Why This Text
This essay grew out of recurring questions I have been asked in recent years about Mevlevi-related initiatives, representation, and authority in the Netherlands. These questions are rarely about personal integrity. They are almost always about position:
who speaks on behalf of whom, on what grounds, and within which framework?
I write this not as an outsider, but from lived involvement and experience — including my own hesitation, withdrawal, and reassessment. What follows is not an indictment, but an attempt at clarification. Not to draw boundaries on behalf of a tradition, but to make visible distinctions where those distinctions risk becoming blurred.
On Mevlevi heritage, contemporary representation, and the necessity of discernment
Over the years, questions about contemporary Mevlevi initiatives in the Netherlands have continued to surface. They rarely concern sincerity, but rather authority: how it arises, how it is framed, and how it is legitimized.
Their persistence points to a broader tension between tradition and modernity, in which inspiration can gradually — and often unintentionally — turn into authority.
Participation is not transmission
Before 2011, an open group met around Rumi and the Sufi tradition in which I was involved. It was explicitly not a tekke in the historical sense, but a space for encounter, study, and exchange. People came and went, brought their own questions, and carried inspiration back into their lives.
Yıldırım Ekin was part of this group during that period. Only later did it become clear that ideas and approaches from these meetings were used to initiate a separate group in Amsterdam. In itself, this is not problematic — inspiration circulates. What matters, however, is that there was no explicit transition from participant to representative, let alone to someone later presenting themselves using classical Mevlevi titles.
In a tradition so deeply grounded in adab and transmission, such transitions are not formalities; they are ethical necessities.
The absence of çile
Within the historical Mevlevi Order, formation into roles such as sheikh or postnişîn was inseparable from a formal and prolonged training: the çile.
This involved years of disciplined life within a tekke, daily service (hizmet), close supervision by a recognized sheikh, and continuous correction within a community.
Çile was not merely an inner process; it was a visible, social, and accountable practice.
In the contemporary Dutch context discussed here, such a formation has not taken place. This is not a judgment on anyone’s inner path, but a factual observation. Inner development alone cannot be equated with traditional or institutional authority.
Implicit authority
In modern spiritual networks, authority often arises implicitly:
- through proximity to well-known figures or organizations,
- through the use of traditional titles,
- through public presentation (websites, lectures),
- and through the absence of explicit limitation.
Authority can thus function without ever being formally defined or transferable. This makes critique difficult: there is no explicit claim to contest, yet the symbolic effect is powerful.
I have witnessed a similar dynamic earlier around Marcel Derkse, who was once seen as someone who “could mean something” for the international Mevlevi field. There too, proximity, location, language, and expectation generated authority without clear articulation or boundaries.
My own path is part of this reflection
I do not raise these questions from a distance. A significant part of my own journey unfolded within the network around Kabir Helminski, who was my teacher at the time. The emphasis there lay on inner verification, essence, and process — deeply meaningful for many, including myself.
Over time, however, I noticed how difficult it became to sustain structural questions. When doubt or critique is primarily interpreted as part of one’s inner process, the possibility of an external or reflective position gradually disappears. This realization led me, in 2001, to step back from formal representative roles — not out of rejection, but out of concern for clarity.
On my own (presumed) authority
Any reflection on authority also requires addressing my own position. My translations, websites, and years of involvement have carried weight for some, and I take that seriously.
When I explicitly asked for permission at the time, I did receive it. There exists a written confirmation authorizing me to facilitate dhikr and share knowledge of the Mevlevi path, based on years of study and service. Yet over time I came to recognize that this permission — sincere as it was — could not be meaningfully situated within the classical Mevlevi-Sufi tradition.
There was no tekke context, no lived çile, and no community within which such authorization could acquire full meaning. The permission was relational and personal, but not institutionally embedded or transferable. Recognizing this led me to lay down my formal role — not because the permission lacked integrity, but because it lacked a solid place within the tradition as I had come to understand it.
What remains is not authority, but a witness position: speaking from experience without claiming succession.
Not a solitary voice
These questions are not mine alone. Internationally, similar critiques have been voiced. Kudsi Erguner has repeatedly spoken critically about attempts by organizations to appropriate authority over a tradition that no longer exists as a living order in its classical form.
Erguner emphasizes that once historical tekke structures and training lineages have disappeared, any claim to exclusive representation becomes problematic. His critique is not directed at individuals, but at a structural confusion between cultural heritage, spiritual inspiration, and institutional authority.
Closing
What concerns me today is not who is “right,” but how inspiration can be honored without creating new centers of implicit authority — unintentionally or otherwise.
Perhaps fidelity to Rumi in our time does not call for representation, but for restraint: keeping the source open, without seeking to manage or possess it.
This text is Part I of a two-part reflection. In Part II, The Quiet Dissolution, I turn inward to explore how these questions of authority, structure, and distinction have unfolded in my own life.