UNDERSTANDING THE GREEKS OF TURKEY

Today’s Zaman
14 October 2009, Wednesday

Understanding the Greeks of Turkey – Being in Turkey, cultural and
religious diversity is definitely an issue worth exploring. The
colorful mix of mosques, synagogues and churches, often found
side-by-side on a single street, probably fascinates many visitors —
and it still says much about the multitude of different communities
that have shaped life in the region over the past centuries.

Being in Turkey, cultural and religious diversity is definitely
an issue worth exploring. The colorful mix of mosques, synagogues
and churches, often found side-by-side on a single street, probably
fascinates many visitors — and it still says much about the multitude
of different communities that have shaped life in the region over
the past centuries.

This week, Today’s Zaman wants to have a look at the Turkish Greek
community in particular. Along with the Armenians and Jews, they
form one of the three minorities officially recognized by today’s
Turkish government.

But how did it actually come to that? The Greek minority in Turkey
is a remnant of a once much larger community — the so-named Greek
Orthodox Church, a Christian denomination which today comprises
five administrative jurisdictions: the Ecumenical Patriarchate
of Constantinople (now Istanbul), the Patriarchate of Alexandria,
the Patriarchate of Jerusalem, the Church of Cyprus and the Church
of Greece. Within the larger communion of Orthodox churches, which
all emerged in the early years of the Byzantine Empire, these five
churches share a common cultural tradition and conduct their liturgy
in Koine Greek, the original language of the New Testament.

During the time of the Ottoman Empire, the Greek Orthodox Christians
were recognized as a separate "millet," a kind of legally protected
religious minority group in the empire’s governmental system. They
were free to run their own religious, cultural and educational
institutions and thus soon came to play a significant role in the
social, p c life of the empire. Especially in the 17th and 18th
centuries, actually a period of apparent decline and loss of power for
the Ottomans, the Greeks were sought after for their administrative,
technical and financial skills. The Phanariotes especially, a class
of wealthy Greeks of Byzantine aristocratic origin who lived in the
Phanar (now Fener) district of Constantinople, became increasingly
powerful as merchants, bankers and diplomats and went on to exercise
great influence in the administration of the Ottoman Empire’s Balkan
domains in particular. It is said that a good 1,700 Greeks filled
some of the highest offices of the Ottoman state at that time.

The leader of the Greek community within the empire officially became
the ecumenical patriarch of the Greek Orthodox Church, which was moved
to the Fener district in 1586, to the Church of St. George. In fact,
at that time the sultan regarded the ecumenical patriarch as the leader
of all Orthodox people, Greeks or not, within the empire and thus, it
had, indeed, considerable financial and political influence. Today,
the patriarchate complex includes the authorization offices, the
patriarchate library, the financial offices and the public enterprises
of the patriarchate and the Cathedral Church of St. George. The
church is definitely worth visiting. It is especially famous for its
priceless artifacts and relics, which include the patriarchal throne,
believed to date from the fifth century; three rare mosaic icons;
a fragment of the Pillar of the Flagellation to which Jesus was tied
and whipped; and the coffins of three saints.

Still, the Fener district is surely one of the most fruitful places
for those keen on discovering the Greek Orthodox past and present
in Turkey. The Greek High School for Boys on the top of Fener hill,
for instance, has always been an important educational institution
to educate young Greeks for Ottoman bureaucracy and orthodox clergy
as well. The Yoakimyon High School for Girls and Marasli Greek
Elementary School next to the patriarchate can also be found in
the district. Further on you will come across a couple of smaller,
more or less well-preserved churches, and you can still find a few
of the typical, small Greek single-family houses, recognizable by
their finely decorated facades.

Indeed, Greek life was flourishing under Ottoman rule, and it
was not only restricted to Istanbul. Great numbers of Greeks also
lived in Thrace and in Asia Minor, around the Mediterranean shore in
particular. All together they formed an estimated 2.5 million at the
end of the empire.

However, something was about to change. Resentment between t er been
uncommon and increased noticeably. The patriarch couldn’t encourage
projects of Greek renaissance and dreams of former Byzantine nobility
in the face of the Ottoman Empire’s increasing loss of power at the
end of the 20th century.

Already apparent in the late 19th century, political instability,
dire economic conditions and continuing ethnic tensions prompted the
emigration of many Greeks to other countries. Thus, by the time the
agreement for the so-called population exchange was signed between the
governments of Greece and Turkey in 1923 to end the Greco-Turkish War
and to constitute the borders of the newly founded republic under the
Treaty of Lausanne, many Greeks had already fled the country. However,
the treaty included further exchanges and the expulsion of about
500,000 Turks from Greece and about 1,500,000 Greeks from Asia Minor
and eastern Thrace to Greece. An estimated 200,000 Greeks located in
Ä°stanbul and eastern Thrace were permitted to stay.

Experience Turkish-Greek history in Kayaköy

Still, these events are a very complicated chapter in Turkish-Greek
relations and they were surely linked to much suffering — on both
sides. Those, however, who want to dig a bit deeper into the whole
matter may travel to a small place named Kayaköy, located a good 10
kilometers from Fethiye on the Turkish Mediterranean coast. A ghost
town and museum village today, its ruins still tell the story of
its former mainly Greek inhabitants, who had to leave the place in
the course of these historic events. Prepare yourself with the novel
"Birds without Wings," written by Louis de Berniéres in 2004. The
fascinating novel tells the fictive story of Kayaköy based on very
well-researched and sensitively prepared historical background facts.

Today, according to a report on religious minorities in Turkey
prepared by the Turkish Foreign Ministry in December 2008, there are
around 3,000-4,000 Greeks left in Turkey today, the majority of whom
reside in Ä°stanbul, as well as on the two islands at the western e
" and "Tenedos" in Greek language), and on the Princes’ Islands —
the places which had been excluded at that time from the population
exchange. All in all, the community runs some 108 churches, 90 of
which are open for worship, and currently has 15 elementary schools
and six high schools in use, all of which are located in Ä°stanbul.