Power of wisdom in Ottoman Palestine

Bahrain Tribune, Bahrain
Nov 22 2004

The recently-concluded photographic exhibition on Ottoman Palestine
stood out as a scholarly study, providing a testament to the Ottoman
society’s dynamism and the capacity for change, and bringing to
the fore important and much-overlooked fascinating aspects of an
outstanding era, writes gopal kejriwal.

The Ottomans were able to think because they had wisdom, because they
had power. There never seemed to be the problem of how to exercise
power to achieve its responsible role – to do more good – rather than
its irresponsible and indulgent use, of how to get the authority to
live for rather than off the public.

A total of 104 photographs and photocopies of 18 written documents
vouchsafed the most revolutionary record of lasting peace and freedom
(you cannot separate peace from freedom because no one can be at peace
unless he has his freedom) that marked the mighty Ottoman Empire and
its rule on Palestine for over 400 years – almost uninterrupted. The
empire’s power consisted in its capacity to link its will with the
purpose of others, to rule and lead by reason, cooperation and trust.

Small though, the displays at Beit Al Quran provided glimpses into
the complexities and the psyche of the ruler and the ruled in all
bitter-sweet aspects.

The gallery – of freedom, harmony, camaraderie and community spirit
that co-existed in Palestine between 1850 and 1919 – highlighted the
irrefutable fact that peace is not an absence of war but is a virtue,
a state of mind, a disposition for benevolence, confidence and justice.

This peace – which was achieved through enlightenment and educating
people to behave more in a noble manner – lived for centuries with
honours and glories of its own, unattended by the dangers of war.
It was a gallery of people of individual honour and personal character,
of independence, of the faces of humanity without mask. There were
no masters, no dictators, no champions. There was no servitude.

With the well-preserved black and white photographs of water-carriers,
Siloam women selling vegetables or melons, philanthropist Shaikh Noury
offering food to passers-by, gypsies, people in boats in Engaddi/Arnon,
fishermen clattering their plates like cymbals, pilgrims inching their
way through the Lion’s and the Damascus gates, the celebration of the
renewal of Jerusalem water pipeline – the gallery was an opportunity
for one-to-one conversations with the elite and the ordinary –
for an exchange of thought and not an eloquent exhibition of wit
or oratory. Every citizen dutifully gave validity to his or her
convictions, beliefs and philosophy.

The still moments all over the halls carried in them infinite space,
and this infinite space was infinitely exhibited – as the everlasting
joy.

Hats off to the Turkish embassy for mining the sources intelligently
and the judicious selection of the photographs from the collection
of Turkish Consulate General in Jerusalem – to capture the spirits
of Ottoman Palestine.

“Of an estimated 15,000 photographs in existence – until the end of
the Ottoman period in Palestine – the Consulate General has acquired
copies of 1,500 after years of painstaking search of the archives of
Orient House, the Arab Studies Society and other local institutions as
well as private family albums,” the Director of Museum at the centre,
Ashraf Al Ansari, tells me.

The photographs – faces, landscapes, town scenes, holy places – also
captured the fabric of the communities, their unity in diversity, the
social, economic and cultural life, the Ottoman Turkish architectural
imprint on monuments and structures. The documents, provided by the
Ottoman Archives Department of the Directorate General of the State
Archives of the Prime Ministry of the Republic of Turkey, depicted the
social and administrative aspects of Ottoman governance in Palestine
– a place which had remained one of the most important districts of
the empire from 1517 until the end of World War I. The most important
document was the ferman (ordinance) of Fatih Sultan Mehmet guaranteeing
religious freedom to all the clergymen from different religions in
Al Quds in 1457 – and affirming that the empire was one of the most
tolerant in the world.

“Unlike the preceding rulers, the Ottomans allowed the majority of
Muslims and Christian Arabs as well as minorities such as Jews,
Circassians, Druses, Serbs, Assyrians, Armenians and Turks to
peacefully coexist – as a natural right – regardless of their religious
or ethnic backgrounds,” Al Ansari says. The population also included
large groups of foreign missionaries, teachers and fringe groups of
Christians and Jewish refugees.

In support of his argument, Al Ansari points to another ordinance
(issued on August 31, 1565) on keeping of the holy places in Al
Quds such as Mariam’s Tomb and Qadem Isa clean and the prevention of
improper acts on such sites.

“Most of the inhabitants, Arabic speaking Christians and Muslims,
lived in a few hundred villages with self-sufficiency. The elite
lived in the towns and were different from the subjects in the
villages. The high priests were often Greek though the congregation
was Arabian. The landowners were often Turks,” Al Ansari says. The
Arabs formed an important part of the structure of the empire and
the Ottoman Constitution provided for one form of government of all
Ottoman territories and people.

The state never prevented any of the Christian communities from
exercising their historically acknowledged rights of free passage
into Jerusalem nor interfered in any way with their religious conduct,
he says.

Further evidence that the empire kept to its contract with the
People of the Book is provided in church documents which reveal the
systematic building, renovation and upkeep of churches and monasteries
in Jerusalem and beyond. One fine example is the permission to the
Armenian Catholic community in Jerusalem in 1887 to build a church
even though the community comprised just four households of 22 men
and women.

No visitor to the exhibition would miss the eclectic social milieu
and its various moods – a man selling ice-cream in Jerusalem (1917),
a local Arab pasha in full Ottoman Army insignia (1900) children
watching through the magic box (1919), an American cavasse (1905) the
cattle market in the Sultan’s pool (1900), a Samaritan with a scroll
(1901). More, a 1918 photograph of a women’s union making handicrafts
in Ramallah is perhaps the best evidence of women’s emancipation as
they were allowed to earn a living with a condition of not getting
involved with men. The sorts of employment were embroidery and weaving.

Education was another priority of the empire which encouraged the
teaching of both Arabic and English languages by opening Arab Primary
School, Friends School in Ramallah, and many others.

Other achievements include the opening of a railway line between
Jerusalem and Jaffa in 1892, the completion of the first major highway
joining the two cities in 1867, the inauguration of the town hospital
in 1891 in the west side of Jerusalem and the first windmill in 1839,
the renovation of the Citadel near Jaffa, adding a few adjoining
structures, and the Clock Tower, the magnificent square tower with
four huge towers at the top of each side that was built in 1909 on top
of Jaffa Gate as a memorial to the British conquest during World War I.

In 1863, the local authority ordered the removal of all market
platforms to create space for pedestrians and in 1885, old tiles
were replaced in all of the City’s alleys and main streets, with the
provision of side channels for drainage.

The empire has gone, but the holy territories have retained to date
some of its remarkable features in the daily socio-cultural life
in Palestine. The Ottoman concept remains in the memories of the
Palestinians.

The exhibition succeeded in its aim – if it was to depict the
remarkable cultural ebb and flow, which characterised the Ottoman
period, if it was to find out hints from the Ottoman rule in this
territory so that they could be feasible examples for the present day,
if it was to remember the longest stable period of the Palestinian
history with respect.

The exhibition stood out as a scholarly study, providing a testament
to the Ottoman society’s dynamism and the capacity for change,
and bringing to the fore important and much-overlooked fascinating
aspects of the period.

A walk through the gallery was like a visit to the Holy Land. At the
same time, it was a reminder of her spirit as a land of peace and
the possibility and hope for a better future.

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress