Al-Zuhayli says Fethullah Gülen’s ideas hope of humanity

Cihan Yenilmez

Wahba Mustafa al-Zuhayli

Leading Islamic scholar Wahba Mustafa al-Zuhayli from Syria, a participant of the two-day Prophet’s Path Symposium held over the weekend, has said the ideas of well-respected Islamic scholar Fethullah Gülen stand as a hope for humanity.

Defining Gülen as a person with a wide horizon, he said the fact that Gülen adheres to Islamic values and that he does not draw opposition is met with admiration from the Islamic world.

Noting that Gülen gives hope to the Islamic world with his teachings, he said Gülen has shown that the future of humanity is bright.

Infiltrating or contributing?

Muhammed Çetin

Over the past few days Muslim scholar and social activist Fethullah Gülen has given a measured and straightforward response to accusations that the Gülen movement, or as it is often called, the “volunteers’ service” or hizmet, is engaged in a conspiracy to infiltrate state institutions. Gülen replied that all citizens have a right -- in accordance with the law -- to be employed in their own country within the ranks of state institutions, including the police and military.

Indeed, it seems to me that since the participants and supporters of the movement number in the millions within Turkey, their presence within such institutions is a statistical certainty given that the movement is not a clandestine organization or cult.

The Community [Gulen Movement]

Ahmet Turan Alkan

I have known them for around 20 years. I have eaten with them and had friendly chats with them. I haven’t seen any of them have a bad attitude, instead, they show respect and love. I will write down what I feel about them from a position, as described by famed Turkish poet Ahmet Haşim as: “Away from the earth somewhat further than halfway/ Closer to the moon somewhat further than halfway.”

Turkey has seen its likes a number of times, but has never met such a successful one. The people who love and rely on Fethullah Gülen and who undertake benevolent and education-related activities with inspiration from him have become a de facto reality in Turkey. This reality does not have a specific name or address. It has a voluntary and civilian character and, therefore, the word “community” generally used to describe it is treated as a dubious concept that hides, even obscures, its profundity. Interesting, those who can safely be defined as a “community” refrain from accepting this flippant and fuzzy concept, but still they cannot come up with an alternative designation except “hizmet” – literally meaning service, and in this specific use, implying a community of people whose sole purpose is to do service to religion and humanity.

Fethullah Gülen: Citizens do not ‘infiltrate' state posts

Today's Zaman

Fethullah Gulen

Well-respected Turkish intellectual and scholar Fethullah Gülen has responded to claims that followers of the Gülen movement have infiltrated state posts -including those of the police force, the military and others- saying citizens of a country do not “infiltrate” the establishments that exist for the country and its citizens because it is a natural right for them to be employed in such posts.

“To urge fellow citizens to seek employment at state institutions is not called infiltration. Both the people urged and these institutions belong to the same country. … It is a right for them to be employed in state posts.

Turkey-KRG ties: How and why did they improve this much?

Abdulla Hawez Abdulla

I remember how relations between the Turkish government and northern Iraq’s Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) used to be. Both sides were ambivalent about how to deal with the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), and had to wrangle over the matter. But these thoughts became obsolete after 2009 and transformed into marvelous relations. Some may wonder how and why they moved away from being enemies to being partners.

We should first mention that before this era of good relations between Turkey and the KRG, there was only one Turkish institution working in Arbil, the pro-Fethullah Gülen Fezalar Eğitim Kurumları (Fezalar Educational Institutes). But Fezalar stayed away from politics. Despite this, it has close ties with Justice and Development Party (AKP) ally the Kurdistan Islamic Union (KIU), and so Fezalar used KIU members to work with it.

‘Prophet Muhammad example of coexistence’

Ahmet Görçüm

Delivering the opening speech for the İstanbul symposium, co-organized by the Turkish “Yeni Ümit” (New Hope) and Arabic “Hira” journals, on Saturday, Grand Mufti of Egypt Ali Gomaa added that there are lessons people should draw from Muhammad’s life in regards to maintaining peace with adherents of different religions and non-believers. “The qualities of the societies he lived in or with did not matter for him as he always knew how to coexist. We have to draw lessons for own our lives by taking his words, state management and service into account,” Gomaa said.

The common message emphasized by speakers at the two-day Prophet’s Path Symposium over the weekend was that the Prophet Muhammad exemplified how to live peacefully with “the societal other,” and that there are lessons people should draw from his life to secure peace in today’s world.

Fethullah Gulen discounts neither past nor modernity, concludes conference

Basri Dogan

A conference titled “Mapping the Gülen Movement,” which took place in Amsterdam on Thursday, witnessed a detailed examination by academics and experts of various aspects of the Gülen movement.

Organized by the Dialoog Academie in the Netherlands, the international “Mapping the Gülen Movement” conference was held at the famous Felix Meritix Congress Center in Amsterdam. The conference was attended by many social scientists and academics from various universities, with one of the speakers well-known Turkish professor Doğu Ergil, who noted in his presentation that the Gülen Movement was a civil movement that called for maximum participation and support from its members.