The Ottoman Empire had become, in the famous expression used by Western powers, the “Sick Man of Europe.”

This “sick man” endured the Russo-Turkish wars, the Balkan Wars, the First World War, epidemics, economic crises, occupations, destruction, and enormous human suffering.

Mehmet Akif, who personally witnessed this period, reflected the conditions of his age with remarkable clarity in Safahat. Professor Mehmet Kaplan describes Safahat as almost a novel that documents its historical period.[1]

Novels and literary works can sometimes portray an era with extraordinary skill.

Like our Prophet, Mehmet Akif lived for sixty-three years. If we set aside the suffering he experienced during the final decade of his life, his interest in poetry developed after graduating from veterinary school.

While practising his profession, he also devoted himself to literature.

He excelled in Arabic, Persian, and French. He also graduated at the top of his class.

In time, Akif rose to the position of what might be called the “spiritual hero” of the Turkish National Struggle.

Poets possess sensitive hearts.

Akif was a deeply emotional man, filled with both national and spiritual feeling.

Although he was ethnically Albanian, he wept—and made others weep—for a homeland whose population was predominantly Turkish.

Mehmet Akif, Despair, and Struggle

Akif was, of course, a human being.

People living through severe psychological crises today can sometimes receive medical and psychological treatment. People of Akif’s generation did not have access to many of these possibilities, while the material misery surrounding them was also immense.

At certain moments, Akif wrote lines that appeared to move toward a fatalistic understanding resembling that of the Jabriyya.

Yet he never abandoned his fundamental direction.

Much of his life was devoted to telling people that they must work, refuse despair, and place their trust in Allah.

Because he himself was hardworking and had experienced success through effort, he wanted his nation to rise through the same determination.

He believed that society had to act collectively to resist oppression and overcome crises.[2]

Akif possessed a profoundly sensitive heart.

It is also obvious that divine wisdom cannot always be understood while events are still unfolding before our eyes.

Deeply distressed by what he witnessed, Akif wrote a poem entitled Tawhid Yahud Feryad—Unity of God, or a Cry of Anguish.

In this poem, we can sense that even he sometimes felt helpless.

He calls upon Allah for assistance and appears, for moments, almost to fall into despair.

Yet at the same time, he made extraordinary efforts throughout his life to prevent other people from surrendering to hopelessness.

In one of his prose writings, he states:

“A section of our people has folded its arms, abandoned all hope of success, and waits without feeling or movement for the most terrible and painful outcomes. But despair cannot produce any other result! If we look carefully, to despair is simply to give a legitimate appearance to laziness and helplessness. Once that cursed disease called despair settles upon the soul, there remains no possibility of movement in the body, no possibility of labour, and no possibility of struggle. For Muslims, who are commanded first to possess determination and then to place their trust in God, falling into this deadly calamity called despair—God forbid—may lead to the loss of both religion and worldly life. Such an outcome is what may be called a manifest loss.”[3]

Akif therefore clearly warns that those who make no effort will ultimately suffer loss.

If we do not act today for the sake of our goals, we will almost certainly regret it tomorrow.

If we look at the future only as darkness and abandon determination, Akif tells us, such surrender is worse than a humiliating death.

This was one of the convictions he wished to instil in the nation.

People today also experience material and spiritual crises.

In these situations, too, we should not surrender to despair.

We should set meaningful and ambitious goals for ourselves and work intensely toward them.

Akif’s generation lived under far more difficult circumstances.

They experienced wars, diseases, poverty, helplessness, financial hardship, and situations in which people were forced to perform almost any work simply to obtain a piece of bread.

Akif himself expected little in material terms.

One of his deepest wishes was simply not to be separated from his homeland.

Yet precisely because he was such an influential figure, he ultimately became separated from it.

Perhaps if he had remained, we might not speak about Akif today in the same way.

The new regime might have discredited him and damaged his reputation.

A national hero such as Kazım Karabekir was kept under a form of house arrest for approximately ten years.

Unfortunately, such things occurred in our country.

Loving one’s homeland without expecting anything in return can itself have a price.

The West, Reason, and the Age of Revolutions

Meanwhile, the West moved from revolution to revolution.

The Enlightenment, the Scientific Revolution, the Industrial Revolution, capitalism, communism, and countless other “-isms” appeared one after another.

The West increasingly proclaimed ideals of religious tolerance.

The French and American Revolutions also occurred during this broader historical era.

Nor should we forget the Russian revolutions.

Many of these were extremely violent revolutions.

Türkiye’s transformation was, comparatively speaking, less bloody in certain respects.

Nevertheless, over the long term, Muslims also suffered deeply from the transformations of the age.

The modern West achieved enormous progress largely through reason, often without drawing upon prophetic revelation or giving sufficient attention to the spiritual dimension of the human being.

Yet that same human reason also produced the First and Second World Wars.

The settlement following the First World War has sometimes been described as a peace that ended peace itself.

The humiliation imposed upon Germany after the First World War contributed to the conditions that eventually produced the Second World War.

Human reason later made possible the atomic bombing of Hiroshima.

Such destruction demonstrates what reason can become when detached from moral and spiritual restraint.

The Holocaust and the Question of God

During the Second World War, German Jews who had previously been offered the possibility of assimilation through the legacy of the Haskalah ultimately faced Hitler’s regime and the murder of millions of Jews.

Survivors of the Holocaust would understandably ask:

Does God exist?

Yet God exists.

He always existed, and He will always exist.

We must not forget this.

Humanity repeatedly passes through such immense crises.

In the end, those who remain patient—and sometimes their descendants—are the ones who survive and rebuild.

The insatiable ambitions of human beings and the efforts of states to maximize their own interests are among the fundamental causes of war.

During Akif’s era, some people may have fallen into negative assumptions about our Lord.

These events unfolded especially during the years between approximately 1910 and 1918.

In 1948, Jews who had endured catastrophe asked again:

“Does God exist?”

Then we come to our own era.

The Syrian people spent years suffering in prisons such as Sednaya.

There, too, people asked:

Does God exist?

Humanity Repeatedly Passes Through Crisis

Humanity repeatedly experiences such periods.

The revolutions and coups that emerged in connection with the Arab Spring were not events that suddenly appeared from nowhere.

They were the consequences of anger and grievances accumulated over many years.

No revolution or coup simply occurs overnight.

Every event has a history preceding it.

The Al-Aqsa Flood of 7 October likewise did not emerge from a historical vacuum.

From the perspective presented here, it was preceded by years of mistreatment, violence, humiliation, abuses, and deep political grievances.

The lands at the centre of these conflicts had once been visited by prophets, saints, dervishes, scholars, and countless Muslims.

These ancient centres of knowledge and spirituality have also witnessed countless acts of oppression throughout history.

Syria and the Problem of Political Stability

During the colonial period, the French sought to govern partly through minority communities.

One consequence of this policy was the attempt to establish an Alawite state in Syria.

Within approximately fifty years, Syria experienced more than twenty coups or coup attempts.

The country repeatedly failed to establish lasting political stability.

The Ba‘ath regime eventually attempted to create stability by governing through an iron fist and transforming Syria into an intelligence-dominated state.

People could no longer act collectively with confidence.

Everyone increasingly became suspicious of everyone else.

Syria, where political stability had become exceptionally rare, entered a new period when opposition forces recently took control of Damascus.

Israel, like earlier French and British strategies in the region, has also sought relationships with minority or non-majority communities.

Israeli strategic thinking has at various times included relations with Kurdish groups, Druze communities, and Maronites.

From the perspective presented here, such policies can create serious problems for long-term regional stability.

Israel may appear to expand geographically, yet expansion can itself create new weaknesses.

Even where opportunities appear open in Syria, Israel faces demographic limitations in the long term.

The author therefore argues that Israel may not ultimately be able to achieve its maximal territorial ambitions.

The United States and other Western powers may also become increasingly uncomfortable with openly messianic political rhetoric and actions within Israeli politics.

Sednaya and the Test of Patience

Sednaya Prison became one of the places in which Muslims faced an extraordinary test.

Those who entered suffered tremendous hardship.

Some, God willing, survived and eventually emerged alive.

There were people who suffered there for more than ten years.

Some spent more than forty years in imprisonment.

Yet we know that we have a Lord.

Nothing He does is without wisdom.

When suffering comes, at least two possibilities may exist.

The first is that we ourselves have made mistakes and are facing the consequences of those mistakes.

The second is that our Lord is testing us.

In either case, patience is necessary.

Adam made a mistake even while living in Paradise.

According to traditional narratives, he then wandered for years seeking forgiveness.

Forgiveness itself is not something we should always expect without repentance, struggle, and transformation.

Sometimes a human being must pass through hardship before reaching spiritual purification.

For this reason, we must remain patient.

For Allah is with those who are patient.

There Are Always Better Days Ahead

No one may be completely satisfied with his or her present condition.

Yet better days always remain possible—either in this world or ultimately in Paradise.

Therefore, dear young people, we must work hard.

We must never attempt to “test” our Lord—God forbid.

We must first do everything within our own power.

We must work.

We must unite.

We must struggle.

We must take every reasonable precaution available to us.

And only after doing everything we can should we turn fully toward our Lord in prayer.

Then, God willing, He will help us in the most beautiful way.

May our blessed holy night be auspicious.

May our Lord bring all our young people—and all of us—to safety, peace, and salvation.

Ozan Dur

Other Sources Consulted

Christian Delacampagne, A History of Twentieth-Century Philosophy, trans. Devrim Çetinkasap, Istanbul: Türkiye İş Bankası Yayınları, 2010.

Isaac Bashevis Singer, Meshugah, trans. Aslı Biçen, Istanbul: Yapı Kredi Yayınları, 2003.

Footnotes

[1] Büyükkavas Kuran, Ş. (2022). “Safahat’ta Duyulan Sesler,” Edebî Eleştiri Dergisi, 6(1), p. 63.

[2] Büyükkavas Kuran, Ş. (2022). “Safahat’ta Duyulan Sesler,” Edebî Eleştiri Dergisi, 6(1), p. 68.

[3] Gülendam, Ramazan. (2009). “Mehmet Akif’e Göre Müslümanlardaki Ümitsizlik İlleti,” SDÜ Sosyal Bilimler Dergisi, 20, p. 122.