Dervish Bektashi Gems – Poems

«… Thus, instead of the master-subject relationship between God and Man, Bektashi anecdotes wish to introduce a relationship between two friendly beings who converse comfortably and who tolerate each other. In the Bektashi anecdotes, the roots of the jokes framed within daily incidents extend to a distant past and these metaphysical ideas. The genial personality of the Bektashi of our recent times can, in a sense, be considered to descend from the lineage of eloquent men such as Celaleddin of Konya, Yunus of Sakarya and Bedreddin of Simavna, who since 13th century did not hold back from expressing free ideas.» Prof. Pertev Naili Boratav