australia and the United States, and has also met several times with Gulen himself. He traces how Gulens Hizmet movement emerged out of a Sufi-influenced civil and cultural school of Islam that does not seek political power, transforming focus on the future of Turkish Muslims into concern for all of humanity and our planet. -- Dr. Alex S. Kohav, Department of Philosophy Metropolitan State University of Denver, Author of Mysticism and Experience A timely and important book focusing on the contributions to modern Islam of one of the most im-portant Islamic theologians of the late 20th and early 21st century. Gulen's Sufi-inspired thought and the Hizmet movement, which it has served to shape, are critical components of an Islamic theology that is faithful to the origins of Islam at the time of the Prophet while adapting them to fit our modern, pluralistic world. Ori Soltess book is a must for anyone who wishes to understand ways in which Islamic ideas and values can be leveraged to benefit all in our interconnected world. -- Zeki Saritoprak, PhD, Author of Islam's Jesus and Islamic Spirituality: Faith and Practice for the Modern World, Professor in the Department of Theology and Religious Studies, John Carroll University Ori Soltes brings to this new volume on Fethullah Gulen over a decade of research, and it shows. Soltes' gift is to synthesize perspectives, and then to integrate them with his own extensive interviews and in-sights. He clearly confronts the slanders that accuse Gulen of being a terrorist, and he helps to situate Gu-len and the movement he has inspired accurately within the broader currents of Islamic theology and cul-ture. This book is a gift to anyone desiring to deepen their knowledge and understanding of the thought of Fethullah Gulen and the global Hizmet community. -- Jon Pahl, author of Fethullah Gulen: A Life of Hizmet--Why a Muslim Scholar in Pennsylvania Matters to the World
