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27.04.2009

ON THE MANIFESTATION OF ARMENIAN DESCENT IN TURKEY

   

Ruben Melkonyan

Patriarch Shnorhk (original)The problem of Armenian women and girls captured by Muslims during the Armenian Genocide has been in the spotlight of Turkish scientific and literature circles, especially in recent period, and this brings forward both news and questions. Mainly in the eastern parts of Turkey, i.e. in a number of places of historical Armenia, rather often people are met who state that they have Armenian ancestors. The issue of Islamized Armenian women has provided the material for contemporary Turkish literature. And one can even speak about the formation of a definite literary theme. There is rather vast stratum of people who was born as the result of the mixed marriages between forcibly Islamized Armenian girls and women and the Muslims who captured them, and among those people the searching of their roots and the crisis of the identity can also be observed. This delicate for Turkey question became widespread and along with the being made public it brings forward new realias, casts a light upon concealed family stories, and very often upon the personal tragedies.

It seems that the theme of ethnic origin, at the same time, touched on almost every strata of Turkish society. The names of several Turkish spiritual leaders are also mentioned in the context of the issue of Armenian origin and this becomes an all-Turkish issue.

Several years ago the issue that the 82nd Armenian Patriarch of Istanbul Shnorhq Galustyan and the chairman of The Committee on Religious Issues (the spiritual leader of Turkish Muslims) Lutfi Dogan are step-brothers became a subject of wide speculations. It was mentioned that during the Armenian Genocide in 1915 the mother of future Shnorhq Patriarch Shushan Gultane was captured by a Muslim Turk and one of their children became a leader of Turkish Muslims in 1970th. According to numerous sources it had been much spoken about their being step-brothers in the Istanbul Armenian community for decades, but this issue raised a hell when in September 2005 an interview of the leader of the German Diocese of Armenian Apostolic church Garegin Bekchyan was published in “Yeli Aktuel” newspaper. He made the following statement: ”Patriarch Shnorhq told me that his mother had been captured (in 1915) and he appeared in the orphanage. His mother latter married the Muslim who captured her and they had two or three children, and one of them was the chairman of the administration on the religious issues Lutfi Dogan”. Bekchyan also added that her Muslim children, including Lutfi Dagan, also attended his mother’s funeral. At that time many people used to say: “She was saint; she has two sons: one of them is the Christian patriarch and the other is a spiritual leader of the Muslims”. This material of “Yeni Aktuel” was re-published by a number of Turkish newspapers and became the main topic under discussion. The resonance lasted for quite a long time and even today it can be heard.

It should be mentioned that the administration on the religious issues of Turkey was headed by two Lutfi Dogans, and they followed one another. After the publication of that news the question emerged, which one of Lutfi Dogans (the 10th or the 11th religious leader) is a step-brother of Patriarch Shnorhq. Let us also add that both former religious leaders immediately denied the news of their Armenian descent, but it is remarkable that they both regarded it as an insult. There were even talks about the prosecuting the claim. Besides, as they were the opponents, they tried to use the statement of the Armenian descent for their purpose and they both stated that the other Lutfi Dogan had an Armenian descent. If we take parallels between the realities of today’s Turkey, we shall see the similarities.

Many people commented on that issue, but even earlier Patriarch of blessed memory turned to that dark page of his family history. Thus, in 1965, the 50th anniversary of the Genocide, Turkish journalists directly asked Patriarch Shnorhq whether there had been any Genocide. For all the Armenian patriarchs of the republican period that question was one of the most difficult ones and they needed diplomatic skills to avoid answering that question. Shnorhq shirked the question saying that he is not a historian and let the historians answer that question. But when Turkish journalists repeated their question patriarch said: “In 1915 I was seven years old. From our kin, which consisted of 70 persons, only me and my mother survived. During the deportation I had lost my mother too. Now you answer me, where are my relatives? If you can answer this then you get the answer whether there was any Genocide or not”.

The present Patriarch of Istanbul Mesrop Mutafyan also touched upon the issue of Patriarch Shnorhq’s family in detail in 2005. According to Patriarch Mesrop none of Lutfi Dogan is a step-brother of Patriarch Shnorhq: “Patriarch Shnorhq’s father Mihran moved from Sebastia to the village of Igdel in Yogghat. The Galustyans were one of the respected and noble families in the village and Patriarch’s mother was from the village of Bebek in Yogghat. Her name was not Guldane but Shushan Gultane. If I am not mistaken in 1908 she came to Igdel and married Mihran Galustyan. There were four children of that marriage: Anush, Shnorhik, Armen and Arshak (later Patriarch Shnorhq). Anush died at the age of two from an illness. During the massacre in Igdel Mihran Galustyan, his brothers and all the relatives were killed. Patriarch Shnorhq said that their mass grave was by the ravine not far from the village. Some people even call that place Bloody ravine (qanl dere in Turkish). The widow Shushan Gultane with her three children was taken as a second wife by their neighbour Haji Ali Dogan. Shushan with her children lived on the ground floor of her husband Mihran’s robbed house”. Mesrop Mutafyan thinks that it is unlikely that Lutfi Dogan and Patriarch Shnorhq were brothers because Shushan Gultane had no son of the second marriage. But the following is remarkable: Mesrop Mutafyan mentioned that Shushan Galustyan was worried Muslims in their village can treat badly her children and might harm them, that is why, she was looking for the way to save them. At first she sent her elder son Armen to the orphanage in Talas and in a year and a half after that she let the relatives of her killed husband know that she sent to Talas orphanage her second son Arshak. In 1923 the elder son Armen fell ill and died. American Protestant missionary took Arshak to the orphanage near Beirut and then to another orphanage in Nazareth in Palestine. In 1927 Arshak Galustyan enters the seminary of the Armenian Diocese in Jerusalem and in 1935 taking the name of Shnorhk became a clergyman. In 1955 after he had been consecrated in Etchmiadzin, he returned to Istanbul and in 33 years visited his native land and met his mother.

During those active discussions the nephew of Patriarch Shnorhq, his step-sister’s son Hanifi Ylmaz, who lived in village of Igdel (the native village of the Patriarch), also commented on that issue. He also stated that Lutfi Dogan was not the step-brother of Shnorhq Galustyan and that entire story might be connected with the fact that the surname of Shushan’s second husband had also been Dogan. The Muslim nephew of the Patriarch had also told that his grandmother (the mother of Patriarch) had adopted Islam after her second marriage. According to Hanifi Ylmaz: “Our uncle also knows that” (i.e. Patriarch Shnorhq R.M.). Hanifi Ylmaz told that in Istanbul Shushan had been visited by her daughter from the second marriage Hanimkiz to whom Shushan Gultane allegedly told that she was still a true Muslim and Patriarch Shnorhq knew about it, but she did not show it openly and followed secretly all the Muslim traditions because she did not want it to make any harm to her son, i.e. she is a kind of crypto-Muslim.

It should be mentioned that this episode from the life of Shushan Gultane is worth of special mentioning; it is known that after the death of her husband she was Islamized and called Gulkiz. But the present Patriarch of Istanbul Mesrop Mutafyan mentioned in his interview, that 1959, when bishop Shnorhq was the Deputy Patriarch of Jerusalem, his mother Shushan Gultane went to Jerusalem and became a palmer, lived in Srb. Hakob Armenian church. In 1961 Archbishop Shnorhq was elected as the Armenian Patriarch of Istanbul. After that his mother moved to Patriarchate and lived with her son. “Every Sunday, as far as health permitted, she visited with her son churches and personally took part in the liturgy. That is why the rumours about her being a crypto-Muslim are a bit strange”, – thinks Mesrop Mutafyan. It is also known that till death Patriarch’s mother had lived with her son, was buried at the Armenian cemetery, there are even some information from Armenian press regarding her funeral ceremony. That means that it would very realistic to suppose that she had re-converted Christianity, and if she were a Muslim then she would not have been aloud to have a Christian burial at the Armenian cemetery.

The facts presented really refute the kinship of Patriarch Shnorhq and the leader of the Muslims in Turkey. According to Hrant Dink: “At last the rumours, which had circulated in the Armenian community for decades, were quieted, but it also became clear that the Patriarch had Muslim relatives”. As a result of this scandal the editor-in-chief of “Yeni Aktuel” magazine resigned. And recently the comment of Garegin Bekchayn relating that issue emerged. He still insists that the story was told him by the Patriarch Shnorhq.

But even after the aforementioned explanations the rumours that one of the Turkish religious leaders had Armenian roots did not stop circulating, and in the days of the fuss connected with the Patriarch Shnorhq Tukish professor Zekeria Beyaz stated that in reality the mother on the 12th Turkish religious leader Suleyman Ates was Armenian. Even more, according to the professor, Suleyman Ates spoke positively about Christianity and thus he served to the Armenian lobby. Some time later Suleyman Yesilyut, who is known for his radical nationalist views, also joined him: in his book “The Armenian and the Greek converts from the past and up to the present days”, published in 2007, he spoke in detail about the Armenian roots of Suleyman Ates. Let us mention that this book, which has scientific pretensions, is full of so called “facts” and “disclosures”. And, in general, in his book the author blames of the faith conversion only victims and not the Turkish state, which had arranged all that and forced them to make that step.

That very Suleyman Yesilyut states that studying different sources he found out the following: Doctor, Professor Suleyman Ates was born on January 31, 1933 in the village of Tadim in Elyazig (Kharberd). His father was Ibrahim Agaha and mother was Beti, Armenian whose parents had left her to one of the Turkish families during the “exile” in 1915. Later Beti married Ibrahim Agha, who was believed to be a religious person and renamed, getting Muslim name Behiye. The Islamized Behiye had two sons Suleyman and Yavuz. Suleyman from the childhood was getting the Islamic education. He entered and finished the department of divinity of the University of Ankara, then defended dissertation, became a doctor and letter professor. In 1976 the new coalition government, which came to power, dismissed the 11th head of the administration on the religious issues of Turkey Lufti Dogan, who was supposed to be the Left and appointed Suleyman Ates in his place. Even at that time the rumours that his mother was Armenian emerged. There was even the opinion spread that the Left head of the administration was replaced by the Armenian. In 1978 the new government, which came to power, dismissed Suleyman Ates, who returned to his work in the university. In the past the rumours about the Armenian descent of his mother caused a stir and later everything calmed down. But after Garegin Bekchyan’s interview that question was again manipulated. It is interesting that Suleyman Ates refutes the Armenian descent of his mother, but his brother Yavuz, who lives in Kharberd, in his interview said: “Yes, my mother is of Armenian descent, but she lived her whole life as a true Muslim”.

All these are the manifestations of the “ethnic origin illness”, which is widely spread in Turkey. Turning to that problem one of the Turkish newspapers expressed an interesting idea: “Today, those who call for the struggle against Armenians should be ready for the surprises, because those people, who came from the places where the massacre had been, cannot be sure in their descent either”, Recently an Armenian from Istanbul Alin Tapchayn touched on the widespread habit to use Armenian descent as an “accusation” saying with sarcasm that one of the obvious benefits of being non-hidden Armenian was that nobody would “blame” you of being Armenian.

It is well-known that during the Genocide captured Armenian women were forced to adopt Islam and Patriarch Shnorhq’s mother Shushan Gultane was not an exception. But when occasion offered, even in her declining years, she returned to her roots, Chrisitanity, and thousands of Armenian women who suffered the same fate, had not been offered such an occasion and kept the secret of their being the Armenian and their memories up to the end of their lives. Besides, they were in rather difficult psychological condition and faced very hard choice: either stay in their new forced families and to take care of their children, born from those who had captured them or to escape. That difficult choice and maternal instinct made them self-sacrifice and suffer their whole lives. The facts show that the mother of Patriarch Shnorhq wanted to save her children at any cost and she could do that only on one condition and her daughter Shnorhik, who stayed in the village, married a Kurd. Here one can distinctly see that even after the being forcibly Islamized the feeling of their being Armenian did not disappear within the Armenian women. And it is enough to mention that one of the most outstanding leaders of the Armenian Apostolic Church of Istanbul Patriarch Shnorhq was a son of such a woman. That is, we can once more see that in case of the Islamized Armenians the circumstances are very important and it is at least wrong to take a negating stance towards everybody.


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