Istanbul

Istanbul, formerly Constantinople, sits at the crossroads between Europe and Asia and has been traded between at least four empires over the past two thousand years. It has served as the capitol of three. Istanbul is venerable, and ancient, and it knows it. Mosques erupt from the seas of buildings on the banks of the Bosporus. Huge, graceful, and beautiful in a strange and exotic way, their domes and minarets serve as reminders of the dominance of Islam in what is nominally a secular nation.

As I make my way between the Aya Sofia and the Blue Mosque, the haunting call of the noon prayer fills every nook and cranny of me. The sound is at once intoxicating, comforting, and utterly alien to everything I know.

I have to wait a few minutes to get into the Blue Mosque. No non-muslims are welcome during prayer time, which is fair. I console myself by buying shaksalef(?) a hot, porridge-like drink that has been heavily spiced with cinnamon. It is blustery, cold, and the shaksaelf is both delicious and mouth burning.

I’d spent the morning in the Aya Sofia, which was a mildly disturbing experience. If you don’t know anything about the Aya Sofia, it was one of the largest churches in the east until the Byzantine Empire, the last true ancestor of Ceasar’s Rome, was conquered by the Muslim Caliphates. It is one of the largest domed structures in the world, and is so glorious that the Blue Mosque was built in direct response to its grandeur. When captured by the Caliphate the Aya Sofia was converted into a mosque. Its Byzantine mosaics were plastered over and or destroyed, the walls were repainted, and massive discs containing verses from the Qur’an were put up. Minarets were added, and prayer rugs were put down over the marble floors.

It stayed that way until after the First World War. Kamal Attaturk, brutal dictator or visionary, depending on who you ask, took over the ashes of the Ottoman Empire and built modern, secular Turkey. He turned the Aya Sofia into a museum, and allowed archeologists to remove some of the Islamic imagery on the walls, revealing the Byzantine mosaics beneath. The prayer rugs were removed, revealing the marble floors.

Fun fact: the archeologists also found some graffiti on the marble columns that could be traced back to a Viking trade expedition to Constantinople sometime between 1000 and 1200 AD.

The Aya Sofia gives me chills. It’s cold, but that’s not what puts a chill down my spine. It’s the feel of the place. The Aya Sofia feels like a corpse.

It’s hollow, and strange echoes float around the ever-present crowd of tourists. The lighting is muted, putting many things in dark shadow. The windows are small and despite the open space, I feel closed in. The walls peel, revealing the bones of the first religion beneath. The pulpit, used in both religions, is empty and bare, like a grinning skull. The plates with the names of Allah hang in strange juxtaposition with the Byzantine Cross architecture of the structure. Everything about it feels discordant and wrong, somehow. Like a dead madman wearing the skin of his equally mad enemy, both frozen in their last agonies.

I stay as long as I can, but eventually leave because it creeps me out too much.

After noon prayer ends, I fall in line behind the other tourists at the Blue Mosque. Since it was built both directly opposite and in direct reflection of the Aya Sofia, I prepare myself for another surreal experience, but am pleasantly surprised.

The Blue Mosque is busy with believers. I slip my shoes off at the entrance and instantly feel more at ease. Barefoot is better.

The lighting is better here. Mosques have ground floor windows, large ones, that allow light from the outside to spill in and illuminate supplicants. The domes are decorated with strange, symmetrical mosaics. They are beautiful, and oftentimes resemble flowers and other plant life, though if you asked an Islamic scholar he would insist they are just shapes, in order to be sure they avoid the Islamic proscription against depicting anything made by God. Idolatry in this religion is loathed even more than in Christianity.

More than being well lit and beautiful, the mosque feels clean. After the dead stench of the Aya Sofia, it’s like a breath of fresh air in my nostrils. I wander in the strange middle area reserved for tourists, watching the men pray in the front portion and the women in the rear. There is a small room located near the exit where an imam sits surrounded by texts. He is old, bespectacled, and has a magnificent salt and pepper beard. A sign on the door says in four languages “Interested in Islam? Step inside.” I resist the urge to walk in and start a lively discussion.

As beautiful as the Blue Mosque is, I might just be convinced.

I stay a long time, leaning up against a pillar, staring at the roof or the people praying around me. I’ve never been a particularly religious person, but at the same time I’ve always been fascinated by people who are and the things they build and do in the ninety-nine names of God. I’ve been to major holy sites on five continents. I’ve prayed in the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, climbed one of the five sacred Daoist Mountains, stood beneath the dome of the Blue Mosque, made offerings at Shinto shrines, meditated where Buddha gave his first sermon, watched Hindus offer their dead to Shiva, and whispered an orison at the Wailing Wall. I’ve seen two thousand year old Confucian scrolls and a sword worn by Muhammed’s generals. I’ve been to the hilltop where Revelations was written and walked the path of Christ’s crucifixion. I’ve rowed war canoes with Native Americans and sang songs asking our ancestors for strength and courage. I’ve seen more tombs, graves, churches, mosques, temples, monuments, relics and trophies than I can count.

All these objects, all these places, all these stories. I’ve been a lot of places and come to one conclusion regarding religion: There is no good or evil, but people make it so. 

-Doug