Written by: Sara Radovic
Edited by: Keerthana Rao
"The preserved source material justifies the thesis that in Byzantium, regardless of the era, the cathedral basilica was conceived primarily as a temple dedicated to Christ - the Incarnate Word of God."
- Zofia Brzozowska
In the July 2020 Turkish court ruling, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan ruled in favor of plaintiff Turkish Association for the Protection of Historical Monuments and the Environment to reconvert Hagia Sophia back into a mosque from its status as a museum. The Council of State – the highest administrative court in Turkey – ruled the 1934 conversion of the edifice into a museum to be unconstitutional. 134 Harvard Law Review 1278 claims the decision to be legally correct, despite its erroneous reasoning, but it must be made known that the final decision is, in fact, not legally – and historically! – correct.
Hagia Sophia was built in 537 A.D. by Emperor Justinian the First. Consecrated on December 25th, 537 [on the feast day of the Nativity of Jesus Christ], it served as the seat of the Constantinople Patriarchate and a beacon of light for the Byzantine Empire, guiding the Orthodox faithful for more than nine centuries. It was named “Hagia Sophia,” which, translated from Greek to English, means “Holy Wisdom” – a direct characterization of the Wisdom of God. In fact, Brzozowska (2012) notes that Procopius of Caesarea, a scholar and writer of the sixth century, adamantly wrote of the importance of the main metropolitan church known as the church of Holy Wisdom because it was the name most suitable and respected by the Byzantines for God’s sanctuary. The analysis of preserved writings and scrolls dating back to the Byzantine Empire confirms the cathedral to have indeed been dedicated to Jesus Christ – the Incarnate Logos Himself.
The temple served as an Orthodox cathedral for nearly one thousand years until the 1453 conquest of the Byzantine Empire by Sultan Mehmed II, leader of the Ottoman Empire, who converted Hagia Sophia into a mosque shortly thereafter. Approximately five centuries later, in 1934, Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, the founder and first President of the Republic of Turkey, and his Cabinet members transformed the building into a museum, a decision labeled by Coruhlu et al. (2020) as an undeniably administrative one – emphasis for the secularization of the remainder of the Ottoman Empire [in short, the separation of state from religion]. Its museum status has garnered much controversial attention, especially from contemporary Turkish political parties, who strove to revert the nation back to its purely Islamic roots. Even though use of Hagia Sophia as a place of worship was strictly prohibited during preservation of its museum status, Augustinos (2018) reveals that the Erdoğan government continued to arrange readings of the Quran in the edifice, as well as the chanting of the muezzin’s call to prayer during the period of Ramadan. In August 2016, the plaintiff filed a petition with the Prime Minister, requesting that Hagia Sophia be reopened for worship. The petition was denied on the nineteenth of October, leading the plaintiff to appeal to the Council of State on December 20th. After much deliberation over the course of four years, the Tenth Chamber of the Council of State granted the appeal, thus annulling the 1934 decision.
134 Harv. L. Rev. 1278 commences with the declaration that Hagia Sophia’s museum status served as “a symbol of interfaith harmony for many.” This is, unfortunately, not true. The temple’s Islamic status served as a reminder of the forceful and vigorous subjugation of what was once an imperial and prosperous empire reigning for more than a thousand years. Efforts were made to eradicate the temple of its Christian background – said efforts most prevalent in the destruction of the mosaics. They were first chiseled at, and then, as Moropoulou et al. (2013) illustrate, covered over with plaster and other drapery because it became practically impossible to remove all traces of Byzantine artwork adorning the walls and domes of the building. Celebration of an alleged union between the two faiths might have been taken into consideration, as documented by Atatürk in his court decision; events leading to the annulment of the 1934 Cabinet decision – as well as the decision itself – only affirm that an alliance was never the intention.
One must first be knowledgeable of history and law to accurately evaluate the error of the 2020 court decision. Mehmed besieged Byzantium’s capital city for nearly fifty-five days, offering terms of peaceful surrender to Emperor Constantine XI, who steadfastly refused – as should be deemed right because no emperor in his right mind would willingly abdicate his throne and give up the freedom of his people, exposing them to torture, plunder, and slavery. Constantinople was thus conquered by force, and everything handed over to the sultan - Hagia Sophia included. According to Ottoman law, which “is essentially Hanafism, one of the four schools of Sunni Islamic law, which the Ottomans officially adopted”; a sultan’s conquest by force allows for the conversion of temples into mosques. This doctrine, however, breaches Islamic law itself because Islamic law protects other places of worship. Verse 22:40 in the Quran openly states that all monasteries, churches, synagogues, and other places of worship where the name of God is much praised will not be converted into mosques. Mehmed’s thirst for power, therefore, is an inexcusable reason for the 1453 conversion of the Orthodox cathedral into an Islamic temple of worship. The building was never rightfully his. His capture and conversion of Hagia Sophia was, thus, an “administrative regulation,” as specified by Mustafa Akyol, a contributing op-ed writer to the New York Times.
An alternative course of reasoning is suggested by 134 Harv. L. Rev. 1278 to conclude that President Atatürk was never entitled to tamper with Mehmed’s endowment of Hagia Sophia as a trust. This is incorrect because, as Atatürk himself explicitly stated in the proclamation of Hagia Sophia’s status as a museum, the temple never had a waqf status because it originally belonged to the Byzantines – once more accentuating that Hagia Sophia never rightfully belonged to the Ottoman Turks. This upholds the article’s statement that there is no historical evidence of Mehmed purchasing Hagia Sophia from the Christians. This is true because there was no purchase. Hagia Sophia was forcibly taken from them.
The reconversion of Hagia Sophia into a mosque is a stark reminder that history indeed repeats itself, as evidenced by Augustinos’s disclosure of all domestic political moves aimed at reviving Ottomanism and Islamicizing the Turkish Republic. Akyol, as a Muslim himself, perfectly expounds that the magnanimity of tolerance should overcome the pettiness of supremacism. The future of Hagia Sophia is difficult to discern, though it must be acknowledged that its reconversion has not hindered people from visiting. The beautiful architectural structure – including its domes and pendentives – and intricate Orthodox mosaics continue to attract millions of tourists annually. Even though Islamic services have recommenced in the temple, it still continues to serve as a symbol of the Constantinople Patriarchate and of Christ’s Holy and Imminent Triumph.
[The views expressed in this article are those of the author and the author alone; they do not necessarily represent the views of all members of the first RULR Editorial Board and Rutgers University.]
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