Fethullah Gulen: There has never been an alliance, a sincere alliance, in the sense of a political alliance between us. The true nature of this relationship is as such that they have promised to uphold the rule of law, justice. They promised to respect the diversity of opinions. They promised to respect religious freedom. We have not changed our position, our core values, but they made a U-turn. …
The two men with the most power in Turkey are President Tayyib Erdoǧan, and religious leader Fethullah Gűlen. The former is the founder and long-time former leader of the AKP and former Prime Minister. The latter, a Sufi theologian known reverentially as Hocaefendi (respected teacher) to his millions of followers, inspired a civil society humanitarian movement, called Hizmet. …
In Gulen's approach to Islam, there is no place for a political organization. He is strongly against using services (Hizmet) as a means to gain worldly or political benefits. Gulen advocates understanding Islam as a religion with its basic precepts within the immutable framework.…
Its institutions and actors continue to initiate new mediations of liberalism and Islam, even as they simultaneously remain subject to the powers of doubt and suspicion that liberalism engenders.…
Even though Hizmet views itself as a proponent of civil society, its work certainly has political ramifications. It is a faith-based movement, although scrupulous in presenting itself as having no religious agenda at all; it is strictly a civil society initiative.…
In addition, Fethullah Gülen is critical of the instrumentalization of religion in politics, and has no direct participation in party politics because the modern world exists in a pluralistic experience rather than within an assumed homogeneity of truth. He is against those who have created a negative image of Islam by reducing Islam to an ideology. Through words and deeds he underlines the distinction between Islam, a religion, and Islamism, a profoundly radical political ideology that seeks to replace existing states and political structures, either through revolutionary or evolutionary means.…
The Civil Islam of Hizmet once more verifies the movement’s anti-Islamist stance. The politicization of Islam is a dangerous path, one that could lead to totalitarian control of the state by giving ambitious men the religious license they seek to undermine the civil society and the separation of government powers that constrains them. If Turkey is to pull back from its current drift toward Islamist autocracy, then its citizens will need to resist the instrumentalization of religion for worldly power and demonstrate the compatibility of Islam with civil democratic modernity.…
Throughout Gülen’s teaching, one can see an abiding concern with fostering a communitarian ethos that aims to improve modern society through the revitalization of Islamic spiritualism, individual religious piety and service to others. Gülen’s ideas are effective in practice because they have rationalized religious ideals and shown their core compatibility with secular interests. This is a projection of worldly mysticism onto his understanding of secularism.…
It is on this basis that the Hizmet movement has competed directly with the revolutionary and authoritarian ideas of Islamists. The religious attitude of Civil Islam rejects the politicized doctrine and the “us vs. them” approach of Islamists, and instead stresses the importance of living Islam through sincerity, honesty, personal piety, and through selfless service to others through modern civil society.…
Is the Gulen Movement an alternative to the state? Fethullah Gulen: "The state is an important institution for the nation. The worst government is better than having no government at all." I repeated these maybe 30 times: Not accepting the state is the source of anarchy. If you want to do something positive by any means, in the end you have to lean on a state. …