ABSTRACT
The religious life in Anatolia from the seventh/thirteenth century to around the end of the tenth/sixteenth century offers a very important field of study. In this milieu – in which numerous great Sūfīs and Sūfī poets, beginning with Yūnus Emre, flourished – many sects and tarīqas that could be included in the bāṭinī group took form and spread, including those of the Bābā’īs, Abdāls, Bektashīs, Ḥurūfīs, Qızılbashes, Qalandarīs, and Ḥaidarīs. In addition, there occurred the uprising of the supporters of Badr al-Dīn {Ibn Qāḍī} Samāwnā, which was a reprise of the previous Bābā’ī uprising, and subsequent religio-political uprisings or isolated incidents of the same kind. During these four centuries, therefore, the Anatolian Turks experienced a life of continuous crisis. False prophets and new creeds, for which a great many adherents risked their lives, flourished. Because these events were influenced by many different factors and took many different forms, it would not be prudent to advance unreservedly a general and definitive idea about them.1 The religio-Ṣūfī life, which, on the one hand, gave rise to bāṭinī currents like these that were contrary to the clear stipulations of the Sharī‘a and, on the other, created with the same strength and vigor new ṭarīqas that conformed perfectly to Sharī‘a principles, spread to every corner of the Ottoman Empire, indeed, as far as the borders of Rumelia and Bosnia. Simply for this reason, this period of Ottoman history reveals two contradictory phases. On the one hand, there were religious uprisings, sectarian movements led by isolated individuals, punitive actions {against rebellions}, killings, and executions. On the other hand, there were shaikhs who enjoyed the honor and respect of the most fanatical members of the official religious establishment and the palace, whose saintly charisma spread among the people, and who exercised great spiritual influence. Indeed, these two contradictory phases were the result of the same event, two different manifestations of the same thing. They reveal the importance of, and high regard for, the Ṣūfī movement among the people. In short, in the region of Anatolia, from the time of the Turkish settlement until the end of the tenth/sixteenth century, the Ṣūfī movement in various guises gradually increased in strength. Indeed, it never subsided and has continued up to the present.
