Sufi rituals in 19th century Istanbul : ludic spectacles or religious ceremonies?

The essence of this article is to describe the Sufi rituals in 19th century Istanbul as a part of the sphere of sacrum. The main question, which has been raised, is associated with cultural determinants of sacrum. To achieve the most objective results the source materials were selected based on cultural diversity – Polish and Turkish memoir literature was compared paying special attention to writers’ attitude towards Sufi rituals (especially Mewlewi and Rufai orders), observed in Istanbul. The analysis of Polish memoir literature shows that Polish writers treated Sufi rituals as a kind of show or spectacle – they felt themselves like the audience in a theatre, using in theirs descriptions a lot of derogatory terms such as: "Paris fleapit" (Antoni Zaleski), "operetta" (Antoni Zaleski), "comedy" (Ignacy Hołowiński), "epileptic dance" (Władysław Mickiewicz), "religious waltz performed by living windmills" (Hieronim Kajsiewicz) or "oddity" (Zygmunt Skórzewski). They did not understand the sacred atmosphere of these rituals, focusing on their external, physical side only. Contrarily, Turkish memoir literature (represented by much less pieces than Polish, which is the effect of different ways of development of Turkish literature) treats Sufi rituals as the undisputed part of sacrum sphere. Being a Sufi seems to be quite popular in 19th century Istanbul, but even those of the writers, who did not declared to belong to any mystic brotherhood, understood the religious and philosophical basis of Sufism (which was an effect of reading Mewlana’s Masnavi, as in case of Muallim Naci). Thanks to that for example Naciye Neyyal Biren could be truly touched by Mewlewi rituals and live the ceremony as a spiritual experience. The article supports the thesis of cultural determination of sacrum sphere.

W artykule podjęty został problem determinacji kulturowej pojęcia sacrum. Materiałem, który posłużył do potwierdzenia tezy o kulturowym uwarunkowaniu granic sfery sacrum były polskie i tureckie wspomnienia dotyczące obrzedów sufickich w dziewiętnastowiecznym Stambule ze szczególnym uwzględnieniem mewlewitów i bractwa Rufai. Opinie i emocje towarzyszące Polakom i Turkom obserwującym owe obrzędy okazały się skrajnie dwubiegunowe, co dobrze wyrażają określenia użyte w podtytule artykułu: "praktyki religijne" oraz "widowisko ludyczne". Głoszona w artykule teza poparta została licznymi przykładami i cytatami z polskiej i tureckiej literatury wspomnieniowej.