Sacred Spaces in a Holy City. Crossing Religious Boundaries in Istanbul at the Turn of the Twenty-First Century

The article examines Muslim pilgrimages to Christian places of worship in Istanbul after the 1950s. It aims to answer whether and how the Ottoman heritage of cultural diversity fits or does not fit with the pattern of the nation-state. After a brief bibliographic overview of the issue of shared sacred spaces, the presentation assembles, as a first step, some of the key elements of Istanbul’s multi-secular links with religious practices: the sanctity of the city both for Christianity and Islam; the long tradition of pilgrimages and their importance for the local economy; meanings and etymologies of the word pilgrimage in the most common languages of the Ottoman space; and the silence of the nineteenth century’s Greek sources concerning the sharing of worship. The second part focuses more specifically on some OrthodoxGreek sacred spaces in Istanbul increasingly frequented by Muslims during the last decades.


Introduction
Throughout time, and especially during the Ottoman era, contacts and exchanges, interactions, hybrid identities, but also different kinds of syncretism were, together with cleavages, permanent features of urban and rural societies in the Eastern Mediterranean region. In contrast to the nation states formed from the nineteenth century onwards, the imperial pattern demonstrates immaterial boundaries more than physical ones. For a large part of the empire's population, the latter remained invisible and distant.
Mental frontiers represented the backbone of rural and urban Ottoman societies.
They offered shapes and forms for the diversity of people and cultures hosted for centuries throughout the Mediterranean East. Their role was not only to trace limits but also to generate transgressions and potential interbreeding and hybridity.
articles, this book covers a geographical area that expands from Morocco to Syria via Egypt, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Macedonia, and Albania, without forgetting Istanbul. The authors of another collective work, edited by Elazar Barkan and Karen Barkey, focus on the notion of "coexistence" in shared sacred places but also study the factors that contribute to interrupting or cancelling sharing. More than the sites themselves, they seek to highlight the socio-political context in which the sharing of places is achieved.
At least two remarks emerge from this brief bibliographic overview. First, recent research on shared sacred places is mostly collective. The need for comparison imposes this mode of operation. Secondly, this research is pluridisciplinary, and even interdisciplinary. Indeed, alongside anthropologists, who are undoubtedly the most numerous, we note the presence of philosophers, sociologists, and historians in this field.
The question this short article aims to answer is a little different from those raised in the aforementioned works. Here, the ambition is to understand how and to what extent the practices of sharing and transgressing cultural boundaries have survived within nation-states. What happens to the heritage of cultural diversity once transferred to "homogeneous" nations?
From 1923 onwards, when the republic of Turkey is officially proclaimed with Ankara as its capital, a new chapter starts for the city of Constantine, which is no longer the center of political power. An increasingly Turkish and Muslim population replaces the former multi-cultural human landscape. Its Christian (Greek, Armenian, Catholic, Protestant...) and Jewish components gradually disappear-they either melt away through assimilation or simply physically disappear-and become more and more invisible after the Second World War. However, in contrast to the human landscape, the architectural religious heritage-Muslim and non-Muslim-remains in situ and continues to be used during the entire twentieth century.
What forms did sharing sacred spaces take within the new Kemalist and secular Turkey? How did the authorities deal with practices inherited from a rejected world?
To understand the transition from the imperial model to the national one, as far as the sharing of sacred spaces is concerned, post-Ottoman and mostly Muslim Istanbul is probably the most relevant case to focus on. It will serve as a field of inquiry. The singularity of the former Ottoman capital is that, during this "republican" era, an increasing number of Christian places of worship was used by Muslim pilgrims. This phenomenon has not been systematically studied. My contribution provides some indications but remains insufficient for a global and exhaustive overview.
As in many major Ottoman cities, the "cohabitation of religions" has always been a dominant attribute of the sultan's former capital. Plurality of historical strata and different layers of use of space are also among Istanbul's basic characteristics. More than two thousand years of history have produced a multitude of religious sites, dedicated to various uses depending on the period. In addition, Constantinople / Istanbul, the capital of two empires, is considered a "holy city" in both Christianity and Islam.
Throughout the following pages, the link between the weight of history and the twentieth/twenty-first centuries' realities is strongly underlined. Turkey certainly entered a secular phase from 1923 onwards. However, this Kemalist secularism, inspired by the French model, is hostile to clergymen rather than to religion (Berkes 1964;Landau 1984, 126). People continue to perform their religious observances; the feast of Ramadan is celebrated every year; iftar meals are regularly offered at the presidential residency (Şahin 2011). Despite the dramatic changes due to the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, the istanbuliot society of the inter-war period seems to live an illusion of suspended time. The heritage of the "cohabitation of religions" is deeply rooted in the collective memories. However, after the 1940s, the Christian and Jewish presence in the city unceasingly diminishes. 3 Many Jews leave for Israel, created in 1948. Greeks feel pushed to migrate massively after the events of September 1955. 4 In 1964, in an extremely tense atmosphere between Athens and Ankara due to the Cyprus question, 10,000 Greeks, all of them Hellenic citizens, are expelled (Akar and Demir 1994;Anastassiadou and Dumont 2011;Akgönül 2004). They are, at least, followed by the members of their families. A total of nearly 50,000 people disappear in a very short period.
Step by step, twentieth-century Istanbul is emptied of its non-Muslim inhabitants, and it becomes less and less possible to consider it as a "multireligious" city. Undoubtedly, cultural diversity still remains a major characteristic of the local society: instead of Greeks, Armenians, and Jews, newcomers of various other origins settle in large numbers from the 1980s onwards. Most of them are Kurds or Alevis from Eastern Turkey. There are also immigrants from Asia (Caucasus, the former Soviet Union, Central and Southeast Asia), Africa, and, more recently, from the Arab World. Although certainly "multi-cultural", the present composition consists mostly of

Muslims. 5
As a consequence of these intense migrations, at the beginning of the twenty-first century Christian places of worship are vacant and many of them remain closed and silent. Is the question of shared sacred spaces still an issue to discuss? What is there to be shared with ghosts?
On the basis of these few introductory remarks, the study presented on the following pages is structured into two parts. The first one aims to recall some "useful" elements of the historical background. These are necessary for a better understanding of current modes of behavior, which are linked to the "others'" religion and gained visibility after the 1920s. The second part re-visits some major sacred "shared" spaces which have become increasingly popular during the last decades. A crosssectional question is whether or not shared practices provoke transgressions of (or the temptation to transgress) religious boundaries-in other words, conversion. 3 The bibliography on non-Muslim minorities in post-1923 Turkey is extremely rich and continuously

A Holy City of Christianity and Islam
The holy character of the city of Constantine for both Christianity and Islam is a first element to underline. In both cases, this sacredness has been almost entirely produced by political power. In his article "Constantinople, a Christian Holy City" (1996), Cyril Mango describes this process, which aims to confirm and consolidate the power of the Roman emperors of the East with substantial religious weight (Mango 1996, 7-11;Ousterhout 2006).
In a world in which political power is systematically deified, it is crucial that the capital city is endowed with all required legitimacy in this respect. The advent of Constantinople as a holy city of Christianity clearly serves this political objective. At the beginning of its Christian era, the city (also called New Rome or New Jerusalem) looks like a replica, a bis, of Christianity's main, founding sacred spaces. During the long Byzantine era, it will become emancipated and develop its own geography of loca sancta (Flusin 2000, 51-70). When they settle in the fifteenth century, the Ottomans do exactly as their predecessors did and make their capital one of the holy places of Islam. In the Muslim world, Istanbul, and especially the Eyüp district, is considered a holy site, together with Mecca, Medina, and Jerusalem. Although attributed to Solomoni, mother of the Maccabees, it is also said to belong to Mary Salome, one of the myrrh-bearing women. The patriarchal church also hosts a portion of the column to which Jesus Christ is said to have been bound and whipped before his crucifixion (column of Christ's Flagellation) (Chryssavgis 2014).
The Ottomans, for their part, strictly implemented the same strategy of constituting a high-level reliquary heritage. The "sacred relics of Islam" (kutsal emanetler), kept today at the Topkapı Palace, were collected by the Ottoman sultans between the sixteenth and nineteenth centuries (Davis 1970;Aydın 2004

Itineris Sacrae and Pilgrimages: A Major Economic Product
A second element to be considered as helpful for comprehension is the practice of pilgrimage (or the so called itineris sacrae), which goes back at least to the fourth century in Istanbul. Generally placed under the supervision of the authorities or the communities' organizing bodies, since the very beginning of the Christian era pilgrimages have been strictly controlled activities. They represent a considerable market and, therefore, a valuable economic product. For example, the church of Blachernae and its miraculous source are known to have been the most visited pilgrimage place throughout the whole Empire until the fall of Constantinople in 1453 (Schlumberger 1884;Mango 1998;Papadopoulos 1920 The linguistic landscape in Turkish is also very different. The word hac refers, as the Arabic ḥajj, to the pilgrimage to Mecca. For "pilgrimage" elsewhere than to Mecca, the Turkish word commonly used is ziyaret, which is of Arabic origin, too, and literally means "visit". In everyday life, within the Turkish Muslim world most of the ziyaretçi (pilgrims) worship mainly the yatır (from yatmak, to lie down), that is to say illustrious dead whose actions during their lifetime brought them close to Allah. There are dozens of tombs (türbe) of these yatır throughout Istanbul and its surroundings. They are called adak yerleri, literally "places of vow."

Silent Sources. No Mention of Sharing Sacred Spaces in Nineteenth-Century Greek Written Literature
Available evidence on shared practices within the nineteenth-century written production in the Greek language is another useful element to take into account. Until the end of the imperial era (1918), Orthodox Greeks represented not only the most numerous Christian community of the Ottoman capital but also the most ancient and historic one; this is why their positioning towards sharing places of worship is highly significant.
For Istanbul Greeks, the long nineteenth century is a period of prosperity from all points of view, economic, demographic, and intellectual. It is, in particular, a period of intense editorial activity. A number of books, newspapers, and periodicals were published in the Greek language in Constantinople. 8 In this literature, the presentation of places of worship is prominent. The objective is evidently to patrimonialize, that is to say to create a collective awareness of centuries-old roots on the spot, especially for those Istanbul Greeks who came from the provinces (and settled as new immigrants) (Anastassiadou 2009a). Greek intellectuals are not necessarily conscious of their effort to transmit to their coreligionists a sense of "ownership" towards the orthodox sacred spaces throughout the city.  Hasluck explains this (Hasluck 1929, 320-321): In Turkey, generally, Khidr seems to be a vague personality conceived of mainly as a helper in sudden need, especially of travellers. He has been identified with various figures of the Old Testament, notably with Elias of whom he is considered a reincarnation, and with the Orthodox St George, whose day…he has taken over; the characteristics he has borrowed from St George include the reputation of a dragonslayer, which St George himself may have borrowed from a pagan predecessor.
Whatever the link between Hıderellez and St George is, their feasts occured on the same date (April 23, according to the Julian calendar), at the very moment of the Pleiades constellation's appearance in the sky (Gökalp 1978
The first is linked to spring and revival; the second brings rain. Hıderellez is also the first day of the warm season. On the joint feast of Hıderellez and St Georges, see Hasluck 1929, 48, 321;Doumanis 2012, 125-127. one, 14 albeit without changing the feast dates of its numerous saints; April 23 is still the St. George day. However, between the two calendars (Julian and Gregorian/revised Julian, known as old and new in the Orthodox world 15 ) there is presently a difference of 13 days. This is why nowadays Hıderellez, which follows the Pleiades movement, is celebrated on May 5/6.

sharing sacred spaces during the second Half of the twentieth century
Since the Second World War, the visibility of "shared" places of worship in Istanbul has unceasingly grown. When there is "sharing", that is to say worshippers from different religions, a source of water almost always dominates the space; and not ordinary sources, but "holy" ones, with "proved" therapeutic and miraculous qualities.
Water sources abound in Istanbul-and this is a geological characteristic! They appear, disappear, and reappear through the centuries and represent major landmarks, material and mental ones, for the city's successive occupants. In his book published in 1990, Nikos Atzemoglou claims to have identified and inventoried more than 500 sources, but estimates that the total number probably exceeds one thousand holy springs throughout the agglomeration (Atzemoglou 1990; see also Kourilas 1958 seek to communicate with people gone or dead, but also to get back a lost object (Alus n.d.). Those who suffer from jaundice go to the baths (hammam) of the Süleymaniye mosque: 16 here, it is more the bowl used for drinking than the water itself which is efficient.
It is to be observed that wells (or fountains) and sources generate diametrically opposite actions. In the first case, the visitor / pilgrim throws in an object (a stone or coin) but has no direct contact with the water. In the second case, the water comes to the worshipper and chases suffering away. The difference is obvious.
Ayazmas are a Greek Orthodox specificity in Istanbul. Currently, many located in private spaces (such as gardens, restaurants (!), and houses) are either abandoned or visited only occasionally. A considerable number of ayazmas is also found in churches or their courtyards and maintained by the parishes. Istanbul Greeks still frequent these places, which are usually strongly linked to the community's collective identity or the sense of belonging to the city. Because they are quite a ways away from touristic spots, the ayazmas on the Bosphorus, in particular (Yeniköy, Çengelköy, Arnavutköy, for example), illustrate these "local" pilgrimages well. In the historic center, certain ayazmas interest and attract Christians from outside, pilgrim-tourists who come mainly from Greece but also from other orthodox countries, such as Russia, Romania, Bulgaria, etc. In this respect, the most famous one is, as it was during Byzantine times, the sacred spring in the church of Blachernes on the Golden Horn, not far from Eyüp (Anastassiadou 2014). For the Greeks, wherever they are, this Virgin's shrine is a central piece of their cultural identity. Many of them go not only for the spring but also for the icon of Mary; when they come from far away, they practice what anthropologists call "tourism of memory".
In ayazmas where Muslims come in large numbers, local Greeks remain, if not invisible, at least discreet. Are they reactivating the nineteenth century's reflexes?
Do they abstain from showing up with "others" who represent, as in the last Ottoman phase, a potential danger of conversion? It is also plausible that a massive Muslim presence can be perceived as a desacralizing factor for practicing Christians and transform the religious feast into a folk event.
Whatever the reason, nowadays some popular ayazmas and the churches that house them are pilgrimage places not only for Christians but also for a large number water from the source. Since the last twenty years, the pilgrimage has been strongly supported and advertised through television. Ayo-Yorgi's popularity leads over 40 000 pilgrims and visitors to the island in one single day. This strong affluence of Muslim worshippers underlines the absence of Christians even more. In contrast, the latter, inhabitants of the islands but also Istanbul residents, used to be very present before the 1990s. According to oral testimonies, 19 "in the old times", probably referring to the 1950s and 1960s, the Greeks went up the hill regularly for Easter. Nocturnal processions of Holy Saturday, with lit candles and chanting, have marked the memories of the elders and are repeatedly recounted. It is certainly interesting to note that in these accounts, like in those of the nineteenth century, there is never any Muslim mentioned.
Although Ayo-Yorgi of Prinkipo (the Greek name for Büyükada) has by far become the most mediatized Muslim pilgrimage to a Christian place in Turkey since the 1990s, there are many other sites throughout Istanbul known to be "miraculous" that receive crowds of visitors on certain dates. The installations of all three Orthodox ayazma presented hereafter were destroyed during the events of 1955 (September 6/7, pogrom against the Greeks). 20 They constituted a privileged target for the mob, which apparently did not ignore their extreme symbolic value for Greek collective memory.
The sacred source (ayazma) of Ay-Tarap is one of the oldest pilgrimage places. the Christian Therapon. If this theory is correct, we have here a cult now shared by both religions, whose origins were neither Christian no Mohammedan, but secular… (Hasluck 1929, 87-88).
Officially, from the point of view of the Orthodox Church and according to the Orthodox lives of the saints, Agios Therapon is a seventh-century martyr whose relics had been transported from Cyprus to Constantinople. The ayazma dedicated to him is close to Topkapı Palace. In the 1820s, after significant work, the source's bed was transferred outside of the enclosure of the Saray. Presumably, the place was among the busiest of the city at that time already. In the beginning of the republican era (1920s and 1930s), the Greek school of the neighbourhood (district) was fully financed by the ayazma revenues. During the 1970s and 1980s, a priest met the pilgrims, henceforth Muslims, every Monday afternoon (Atzemoglou 1990, 17-19).
In Kuruçeşme (Xirokrini / Ξηροκρήνη, in Greek), a village on the European shore of the Bosphorus, long queues in front of the church of St. Demetrius (Agios Dimitrios in Greek; Ayo-Dimitri in the local tongue) can be seen on certain days of the year.
Here, the source lies at the end of a 40 meter long narrow and low-ceilinged tunnel that is constantly wet. Water drops (of sacred water!) hang from its rocky walls. When arriving at the source, the pilgrim / visitor is already soaked in ayazma. Those who go to Xirokrini know that the efficiency of their pilgrimage and the fulfillment of their wish require precise rituals. A piece of cloth or a garment has to be left in front of the source when the vow is expressed; until recently, there were rings around the source which mute children were supposed to bite in order to be able to speak again (Atzemoglou 1990, 104).
Open on Thursdays and the first day of every month, the ayazma of Vefa is another Orthodox space of worship extremely fashionable among Muslims nowadays (Atzemoglou 1990, 21-23

concluding remarks
The main observation that emerges from the preceding pages is that popular forms of religiosity are very resistant and part of a remarkable continuity. Continuum and continuity: this is probably the major outcome of this study.
Continuum / continuity with respect to chronic fears (on both sides) of conversion.
A question rarely put in words but present in the mind is whether Muslims who become accustomed to going to Christian sacred places are likely to convert to Christianity.
A constant fear of Christian priests and other clergymen in Turkey is to be accused of proselytism. Although active in Anatolia (and in the southeastern provinces), Protestants have a discreet presence in Istanbul and seem relatively protected against such suspicions. The same is true for Catholics. In practice, the Orthodox-that is to say the Phanar-are potentially the main concern for Islamic religious authorities, because of places of worship which are under their responsibility and attract masses of Muslim pilgrims. This is why the Church of Constantinople strictly controls such activities. 23

23
Concretely, when people start going to "others' religious places", they are probably, in the beginning, only pushed by curiosity. But this curiosity can create religious complicity likely to lead to conversion. The opacity on the subject is nearly total. Impossible to say how many are those Continuum / continuity also as regards the relationship between shared practices or spaces and public authorities. As already stated, since the very founding of the city, religious activity in Istanbul has always been under state scrutiny. When looking at the present situation, we can remark that Ankara has the same attitude towards the religious practices of Muslims on Christian places as the Ottomans did towards all kinds of social deviance (begging, prostitution, vagrancy 24 ): be watchful, organize, and to monitor in order not to lose control. Even if official Islam does not approve of either the candles lit in front of Christian holy icons or the prayers Orthodox priests address to Muslims, it turns a blind eye-at least as long as boundaries of strictly religious practices are not transgressed.
Continuum / continuity finally as to the national narrative. Recall that "cultural diversity" was introduced into national discourse from the beginning of modern Turkey onwards. Despite the nation-building process, it is in accordance with an official ideology. Even the Kemalist authorities sought to stress the multicultural roots of Turkey and to support the idea of Anatolia as the cradle of civilisations. 25 In twenty-first-century Turkey, cultural diversity is an Ottoman heritage, all the more precious as it underlines the legitimacy of the Turkish state to claim the exclusivity of the imperial succession. It recalls the tolerance and magnanimity of the Ottomans towards their zimmis that Ankara takes into account to better highlight the superiority and supremacy of Islam. In this context and during the same period (2005) 25 Mustafa Kemal himself largely promoted this idea since the very beginning of the Turkish Republic.
Over sixty years later, Turgut Özal (Turkey's prime minister and president in the 1980s) developed and elaborated it in his La Turquie en Europe (Özal 1988).