By Udbhav Bhargava
On the 2nd of July, a Turkish court heard a lawsuit in which the Hagia Sophia was turned back into a mosque. It will have its decision released within 15 days.
The 1,500-year-old structure, listed as a UNESCO World Heritage site, was originally a cathedral before it was turned into a mosque.
The History of Hagia Sophia
Two churches were built on the site where the present Hagia Sophia stands, in 360 AD and 415 AD, and were later demolished. Eventually, in 537 AD, during the reign of Emperor Justinian, the present building was built as a church. It was established to become the seat of the Eastern Orthodox Church’s Patriarch, and remained so for around 900 years. It was at the time the world’s largest building and a marvel of engineering, and was renowned for its wide dome. The words ‘Hagia Sophia’ signified ‘Holy Wisdom’.
Transition from Cathedral to Mosque
In 1453, Constantinople (old name of Istanbul) fell to Ottoman Sultan Mehmet II. The Hagia Sophia was vandalized by the Ottoman army (but not totally destroyed). It was soon after transformed into a mosque. Major interior repairs have been carried out; the Christianity signs and symbols have been plastered over but still remain visible. Minarets were added according to Islamic architecture.
And then from Mosque to Museum
After World War I, the Ottoman Empire saw its downfall and the modern and secular Republic of Turkey was established three years later, under the Ataturk’s leadership. The patriarchal head, Mustafa Kemal Pasha ‘Ataturk’ ordered the Hagia Sophia to be converted to a museum in 1934. Hagia Sophia was listed by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site in 1985 and currently attracts over 3 million visitors a year. In 2013, government allowed the muezzin to call for prayer from the minarets of the museum. The conversion issue was raised during local elections in 2019, after which Erdogan’s party lost the municipal elections in Istanbul. Further, this year, special Islamic prayers were held in the museum structure on the 567th anniversary of the Ottoman invasion.
Association for the Protection of Historic Monuments and the Environment, a group asking for the Hagia Sophia to be reverted from a museum to a mosque filed a case in Turkish courts.
Local media sources suggest the government has been planning to keep Hagia Sophia open to visitors even though it has been converted into a mosque. The World Heritage Committee shall take decisions relating to the application of the Convention on the Preservation of the World Cultural Heritage. When a country has ratified the Convention and wants to change the name of a monument, it must send its request for approval to the Commission.
Many religious and political figures have opposed the agreement, including the Istanbul-based Ecumenical Patriarch, the spiritual leader of the world’s Orthodox Christians, as well as Greece, France and the United States. The intense executive activism in Turkey is fueled by political motives and is an effort to establish Islamic supremacy which is against the secular character of the republic established in 1922.
Eduindex News 