Reflections on the Trip of a Lifetime: Day 7 Mevlana Museum, Pisidian Antioch

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Mevlana Museum, Pisidian Antioch

IMG_6612Beforehand, I would have expected Mevlana Museum to be irrelevant, and Pisidian Antioch to be somewhat interesting. At the end of the day I had been somewhat disappointed by Pisidian Antioch, but was incredibly grateful for the visit to Mevlana Museum.

 


 

Mevlana Museum

The “Whirling Dervishes” as far as I knew, were those little dusty whirlwinds that you see in the desert, and I didn’t recognise the name, “Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi”. I learned a lot this day!

IMG_6553The Dervishes were a religious order, effectively like monks. Their characteristic “whirl” is a trance-like dance in which they spin for about ten minutes and then suddenly stop, bow, and begin spinning again. Basically, that is impossible to do without falling over!

It’s a kind of meditation and spiritual discipline.


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Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi, was, in fact, already known to me, but only as “Rumi”, the Sufi poet and mystic. I did not know that he had founded the order of the Dervishes, and the penny dropped as we started learning about his life and times. The Melvana Museum contains, among other things, a tomb of Rumi (also called Melvana). It was the Muslim equivalent of a monastry.

A friend of mine gave me a book of Rumi’s poetry a couple of years ago. I could see at the time that Rumi was essentially an Islamic poet, but I was struck by how much of it was agreeable in Christian terms. Rumi contemplates a range of spiritual questions in poetry, but none more so than the love of God.

It later became evident to me that the works of Rumi provide a bridge between myself and the Islamic world. I have committed to becoming increasingly familiar with Rumi’s writings so that I can say in the same way Paul did in Athens, “as even some of your own poets have said…” (Acts 17:28), and then quote Rumi!

Pisidian Antioch

I confess to being disappointed at first.

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Primarily I was disappointed by the state of this archaeological site! There were important pieces just lying around, one with an inscription had been placed upside down, and it seemed that no care was being taken either to maintain or protect the site. The contrast to the sites we had seen in Greece was stark! The Greek sites were carefully fenced off, and guards often accompanied the tour group to ensure that the site was treated with respect.

The only readily recognisable feature of the site (for anyone who wasn’t there), from my photographs was the theatre.

Afterwards it became more apparent that the lack of attention was probably primarily due to a lack of financial means, rather than a lack of motivation. There were other sites which were better maintained, and they had foreign teams providing money. The same was true for the Greek sites, in that they were heavily funded by foreign money.

When I realised this, I overcame my misgivings. I had unfairly accused the Turks (privately) of disrespecting this site. It wasn’t a fair judgement.

2014-01-17 08.24.49That night we stayed in Pamukkale, and enjoyed a bath in natural hot spring water!

Not the one pictured, but one underneath it, in an underground complex. This is central Turkey in the middle of winter… we had very mild weather, but it probably got down close to 0 degrees overnight.

The one pictured would be popular in the summer, which is peak tourist season.


 

Engagement with the Text

The text for the day was Acts 13, in which Paul travels from Syrian Antioch to Pisidian Antioch and begins preaching the Gospel there. It is a (effectively the first) major push into new territory for the Gospel.

Paul’s word is received in the synagogue reasonably well at first, but the next week when “almost the whole city” (v44) came to hear the message, the Jews were “filled with jealousy” (v45).

I strongly suspect that this jealousy had nothing to do with the size of the crowd, but was instead a “jealousy” which related to the inclusion of Gentiles in the audience and, as we subsequently find out, in the message as well! This was scandalous to the Jewish thinkers of the day, and very difficult for them to comprehend. This issue would dominate Paul’s whole ministry, resulting in many beatings and indignations, eventually landing him in chains before the Roman emperor!


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